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VENGEANCE
JJ CONNINGTON



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AUDIUNT
THE GIFT OF
Mrs. Albert Stanley


i


GRIM VENGEANCE


GRIM VENGEANCE
BY
J. J. CONNINGTON,

BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY
1929


Copyright, 1929,
By Little, Brown, and Company
All rights reserved
Published July, 1929
Reprinted July, 1929
Printed in the United States of America


imgiden!
NOTE
19
I take this opportunity of acknowledging my indebtedness to
Mr. Victor Gollancz, who suggested the basal idea of the fol-
lowing story. For certain details in the narrative I have
drawn upon the information given in the League of Nations
paper C.52.M.52.1927.IV. and Mr. Albert Londres' book
“The Road to Buenos Ayres.”
J. J. C.
-4.7.?
0





CONTENTS
I THE AFFAIR BY THE ROADSIDE
II THE MAN FROM THE ARGENTINE
III SERGEANT LEDBURY
IV ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE?
V SOME FACTS IN THE CASE
VI A NEW LINE IN MURDERS
VII THE AGENT 7-DH.
VIII THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRÈRE
77
103
IX
THE CYPHER TELEGRAM
X
THE RESPONSIBILITY
143
XI AN OLD LINE IN MURDERS
164
182
XII FRANCIA'S ATTACHÉ CASE
XIII THE GOVERNMENT MISSION
XIV THE LETTER WITH THE PARIS POSTMARK
195
XV THE BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE
XVI A SURPRISE FOR SIR CLINTON
XVII SERGEANT LEDBURY'S INVESTIGATION
XVIII THE MAN WITH THE TELESCOPE
XIX THE FRENCH METHOD
XX IN SAFE DEPOSIT
266
279
298





GRIM VENGEANCE



Corridor
Book Case
Phone
Table
French Window
Rexis
Cheir
Meccano
Table
VERANDAH
cla's
Open Window
Shelt
7 Chair
Hearth
Window
Seat
To Front Door
Feet


CHAPTER I: THE AFFAIR BY THE ROAD-
SIDE
The big car ran smoothly through the darkness, open-
ing up vista after vista of the road with the long beams
of its headlights; and Sir Clinton Driffield, alone at the
wheel, reflected contentedly that he might have fallen
upon a worse night for his journey. He liked to drive
late in the evening when the heavy traffic of the day
was over; and now for the last half-hour he had not
seen the lamps of another car. A pleasant feeling of
isolation from humanity, tempered by the company of
the machine, fitted in well with his mood and served
to make him forget the annoyance of disarranged plans.
He was just back from a holiday, and had intended
to drive down in time for dinner at the house which his
sister had leased at Raynham Parva. But the break-
down of an engine had disorganized the Continental
service; and when at last he reached London, it was
too late to keep to his original programme. He had
telephoned his news, so that there might be no anxiety
at his non-arrival; and then, after dining at his club, he
had started out in time to reach his destination about
midnight.
Sir Clinton diverted his gaze momentarily from the
pale ribbon of the road under his headlights and
glanced across at the milometer on the dashboard. He
had never been over the route before; but he had a
mental picture of the map to guide him; and the figures*-


4
GRIM VENGEANCE
on the dial showed that he was near a point where he
would have to leave the main highway for a by-road.
His eyes turned to the illuminated clock beside the
speedometer, and he noticed that it was rather later
than he had believed.
Half a mile farther on, he swung off into the expected
side-road; and with the change came a feeling of even
more complete solitude. Except for the hum of the
motor, the night was silent. The air was pleasantly
cool; and as he swept through a little pine wood, Sir
Clinton caught a whiff of aromatic scents drifting from
the trees. Then once more he was under the open sky,
running between low hedges, over the tops of which he
could catch faint glimpses of fields under the stars.
A small dark object hurried laboriously across the
road in the beam of his headlight, and Sir Clinton re-
laxed his pressure on the accelerator lest he should run
over the creature ere it could get out of his way. When
it had scuttled into safety at the wayside, he let the car
out once more.
"A hedgehog!" he said aloud to himself. "This is the
peaceful country and no mistake. I wonder if it would
have punctured a tyre if I had run over it."
The hedges gave way to a high stone wall enclosing
some large estate; and a couple of miles farther on, Sir
Clinton had to take another turn. Inspection of the
milometer told him that he was nearing the outskirts of
Raynham Parva, and two or three scattered lights
ahead suggested the village itself. He slowed down, for
the road had become crooked. Then, as he rounded a
turn, his headlights broke on a scene which contrasted
strangely with the peace out of which he had come.
A car with only sidelamps lighted stood by the road-
side; and in the free space of the road, Sir Clinton's


THE AFFAIR BY THE ROADSIDE 5
headlights glared upon the figures of two men who had
come to grips with each other. Close by, but in the
background, stood a woman, with something which
looked like a suitcase at her feet.
Sir Clinton had all the decent man's dislike for get-
ting mixed up in a brawl, especially one in which it was
impossible to distinguish the right side. The presence
of the girl influenced him to some extent; since she
might be left at the mercy of the victor in the struggle,
if no help were at hand. Apart from all other consider-
ations, this factor weighed with him as he checked his
car and cautiously drew nearer to the three figures.
But his mere arrival momentarily disturbed the
balance. As the blaze of the headlights fell upon the
group, one of the combatants, dazzled by the unex-
pected glare, fell back a pace; and the smaller man
seized the opportunity to launch a not unsuccessful
kick. The heavier figure stepped back under the shock
and desisted from his attack while he rapidly explored
the extent of the damage.
The advantage gained was merely momentary. Find-
ing himself undisabled, the bigger man paused as
though gathering himself together; then, with a dash,
he fell upon his antagonist, shook him by the coat-
collar, and swung him round.
"So kickin's in the game, is it?" he demanded
furiously. "All right. Turn about's fair play. It's my
turn."
And at once he put his suggestion into practice, ad-
ministering a brutal punishment to his adversary.
The girl made a movement as though to interfere;
but the burly man, with an angry gesture, warned her
back to her place. Sir Clinton pulled up his car and
stepped out; but before he could reach the group, the


6
GRIM VENGEANCE
affair was over. The bigger man, after a last kick, flung
his opponent from him so violently that he stumbled
and fell to the ground, where he lay groaning.
"That'll perhaps learn you not to come sniffin' round
after other men's girls!" the victor commented sneer-
ingly, as he stood over his adversary.
Then, seeing Sir Clinton's figure approaching, he
turned away and beckoned to the girl.
"You come along with me," he ordered. "I'll see you
safe home."
But the girl ignored his order, still keeping her place
by the roadside. For a moment the man seemed to
think of using force to compel her obedience; then,
with a glance at Sir Clinton's approaching figure, he
turned and walked past the tail of the standing car.
Before he could be called back, he had slipped into a
by-road out of sight. From round the corner came the
sound of a self-starter; gears were engaged; and soon
the noise of the motor had died away in the distance.
Coming up to the standing car, Sir Clinton stooped
over the figure on the road and offered his hand to
assist the man to rise. Evidently the kicking had been a
vicious one; but it seemed to have done no permanent
damage; for when the man got to his feet again he was
able to hobble painfully to the door of his car. Appar-
ently he was in a furious rage, for he did not even pause
to thank Sir Clinton for his help. Instead, he climbed
painfully into the driving seat of the two-seater and
worked the self-starter.
As he lifted his head after reaching forward to the
knob, his face came into the full glare of Sir Clinton's
headlights and revealed his features, contorted with
passion. Sir Clinton noted that he had a sort of coarse
handsomeness; and that the cast of his looks was un*


THE AFFAIR BY THE ROADSIDE 7
English. He might have been a southern Frenchman or
Spaniard, had it not been for the suggestion of some
other race which Sir Clinton failed to identify. In spite
of well-cut and inconspicuous clothes, there seemed
to be a hint of showiness in his appearance which ac-
centuated his divergence from the normal English type.
Paying no attention to Sir Clinton, he leaned out of
the car and addressed the girl, who was still standing
where she had been throughout the scene.
"Strap your suitcase on the grid and get in," he said
curtly.
But the girl's attitude showed more than a little
hesitation. She glanced from the man in the car to Sir
Clinton, as though weighing the position in her mind
before she spoke.
"I don't think I'll come," she answered doubtfully.
This seemed to infuriate the man in the car.
"Get in when I tell you," he said angrily. "Don't
stand there gaping! That fellow may change his mind
and come back again, any minute. Come on, now,
quick!"
The tone of his voice seemed to stiffen the girl's
resistance.
"I'm not going with you," she answered in a firmer
tone.
The man examined her face in the glare of the head-
lights, and seemed for a moment or two as though he
were calculating his chance of swaying her from her
decision. But the presence of a stranger evidently ham-
pered him. He cast a glance of annoyance at Sir
Clinton; and decided to give up his attempt.
"All right," he snarled. "Stay where you are. It's
your loss."
And without wasting more words, he started his car.


8
GRIM VENGEANCE
The girl watched him stonily as he drove away round
the corner and out of sight. A glimpse of her face,
brightly lit by the headlights, gave Sir Clinton the im-
pression of a conflict between relief and disappoint-
ment on her features.
The affair was no business of his, obviously, however
out of the common run it might appear, but he could
hardly leave a girl by the wayside at that time of night
without offering some assistance, since her suitcase
might be a heavy one. It was a case for tact; and he
determined, even at the cost of absurdity, to ignore
what he had seen.
"You seem to be left stranded," he said, as he ap-
proached her. "I'm driving into Raynham Parva; and
if it's any use to you, I'll be glad to give you a lift in
my car."
He pointed to the empty back seats, by way of
suggesting that she need not sit beside him unless
she wished to do so. For a moment or two, the girl
seemed to hesitate; then, with a glance at the pine
spinney which fringed the road behind her, she shook
her head decidedly.
"I'll manage all right, thank you."
As she turned her head to answer him, Sir Clinton
saw that she was a pretty girl. Her voice, with its
slight quiver of agitation, was a pleasant one; and only
the faintest accent betrayed that she did not belong
to his own class. A single incurious glance had shown
him that she had good taste and carried her clothes
well, though they were not expensive ones.
"If it's any help, I'll take your suitcase for you and
drop it in Raynham Parva. There's no need for you to
drag it along, even if you don't feel inclined to risk
yourself with a stranger at this time of night."


THE AFFAIR BY THE ROADSIDE 9
"No, thanks. I'll manage quite well."
Sir Clinton had no intention of forcing his company
on her. After all, she knew her own business best; and
it was not his affair to look after her if she preferred
to be left to her own resources.
"That's Raynham Parva just ahead, isn't it?" he
asked, by way of taking the awkwardness out of the
situation.
The girl nodded.
"Keep straight on," she volunteered. "You'll come
to it in two or three minutes. It's only half a mile or so
along the road."
Sir Clinton thanked her and was about to turn away,
when a thought struck him.
"Perhaps you could save me some trouble. I'm going
to Mrs. Thornaby's — at Fern Lodge. I don't know
the village — never been here before; and by the time
I get there, everyone will have gone to bed long ago
and I'll find no one to tell me my road. Perhaps you
could direct me?"
A new expression came into the girl's face, some-
thing with more than a tinge of dismay in it.
"Oh, then you're Sir Clinton Driffield?" she ex-
claimed.
She stopped abruptly, biting her lip as though she
had let the question slip out in spite of herself and
now regretted that she had done so.
"You seem to know me," Sir Clinton admitted,
restraining his surprise.
He examined the girl closely; but could not recall
that he had ever seen her before. He felt a slight touch
of vexation at this, for he prided himself on his memory
for faces.
She seemed uneasy under his scrutiny; and made no


10
GRIM VENGEANCE
reply to his implied question. To relieve her, he took
his eyes from her face and made a gesture towards
his car.
"Well, since you know who I am, now, perhaps you'll
change your mind and let me take you in to the village.
There's no point in your dragging that suitcase along
the road."
But again the girl shook her head, this time so
definitely that Sir Clinton saw her mind was clearly
made up.
"I can tell you how to get to Mrs. Thornaby's," she
said. "You go right on till you come to the village. . . .
Wait a moment, I must think. . . . Yes, go down the
main street till you come to the Black Bull Hotel —
you can't miss it. Turn up the road on the right, just
beyond it. There's a grocer's shop at the corner, so you
can't mistake it. Then you go along that road till . . .
let me see. . . . Oh, yes, till you cross a bridge with
stone walls on each side of the road. Then you take the
first road on your right again. Mrs. Thornaby's house
is in that road. It's on your left hand side. You'll know
it at once because it's got two beasts carved on the
tops of the gate-pillars; and the name of the house is on
shield-things on the pillars, too. You can't possibly mis-
take it."
"Thanks," said Sir Clinton. "I'd better get on my
road. You're sure you'll be all right if I leave you
here?"
Again the girl refused the invitation which he im-
plied.
"I'll manage all right," she assured him.
Sir Clinton had no further excuse for lingering; but
he was still puzzled, and he hated to be perplexed by
an unsolved problem.


THE AFFAIR BY THE ROADSIDE II
"I wish you'd tell me how you recognised me," he
said. "You don't know me by sight, obviously, or you'd
have spotted who I was when I came up at first."
For a second or two the girl remained silent,
evidently uncertain what to say.
"I knew you were coming to-night," she said at last,
"and I guessed who you were when you spoke to me."
She stopped, as though a fresh aspect of the situa-
tion had occurred to her, and it was only after a pause
that she went on:
"Please don't ask questions, Sir Clinton. And, please,
if you see me again, don't say anything to anyone about
this affair to-night. You must have seen that it wasn't
nice. I want to forget all about it. And I don't want
anyone to hear a word about it. Don't let anyone know
that you've seen me before. You won't, please?"
Her distress was apparent; and Sir Clinton could see
no valid objection to giving his promise.
"Sounds a bit mysterious, doesn't it?" he said lightly.
"You seem to think we're likely to come across each
other again. Well, if it'll ease your mind, I certainly
won't say anything about it to anyone; and you needn't
recognise me when we do meet. That's all right. Now
about these directions you gave me. Let's see if I have
them right. Straight on till I come to the Black Bull;
then up to the right past the grocer's shop; then on till
I come to a bridge; and the first road on the right
brings me to Fern Lodge. That's correct, isn't it?
Thanks for putting me on my way."
He did not repeat his offer of a lift, but made his way
back to his car. The girl showed no sign of leaving her
post, but stood on the grass edging of the road with her
suitcase at her feet as he drove slowly past her. A few
yards down the road, he turned and glanced back in


12
GRIM VENGEANCE
her direction; but by that time her figure seemed to
have been swallowed up in the darkness.
A few hundred yards farther on, he ran into Rayn-
ham Parva, and had little difficulty in finding the Black
Bull Hotel. The village was asleep; and he congrat-
ulated himself on having secured directions about his
route beforehand, for there was no one in the streets
whom he could have questioned. Taking the turn at
the grocer's shop, he found a couple of minutes driving
took him beyond the outskirts of the village into the
open country once more.
His thoughts, however, were less on the road before
him than on the scene which he had just witnessed. On
the face of it, the meaning of the affair was plain
enough: the quarrel of two men over a girl, ending in
a rough-and-tumble struggle. The girl's suitcase pointed
clearly to some projected elopement which had ap-
parently been interrupted by the arrival of the second
man.
Sir Clinton's eye was trained to catch minor details;
and he had noticed that the girl's ring-finger was bare.
But that in itself meant very little. A married woman
leaving her husband might very well take off her wed-
ding-ring, even if the removal of it was a mere emo-
tional gesture.
The foreign-looking fellow in the car seemed an
obvious interloper. If he had been posing as a lover of
the girl, the pretence had been stripped bare by his
actions at the last moment; for all the emotion which
he had shown was easily to be accounted for on other
grounds, and his manner to the girl had been anything
but lover-like. He had behaved like a bad loser con-
fronted by an unexpected disaster.
The second man's doings presented an even greater


THE AFFAIR BY THE ROADSIDE 13
puzzle. If he was the girl's husband, why had he left
her by the roadside? Village manners would suggest
quite another line of action for him. If he were either
a lover or a brother, why had he not waited until the
other man drove away and then settled matters to his
own satisfaction, if possible? There must have been
some fairly strong motive in his mind if it impelled
him to leave the girl stranded on the road with a suit-
case at that hour of the night, especially when he had
a car in waiting round the corner.
The girl's behaviour furnished yet another problem.
Her voice, Sir Clinton recalled, had not suggested any
local accent, though she obviously did not belong
to his own class. She spoke nicely — with an intona-
tion quite different from that of the second man. But
in country places it is not uncommon to find a girl
with a cleaner accent than that of the men in her circle.
One thing was fairly apparent. She had arranged to
meet the foreigner at an hour when the coast was clear;
and she had brought a suitcase. The whole affair was
obviously clandestine; and on this basis it was clear
enough that she could not be picked up by the car at
the very door of her own house. On the other hand,
if the car was available, there would be no point in
letting her carry her suitcase for any considerable dis-
tance from her home. The conclusion seemed to be
that she must live somewhere close to the point where
Sir Clinton had left her by the roadside; and this, in
addition to other possible reasons, would account for
her refusal of a lift in his car.
Finally, there was the question of her recognition of
himself, which at first sight seemed the most puzzling
point of all. Very brief consideration gave Sir Clinton a
possible explanation of that side of the problem; and,


14 GRIM VENGEANCE
as he thought it over, he found that it fitted neatly into
the rest of the affair.
While he was thinking, the car had run for the
best part of a mile, and yet there had been no sign of
the bridge which was one of his landmarks; and he had
almost come to the conclusion that the girl had mis-
directed him when he saw the stone parapets lining the
road. And when he had crossed the stream, there was
no sign of any road leading off to the right. He held to
his instructions, however, though he knew that by this
time he had left Raynham Parva far behind; and at
last he came to a hairpin corner formed by the expected
tributary road.
Sir Clinton had a good head for locality; and after
he had gone a mile or so along this fresh route, it be-
came obvious to him that he was now returning on a
line which would bring him back to the vicinity of the
village. When he realised this, a faint smile crossed his
face; for it was just what he might have expected, if
his guess at the situation had been correct.
"Very smart, on the spur of the moment," he con-
fessed to himself. "She's evidently got her wits about
her even when she's shaken up a bit."
His suspicion that he had been entirely misdirected
died away; and his faith in his interpretation of the
affair by the roadside was strengthened when the gates
of Fern Lodge appeared in the beam of his lights, un-
mistakable with the carved lions surmounting the
pillars.
The way was clear, and he turned his car into the
entrance. Before him, a short drive opened up; and at
the end of this Fern Lodge itself appeared, a substan-
tial house decked with creepers, which gave it an old-
established air. Light streamed from the hall door


THE AFFAIR BY THE ROADSIDE 15
across the gravel sweep; and the windows of one room
glowed in the night. Except for this, the building was
dark against the sky.
A glance at the clock on the dashboard showed Sir
Clinton that the detour he had made since leaving
Raynham Parva had been longer than he had supposed.
Evidently the Fern Lodge household had gone to bed,
with the exception of someone who was sitting up to
await him on his arrival. He sounded his horn gently as
he drew near the door; then, pulling up his car, he got
out and entered the house without ceremony.


CHAPTER II: THE MAN FROM THE AR-
GENTINE
As Sir Clinton entered the hall, he heard a light step;
a door opened, and Mrs. Thornaby came forward to
welcome him. Though she was slightly older than her
brother, few people would have realised this at first
acquaintance. Her looks did not betray it; and she had
a personality which seemed to take her out of the
normal limitations of age and to let her mix with young
people as easily as with those of her own generation. A
marked capacity for making allowances for the preju-
dices of others was one of her most salient characteris-
tics; and it made people turn to her for sympathy in
their difficulties with a certainty that they would go
away again with fresh courage.
"I heard your horn," she said, after they had ex-
changed greetings. "Just as well you telephoned. I'd
have been worried about you if you hadn't turned up
at dinner-time.
"You'd better put your car into the garage now. It'll
save going out again later on. Drive down that path
there, and you'll find the place."
She watched him start the engine, and then turned
back into the house. Sir Clinton put his car into the
garage, locked the front door of the house as he re-
turned, and took off his overcoat.
"Come in here, Clinton," he heard his sister directing
from the room out of which she had appeared on his
first arrival.


THE MAN FROM THE ARGENTINE 17
As he crossed the threshold, he threw a quick glance
of inquiry round the room; but if he was surprised to
find his sister alone, he did not let it appear in his ex-
pression.
"You must be cold after that long drive. There's
whiskey and soda over yonder. If you'd rather have
coffee, I can make it in a minute or two; I've got the
machine here. When you telephoned that you'd be late,
I didn't keep the maids up; and 1 expect they're off to
bed long ago."
Sir Clinton nodded, declined the coffee, and helped
himself to some whiskey and soda. With a gesture, Mrs.
Thornaby invited him to take a comfortable chair near
her own. Part of her charm lay in the fact that she
always seemed more interested in other people than in
herself; and it was characteristic that now, although
she had news which concerned her deeply, she put it
aside for the moment and questioned her brother about
his own doings.
"Had a good holiday, Clinton?"
"Not bad."
Sir Clinton also had the habit of suppressing his own
affairs and showing a greater interest in other people's.
His sister laughed gently.
"Really, Clinton, this police work of yours seems to
be converting you into a sort of human oyster, so far
as your own doings are concerned. One would think
you were losing the gift of expression. I suppose it's
all this official secrecy business; but surely, after a
couple of months on the Continent, you might come
back with something more detailed than 'Not bad' as
a report. It sounds a trifle bald, somehow."
Sir Clinton laughed in his turn at this thrust.
"What do you expect? Detailed descriptions of


i8
GRIM VENGEANCE
Dutch windmills? You've seen 'em yourself. The Eiffel
Tower's still standing, and I don't see much change in
the view from the Lucendro Pass. I just wandered
about and met a lot of interesting human specimens,
here and there."
"And left no address behind you."
"How could I? I didn't know, one day, where I'd
go on the next. I wanted a real holiday, not a Cook's
tour with a time-schedule. When I got tired of a place,
I just moved on to a fresh one that took my fancy."
He drew a case from his pocket, chose and lighted a
cigarette. In some indefinable way he made the gesture
put a closure on the discussion of his own affairs.
"Now what about yourself?" he demanded, as he
laid down the spent match. "Johnnie's in bed long ago,
I suppose; but where's Elsie? I thought she'd have
stayed up to see me."
His quick eye detected a faint tinge of trouble in
Mrs. Thornaby's face at the mention of her daughter's
name; but when she spoke, it was evident that she was
trying to treat the matter lightly.
"If you insist on cutting yourself off from your
family for weeks, Clinton, you can't complain of sur-
prises when you turn up again. I've got one for you.
Elsie's married."
Sir Clinton seemed less astonished than she had ex-
pected.
"Married, is she? Well, Rex Brandon's a sound
young cub as cubs go; and he certainly deserved to
win. I've seldom seen any youngster so keen on a girl."
Mrs. Thornaby shook her head.
"It isn't Rex Brandon. It's someone you've never
heard of, Clinton."
The tone of distrust in his sister's voice was faint


THE MAN FROM THE ARGENTINE 10.
but unmistakable. Sir Clinton's careless manner fell
from him at the sound of it; and the face which he
turned to Mrs. Thornaby was that of the official Sir
Clinton.
"That's rum," he said slowly. "Tell me about it,
Anne. You've managed to spring a surprise on me all
right."
Those who knew Sir Clinton only as an efficient and
somewhat cynical Chief Constable would have been
surprised if they had seen him with his nephew and
niece. They would have discovered an entirely fresh
side of his character; for since the death of his
brother-in-law, ten years before, he had taken the two
children under his wing and made an effort to fill the
gap left in their lives by their father's death.
Mrs. Thornaby made a gesture which seemed to
suggest that she herself knew very little about the
matter.
"I was never very keen on Elsie's going to London,
you know," she explained. "I'd much rather have kept
her beside me, though perhaps I'm a bit old-fashioned
in that. But one can't deny that she's good with her
violin. She's quite worth the best training I could afford
for her. And when she wanted to go to the R.A.M., I
hadn't the heart to refuse, once I found she was really
eager about it. You know how one feels, Clinton. If she
had her chance, then there was no grievance; but if I
had objected to her going, she'd always have felt she'd
missed something that might have made a big difference
to her playing. She wouldn't have groused about it;
but I'd have felt all the time that I'd stood in her way.
Let her have the experience, I thought, and then she
won't feel she's missed an opportunity, even if nothing
comes of it in the end. Besides, I felt that in a case of


20
GRIM VENGEANCE
that sort, one's better to weight the scales against one-
self — just to make sure. I wanted to keep her; and I
had a sort of notion that I was being selfish and dis-
guising it by telling myself I was prudent. You see
what I mean?"
Sir Clinton nodded, but said nothing. He and his
sister understood each other; and this problem was one
which Mrs. Thornaby had settled for herself. Comment
was needless.
"Well, I'm afraid it didn't turn out quite as I'd
hoped," Mrs. Thornaby went on. "Elsie didn't neglect
her work — trust her for that. She's too keen on her
fiddling. But she seems to have got among a rather
weird lot of people in London. Some of the musical set
introduced her to people outside, and they introduced
her to others, and so on."
Again Sir Clinton nodded without speaking.
"What I didn't like about it was that she seemed to
pick up a lot of futile ideas from these people; and if
one didn't agree at once that these notions were the last
touch in up-to-dateness, then one was classed as mid-
Victorian. I don't mind being called Edwardian, but
really mid-Victorian is a bit unkind, at my age."
Sir Clinton's face relaxed in a smile.
"They seem to have stirred you out of your senile
torpor, anyhow. What sort of notions were they?"
"Oh, all about freedom, and living your own life
without bothering about other people's feelings, and so
forth. Getting away from all the petty restrictions that
hampered the older generation."
Sir Clinton's smile deepened.
"That comes well from people who can't buy a
cigarette or a box of chocolates in a shop after 8 p. m.
without running the risk of being run in. We weren't


THE MAN FROM THE ARGENTINE 21
quite so hampered as all that in King Edward's
days."
"Most of their notions seemed mixed up with the sex
question," Mrs. Thornaby continued, disregarding the
interjection. "Some of them seem to me simply silly.
For one thing, they don't believe in a girl getting en-
gaged to a man; it seems that's a case of petty restric-
tion. A man and a girl go about together for a while;
and then, one day, they decide to get married — if
they take even that trouble — and they drop into a
registry office and fix it up without telling anyone. And
that's that. It may be a new way of doing things, but
I don't think much of it."
Sir Clinton made no effort to conceal his amuse-
ment.
"It's none so new, you know, Anne. When I was a
boy, it was the ordinary method of getting married
which servant-maids used. 'Walking out' they called it.
I don't see much novelty in that. Mid-Victorian's no
name for it. They must be a very unsophisticated
bunch if it's fresh to them."
"It's no laughing matter to me, Clinton. That's just
what Elsie did."
The "official" expression returned to Sir Clinton's
face.
"Let's hear about this, Anne."
Mrs. Thornaby seemed to find relief in putting the
matter into words. She was not the type which discusses
its private affairs with friends; and the return of her
brother had given her an outlet which hitherto she had
lacked.
"Well, it seems that a man Francia was one of the
circle she drifted amongst."
"Francia? What is he? Spanish?"


22
GRIM VENGEANCE
"South American, I believe. He comes from the
Argentine, Elsie told me. It seems that he fell in love
with Elsie — violently in love."
She paused for a moment, as though the subject
grated on her indefinably.
"You'll see him to-morrow," she continued, as Sir
Clinton made no comment. "Perhaps it's jealousy on
my part — quite likely. You know how much Elsie is
to me, Clinton, and naturally 1 don't like the idea of
her going away to South America. It's selfish, perhaps,
but there you are. I can't help it."
She halted again, as though expecting some remark
from her brother. Sir Clinton threw away the stub of
his cigarette and chose another from his case, as though
to fill the pause. He was evidently following his sister's
story closely, but had no intention of interrupting the
narrative.
"Elsie attracted this man's attention," Mrs. Thorn-
aby continued with some hesitation, as though she
were picking her words in dealing with a disagreeable
subject. "They seem to have gone about together a
good deal. He managed to make her care for him —
she's quite keen on him, I can see. And the result was
that they put these modern notions into practice:
arranged everything and went off one day to a
registrar's and got married without a word to anyone
beforehand. She's of age of course, and it's all in order;
but they didn't even tell me about it till it was all over.
That cuts one a bit, you know, Clinton."
Sir Clinton nodded gravely. He had had a different
picture of his niece's wedding in his mind. Elsie's excite-
ment over an announced engagement; her surprise
over her wedding-presents; all the fun of choosing a
trousseau; a pretty wedding, with her friends as brides-


THE MAN FROM THE ARGENTINE 2$
has influence in that line. That reminds me, Clinton.
They've got a couple of girls here — Elsie asked them
down. It's something to do with this theatre business.
You'll see them to-morrow."
Sir Clinton nodded rather absent-mindedly at this
information. He was evidently still trying to bring him-
self to new bearings in the matter of his niece.
"She was always such a pretty, trustful kiddie," he
said reminiscently. "Never been hurt, and thought
everybody was as straight as herself. The worst of the
marriage system is that, if the husband comes a smash,
he drags his wife down with him. It's hardly fair, when
one comes to think of it."
He glanced at his sister's face, saw that he had let
something slip out which had done no good, and
changed the subject abruptly.
"What about the other half of the family? At the age
of eleven, Johnnie's hardly likely to have got involved
in troubles of that sort, anyhow."
"Johnnie's all right," Mrs. Thornaby confirmed. "He
was looking forward so much to seeing you to-night;
and when he found you wouldn't be here till late, and I
wouldn't let him sit up for you, he nearly rebelled. 1
expect he'll be hammering at your door to-morrow long
before you're awake. He's got a lot of things he wants
to show you. He's got a regular menagerie round by the
garage, and he's frightfully keen over some hutches he's
made. Don't omit to be enthusiastic."
"Is he still worrying round with Meccano and that
sort of thing?"
"He's still quite keen on it. Some of the things he
makes on it are really quite good — most complicated
working models. He seems to have a turn for that sort
of thing."


26
GRIM VENGEANCE
"It's always a sound thing if a cub can use his hands.
I've brought him a lot of supplementary stuff — it's
in the car and he'll get it to-morrow. That'll infuse
some fresh interest into the business for him."
Mrs. Thornaby nodded.
"You spoil the boy," she said, with a faint smile.
"But I don't think he likes you merely for what he can
get out of you. The latest is that he's 'going into the
police, like Uncle Clinton,' when he grows up. By the
way, Clinton, are you really dropping the Chief Con-
stableship?"
Sir Clinton glanced up whimsically.
"No. Shouldn't dream of it now," he said, with a
purposely solemn face.
"You aren't sending in your resignation, then?"
"No. Once is quite enough. I resigned the other day.
You see, Anne, when old James left me his money, I
knew there was a string tied to it. He didn't put it in
black and white because he knew he could trust me.
But he wants the old place decently kept up; tenants
looked after and so forth. James had very conscientious
views about the duties of the country landlord towards
his dependents. So I'll have to step into his shoes and
run the thing properly; and that's a whole-time job if
one takes it seriously. I haven't time for that and the
Chief Constableship, obviously, unless I let one or
other of them down — or both. So I cleared out. No
more police for me. I've earned a change of occupation,
at any rate."
Mrs. Thornaby's face showed her satisfaction at the
news.
"Well, we shall see more of you in future, Clinton.
You won't be tied down so much as you used to be."
"It'll be a change, certainly. And this affair of Elsie


THE MAN FROM THE ARGENTINE 27
has altered things a good bit. You'd better come and
help me to look after things at the old place. I'm short
of a Lady Bountiful at present; and there's nothing to
keep you here when Elsie's gone."
He rose slowly to his feet, glancing at his watch as
he did so.
"It's getting well on into the morning. I'd no notion
time had gone so fast. Suppose we turn in? I've got a
suitcase in the hall, if you'll show me where my room
is. The geography of this place is new to me."


CHAPTER III: SERGEANT LEDBURY
Mrs. Thornaby's overnight prophecy was fulfilled to
the letter. Long before the normal breakfast hour,
Sir Clinton was awakened by a peremptory rapping
at his door and the incursion of a small boy into the
room.
"Good morning, uncle. I say, here's your shaving-
water; and I've told them downstairs to have break-
fast ready for you in half an hour."
He put down the steaming can and flew to the win-
dows to throw back the curtains, through which the
sunlight was already making its way. Sir Clinton, wide
awake on the instant, inspected his watch.
"Easy with those curtains, young man," he directed.
"You'll wake the whole neighbourhood if you slam
the runners about like that. This is an ungodly hour to
rouse a travel-worn relative."
Johnnie turned back from the window and perched
himself on the edge of the bed.
"They wouldn't let me sit up to see you, last night,"
he complained, "and I've got heaps of things I want
to talk to you about."
"That last one's a commoner complaint than you
seem to think, Johnnie. Quite a lot of people suffer from
a mania for talking about their own affairs," Sir Clinton
pointed out. "Like this place in the country, after
having been a town-bird all your life?"
Johnnie nodded vigorously.


SERGEANT LEDBURY
29
"It's A 1.1 never thought I'd live in a place like this,
just stuffed full of interesting things. Do you know,
uncle, I saw a badger yesterday, wandering along under
a hedge. I didn't know what it was when I saw it, but
somebody told me afterwards. I'd no notion badgers
were as big as that, had you?"
"Not knowing how big it was, I can't say."
"Well, it was ever so much bigger than 1 expected.
And there's a rabbit-warren in the wood behind the
house. You can see them come out into the fields just
about dusk. And I've seen two weasels in the wood. I
don't like weasels. And there's a dovecote on the top of
a pole in the yard; and there's any amount of fowls
and pigs and ducks and turkeys. And two collie dogs.
And, do you know, uncle, I've got a pony all to my-
self."
His uncle made a pretence of being galvanised by
this last item of news.
"All the modern conveniences, evidently. Hop off
the bed, young fellow, and let me get up. We must look
into all this."
Sir Clinton slipped out of bed and put on his dress-
ing-gown.
"Now you can show me where the bathroom is.
This house is new to me, and I forgot to inquire my
way about last night. If I happen to fall asleep while
I'm dressing, please wait for half an hour and then
waken me again — gently, this time. Meanwhile, kindly
lead the way, and don't talk at the top of your voice
when you pass the door of anyone's bedroom. Show
some fellow-feeling and let 'em sleep, even if I mayn't."
Johnnie grinned at his uncle's suggestion. He had
carried his point and managed matters so that he would
have Sir Clinton to himself during breakfast; and he


30 GRIM VENGEANCE
hoped to carry him off immediately afterwards to in-
spect the grounds, before any of the rest of the family
put in an appearance. He led the way to the bathroom,
chattering eagerly as he went; and it was with obvious
reluctance that he turned away when Sir Clinton cut
him short by closing the door in his face.
"I forgot one thing, uncle," he communicated via
the keyhole. "There's a lake runs up into the grounds.
It's got fish in it and a lot of water-fowl live there.
And I've learned to row a boat on it. I'll row you, by
and by."
"I don't mind if you do. I can swim. Now clear
out!"
Twenty minutes later, Sir Clinton descended the
stairs to find Johnnie restlessly wandering about the
hall, in evident impatience at what had seemed to him
an interminable delay.
"Come on, uncle. Along this way. Stamn's just taking
in the grub. 1 told her you took coffee. Do you know,
there's a couple of owls about the place — huge ones.
I've never seen a live owl before, except at the Zoo.
But you'll need to wait for dusk to-night. In here, this
is the breakfast-room."
He stood aside to let his uncle enter; but at the door
they almost collided with the table-maid, who was
hurrying out of the room. Her eyes met those of Sir
Clinton for a moment, and he recognised the girl he
had left by the wayside with her suitcase on the pre-
vious night. She looked anxiously at him as they met;
but Sir Clinton, mindful of his promise, let no sign of
recognition escape him.
As he helped himself to breakfast, he reflected that
his inferences had been correct. The point where he had
encountered the girl was obviously quite close to Fern


SERGEANT LEDBURY 31
Lodge; and she had deliberately misdirected him over
a roundabout route in order to give herself time to re-
gain the house before he arrived himself. Obviously it
might have been difficult for the girl to re-enter the
house and slip off to her room undetected, if she had
come back at the moment when the place was astir at
his arrival. She could hardly guess that only Mrs.
Thornaby would be sitting up to welcome him. And,
naturally, when she met him on the road, she guessed
his identity as soon as she heard that he was bound
for Fern Lodge, since he was the only visitor ex-
pected.
"There's a pine spinney running down to the road
near here, isn't there?" he asked Johnnie, merely to
clinch the point to his own satisfaction.
"Oh, yes. There's a short cut through it, down to
the road. It's in our grounds. I found a toad there, tht
other day."
Johnnie was so eager to exhibit the resources of the
neighbourhood that Sir Clinton found breakfast any-
thing but a quiet meal. Good-naturedly, he made as
little delay as possible; and they rose from the table
before any other members of the family appeared.
"Now where's this pony of yours, Johnnie?"
The pony occupied some time; and, after it had been
fully admired, Sir Clinton was conducted round the
chief sights of the farmyard and out-buildings. At last,
when Johnnie had exhausted the sights in the im-
mediate environs of Fern Lodge, his uncle turned
resolutely towards the house.
"Elsie will be downstairs by this time, Johnnie. I
haven't seen her yet, you know. By the way, which is
the shortest way to the garage? There's something
we've got to pick up there."


32 GRIM VENGEANCE
Johnnie, feeling that his uncle was passing into the
hands of unappreciative grown-ups, led the way reluc-
tantly to the garage door. Sir Clinton's luggage had been
removed from the grid of his car and taken up to the
house; but a large wooden box had been left in the back
of the tonneau. Sir Clinton went to take it out, whilst
Johnnie glanced round the roomy garage in manifest
surprise.
"Why, where's Vincent's car?" he demanded.
"Who's Vincent?" Sir Clinton inquired, as he lifted
out the box.
"Elsie's husband, of course," Johnnie replied. "She
calls him Vincent. His real name's Vicente, though.
I know that because he told me himself. Vicente's the
Spanish for Vincent."
"Well, what about his car?" Sir Clinton asked.
"It isn't here," Johnnie explained. "It's a two-seater
and he keeps it in our garage. This is our own car," he
added, pointing to a four-seater saloon which was stand-
ing beside Sir Clinton's touring car.
"Never mind about it just now. Here's something
for you," his uncle answered, indicating the wooden
box. "It's a new set of Meccano parts, and a few other
things I picked up for you a while ago and didn't send
on at the time. There's a couple of electric motors to
make the wheels go round; and a battery or two for
the motors."
Brushing aside Johnnie's thanks, his uncle picked up
the box.
"A bit too heavy for you to carry. I'll take it up to
the house and you can unpack it for yourself."
When they reached Fern Lodge, Sir Clinton was sur-
prised to find Staffin, the table-maid, in the hall. The
girl was making a pretence of setting something to


SERGEANT LEDBURY
33
rights; but it was obvious at the first glance that she
was doing this merely as an excuse for her presence. Sir
Clinton was about to pass her, when over the head of
Johnnie she made it clear that she was anxious to speak
to him in private.
"Hardly like Anne to have a table-maid who vamps
casual visitors at second sight," Sir Clinton reflected
amusedly.
A glance at the girl's face convinced him, however,
that she was in real trouble.
"Cut along and get your box opened, Johnnie. Put
it down somewhere where the packing won't make too
much of a mess," he directed.
Then, as Johnnie disappeared towards the back of
the house, Sir Clinton turned to Staffin.
"Well?"
The girl threw an apprehensive glance towards the
stairs and the breakfast-room door, as though afraid
that she might be overheard.
"Oh, sir," she said breathlessly, "I've just heard that
Mr. Quevedo's dead and they've arrested Teddy . . ."
"Mr. Quevedo being the man in the motor-car, and
Teddy your old friend?" Sir Clinton interjected.
"Yes, sir. Teddy's hot-tempered; but he'd never go
that length, or anywhere near it. It's all a mis-
take . . ."
She had some difficulty in restraining herself as she
broke off. Sir Clinton offered her no assistance. It
seemed better, since she had a story to tell, to let her
tell it in her own way without leading questions. In a
moment or two she regained control over herself and
was able to continue.
"It was like this, sir. Teddy's the son of a small
farmer close by; and when I came down here with Mrs.


34 GRIM VENGEANCE
Thornaby, he took a fancy to me. We'd talked in a
sort of way about getting married; and I suppose he
thought it was all settled up. Then Mr. Quevedo came
to the village; and he seemed to take a fancy to me
too. He made Teddy jealous; and Teddy and I had a
row over the head of it; and I sent him about his
business."
Sir Clinton refrained from showing by his expression
that he had inferred most of this from what he had seen
with his own eyes.
"Then," the girl went on, "Mr. Quevedo got a bit
more friendly; and he was always telling me that a girl
like me was wasted in service. I could do better for my-
self than that, if I'd go to London. He was going to
find a good post for me. He seemed so kind about it,
and he never seemed to expect anything for himself. All
he wanted, he said, was to see a girl making the best of
herself and getting a good screw."
She threw another apprehensive glance at the door
of the breakfast-room, from which came the sound of
voices.
"They'll be finishing breakfast any minute," she
went on. "When things got this length, Mr. Quevedo
found he had to go back to London himself; and he
offered to give me a lift in his car. He was very care-
ful, and said that he wouldn't like to drive up to the
house and take me away. People would get all sorts
of bad ideas in their heads if he did that. And, of
course, so they would."
Sir Clinton nodded without speaking, but the glance
which he threw in his turn towards the breakfast-room
had the effect of keeping the girl to the point.
"Mr. Quevedo arranged to pick me up on the road
last night. I was to slip down through the spinney and


SERGEANT LEDBURY 35
meet him where you saw us. He said he could find a
place for me to stay in London, if I had no friends
there. Very particular people, he said they were. They'd
probably take me to church on Sundays, he said; and he
asked if I thought I could stand that, just so as not to
give them a bad impression."
"And you believed all that?" Sir Clinton demanded,
almost incredulously.
"I don't now, of course," the girl admitted frankly,
"but then it sounded quite all right, sir. He seemed so
anxious to give me a chance; and he never made any
suggestions or took any liberties with me. I thought he
was just being kind. And he had a way of talking that
made it all seem just as simple as anything. Looking
back I see — oh, what a fool I've been!"
She showed signs of breaking down, but again she
managed to recover her surface composure.
"Then I met Teddy, sir, and he was so anxious to
make it up and begin again. But he'd hurt my feelings
badly with some things he'd said in his quick temper
before; and 1 just wanted to even up with him. So I
told him I'd better things to think about than him.
And somehow, with our getting a bit angry with each
other, I let slip something that showed him how the
land lay — about Mr. Quevedo meeting me that very
night."
She glanced rather piteously at Sir Clinton, as
though expecting some comment on her tale; but
none came.
"You saw what happened, sir. Teddy's got a terrible
temper. But he'd never — he'd never have killed Mr.
Quevedo. It's all some dreadful mistake. Teddy's not
that sort of man, sir. He's as kind as kind, really. I
can't think what made me behave like a fool and not


36 GRIM VENGEANCE
know when I'd got what I really cared for. It was just
Teddy making me lose my temper, and his losing his,
that did it."
"And why do you tell me all this?" Sir Clinton
asked in a colourless voice.
"Why, sir, we know all about you, being Mrs.
Thornaby's brother. They all say you're so clever at
finding things out, Sir Clinton. Can't you do something
to help poor Teddy? It nearly drives me out of my
mind when I think of him in gaol, and knowing no more
about Mr. Quevedo's death than I do, I'm sure. That's
why I came to you, sir. Please help us, and get Teddy
off. Please, please, do! You're in the police yourself,
and they'd listen to you."
"I'm not in the police now," Sir Clinton corrected.
"And that makes no difference in this kind of case.
I'll give you one bit of sound advice, Staffin. When
you're dragged into this, as you may be, then stick to
the plain truth. Don't try to make up a story in the
hope of helping Teddy — what's his other name, by
the way?"
"Barford, sir. You will help him, Sir Clinton, won't
you?"
Sir Clinton's face betrayed his sympathy with the
girl in her trouble, but his reply was guarded.
"It's everybody's business to see that an innocent
man isn't condemned. But I can't suppress what I
know myself about your doings last night, remember."
"But that's the worst thing there is against Teddy!"
the girl exclaimed. "If that comes out, everybody'll be
sure he went after Mr. Quevedo and killed him."
"They'll have to prove it, though; and that's harder
than merely saying it. Take my advice, and make a
clean breast of the whole affair, if they ask you about


SERGEANT LEDBURY
37
it. If you don't, it'll be dragged out of you sooner or
later; and it'll make a very much worse impression
that way."
The girl was obviously about to make another appeal
to him when the sound of a chair colliding with some-
thing in the breakfast-room arrested the words in her
throat.
"They're coming," she muttered, and she hurried
away towards the servants' quarters before the break-
fast-room door opened.
Sir Clinton glanced after her as she went. A faint,
but not altogether pleasant smile crossed his face as he
thought of the trouble she had raised by not knowing
her own mind in time. Of course some men had the gift
of a plausible tongue; and no doubt Quevedo had
played his game well enough to take this girl in com-
pletely. Barford's temper had probably precipitated
the whole business and thrown the girl straight into the
foreigner's hands at the crucial moment; though
luckily for her he had upset the arrangement and let
Quevedo show himself in his real colours in the end.
On the face of it, the whole business seemed to be a
sordid enough little affair; and it was the duty of the
local police to clear it up. But would the local police
get to the bottom of it? Sir Clinton discovered a cer-
tain sympathy in his mind for Barford, in the circum-
stances.
His train of thought was interrupted by the opening
of the breakfast-room door. He heard his niece's voice
speaking to some people who were evidently still at
table. Then, as she came out of the room, she caught
sight of him and hurried forward.
"Oh, there you are, uncle! You must have come
down very early. When we turned up, Johnnie had


38 GRIM VENGEANCE
carried you off somewhere or other, and no one knew
where you'd gone."
She held up her face and Sir Clinton kissed her. As
he did so, he became aware of a second figure in the
background.
"This is Vincent, uncle. Mother's told you all about
us, I expect, hasn't she?"
Francia came forward as she spoke and bowed to Sir
Clinton with a certain foreign politeness which seemed
to suit his appearance. Sir Clinton let his eyes travel
unobtrusively over his new relative. He did not wish to
let himself be prejudiced by anything his sister had
said; and, at the first glance, he found little to cavil at
in Francia's appearance. The man would never have
passed for an Englishman; but Sir Clinton was enough
of a cosmopolitan to judge other races by their own
standards rather than by British criteria; and he men-
tally ticked off the externals of the man before him.
Foreign-looking, Francia undoubtedly was; handsome,
by some standards undeniably, though to Sir Clinton's
taste the Argentiner's looks were a trifle florid. As for
his clothes, "good tailor" might have been inferred at a
glance from their appearance. Altogether, the result of
his survey removed one of Sir Clinton's apprehensions.
This new nephew-in-law was at least outwardly pre-
sentable; though Mrs. Thornaby had been quite fair in
describing him as "foreign."
"He's not Anne's sort; that's plain," Sir Clinton
reflected rather ruefully. "The main thing is, though,
does he suit Elsie?"
He seemed to find an answer in a glance which his
niece shot at her husband. Despite himself, he felt a
twinge of jealousy as he saw it. All of them would have
to take a back seat now, evidently. The old relation-


SERGEANT LEDBURY 39
ships might go on, but this new one had altered all
former bearings; and Sir Clinton could not help realis-
ing how acutely his sister would feel the change.
Elsie slipped her arm into her uncle's and led him
towards the hall door.
"Now I've rescued you from Johnnie's clutches, I'm
not going to yet you go," she announced. "I've heaps of
things I want to hear."
She turned to her husband.
"Vincent! Please bring some camp-chairs out to the
lawn. We'll sit there for a while — over yonder under
the lee of the rhododendrons. You'd better fetch four
chairs when you're about it. Mother may come out
when she's got through breakfast."
Her husband, with a gesture of excuse towards Sir
Clinton, went off obediently in search of the chairs,
while Elsie led her uncle out into the open air.
"Well?" she demanded eagerly, as soon as Francia
was out of earshot.
Sir Clinton had guessed the reason which had led her
to despatch Francia on his errand; but he wished that
he had more time in which to reply to the implied
question.
"You seem to favour the compendious in your con-
versation nowadays," he said teasingly. "I suppose
your 'Well?' means 'What do I think of your husband?'
He seems all right and he says 'Good morning' better
than most people. Beyond that, our acquaintance
hasn't provided much material, has it?"
He glanced down at his niece's eager face.
"Quite happy?" he demanded seriously.
"Just ever so, and a bit more," Elsie answered, with
equal seriousness. "You've no notion what a dear
Vincent is. You'll like him, uncle, once you get to know


40 GRIM VENGEANCE
him. He's so thoughtful — seems to spend his time
thinking of things that'll please me."
"H'm! Spoils you, in plain English," said Sir Clinton,
with a glimmer of a smile.
"Well, what if he does? You did your best yourself
in your day, uncle, so you can't afford to put on airs."
Sir Clinton's smile vanished abruptly. The sting of
the phrase "in your day" was all the sharper owing to
Elsie's complete unconsciousness that she was marking
the vanishing of the old order of things. His day was
over now, as it was bound to be, sooner or later. That
was inevitable, of course. No one wanted a girl to spend
all her life in circling round an uncle. But at the back
of Sir Clinton's mind there had always been a fairly
definite idea of the sort of man who would supplant
him: not necessarily young Brandon, of course, but at
least someone of the young Brandon type, a youngster
one could take to and trust with Elsie, because he was
one's own sort. This man from the Argentine was dif-
ferent— "foreign," as Mrs. Thornaby had put it the
night before. He might be all right; one hoped he was;
but he wasn't young Brandon or anything like him.
"You musn't be jealous, you know," Elsie said im-
pulsively, as though she had been able to read her
uncle's mind. "You needn't think anything of that sort.
I'm not that kind."
"Jealous!" Sir Clinton laughed to conceal the
shrewdness of the stroke. "What would I be jealous
about? I couldn't have married you myself, could I?
All 1 want is to see you happy, Elsie. You know that
well enough."
"Then I am happy, so that's all right."
Her smile vouched for her even better than her tone.
"Here's Vincent with the chairs. Put them down over


42
GRIM VENGEANCE
to Sir Clinton with another smile, which showed his
teeth under his moustache. "We are not accustomed to
this particular kind of dampness over yonder. Brrr!"
He shrugged his shoulders as though a shiver had
gone up his spine.
"I shall be glad to be back in Buenos Ayres, I can
tell you, Sir Clinton."
"You aren't thinking of leaving immediately, I
suppose?"
"In a month or six weeks," Francia answered. "I
shall be much pleased to taste caji con lech again.
England is, of course, a wonderful country; but it can-
not make cafe" con leche as we can."
"That's caji au lait, uncle," Elsie explained.
Sir Clinton needed no assistance in the matter, but he
nodded his thanks for the information.
"Six weeks?" he said, returning to the earlier sub-
ject. "I'd no idea you were leaving so soon as that."
"It does seem short," Elsie interrupted. "But won't
it be a lovely trip when it does come? We're joining the
boat at Havre, you know, uncle; and then we go down
the coast of Spain. I've never seen Spain before. And
then on to Teneriffe and Dakar — fancy seeing Africa!
I never thought I'd get as far as that."
"Neither did I," Sir Clinton admitted, with an as-
sumption of cheerfulness so good that it deceived his
niece. "And then?"
"Oh, Rio. You know, the place where the armadillos
come from. You used to make me sing 'Roll down, roll
down to Rio' when you gave me the 'Just-So Stories,'
you remember, long ago; and I used to wish I could roll
to Rio. I was only about six then, wasn't I?"
"About that, I suppose."
"And then Santos, Montevideo, and Buenos Ayres,"


SERGEANT LEDBURY 43
Elsie wound up, disregarding him. "I've looked it all
up in the atlas, you know, uncle. What a trip I"
Sir Clinton agreed with a gesture.
"If I had the time, I'd go out with you and have a
look round myself. Nice to see you settled down in your
own house."
"I wish you could," Elsie exclaimed. "Oh, uncle,
now you're out of the police, couldn't you manage it?"
Sir Clinton saw from the tone of her voice that, al-
though he might have dropped into the second place in
her life, he still had his full share of her affection. Quite
obviously, she was eager to see him come out. The tail
of his eye swept round to Francia's face in time to
catch a totally different feeling displayed there. It was
a mere fleeting expression, but Sir Clinton saw it clearly
enough before it was suppressed.
"Can't be done, I'm afraid, Elsie," he said regret-
fully. "I'll have my work cut out for me this year in
getting to know my way about the estate business. I'm
new to it, you know."
Elsie's face betrayed her disappointment.
"Then you'll come out later on," she decided.
A mischievous expression crossed her face.
"What a pity you can't come. You'd have been such
company for Estelle."
"What's Estelle got to do with it?" Sir Clinton de-
manded.
Estelle Scotswood was one of Elsie's oldest friends,
and in the days when the two children had been almost
inseparable, Sir Clinton had been elected to the post of
Estelle's "Honorary Uncle." The honorary uncleship
had its perquisites later when Estelle grew up into a
tall, graceful girl who was never bored when taken out
to dinner or to a theatre.


44
GRIM VENGEANCE
"It was Vincent who suggested it," Elsie explained.
"He said he was afraid I might be lonely, going away
out yonder, at first."
Francia nodded gravely to Sir Clinton as though in
confirmation.
"A new country, new faces, a new language," he
said, "it might be rather trying at first if one had no
friend at hand. So I thought."
"And so we're taking Estelle out with us, and she'll
stay with me for a couple of months. Wasn't it nice of
Vincent to think of it? Of course, we're paying Estelle's
passage, as she's our guest. She's tremendously keen to
come; and it'll be so nice to have her there, instead of
starting off with no friends at all. Won't it?"
A weight fell from Sir Clinton's mind when he heard
the plan. Elsie couldn't have picked a better companion
than Estelle; and it was a relief to know that she
wouldn't be landed out in Buenos Ayres with not a soul
she knew, except her husband, on the whole western
continent. Estelle would bridge the gap until Elsie
picked up some acquaintances. He had to admit to him-
self that Francia had shown thoughtfulness for which
Elsie had praised him. An idea of that sort needed some
sympathetic imagination to produce it. And there was
a certain amount of sacrifice involved as well. Most
men would shrink from having a friend of their wife's
planted on them for a couple of months immediately
after marriage and before there had been time for the
inevitable adjustments which marriage brings in its
train.
Before he could answer his niece, however, there
came an interruption. The figure of the table-maid
came across the lawn towards their group; and as she
drew near Sir Clinton saw that her face was white.


SERGEANT LEDBURY
45
"Sergeant Ledbury's in the smoking-room, sir," she
said, addressing Francia. "He's called about a motor-
car, he says. And," she added, turning to Sir Clinton
with a look of appeal in her eyes, "he says he's heard
that you're here; and he'd be very glad if you could
spare time to have a word with him."
Francia was evidently taken by surprise.
"What can he want to see me about?" he asked.
"A motor-car was what he said, sir."
Sir Clinton dismissed the maid.
"We'd better see what it's all about," he suggested
quietly.
He was careful to betray no hint that he had any clue
in the matter. Francia looked doubtful, and a puzzled
expression passed over his face as he offered Elsie his
excuses for leaving her. Sir Clinton said nothing; but
the unspoken message in his glance served to reassure
his niece as they left her and turned towards the house.


CHAPTER IV: ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE?
Sergeant Ledbury proved to be a burly, red-mous-
tached man whose general air of dullness was curiously
belied by the sharpness of his rather small and close-
set eyes. Sir Clinton, after a shrewd glance of inspec-
tion, inclined to the view that the dullness was wilful
rather than natural; and he waited with some interest
to see if his inference would prove accurate.
"You're Sir Clinton Driffield, sir?" Ledbury in-
quired respectfully as they came into the room. "And
this will be Mr. Francia, I suppose? Just so."
Sir Clinton nodded; and the sergeant subjected both
of them to a polite but detailed scrutiny, as though he
had not quite decided what to say next and was merely
occupying his eyes while he turned over his phrases in
his mind.
"I've called about your motor-car, sir," he ex-
plained, turning to Francia. "Isn't it a grey two-seater
Alvis with the number JX. 7079?"
The sergeant's query stirred Sir Clinton's recollec-
tions. He recalled that Johnnie had drawn attention
to the absence of Francia's car from the garage that
morning; and this linked itself in his mind with the
two-seater which had played a part in the affair by the
roadside on the previous night. Though apparently in-
different, he was watching Francia keenly; and he
detected a fleeting expression of surprise and uneasi-
ness on the face of the Argentiner when the sergeant
put his question.


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE?
47
"Yes," Francia admitted, "that is a description of
my car."
The sergeant waited for a moment, evidently in the
hope that Francia might be drawn into something fur-
ther if he were given time; but, finding that nothing
was volunteered, he assumed an expression of con-
dolence.
"I'm sorry to say, sir, that it's met with an acci-
dent. The radiator's smashed and one of the wheels is
badly buckled. You weren't driving it yourself, of
course?"
Sir Clinton mentally gave the sergeant a good mark.
Ledbury knew, of course, that Quevedo had been driv-
ing the car and had been killed; but in all probability
he had ascertained from the servants that Francia was
still in ignorance of the tragedy; and he was keeping
this card up his sleeve until the proper moment arrived
for playing it. Evidently the sergeant believed in giving
himself every chance of eliciting information before he
was forced to be frank himself.
The effect of the news upon Francia was what might
have been expected from any man who learns that he
has had a valuable car smashed up.
"That is a bad business," he ejaculated. "I hope no
one was hurt?"
Ledbury's face showed that his hand was being
forced.
"Well, sir," he said, "might I ask who was driving
your car last night? I take it that it hasn't been stolen."
"No," Francia admitted, after a pause so slight that
it might easily have passed unnoticed, "it wasn't stolen.
I lent it to an acquaintance of mine. He had to get to
London in a hurry, and he borrowed it."
"Ah, just so," said Ledbury, producing a notebook.


48 GRIM VENGEANCE
"I'll take the particulars, sir, if you don't mind. One
likes to have things ship-shape, and I never trust my
memory. Now, would you let me have the name of the
driver?"
"Quevedo is his name—Pedro Quevedo."
Ledbury, slightly accentuating the dullness of his
expression, requested Francia to spell the name, and
then took it down in his notebook after laboriously
moistening the tip of his pencil.
"Pedro Quevedo," he said at last ruminatively.
A friend of yours, sir, I suppose?"
"An acquaintance," Francia amended.
"Ah, just so," Ledbury corrected himself. "An
acquaintance."
He moistened his pencil once more and made a note.
Sir Clinton watched him amusedly. He was afraid that
the sergeant was overdoing things a little; but possibly
a foreigner might not see through the acting. As Led-
bury looked up from his notebook, Sir Clinton glanced
at him with a twinkle in his eye; but the sergeant
stared owlishly at him with no answering flicker in his
face.
"An acquaintance?" he repeated heavily. "You
didn't know him long, then?"
Francia shook his head definitely.
"I met him on the ship coming from Buenos Ayres."
Sir Clinton was following the interview with a certain
mild amusement. Quite obviously, Francia had made
up his mind to volunteer no information; and the ser-
geant was finding his task more difficult than he had
expected.
"I thought perhaps you might have had some infor-
mation about him," Ledbury confessed, with an air of
disappointment. "You see, sir, in this country one


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE? 49
doesn't lend one's car to chance acquaintances. It's not
usual."
Again there was an almost undetectable pause be-
fore Francia replied.
"I think I had better be quite clear," he suggested.
"Mr. Quevedo was not a friend of mine, you under-
stand? But we had some business dealings — private
business transactions — and naturally I went, perhaps,
a little out of my way to oblige him in the matter of
the car. A business acquaintance, that is how I should
describe him."
"Quite so," Ledbury answered, as though the point
had been cleared up to his satisfaction. "I quite see
how it is, sir. You'll have his home address — I mean,
his business premises in America — of course?"
This time the pause was a shade longer than before.
"No," Francia said, at last, "I don't remember it.
I had his address in London at one time. But when he
came down here to stay at the Black Bull Hotel, I
threw his London address into the wastepaper-basket
— having no further need of it — and I cannot recall
it now."
At this answer, the sergeant's face brightened
slightly. The information seemed to have taken a
weight off his mind.
"I see, sir," he said briskly. "This Mr. Quevedo,
then, was nobody of much interest to you personally?
That's all the better; for I'm sorry to say he was killed
in this motor-smash. Very sad, isn't it?" he added per-
functorily.
Sir Clinton, knowing that this revelation was bound
to come sooner or later, had kept his eyes on Francia's
face; but the Argentiner betrayed no particular sorrow
at the news of Quevedo's fate.


GRIM VENGEANCE
"Very sad," he agreed, in an almost formal tone.
"How did it happen?"
"A skid, sir. It took him smash into a stone wall.
He's been badly cut about by the glass of the wind-
screen. Later on, perhaps, we'll need to ask you to
identify him, just for form's sake, sir. But that won't
be immediately."
Francia nodded as though agreeing to this.
"I'm quite at your service," he volunteered.
Then, as though a thought had struck him, he in-
quired:
"Was anyone else hurt in the accident?"
Ledbury shook his head.
"Nobody, sir."
He seemed to have elicited all that he wanted from
Francia at the moment.
"I think that's all just now, sir. I'll let you know
later on about the identification."
He turned to Sir Clinton, but seemed doubtful about
dealing with him so long as Francia was present. Sir
Clinton saw his difficulty and helped him out.
"I think you wanted to speak to me about something,
sergeant? Right! Then I tell you what we can do. I've
got my car in the garage, and I'll run you down to the
village. Save you a bit of a walk, and you can do your
talking in the car. That suit you?"
Ledbury accepted the invitation eagerly; and, taking
leave of Francia, they walked round to the garage. As
Sir Clinton drove down the short approach to the house,
he turned to the sergeant.
"I don't know this neighbourhood — only arrived
last night after dark. You'll need to pilot me."
Ledbury nodded.
"Turn to the left at the gate, sir, and then, if you


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE? 51
don't mind, you might take the first on the left. The
fact is, I'd like you to see the state of affairs with your
own eyes; and then perhaps you'd be good enough to
give me your advice. You've had experience, sir, and
I'd be very glad if you'd give me the benefit of it."
Sir Clinton turned an innocent face to his passenger.
"Advice? What do you want advice for, sergeant?
I gather a man's been knocked out in a car accident.
Well, the coroner will have to look into it. You know
the routine, surely?" *
Ledbury fidgetted slightly in his seat before replying.
"It's not quite so simple as all that, sir."
Sir Clinton made no effort to restrain his smile.
"Ah, I see, sergeant," he suggested, "It's this murder
case you have in your mind — Teddy Barford, I
suppose?"
The sergeant was evidently taken aback.
"Well, you do seem to know more than one expects!
It's what I'd heard about you, sir, if you don't mind
my saying it. How . . ."
Sir Clinton had no desire to encourage a roving
inquiry into the sources of his information. He changed
the subject abruptly and decisively.
"You didn't say anything about a murder to Mr.
Francia, I noticed?"
Ledbury seemed to take the hint.
"Well, sir," he explained, "when you're out to get
all the information you can, it seems to me there's two
ways of doing it. One's to pretend you know all about
it before you start, and let on you can check every fact
as it comes out. That wants a good bluffer to work it
properly. Then there's the other way: to pretend you
know nothing at all and take all you get as if it was a
treat to get it. That's the sympathetic way, and the


52 GRIM VENGEANCE
stupider you look while you're working it, the more
you're likely to fish up. I'm more fitted to look stupid
than to bluff well, sir; so I take the easiest line."
"Ah," commented Sir Clinton, "then that would
account for the laborious pencil-licking and so forth,
. I take it?"
Ledbury recognised that he had met a kindred
spirit.
"Just so, sir. It all helps, you see. When people see
me licking away at my pencil, they put me down as a
blank idiot, naturally; because anyone with a grain of
common sense would sharpen the point before it got to
that state. I've thought out one or two things of that
sort: like scratching your ear as if you were puzzled, or
breathing noisily, or losing your place in your note-
book. It's easier to pretend that you're stupider than
you are than that you're cleverer than you are."
"A bit involved, that last sentence. But I get a dim
notion of your drift, I think. Now suppose, sergeant,
that for a moment or two you contrive to be just as
clever as you are, no more no less; and kindly tell me
what it's all about."
The sergeant struggled for a moment with a nascent
grin and succeeded in repressing it at last. Sir Clinton's
reputation had led him to expect this kind of thing;
and he was pleased to find himself ready for it.
"Turn to the left here, sir," he directed, as they came
to a cross-road.
Sir Clinton obediently swung the car round; and as
he came into the fresh road, he recognised that it
was the one which had brought him into Raynham
Parva on his arrival. The pine spinney on the left was
where he had left Staffin with her suitcase. She had


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE? 53
evidently sent him on a long wild-goose chase by her
mis-directions.
"Well, sergeant?" he prompted.
"This is what happened, sir. About a quarter to one
this morning, Constable Peel was cycling home along
this road a bit farther up — coming in this direction.
He'd been out to some spree or other;—he's young and
unmarried — and he'd stayed pretty late. Of course he
was off duty."
"It sounds like it. Go on."
"He was pedalling along, not expecting anything on
the road at that hour of the morning; and he'd come
within a few hundred yards of the lodge gate of
Screvesby Manor. There's a stone wall on each side of
the road there, sir, with a deepish ditch."
Sir Clinton nodded as though accepting informa-
tion; but he had no difficulty in recalling the long
high wall past which he had driven on the previous
night.
"He turned a corner, sir," the sergeant continued,
"and in front of him was the glare of a motor's head-
lights. He expected it to be down on him in a second or
two; but it turned out that the car was standing; so
he cycled along towards it. By the time he came level
with it, he was pretty dazzled by the lights, but as he
passed the car, he saw it was empty and the door was
open. Then, a few yards farther down the road, he
made out — after he got his eyes free from the glare
of the lamps — something big on one side of the road,
and somebody standing beside it."
"Was that near the lodge gate?" Sir Clinton de-
manded.
"A couple of hundred yards on the other side of it


54
GRIM VENGEANCE
from here," Ledbury explained. "You'll see it all for
yourself in a few minutes, sir."
Sir Clinton nodded, and the sergeant went on with
his tale.
"When Peel got his eyes a bit undazzled, he made
out that the thing in the ditch was a car, pretty badly
smashed up. So he got off his bike and wheeled it over
to where the man was standing. Peel recognised him, of
course, at the first look. It was Teddy Barford. So Peel,
not rightly understanding what was afoot, spoke up and
asked Teddy what it was all about and if anyone was
hurt in the smash. Meanwhile, he was peering about
as best he could with his dazzled eyes, trying to see
for himself. I always keep one eye shut myself, when
I'm passing motor-lights; but Peel never thinks to do
a simple thing like that."
Sir Clinton had a suspicion that Constable Peel was
not altogether a favourite with his superior.
"Teddy Barford looked a bit taken aback, it seems,
when he saw Peel," the sergeant proceeded. "He's
rather a rough-spoken man when he's angry, and I
gather he asked Peel what the hell he was doing there
— or words to that effect," Ledbury added hurriedly.
"It sounds as if he'd been a bit surprised by Peel
turning up like that — hadn't noticed him coming up,
I expect. Anyhow, Peel pushed past him and looked at
the smash-up; and there was the body of a man lying
in the ditch, and a lot of stuff that Peel took to be
blood. So Peel laid down his bike and had a good look
at things. It seems the poor chap was a deader — com-
plete— but quite warm. Knocked out only a few
minutes before, by the look of things."
Ledbury paused for a moment, as though his last
words had completed one section of his narrative.


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE?
55
"Peel climbed out of the ditch, after he'd seen all
he could see with the help of his bicycle lamp; and
then it seems to have struck him that Teddy Barford
wasn't doing overmuch to help in the affair. He'd had
a good look at the deceased's face; but it was so cut
about with the glass of the windscreen that he made
very little of it. So he turned to Teddy and asked if
he knew who it was. Teddy glowered at him and said:
'Yes, it's that swine Quevedo. That settles the score
I had against him.' And a few more things that showed
there'd been bad blood between 'em. Peel pricked up
his ears at that."
"Death settles most scores," Sir Clinton commented,
with wilful sententiousness.
Ledbury glanced round as though he detected some-
thing more in the phrase than appeared on the
surface.
"Just so, sir," he agreed. "It might mean that. But
Peel, being one of those young fellows that's keen on
promotion and getting their names into the papers,
didn't quite take that out of it all. There'd been a bit of
talk about the place lately about Teddy Barford
having his nose put out of joint by Quevedo over
some girl or other; and Peel, putting one thing to
another, made up his mind that likely enough Teddy
Barford had lost his temper and gone for Quevedo.
Peel's got one of these leaping intellects, sir, that
don't seem to need to wait for evidence before they
get set like a bit of concrete."
Sir Clinton smiled covertly at this further reve-
lation of Ledbury's distaste for his subordinate.
"Some people go one way to the truth, others go
another, you know, sergeant. It takes all kinds to make
a world."


56 GRIM VENGEANCE
Ledbury stared suspiciously at his companion. This
flood of platitude was hardly in keeping with his pre-
conceived opinion of Sir Clinton.
"Ah, just so," he admitted grudgingly, after a slight
pause. "Well, the end of it was, he asked Teddy if
he'd any objection to being searched — just as a kind
of guarantee of good faith, or something of that sort.
And Teddy Barford was so mad at the notion, that he
fairly damned Peel's eyes for him — just as I expect
I'd have done myself in his place. That made Peel
more set on his notions than ever, of course. He's one
of these obstinate fellows — you know, sir. And the
upshot of it was that he arrested Teddy Barford there
and then for murder. No warrant, of course, and no
evidence worth a hen's whistle."
His face showed clearly enough what he thought of
the affair. Sir Clinton made no comment; and the
sergeant, after waiting for one, decided to go on with
his story.
"He made Teddy take his bike into the car as well
as himself, and then they drove into Raynham Parva
and got me roused up. By that time, Teddy Barford
had got cooled down a bit. He'd had time to think
things over. So when I tackled him, he just said that
he'd make no statement till he'd seen a solicitor. Wisest
thing he could have done, of course; and I didn't
dissuade him. If I'd thought it was murder, I'd have
had a turn at him myself, to see if I could get him to
talk. But the whole thing was obviously an ordinary
motor-smash, from all I could get out of Peel. So I
explained to Teddy Barford that he'd better let us
lock him up for the rest of the night and it would be
all right in the morning, no doubt. He'd sobered up


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE? 57
a good bit, and he agreed to this. He knows he'll get
a square deal from me."
"Humorous situation you all seem to have got into,"
Sir Clinton admitted. "And meanwhile the unfortunate
dead man was left by the roadside to horrify the
next passer-by?"
"No longer than I could help, sir. I got hold of an-
other constable and sent him out with a waterproof
sheet to make things decent, and gave him orders to
stand by until he was relieved. Much better to leave
things as they were until daylight, when we could
see clearly."
"And then?"
"Well, of course, by breakfast-time, the whole place
was buzzing with the news. I took Peel with me and
went down to the smash-up. Once I'd had a look round
in daylight, the thing was clear enough. It was just an
ordinary motor-smash. The tracks are plain enough
on the road. Quevedo's car had swerved, hit the ditch,
half-overturned with the jerk. He'd gone clean through
the windscreen and got frightfully cut about the face
and neck by the glass. The car had brought up short
against the stone wall — the radiator's crushed and
the bonnet's all burst. Then, as the tracks show, Teddy
Barford had come along behind in his car. His track
overlies Quevedo's car-marks and travels on a bit be-
yond the place where Quevedo went into the ditch.
There's no doubt he arrived after the smash. He pulled
up at the sight of the wreck, got out, and walked back.
And then Peel must have come down on top of him
before he'd time to do much."
"Well, that sounds simple enough," Sir Clinton
pointed out. "What am I doing here, if I may ask?"


58
GRIM VENGEANCE
Ledbury grinned at the thrust.
"It's this way, sir," he explained. "The car's well
enough known round here. We've all seen Mr. Francia
and his wife driving it. So we had to inquire about it,
anyhow, in case it had been stolen by Quevedo, or any-
thing of that sort. And we had to let the owner know
it had got into a smash. Well, you'd hardly believe it,
sir, but even after I'd shown Peel the track of Teddy
Barford's wheels overlying those of Quevedo's car, he
still stuck to it that it was a murder case. He's got his
knife into Teddy hard. They never liked each other;
and now, what with a chance of a bit of notoriety
and a chance of paying off scores, Peel's that obsti-
nate that he won't give in he's wrong. Now I want
to let Teddy Barford out as quick as may be, for the
whole thing's a mare's nest. But Peel's obstinate; and
he's been as near insolent as he dares be about my
'favouring the escape of a criminal' — that's his way
of putting it."
To Ledbury's astonishment, Sir Clinton interjected
a question which suggested that his mind was wander-
ing from the main track.
"What sort of driver is Mr. Teddy Barford? A
good one?"
"Oh, quite good," the sergeant admitted in a
puzzled tone. "He drives hard, but I never knew him
to come near an accident for all that. He's no patience,
Teddy though. I've often had a lift in his car; and
when he starts off, it fairly jerks the inside out of you."
"Let's the clutch in with a bang, you mean?"
"Just so, sir. Makes the car jump about two feet as
it gets off the mark. Cruel on the machinery, sir."
"Sorry I interrupted," Sir Clinton apologised. "Go


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE? 59
on with the story. I'm still unable to see why I'm
here."
"Well, it's this way, sir. Peel wouldn't give way and
nothing I could say to him would shift him from his
notions. So at last I said to him: 'There's no use our
arguing this thing up and down any more. You say it's
a murder done by Teddy Barford. I say it's just a
plain motor-smash. Suppose we call in an umpire to
settle it one way or the other?' You see, I'd got word
you were coming down to stay at Fern Lodge, sir.
So I said to him: 'You've heard of Sir Clinton Driffield
that's just retired from the Police? You're so keen on
the papers that you must have seen that and know all
about him. What about asking him to settle who's
right? You won't go against his opinion, will you? Nor
I, either.' Well, Peel hummed and hawed, but at last
he had to give in. 'You'll never get him to come,' he
said. 'If he's the sort of person I've heard he is,' I said,
'he won't refuse. And I'll go up now and fetch him if
he'll come. You wait here and see no one stands round
gaping. And keep your mouth shut,' I said to him as I
went off. And I left him thinking."
"You didn't leave me much chance of refusing, did
you?" Sir Clinton pointed out, with a smile. "Well, if
it's really going to be of any help to you, it's very
little trouble to me. But I must have a look round, you
know. I can't hazard an opinion on second-hand evi-
dence in a niatter of importance."
"Of course, sir. That's understood. And it's very
good of you to fall in with the idea, sir. Peel won't have
a word to say if you agree with me."
"And if I happen to agree with Peel, by any
chance?"


6o
GRIM VENGEANCE
"I've heard a good deal about you, sir. I'd trust
your opinion even if it went against my own."
"There's a third possibility on the board," Sir Clin-
ton remarked. "Ah, here we are!"
The wrecked car had come in sight as he spoke; and
he slowed down, bringing his car to a standstill long be-
fore it reached the point where the lodge gate broke
the line of the wall on the left of the road. Ledbury's
surprise at this was evident. He had expected Sir Clin-
ton to drive straight up to the scene of the disaster,
where the constable was awaiting them, on guard over
the wreckage.
"Aren't you going on, sir?" the sergeant inquired,
holding the car-door open in a tentative manner, as
though he expected to be told to keep his seat.
"No use bringing an extra set of car tracks to mix
things up, is there, sergeant?" Sir Clinton answered.
"It's safer to stop a decent distance away, just in case
of need. We'll walk the rest. By the way, have any cars
passed this way since the smash?"
"None, sir, up to the time I left Peel here."
"H'm!" Sir Clinton commented ruminatively.
"There's been at least one car through, if you look at
the tracks there on the road. Lucky the surface seems
to have been just right for taking impressions of the
tyres. Now we'll interview your friend."
Constable Peel proved to be a young man with a cer-
tain cockiness of demeanour which suggested that he
was not likely to under-estimate his own merits. Sir
Clinton questioned him about passing cars, and found
that his inference had been correct: one car had passed
up the road not far ahead of their own.
"I signalled them to stop, sir," Peel explained, "and
then I went down and made them drive carefully past.


ACCIDENT OR HOMICIDE?
61
Got them in as close to the ditch as possible, so's they
wouldn't mix up the other wheel-tracks with theirs.
That's their track — the fresh one yonder."
Sir Clinton's nod conveyed his appreciation of his
caution; and Peel threw a glance at the sergeant as
much as to say: "There! You wouldn't have thought
of that!" Ledbury ignored this, and contented himself
with explaining that Sir Clinton had come to look into
things on the spot.
"This is how it was, Sir Clinton . . ." Peel began.
But Sir Clinton cut him short in a tone which combined
politeness and decision.
"I'll have a look round myself, first, constable. Then
I'll know better what questions I want to ask you."
Constable Peel's jauntiness declined slightly.
"Very good, sir," he agreed.
He fell in alongside his superior, and both of them
followed Sir Clinton over to the wreck of the car.


CHAPTER V: SOME FACTS IN THE CASE
For several minutes, Sir Clinton stood on the grassy
border of the road, apparently trying to reconstruct the
sequence of events which had led up to the tragedy.
Quite evidently, the car had been travelling at a fair
speed when it went over the edge of the ditch and col-
lided with the wall beyond. The radiator was smashed
and twisted with the impact, and the near forewheel
was badly buckled. Glass from the broken windscreen
was scattered over the seats and the floor, as well as on
the ground near by; and the floor-boards of the car, as
well as the grass, showed ominous dark stains on which
the blood was still moist. Quevedo had apparently been
thrown through the windscreen when the shock oc-
curred; and he had landed on the grass, clear of both
the car and the wall.
Constable Peel manifestly found Sir Clinton's silence
rather long; and at last he decided to speak himself.
"The way I look at it is this, sir. The deceased had
a skid or something, and his car went into the wall. He
wasn't killed outright. Then Barford—who'd a grudge
against him—came up; and, seeing the man was all cut
up with glass, he saw his chance and finished him,
thinking that a knock on the head would pass as having
happened in the accident itself. And so it would, if he'd
had time to get away. That would explain his saying
to me . . ."
Sir Clinton looked up, evidently none too pleased at
being interrupted.
"A skid, you say? Very well. Let me see the trace


SOME FACTS IN THE CASE 63
of that skid in the track of the car. Facts are what I
want, constable."
With rather less confidence in his air, Peel retraced
the wheel-marks of the shattered car along the road.
"There!" he said, after walking a few yards, "that's
what I would say was the beginning of the skid, sir."
Sir Clinton stooped over the marks and scrutinised
them with care.
"It's a matter of terminology, I suppose," he said
sarcastically. "Skid seems to convey something to your
mind which it fails to suggest to me. What do you say,
sergeant?"
Ledbury, concealing his joy at the constable's down-
cast appearance, bent over the track before offering
an opinion.
"What I mean by a skid," he explained, "is when
the wheel slides sideways instead of rolling forwards.
I don't see anything like that in the tracks."
He paused for a moment, and then added in a doubt-
ful voice:
"That's a rum start!"
"Very rum," Sir Clinton agreed in a colourless tone.
"But it's a fact. You'd better make a note of it."
Ledbury nodded and drew out his notebook. Sir
Clinton was faintly amused to see that the pencil which
the sergeant produced was one which required no lick-
ing to make it write. Peel also fished out a notebook
and made a jotting.
"You think there wasn't a skid, sir?" he demanded.
"Do you yourself think there was, after examining
the track closely?"
Peel's assurance was replaced by a slight nervous-
ness as he heard Sir Clinton's tone.
"Well, sir, perhaps I made a mistake."


64
GRIM VENGEANCE
Sir Clinton's expression was hardly reassuring; and
his next words took the last trace of swagger out of
Peel.
"A minute ago, you'd have been prepared to take
your oath that this car skidded. If the coroner ques-
tioned you about it, that's what you'd have testified,
apparently. By that time, these tracks would have dis-
appeared and there would be no way of checking your
evidence. This isn't one of your chicken-stealing cases,
constable. You've charged a man with murder. And
you don't seem to think it worth while to look at things
carefully. You'd simply got the idea that if a car
smashed into a wall, there must have been a skid; so
you took that for granted and never bothered to look.
Isn't that about it?"
Peel's face showed that this shot was near the truth,
and he refrained from attempting to answer.
"That comes of preconceived notions," Sir Clinton
pointed out. "What we really want are the facts, first
of all. I don't suppose either of you can tell me, but I'd
like to know if this man Quevedo drove his car on the
throttle or on the accelerator."
Neither official could answer this query; but it
prompted Ledbury to walk back to the car and ex-
amine the steering-wheel.
"You mean, sir, that the throttle's full open."
"Yes."
Sir Clinton looked thoughtfully at the car for a mo-
ment or two, and then tested the throttle-lever gingerly
with his finger.
"It's quite tight, you'll find, sergeant, if you test it.
The shock of the smash wouldn't shift it over, so far
as one can guess. So apparently the car was on full
throttle when the smash happened. If he'd been driving


SOME FACTS IN THE CASE
65
on the accelerator, the throttle would have been right
back — just giving enough gas to let the engine tick
over when the clutch was out."
"I see that, sir, though I don't drive a car of my
own."
He looked doubtfully at Sir Clinton.
"I suppose I ought to make a note of that, sir?"
"Wait a bit. There's something else to couple on to
it. You don't drive a car, you say. Well, this is a four-
speeds-forward gear-box. And the gear-lever's in the
notch for the third speed — the car's not on top gear.
You'd better jot that down in connection with the full
throttle."
Ledbury's little eyes brightened.
"I think I see what you mean, sir. It's a flat road, so
he wouldn't have been changing gear between here and
the village. And he wouldn't be driving full throttle on
third speed when he might have been getting more out
of the machine by putting his gear on top and closing
the throttle a bit?"
Sir Clinton seemed in no mood to encourage pre-
mature theorising.
"All you know, sergeant, is the position of the two
levers. That's a matter of fact. Let's leave the pretty
hypotheses out of it at present."
He turned from the car to the spot where the body
of Quevedo lay under the waterproof sheet.
"We'll have a look at him now, sergeant," he sug-
gested.
"He's a bit ugly, sir," the sergeant suggested. "The
glass of the windscreen cut him all about the face and
neck — ghastly."
"I'm not sensitive," Sir Clinton explained curtly.
"Let's see what damage was done."


66
GRIM VENGEANCE
Ledbury lifted the sheet and exposed the body. It
was clear at a glance that the sergeant had not over-
stated the case. Quevedo's face had apparently been
driven across a sharp edge of the broken windscreen,
and hardly a feature had escaped intact. Even the
neck, where it was unprotected by his collar, had been
cut deeply here and there.
"I told you, sir," the sergeant pointed out. "He's
not a pretty sight. Nothing much to be seen but blood
and cuts. Even if he hadn't been hurt in the smash-up,
the glass would have finished him. His jugular vein's
severed. He'd have bled to death in no time. You can
see the amount of blood there is round about him on
the grass."
Sir Clinton nodded absently in reply and continued
his examination.
"Funny what a clean cut you get from a piece of
glass," Constable Peel communicated to the world in
general. "Just like a razor, it is."
"Or a piece of paper," the sergeant amplified. "I've
had a finger cut with the edge of a bit of paper once —
deep. You'd hardly believe it unless you saw it."
He seemed anxious to soothe Peel's feelings after
the rough handling that Sir Clinton had given the con-
stable. Ledbury was not the man to bear a grudge
too long.
"A thread'll bite deep enough, too," Peel pursued.
"If you pull a fine bit of thread through your fingers
too quick, it'll give you a nasty sort of wound — just
like a glass-cut. It's so clean that it doesn't bleed on
the surface for quite a while."
Sir Clinton rose to his feet.
"You can cover him up again for the present," he
said. "I've seen all I want to see just now."


SOME FACTS IN THE CASE 67
He moved over to the car and stood examining it
while the two officials covered the body with the
sheet again.
"I suppose you've taken a note of the appearance of
the face and so forth?" he asked, as Ledbury came to
his side.
"Yes, sir. But of course there'll be a P.M. and the
surgeon will get all the details then."
Sir Clinton leaned on the side of the car and ex-
amined the litter of broken glass on the floor of the
driving-seat.
"Lot of blood there," he pointed out. "Better make
a note of that, sergeant. By the way, did you note any-
thing about blood on his clothes?"
"There was a lot down the front, sir. I suppose it
soaked him pretty well when the jugular began to
bleed. He was lying partly on his side; and it would
flow all over the place when it gushed out."
"I'd make a note of that too, if I were you. Now
we'll have a look at these car-tracks. It's lucky the
tyre-marks seem to be different. Makes it easy to pick
out one from another."
He stepped along the road beyond the body.
"This is the mark of Barford's car, I take it?"
he asked Peel. "He overran the spot where the smash
was, and then pulled up sharp, if one can trust the
marks."
Peel followed his gesture, and saw where the regu-
lar marking of the tyre merged into a long clean stroke
in the mud.
"You mean these'll be his back wheels with the
brakes on and the wheels locked—just sliding on the
road instead of rolling, sir?"
Peel stopped abruptly, realising that he was on the


68
GRIM VENGEANCE
forbidden ground of theory. Sir Clinton's smile reas-
sured him slightly.
"This mark here, sir," he went on, rather encour-
aged, "is where Teddy Barford reversed his car after
I'd told him he'd have to come along with me."
"Did he start off with a jerk?" Sir Clinton inquired,
pointing to the place where the back wheels had evi-
dently spun and slipped as the clutch was let in.
"He did, sir. He always does."
Sir Clinton accepted the information as though it
were fresh to him.
"Now, I think, we'll have a look at the track of the
wrecked car," he suggested. "We may as well be
thorough when we're at it."
Accompanied by the two officials, he started at the
point where the two-seater had gone into the ditch and
worked back along the trail without haste.
"One of you had better make a diagram of this, be-
fore the marks get obliterated," he suggested. "It's an
easy enough job for you — the track's almost perfectly
straight. All you have to do is to measure the near
wheel's distance from the edge of the road, here and
there, along the track at fixed distances apart."
They had come to the lodge gate as he spoke; and a
glance showed him that the lodge itself was unoccupied.
The gate was slightly set back from the road, and the
avenue from the house broadened out like a delta so as
to round off the turns at the sides. Sir Clinton left the
track of the wrecked car and moved into the end of
the avenue.
"H'm!" he said. "See that? Here's the track of
another car. Down on the road, its track's crossed by
the track of the wrecked car, so this one was here be-
fore Quevedo came along."


SOME FACTS IN THE CASE 69
They studied the fresh track for a short time; and
at last Constable Peel could restrain himself no longer.
"Here's a funny thing, sir!" he pointed out eagerly.
"This car turned in to the mouth of the avenue and
then reversed out again. Funny thing to turn back at
this point of the road. He must have missed his way,
or something, and only noticed it when he reached
this length."
Ledbury had examined the track even more mi-
nutely.
"Another funny thing," he contributed, with an ex-
pression on his face which showed he was not ill-
pleased to wipe the eye of his colleague. "This fellow's
track coming in is overlaid by Quevedo's car-track,
just as you said, sir. But the track he made after he
reversed out is on top of Quevedo's track. And, what's
more," he added, "this fellow seems to have been
manoeuvring about a bit. He came in here; then he
reversed till he was half across the road; then he
drove in again; and finally he reversed out a second
time for his turn homewards. The two tracks of his
wheels are almost on top of each other, but I can see
the double trail in the blur all right."
"That's a sound bit of observation, sergeant," Sir
Clinton complimented him. "I'll add two further
points; and then I think we've got the lot. First, the
bed of the avenue's fairly soft; and if you look at the
point where the car rested when it came in first, you'll
find the marks are deep compared with the ones made
when it came to a standstill a second time. Evidently it
stood for quite a while the first time, and only a short
time afterwards. Second, this car wasn't here when I
passed along the road last night; and I may tell you
I met Quevedo's car just outside Raynham Parva. So


70 GRIM VENGEANCE
this fellow must have come along a side road and
turned into this road after I'd passed. Otherwise, I'd
have met him. And I met no one but Quevedo."
He seemed to consider carefully before he con-
tinued:
"You've seen Barford's clothes by daylight, I sup-
pose. Any blood on them, did you notice?"
Ledbury looked at the constable, and both shook
their heads. Sir Clinton's expression seemed to sug-
gest that he was relieved by this negative evidence.
"I'd like to have another look at that car," he said,
turning back along the road in the direction of the
wreckage. "We'd better do the thing thoroughly, ser-
geant; and search the floor in case there's something
to be picked up amongst the litter."
Under his directions, the sergeant began to collect
the broken glass which strewed the seats and floor of
the car, each fragment being handed to Sir Clinton for
examination as it came to hand. Most of those on the
floor were moist with blood. At last it seemed as though
only a few minor fragments remained to be secured.
"Nothing that looks important so far," Sir Clinton
confessed. "Still, stick to it, sergeant. Let's have every
scrap you can find."
Ledbury obediently grubbed on the floor; and, after
fishing out one or two fresh samples of glass, he came
upon one which Sir Clinton evidently regarded as of
more interest than the rest.
"Have a good look at this, sergeant," he suggested,
holding the fragment out for inspection. "Would you
say that was plate glass from the windscreen?"
'Ledbury and Peel bent over it.
"That's not plate glass," Peel declared, "It's far too


SOME FACTS IN THE CASE 71
thin; and you can see a rounded sort of edge at one
side — a ground edge, isn't it?"
"That describes it well enough," Sir Clinton ad-
mitted.
"I know what that is, sir," Ledbury broke in. "It's
a bit of a spectacle lens."
"Have a good look at it," Sir Clinton repeated, offer-
ing it to the sergeant.
Ledbury scrutinised the fragment for some seconds.
"It's a spectacle lens, sir, right enough."
"Hold it up and look through it, sergeant. It's not a
lens, you'll see. There's no curvature. It's plain on
both sides."
"So it is, sir," Ledbury admitted, handing it over to
Peel so that he also might examine it.
"Hunt around a bit more, sergeant. This looks as if
we might find something else worth having."
Ledbury returned to his task, handing out his dis-
coveries as he made them. Three or four small pieces
of glass were dismissed by Sir Clinton without com-
ment; but at last he seemed to find something which
interested him.
"What do you make of that?" he inquired, handing
the last chip back to the sergeant.
"It's too thin for plate glass, so it isn't a bit of the
windscreen. There's no other broken glass on the
car that I can see; for the lamp lenses wouldn't get in
here; and the clock and speedometer faces aren't
smashed — nor the dashboard light." Ledbury held the
fragment up and peered through it. "It's got a curve
on it."
He fished out a pocket-lens and scrutinised the chip.
"Looks like cheap glass, sir, so far as I can see.


72 GRIM VENGEANCE
One or two bubbles in it; and there's a faintish tinge
in it. What do you make of it?"
"A bit of broken bottle, perhaps?"
"I believe you're right, sir. It looks like something
of the sort."
"Well, keep it carefully, sergeant. It may turn out to
be important. One never can tell. By the way, where's
the other thing — the flat bit with the round edge. Oh,
here it is."
Sir Clinton drew a few coins from his pocket and
compared the curves of their edges with the arc of the
ground rim of the glass fragment.
"The complete thing's been a shade larger than a
half-crown," he pointed out, handing the glass and the
coin to Ledbury for comparison. "You'd better pre-
serve that carefully also. It might have a bearing on
the case, once things are pieced together. Is there any-
thing left on the floor of the car or on the seats?
Nothing?"
"Just some bits so small that they're almost powder,
sir."
"I'd sweep them up before the car's shifted. One
never can tell what may be useful. And now, I think,
we might have a look at the contents of Quevedo's
pockets."
"I've got all the stuff parcelled up, sir," Ledbury
explained. "I was able to get at the pockets without
disturbing the body."
He produced a brown-paper parcel from a recess in
the car, where he had placed it for safety; and unrolled
it on the grass for Sir Clinton's inspection.
"H'm! Not much here of interest. Cigarette-case,
match-box, fountain-pen, and so forth. Just what a
normal man carries. What about this letter, sergeant?"


74 GRIM VENGEANCE
"I believe so," Sir Clinton confirmed.
"Just so," Ledbury agreed. "This'll perhaps be one
of his business letters."
Sir Clinton glanced along the road as the sergeant
repacked his parcel.
"Let's have a last look round," he suggested, mov-
ing off towards the lodge gate.
From that point he followed the tracks of Quevedo's
car a few yards in the direction of Raynham Parva
and then halted suddenly.
"Make anything of that?" he demanded, indicating
one particular point on the trail.
Ledbury and Peel knelt down and examined the
place carefully.
"Looks like the scrape of a wheel starting, sir; but
it's very slight. There's just the faintest change in the
track."
Peel confirmed the sergeant's suggestion with a nod,
but refrained from any verbal comment.
"That's what I'd take it to be myself," Sir Clinton
agreed. "Well, that seems to be all I want to see, ser-
geant. And, now, what about giving you a lift into
Raynham Parva, if you've any business in that direc-
tion — fetching up a cart to remove the body, or what
not?"
"You haven't given us that expert opinion yet, sir,"
Ledbury reminded him slyly.
"Oh, my opinion? Well, here it is, for what it's worth.
You're both wrong."
The sergeant was evidently quite unprepared for this
verdict.
"I'm not quite sure what you mean, sir," he blurted
out.
"Simple enough," Sir Clinton answered. "You said


SOME FACTS IN THE CASE 75
it was an accident pure and simple. It wasn't. Consta-
ble Peel said that Mr. Teddy Barford was a murderer.
He isn't. If the coroner sees things as I do, I think
you'll find the jury persuaded to give the verdict, Mur-
der by some person unknown. And a remarkably clever
person, too, I can tell you, sergeant. He's struck a new
line in murders — at this late stage in the game."
The two officials were completely taken aback by
this bold statement.
"There's just one other thing," Sir Clinton continued.
"Go over that car with a small-toothed comb if neces-
sary; but see that you don't miss a piece of the rim of a
pair of horn-rimmed spectacles. That would come in
very handy, if you can lay your hands on it. But I
doubt if it's there. One can't expect to have all the
possible luck."
Ledbury recovered quickly enough from this second
surprise.
"You read all that from the things you saw, sir?"
he asked.
"Yes, you've seen everything for yourself. I know no
more than you do. I'll explain it, if you like."
The sergeant hurriedly put up his hand to check the
impending revelation.
"No, sir. Just wait a moment, if you please. If it's a
murder case — you're not having a joke, I take it? —
then it's the first murder case that's come my way. I've
often wondered how I'd shape, if anything of that sort
did happen hereabouts. Now, if you were to tell me all
about it, there wouldn't be much for me in it, would
there? I mean, I'd like to feel I hadn't just been led by
the nose, you see? If it's all there, I'd like to have a
chance of thinking it out for myself and comparing
notes with you later on, if I may. There'd be more of


76
GRIM VENGEANCE
what you might call intellectual satisfaction that way."
Sir Clinton felt more convinced than before that
Ledbury was a man after his own heart. He liked inde-
pendence of mind when it was coupled with efficiency.
"Quite right, sergeant. I'd feel the same myself."
Ledbury's face showed that he took this as a compli-
ment.
"But remember, sergeant," Sir Clinton added, "one
can't afford to lose time in a murder case. If you find
you don't tumble to it quickly, then ring me up and
I'll give you my notions for what they're worth. In any
case, I'd like to hear your interpretation."
Ledbury was evidently pleased by this.
"I'd like to talk it over with you, sir. You think
there's no reason why we shouldn't let Teddy Barford
out now? If we've really made a mistake in locking
him up, then the sooner he's let out, the less fuss he's
likely to make."
Sir Clinton gave Ledbury a good mark for that "we,"
since the detention of Barford had been contrary to his
own wishes. The sergeant might not like Peel, but he
had refrained from shuffling the burden of the mistake
on to the constable's shoulders, as he might have done.
"Well, I think that's all we have to do here," he said,
by way of closing the affair. "If you happen to have a
camera handy you might photograph the smash-up be-
fore you shift things. It's as well to have a permanent
record. And, now, if you'll get aboard, I'll run you into
Raynham Parva so that you can get a cart or some-
thing to fetch away the body as soon as possible.
There's no need to leave it here any longer."


CHAPTER VI: A NEW LINE IN MURDERS
A few minutes sufficed to take Ledbury into Raynham
Parva and drop him at the entrance to the police
station. So long as the sergeant was with' him Sir Clinton
showed no sign that he had anything on his mind;
but as he drove back through the village again towards
Fern Lodge, he was free to concentrate on a problem
which the Quevedo affair had suggested to him; and
it was evident that he found it but little to his liking.
Ledbury would, of course, release Teddy Barford at
the earliest possible moment; and Sir Clinton felt that
he could relieve Staffin's anxiety on this score as soon
as an opportunity presented itself. He had seen enough,
on the scene of the disaster, to feel sure that Barford
could be exculpated. Only the ill-controlled zeal of Con-
stable Peel had thrown suspicion on the man; and, on
the facts of the case, no jury would feel justified in
bringing in a verdict against him. That side of the affair
was as good as closed.
When Sir Clinton drove up the approach from the
gate of Fern Lodge, he noticed that Francia had re-
turned to the lawn and that two girls were there also,
along with Elsie. As he passed them on his way to the
garage, his niece made a gesture inviting him to join
them; and as soon as he had put his car under cover, he
strolled across the grass towards the group.
Francia had a newspaper in his hand, from which he
appeared to have been reading aloud to the girls; and


78 GRIM VENGEANCE
Sir Clinton saw that he had a pair of large, tortoise-
shell-rimmed spectacles on his nose, which markedly
altered his appearance. Catching sight of Sir Clinton,
he put down the newspaper and folded up his glasses,
storing them away in his pocket. As her uncle came
up, Elsie introduced him to the two strangers.
"My uncle. This is Miss Anstruther, uncle . . . and
Miss Noreen Anstruther."
Sir Clinton's glance passed from the grey eyes of the
elder girl to the brown ones of her sister; and the
impression he got was one which pleased him. Frank-
ness and naturalness were two qualities which he rated
highly; and both girls seemed to have them in full
measure.
"A nice, straight pair," was his mental verdict. "Not
much cash to spend on their clothes, evidently; but
they've got good taste and they've done the best with
what they have. No cheap shoes and stockings to ruin
the effect."
He looked round, and was about to seat himself when
his niece cautioned him.
"Mind that chair, uncle. It's the rickety one, so don't
drop into it with a thud."
Sir Clinton inspected the camp-chair dubiously,
tested it, and then seated himself gingerly.
"Don't let me interrupt," he suggested to Francia,
with a glance at the dropped newspaper.
Francia waved the matter aside.
"It is only a copy of El Diario which I got by the post
this morning," he explained. "I was translating some
of the news for the ladies. As they are going out to my
country, I thought it might amuse them to hear some-
thing of what is going on there at present."
He dismissed the matter with a shrug of his shoulders


A NEW LINE IN MURDERS 79
which accentuated that foreign appearance to which
Mrs. Thornaby took exception.
"Going out to the Argentine, are you?" Sir Clinton
asked lazily, turning to the two girls. "May I smoke?
. . . Thanks . . . Funny thing, everybody I meet
nowadays seems to be going out to the Argentine."
He lighted a cigarette, after offering his case.
"My niece nearly persuaded me to go myself," he
added.
"My uncle's promised to come out later on," Elsie
told the two girls. "Miss Anstruther and her sister are
going to stay with us at first, uncle. Vincent thought it
would be more comfortable for them. They're going out
to take an engagement that Vincent's arranged for
them."
"I'm a fiddler," Linda Anstruther explained, "and
my sister plays the piano. Mr. Francia very kindly
secured some engagements for us over there. It's so
hard to get anything in this country, nowadays, when
one isn't first-class."
"You don't sound like a misunderstood genius," Sir
Clinton interjected with a smile. "I've met very few
musical people who would admit frankly that they
weren't worth a place at the top if they had their
rights."
"Miss Anstruther's very good indeed, uncle. Wait
till you hear her play," Elsie put in. "He's not really a
Philistine," she added, turning to the girls, "but he's
got a cold, hard mind, and all that sort of thing,
you know. See-things-as-they-are-and-draw-the-proper-
inferences."
"Just so, as my friend Sergeant Ledbury would say.
Get hold of the right end of the stick, no matter who's
at the other end. It's his look-out."


80
GRIM VENGEANCE
"He can't keep away from it," Elsie complained in
mock vexation. "I haven't seen him for months and
months, you know; and we'd just settled down to have
a talk this morning when this sergeant-person put his
nose in at the gate. Off you went, uncle, without a
second thought for your affectionate niece. No, you
needn't apologise, really. No afterthoughts, by request.
You can tell us about it, if you like, though."
Sir Clinton threw a glance at Francia, but the
Argentiner chanced to be looking in another direction.
Evidently he had not thought it necessary to tell Elsie
any details of the sergeant's visit.
"There was nothing much in it," Sir Clinton ex-
plained. "A motor-smash, and the sergeant wanted
some help over a minor point."
With the tail of his eye he saw Francia glance sharply
across, as though he had been taken by surprise.
"It was our car that has been damaged," Francia
explained smoothly to Elsie. "I lent it to a — to an
acquaintance; and he has unfortunately come to grief
with it. I am afraid it will not be fit to use for some
time?"
His interrogation was evidently addressed to Sir
Clinton.
"No, not for a while, I'm afraid. You can use mine
any time you want to, Elsie," Sir Clinton suggested.
If Francia wished to spare the girls the news of
Quevedo's death, there seemed no reason for bringing
it out. They were sure to hear of it sooner or later; but
there was no need to speak of it just then.
"Oh, yours will do quite well," Elsie assured her
uncle. "It's lucky you're here just now."
"Yes, isn't it?" Sir Clinton retorted ironically. "As
the owner of a spare car, I'm a positive asset."


A NEW LINE IN MURDERS
81
Before his niece could reply, Johnnie appeared at the
front door and, espying his uncle, ran to them across
the lawn.
"I say, uncle! I've got the box all unpacked. Some
of the things are just what I wanted. And thanks ever
so much for them. But, I say, uncle, one of the motors
has got a plug for the electric power, and the plug won't
fit our plug-holes. Mother said I wasn't to go fiddling
about with it myself. I was to bring it to you and see if
you would do something with it. Will you come now?
I want to see the motor working."
Sir Clinton rose with a gesture of apology to his com-
panions.
"We'll have a dash at it, Johnnie. I daresay there will
be a spare plug somewhere about the house which will
work all right. Come along."
Johnnie, delighted at his success in cutting out his
prize under the very guns of the enemy, carried off Sir
Clinton in triumph to the house.
"I've got all my stuff in the smoke-room, uncle," he
explained. "Nobody uses the place much, you see;
and it's got a big table in it that's just right for setting
things up. I can build up what I want, there, without
people coming fussing round and telling me to clear my
things away. Here's the place."
He ushered Sir Clinton into a big, light, airy room
furnished with comfortably cushioned cane chairs,
which lent a summery aspect to the place. Opposite the
door, a broad window overlooked the lawns before the
house; to the right, the wall was broken by a French
window giving access to a verandah, and by a second
window. Between the windows stood Johnnie's table,
littered with Meccano parts and tools.
Sir Clinton crossed the room and, glancing from the


82
GRIM VENGEANCE
window on the verandah side, found that it overlooked
a little lake with wooded sides.
"That's the lake I told you about, uncle," Johnnie
informed him, rather unnecessarily. "Down on the left
there, you can just see the roof of the boat-house.
There's a roller-slip for putting the boats into the
water, and a lot of pulleys and tackle for hauling them
up again. It's as easy as anything. I can bring my boat
up myself."
Sir Clinton seemed interested in the view for a mo-
ment. Then he glanced absently at a row of books
which stood rather untidily on the sill of the window,
and mechanically he shifted one or two of them so as
to bring them into order. Johnnie failed to notice his
uncle's preoccupation.
"Here's that motor, uncle. Look, it's got a plug on
the wire like these ones they put on electric irons. It
won't fit our wall-plugs."
Sir Clinton's introspection came to an end abruptly.
He glanced at the plug which Johnnie held up.
"There's bound to be a spare plug lying about the
house somewhere. Let's see . . ."
He moved across the room to the bell and rang.
"If we can't find one on the premises, I daresay we
can pick one up in the village," he suggested. "If not
we'll take out the car later on and hunt one up some-
where."
Staffin appeared in answer to the bell's summons,
and Sir Clinton turned to her with a glance which
warned her that he wished to speak to her alone.
"I need a spare plug for the power-circuit. Where do
they keep them?" he asked.
Staffin evidently understood what he wanted.
"I think there are some in a drawer in the pantry


A NEW LINE IN MURDERS 85
answering questions just now. Come along. Which is
the way to the boat-house?"
Johnnie, overjoyed to learn that he was to have his
uncle's company for longer yet, led the way through
the French window and down the path to the little
landing-stage at the edge of the lake. The prohibition
which accompanied the invitation did not trouble him
much. He had been trained to keep quiet when his
uncle was in an uncommunicative mood. Merely to
have Sir Clinton's company was a treat in itself.
Though it was of no great extent, the lake was not
without variety; and Johnnie managed to display most
of its features in the course of his row. Sometimes the
boat explored a cool inlet overhung with trees, where
Johnnie shipped his oars and, leaning perilously over-
side, studied the bottom in search of trout. Farther on,
they coasted banks where the green turf ran clear to
the water's edge; or again they slid into forests of high
swishing reeds among which Johnnie entangled his
oars. Very occasionally Sir Clinton dropped a remark
which showed that his eyes were alert; but Johnnie was
not tempted to prolong any conversation which sprang
up. He knew the symptoms of his uncle's mood, and he
suppressed his desire for talk.
An ordinary oarsman would have made the circuit
of the lake in a very short time; but Johnnie's rowing
technique was in the elementary stage; and when he
had completed his somewhat leisurely exploration it
was lunch-time. They tied up the boat at the tiny
landing-stage and went back to the house. Sir Clinton
was still in his uncommunicative mood; and Johnnie
could see that the problem, whatever it was, had not
been solved. During luncheon, Sir Clinton roused him-
self, as politeness required, and seemed to shake off his


86
GRIM VENGEANCE
concentration. Without showing it, he studied Francia
and attempted to draw him out. But the Argentiner
had the knack of bringing other people into a conver-
sation instead of talking himself; and Sir Clinton
learned little more about him than he already knew.
Late in the afternoon, Sergeant Ledbury presented
himself again; and from his expression it seemed clear
that he was not ill-pleased with the way in which he
had spent the day. Sir Clinton took him to the smoke-
room, which offered the best chance of privacy.
"Well, sergeant, got to the bottom of it yet?" he
asked, with obvious interest.
Ledbury shook his head cautiously. It was clear that
he did not propose to boast of his results.
"I think I see my way through some of it, sir. That's
as far as I'd care to go."
"Suppose we go that length together, then?" Sir
Clinton suggested. "Let's compare notes. You let me
have your theory of the business, and I'll tell you if we
happen to differ on any point."
The sergeant seated himself in response to a gesture
from his host, pulled out a notebook, and glanced over
some entries.
"Well, sir," he explained, looking up again at Sir
Clinton, "I started with the car tracks."
"So did I," Sir Clinton admitted.
"There were five of them altogether," the sergeant
continued after a nod of acknowledgment. "First of
all there was the trail of the car that passed while Peel
was on guard over the smash-up this morning. We can
disregard that, seeing that Peel saw it go by without
doing anything."
He glanced at Sir Clinton as though seeking confir-
mation of this before continuing.


A NEW LINE IN MURDERS 87
"Its tyres were different from all the rest," Sir Clin-
ton interjected, "so it's reasonable to leave it out of the
case. It wasn't one of the other cars coming back, or
anything of that sort. We needn't bother about it."
"That leaves four tracks," the sergeant proceeded.
"One of them was your own track, made when you
arrived here last night. A bit along the road, near the
village, the track of Quevedo's car crosses your track.
That confirms what you said this morning — that you
met Quevedo coming out of the village."
Sir Clinton's expression showed that he was in no
way offended by this.
"That's very sound, sergeant. You were quite right
to check everything and take nobody's word for any
point. I'd have been glad to have had you under me
when I was in the police myself. Nothing like testing
things and taking nothing for granted. Next?"
"That leaves three tracks: Barford's, Quevedo's,
and the track of the man who reversed in the avenue.
I took Barford's trail next, sir. Now you'll remember
that Barford's track went straight on without a check
until he pulled up sharp just beyond the site of the
smash. That meant that he'd never got out of his car
until the smash was over — that's obvious, isn't it?"
"Quite, 1 think," Sir Clinton conceded willingly.
"Just so," Ledbury continued. "But it struck me
that one man in a motor mightn't need to get out of his
car if he wanted to kill another man in a second car.
He might do it either of two ways."
Sir Clinton became obviously alert.
"You're getting interesting, sergeant. This is good
stuff. Go on."
"The way I look at it," Ledbury pursued, with
obvious pleasure at the compliment, "is this. Barford


88
GRIM VENGEANCE
might have driven up level with Quevedo and hit him
a bat on the head in passing. That's not outside the
possibilities. But there's two things against that notion,
as I found when I went into things. First of all, I know
enough about first aid and ambulance work to find out
for myself whether a man's skull's gone. I looked care-
fully; and there's nothing wrong with Quevedo's skull.
What he died from was loss of blood from the glass
cuts so far as I can see. Besides, if you were driving a
car and someone hit you a bat on the head, you'd lose
control of the wheel and your car would swerve."
He glanced interrogatively at Sir Clinton, who
nodded in confirmation.
"Just so," Ledbury went on. "Now there wasn't a
sign of a swerve in Quevedo's track, so far as I could
see — not a big swerve, anyhow. The track wasn't dead
straight; but no motor track ever is dead straight, any-
how. It was as near straight as one usually sees 'em. So
that put out of court any notion that Quevedo was
killed at the wheel from a passing car."
"I'm quite with you there," Sir Clinton commented.
"Now what about your second possibility about Bar-
ford's behaviour?"
"Well, it's this way, sir. Suppose, I thought, that
Barford had been coming along full tilt behind Que-
vedo and had made up on him. Wouldn't it have been
possible, with both of them travelling at a fair lick, for
Barford just to draw level and then begin scrounging,
so to speak. I mean edging in towards Quevedo's car
until he forced him into the ditch. That would fit the
long, smooth curve of Quevedo's track, edging in and
in towards his own side of the road until he got his near
wheel into the ditch, wouldn't it?"
"Undoubtedly it would," Sir Clinton admitted. "But


A NEW LINE IN MURDERS
89
I'll tell you what it won't fit. I noticed that Teddy Bar-
ford's track overlay Quevedo's track for most of the
way. I mean that Barford's near wheels were running
between the tracks of Quevedo's wheels. Whence it's
obvious that Barford came along almost in Quevedo's
track, and that he only passed him, as the crossing of
the tracks shows, after Quevedo had gone to smash."
"Oh, you noticed that, did you, sir? I thought it was
a bit of discovery of my own. Things are as you say,
and that put the lid on any notion that Teddy Barford
killed Quevedo without getting out of the car."
"You've been very thorough, sergeant, I see. Go on."
"Well, if Teddy didn't kill Quevedo up to that stage,
there's no case against Teddy. He didn't knock him on
the head, like Peel wants to make out; for I've exam-
ined Quevedo's skull and there's no sign of any knock
on it heavy enough to finish him. And Teddy didn't cut
Quevedo's throat or anything of that sort, while he was
lying on the ground; for there isn't a trace of blood on
his hands or his clothes. Lucky for him he hated
Quevedo, sir. If it had been an ordinary man, Teddy
would have been trying to lend a hand and got all
mucked up with blood in doing it. It wouldn't have
been as clear a case."
"So Barford's cleared, in your opinion?"
"Quite cleared, sir. I'm glad of it. And now, sir, we
come to the track of the man who reversed into the
avenue entrance. The way I reasoned it out was this.
He arrived there, coming from Raynham Parva direc-
tion. I've traced his tracks and they turn off into a side-
road a bit along the main road. I can't trace 'em farther
than that, for there's been a lot of new metal laid down
thereabouts lately and the surface is bad for tracks.
I've followed him up as far as I could go on a bicycle;


90 GRIM VENGEANCE
but in the end the tracks disappeared, and when I tried
the side-roads I found nothing. He turned off some-
where or other and got clear away."
Sir Clinton nodded without speaking.
"Well, I had to give it up," Ledbury went on. "All
I had to go on was the tracks round about the avenue
gate. Here's what I made of them."
"Wait a bit," Sir Clinton interrupted. "It'll be easier
if we give this man a name. Call him Mr. Jones for the
present. It saves words."
"Jones, sir? Very well," Ledbury acquiesced, with a
broad smile. "This Jones, then, came along the road
before Quevedo, but after you'd passed last night. I
checked that up by the overlaying of the tracks when
they happened to cross. It was clear enough in one or
two places. And that confirmed your statement, sir,
that this Jones wasn't at the avenue gate with his car
when you passed there yourself."
He glanced slyly at Sir Clinton to see if this hit was
acknowledged.
"Go on," Sir Clinton suggested. "Truth-telling at
the right time is one of my accomplishments, sergeant.
It hardly calls for comment."
Slightly damped, Ledbury continued his exposition.
"The way I look at it is this. The Jones man came
along the road in front of Quevedo. For some reason or
other, he decided to turn back, and he drove into the
end of the avenue. Then he began to reverse out. Just
as he'd got his car broadside across the road, Quevedo
came along in his car. This Jones, seeing Quevedo's
lights started to drive back into the avenue entrance so
as to clear the road. Meanwhile, Quevedo had seen the
obstruction and pulled up. After the Jones man had


92 GRIM VENGEANCE
got," he confessed. "I don't somehow seem able to fit
anything more into place. I'd like to hear how you
worked it out yourself. If it's really a murder, then
there's no time to be lost, I know, and it doesn't seem
quite straight to go muddling along myself when you've
got something up your sleeve that might help."
Sir Clinton could appreciate Ledbury's position.
"I daresay if you'd had a little more time, sergeant,
you'd have worked things out a bit further. We've been
much on the same lines of thought so far, apparently;
and at one or two points you've been more thorough
than I was."
"I had more time, sir."
"Well," Sir Clinton continued, brushing this aside,
"what you haven't fitted in yet, so far as I remember,
are three things at any rate, or perhaps four: the open
throttle, the two bits of glass we found amongst the
debris, and the blood on the inside of the car."
Ledbury's sudden gesture betrayed his vexation as
this last item was mentioned.
"Now I see it, sir. I was a bit of an ass," he added
ruefully.
Then his face, which had cleared for a moment, be-
came puzzled again.
"I'm not sure I see it rightly yet, sir," he confessed.
"You mean, don't you, that if Quevedo got cut by being
thrown through the windscreen, then he'd have bled
outside the car and not inside? His blood would have
been on the grass and not on the floor and seats of the
car? That's right enough, now I come to see it; but it
doesn't seem to get us much forrarder, does it?"
"Perhaps not," Sir Clinton conceded. "It certainly
doesn't get me so far that 1 can tell you much about the
murderer. You won't be able to arrest him without a


94 GRIM VENGEANCE
wheels were deep where he stood the first time, as I
pointed out to you."
Ledbury made a gesture of acknowledgment.
"I'd forgotten that point, sir. Stupid of me."
"From that spot, Mr. Jones could see down the road
towards Raynham Parva. It's a straight, level stretch,
you remember. By and by, he sees the lights of a motor
coming along; and at once he lets his car run out,
blocking the road. If it turns out to be a stranger,
there's no harm done. All Mr. Jones needed to do was
to apologise for blocking the road, and drive his car
back into the avenue to clear the way for the other
man. No one would think twice about a thing of that
sort. The other driver would see Mr. Jones was turn-
ing his car. Quite an innocent thing to do. The blocking
of the road would look quite accidental."
"I see," Ledbury hastened to interject. "Go on, sir.
What happened next?"
"As it chanced, there was no hitch of that sort. The
first car that came along was Quevedo's. Everything
happened according to plan: Mr. Jones ran his car out,
blocked Quevedo's car, and made Quevedo pull up.
That was what he wanted. He left his own car still
blocking the road, got out, and walked over to Que-
vedo's car as if he wanted to ask something. There
would be no great difficulty in keeping out of the direct
line of Quevedo's headlights — at any rate, he could
keep his face from being thrown up clear by the glare.
He walked over, then, quite naturally; and Quevedo
would suspect nothing. Mr. Jones, I think, had in his
hand the bottom of a bottle with the upper part broken
away to leave a cutting edge."
Sergeant Ledbury brought his open hand down on
his knee with a slap.


Anew line in murders 95
"That's it!" he exclaimed. "But I never came near
seeing it till you pointed it out, sir."
"This is only a bit of fiction, remember, sergeant.
I can't guarantee that it's accurate. I think I ought to
have mentioned that Mr. Jones had taken some trouble
to avoid being recognised by Quevedo. That's a very
shaky bit of theorising, however, so don't lay too much
stress on it. Some people have normal sight in one eye
and weak sight in the other; and consequently they
wear spectacles with a lens on one side and a plain glass
on the other. Possibly the murderer was like that. But
horn-rimmed spectacles change a man's appearance
markedly, specially, if you shave off a moustache as
well; and, on the facts of the case, I'm inclined to think
that the spectacles were a bit of disguise. The murderer
wanted to be able to pass muster as a stranger for a
few seconds — all the time that he needed for his
work."
"You mean Quevedo knew him well, sir?"
"It might be a case of a homicidal maniac, of
course," Sir Clinton admitted. "If it were, then the first
motorist who came along would have served as a vic-
tim and there would be no point in disguise. But, on
the facts of the case, I think it's safer to leave the homi-
cidal maniac as a last resource and to assume that it
was a case of Mr. Jones paying off a score. In that case,
it's most probable that Quevedo knew him and would
be on his guard if he recognised Mr. Jones at the first
glance. Hence the need for a disguise which would pass
muster for just a few seconds, even if it wasn't good
enough to stand lengthy examination."
Ledbury showed his agreement by a nod.
"And what happened next, sir? I think I can guess."
"It's pretty obvious, isn't it, provided you swallow


96 GRIM VENGEANCE
the initial hypothesis? Mr. Jones walked up to the side
of Quevedo's car, bent over as if to say something —
and then a single slash of the sharpened edge of the
broken bottle opened Quevedo's jugular neatly. A glass-
cut, you see."
"A razor would have done the job just as well, and
it'd be a handier thing to use, sir," the sergeant ob-
jected.
"Yes," Sir Clinton conceded, "but a razor has a
nasty knack of keeping blood-stains round about the
handle — round about the pivot of the blade, where
you can't clean them away without breaking the whole
thing to bits. A microscopic examination would show
up the blood corpuscles. So, if you happened to be
caught with that kind of razor in your possession, you'd
be in Queer Street. And if you threw it away imme-
diately, a razor lying by the roadside is a thing that
might attract notice. Mr. Jones was cleverer than that,
I think. He meant the whole affair to look like an ac-
cident, pure and simple; and he wasn't going to leave
any link with himself, such as a weapon."
"I see your point, sir. By the way, 1 think I'll have a
look round about the lodge gate and see if I can't pick
up that broken bottle. It ought to have blood on it."
Sir Clinton interjected a caution.
"Don't under-estimate your man, sergeant. Would
you yourself just pitch a blood-stained bit of bottle
over the hedge at the very point where people would
look for it?"
Ledbury's face fell.
"No, I wouldn't," he admitted. "But there's no harm
in being thorough, is there?"
"Of course not. But, if I'd been Mr. Jones, I'd have
had a thermos flask in my car, and I'd have washed


A NEW LINE IN MURDERS
97
the bottle before throwing it away, say, a mile or so up
the road. As it was, poor Mr. Jones had hard luck with
his bottle."
"You mean it broke when he was cutting Quevedo's
throat, sir, and that chip with the bubbles in it got
snapped off — the bit I found on the floor-boards?"
"I don't profess to know exactly how the chip got
split off. It may have been as you say; or Quevedo may
have struggled and the bottle got knocked against the
side of the car. The certain thing is that the chip was
left behind. You must remember, sergeant, that Mr.
Jones was in a hurry. That's obvious, or he wouldn't
have left part of his spectacle glass lying about. But
when you're standing on a public road with a murdered
victim beside you, and a chance that someone may
come along any moment, I don't suppose you can spare
time to do everything you'd like to."
"That's so, sir. He must have been a smart lad, even
with these little slips in his scheme."
"Very smart indeed to invent a new line in murders,"
Sir Clinton agreed, with something suspiciously like
admiration in his tone. "I expect Quevedo struggled a
bit and accidentally knocked the spectacles off Mr.
Jones's nose. In falling, they must have hit the gear-
lever, or something; and the plain glass got smashed.
Mr. Jones was" hurried. He had to get the rest of his
little play staged before anyone came along. So he
grabbed the spectacle-frame, felt one of the glasses in-
tact, and perhaps hadn't time to bother about the rest.
It was going to be covered up and lost in a pile of
smashed glass anyhow, later on; and I expect he just
let it go at that, rather than waste time hunting about.
By the way, did anything occur to you about the
wound, sergeant?"


Anew line in murders 99
cause he had to jump off; and he wasn't going to risk a
tumble at high speed. So he put in the third speed,
opened the throttle full, so as to brisk up the car dur-
ing the rest of its run and ensure a fine smash at the
end. Then he put the wheel as straight as he
could, jumped off, and left the car flying up the
road at increasing speed. It was bound to take the ditch
on one side of the road or other before long; and there
was a stone wall on each side which would ensure a
good smash-up of the windscreen. I expect he'd
counted on Quevedo being left in the driving-seat in-
stead of being thrown out. Then the blood on the floor-
boards would have been neatly accounted for."
"He must have been a bit mucked up with the blood
when he got into the car beside Quevedo's body," the
sergeant reflected unpleasantly.
"I expect he was wearing a light driving-coat or one
of these linen overall things. That would shield his own
clothes, and when he got well away in his own car he
could get out and burn the blood-stained coat with the
help of a little petrol. And he could wash his hands in
some stream or other. Now, I think that finishes my
effort in fiction, sergeant. What do you make of the
villain of the piece?"
Ledbury pondered for a full half-minute before tak-
ing up the challenge.
"If you're right, sir, then I'd say he was very likely
something like this. He was somebody who knew Que-
vedo before. That might mean a foreigner. Or again it
mightn't. H'm! That's not much help, is it?"
"Not if you* put it that way," Sir Clinton admitted,
with a broad smile. "But go on, sergeant."
"He must have known Quevedo was going to London
last night, so he must have had some sort of informa-


100
GRIM VENGEANCE
tion about Quevedo's movements. If he had a grudge
against Quevedo, he'd hardly have shown up much be-
fore the murder for fear of putting Quevedo on his
guard. That means there's a confederate somewhere,
perhaps. This Jones must have had pretty up-to-date
news."
Sir Clinton hesitated a moment as though about to
interrupted. He was not quite sure whether he should
divulge the facts about Staffin and Teddy Barford to
the sergeant. One point which might be of importance
later was involved; but, at the moment, a knowledge
of it would hardly help Ledbury, so Sir Clinton de-
cided to say nothing about it at that juncture.
"Yes?" he prompted the sergeant.
"He might be wearing horn-rimmed glasses with one
plain glass and one lens," Ledbury pursued. "Or,
again," he added regretfully, "he mightn't wear glasses
at all."
"True," Sir Clinton confirmed solemnly.
"Then he might be a medical man. But perhaps he
wasn't. Really, sir," Ledbury commented in an ag-
grieved voice, "these notions of yours sound all right,
but they don't somehow seem to lead anywhere par-
ticular, do they?"
"He has a car," Sir Clinton suggested.
"Yes, he has a car all right," Ledbury admitted, "but
its tyres are worn smooth and that doesn't help much,
does it? How many people in this country are running
round in cars with well-worn tyres, sir?"
"Quite a lot, I suppose," Sir Clinton said, laughing
at the sergeant's expression. "Poor Mr. Jones! He's
had hard luck. If it hadn't been for Peel's grudge
against Barford, no one would have dreamed for a
moment that it was a case of murder. Mr. Jones would


A NEW LINE IN MURDERS 101
have got clear away with it. Everyone would have put
it down as a purely accidental smash. Hard lines on
poor Mr. Jones."
"I wasn't suggesting you hadn't cleared things up a
lot, sir," Ledbury hastened to explain. "As you say, it'd
have passed as a plain motor-smash easily enough. But
I don't somehow seem to have much to take hold of
with it all. I get no sort of notion of what this Jones
was like, if you understand me. If this is the sort of
thing one finds in a murder case, then I hope this one'll
be my last. I don't seem to make much of a fist of it,
and that's the truth."
"You're under-estimating yourself, sergeant. You
didn't expect to lay hands on Mr. Jones in ten minutes,
surely?"
"Well, sir, they say that if a murderer gets twenty-
four hours' start, it's mighty difficult to prevent him
getting away with it."
"It depends on what you mean by 'twenty-four hours
start,' sergeant. That might mean one thing to some
people and quite a different thing to other people. Don't
get discouraged. You've gone the right way to work, so
far, if that's any satisfaction to you. It's more than a
good many people can say for themselves."
Ledbury seemed slightly cheered up by this compli-
ment.
"Well, sir," he said, as he rose to leave the room, "I
suppose something may turn up that'll suggest some-
thing, perhaps. I'll have a hunt around for the broken
bottle, anyhow; and I'll see if I can get word of any
burnt place where this Jones man could have been de-
stroying his coat. That might point to which road he
took when he went off, at any rate; and that would
always be something done."


102
GRIM VENGEANCE
He moved over towards the door, but suddenly came
back again.
"It slipped my memory, sir," he explained. "There's
a young gentleman staying at the Black Bull just now.
A Mr. Brandon. He was talking to me — very pleasant-
spoken, he is — and it seems he knows you. He asked
me to let you know he was in the village when I saw
you."
"Tall, clean-shaven, fair-haired, blue eyes?" Sir
Clinton inquired, making certain of the identity.
"Yes, sir. That's him."
"Thanks, sergeant. I'll ring him up and leave a
message if he's out."
"Then that's all, sir," Ledbury said, turning again
towards the door. "I've just got to see Mr. Francia
again, to make sure of one or two little points."
Sir Clinton nodded; and, as Ledbury left the room,
he walked across to where the telephone stood on a
small table close to the door.


CHAPTER VII: THE AGENT 7-DH
The freshness of the air tempted Sir Clinton to halt
under the porch of Fern Lodge when he came out of the
house next morning on his way to keep an appointment
with Rex Brandon at the Black Bull Hotel. For a mo-
ment his glance swept over the lawns, from which a
heavy dew had just been lifted by the sun; then he
turned towards the water. The surface of the little lake
was untroubled in that still air, save where Johnnie's
boat left its long ripple-track; and, as Sir Clinton
watched, even this died away. Johnnie shipped his oars,
fitted a rod together, and began to fish.
Sir Clinton watched his nephew's efforts for a while
with sympathetic interest, making mental notes for
some hints for improvement in the boy's technique.
The minutes slipped past unnoticed, for Sir Clinton
lingered on in the hope that Johnnie might fluke a catch
while he was watching. At last, however, a glance at his
watch showed him that he had idled longer than he had
meant to do; by that time it was too late to walk into
Raynham Parva if he meant to keep his appointment.
He had still time enough in hand to be punctual if he
took his car; so, abandoning his original plan, he
turned towards the garage.
Rex Brandon was evidently on the qui vive; for, as
the car slowed down at the entrance to the Black Bull,
he was standing on the steps of the hotel in conversa-
tion with a dark, clean-shaven stranger. Catching sight


THE AGENT J - D H 105
you might introduce me," he suggested. "He must feel
rather a fish out of water in a place like this."
Rex acquiesced with a gesture; and for a time Sir
Clinton drove on in silence. It was too early to think of
drawing any inferences yet; but the presence of a third
foreigner in a tiny place like Raynham Parva seemed
to furnish food for thought. There would be no harm in
cultivating Dr. Roca's acquaintance, since chance had
thrown him into Sir Clinton's way.
For some minutes, Rex Brandon seemed to have fal-
len into a taciturnity which was foreign to his normal
character; but at last, with an obvious pretence of in-
difference, he threw out a question.
"Elsie's at Fern Lodge, sir?"
Sir Clinton had no particular desire to guide the con-
versation ih this field. He contented himself with a
confirmatory nod. Rex relapsed again into silence for
a while.
"What sort of a man is her husband, sir?" he asked
at length, in a casual tone which seemed to cost him
something of an effort.
"About your height, dark, brown eyes, rather suave
voice," Sir Clinton answered, with a deliberate avoid-
ance of the real purport of the question.
"H'm!"
Rex seemed doubtful whether to regard Sir Clinton's
answer as a snub or not. He gazed down the road in
front of the car, evidently hesitating about pursuing the
subject. Sir Clinton examined him with a swift side-
glance and felt a twinge of discomfort. Rex Brandon
was so obviously the sort of man Elsie ought to have
married, instead of picking out that foreign fellow with
his feline softness and his expertness in handling


io6
GRIM VENGEANCE
women. Rex, possibly, was not a deep person; his char-
acter had few reserves. But at least he could be trusted
to pick a sound line of behaviour and stick to it through
thick and thin. He had tenacity of the comprehensible
kind. Sir Clinton had known him before he was in his
teens and had tested him, as he tested most people.
Sound stuff. Somehow, compared with him, Francia
came out of it badly. His air of reticence contrasted so
markedly with Rex's frankness.
Sir Clinton's reflections were broken by Rex's voice.
From his tone, it was evident that he knew he was
venturing on thin ice.
"I mean, is he good enough for her and that sort of
thing?"
This was the very question which Sir Clinton had
been asking himself for the last twenty-four hours, and
it flicked him on the raw to have it put into audible
words.
"How should I know?" he demanded brusquely.
"I've only seen him a couple of times or so."
Rex was sharp enough to see the reservation in the
answer, but he evidently felt that he was overstepping
the bounds.
"I just wanted to know," he said, half-apologetically.
"Elsie's a good sort and . . ."
His voice trailed off into silence.
"It's done now," Sir Clinton pointed out.
If he meant to close the subject, he had chosen the
wrong line.
"I suppose it is," Rex admitted. "Didn't it come as a
bit of a surprise, sir? To me, it did. I'd never dreamed
of anything of the sort until I heard about it. Some
shock."
He watched Sir Clinton's face as he spoke, but the


THE AGENT 7 - D H 107
late Chief Constable had too much command over his
muscles to betray anything on his features. Rex, by
some sixth sense, seemed to read what was going on be-
hind the mask.
"Well, I hope she's happy, sir," he added, giving in
all innocence the final stab to Sir Clinton's feelings.
"She seems to be," Sir Clinton answered brutally.
Rex's questions were acting as irritants to his own
misgivings about Elsie's marriage; and in his reaction
he could not help rasping the feelings of the youngster
beside him.
"That's always something," Rex replied in the tone
of a man talking in order to conceal the fact that he has
had a severe shock. "In fact, I suppose, it's the main
thing. So long as she's happy, and he's a decent
sort . . ."
Sir Clinton felt the probe inserted clumsily into his
private feelings; but he had no grudge against Rex for
doing it. He knew the boy was torturing himself as
well as his listener when he put questions like that. Rex
had always wanted Elsie; and he wasn't the sort of per-
son to forget in a hurry or console himself at once with
the next best. This business would ruin his life for
years. Sir Clinton thought rapidly and came to a de-
cision. One might as well bring things to a head at once
and let the boy see the state of affairs with his own
eyes. Since Elsie was now out of his reach, the sooner
he recognised that the better. It would be a radical
cure; and it would save any further questions.
"Johnnie's taken to fishing nowadays, Rex," Sir
Clinton began after a pause. "It's the first real chance
he's had, and he seems to be keen. I haven't done any-
thing in that line myself for years now, and I'm so
hopelessly out of practice that I can't teach him


io8
GRIM VENGEANCE
properly. Could you drop your own fishing for a morn-
ing now and again and give him a bit of tutoring? I
hate to see him flogging the water as if he meant to
hurt it. He hasn't a notion of throwing a cast decently."
Rex looked doubtful, as Sir Clinton had expected.
"Well," he began grudgingly, "I daresay he wouldn't
be the worse of some help, or he'll get into bad habits."
A fresh idea seemed to strike him, and his face
cleared.
"Send him down to the Black Bull and I'll take him
out with me this afternoon. I'm going to fish a stream
quite near the village. It won't be far for him to walk."
But this arrangement did not suit Sir Clinton's pur-
pose. He meant to bring Rex up to Fern Lodge.
"I think you'd better try the lake instead. It's not so
much a matter of catching anything: I want him taught
how to cast properly. When he rowed me round the
lake, I spotted the very place for that: a little promon-
tory near a stream. No trees or undergrowth, deepish
water close in shore, and just enough current from a
stream that comes in near by. The fly will float down
as nicely as you could wish. And, if he catches nothing
there, you can always give him a point or two about
trawling from the boat. There are plenty of trout,
though I don't suppose you'll find a salmon, naturally.
I'll fetch you in the car this afternoon. The sun will be
just about right then."
For a moment or two Rex hesitated, evidently torn
between conflicting desires. He wanted to keep away
from Fern Lodge and its might-have-beens; and yet
something was pulling him in the opposite direction.
Even if Elsie was out of his reach now, still he wanted
to see her again. Facts were facts, of course. His
romance had gone down the drain, as he phrased it


THE AGENT )-DH 109
bitterly to himself. Still, it would be interesting to see
what sort of man had beaten him. This thought gave
him the excuse which he felt he required in order to
justify his decision to himself. No harm in paying a
visit to the place. He had a good pretext, and he could
keep his feelings below the surface easily enough. To
Sir Clinton, Rex's face was an open book; and he care-
fully refrained from an interruption which might have
influenced the conflict. At last the balance swayed
definitely to one side.
"All right, then," Rex agreed. "I'll take Johnnie on,
if you think it'll be any help to him."
Then, as though to avoid the risk of changing his
mind if he dwelt further on the matter, Rex broke
abruptly into a fresh subject.
"You've been abroad lately, sir, haven't you?"
"Just back," Sir Clinton confirmed.
"Hope you had a good time?" Rex inquired per-
functorily.
"Not bad."
Once again Sir Clinton's habitual reticence about
his own affairs was of good service. Not even his sister
had suspected that his so-called "holiday" had really
been spent in a confidential mission for the Govern-
ment. But the subject was one best avoided, and Sir
Clinton bestirred himself to draw Rex off to other
topics. He succeeded so well that they were nearing
Raynham Parva again before Rex realised how quickly
the time had passed. As the village spire came in sight
round the shoulder of a hill, Sir Clinton thought it
well to give his companion a reminder.
"When we get back to the Black Bull, Rex, you
might hunt up your foreign friend and introduce me."
Rex, apparently, had not taken the earlier suggestion


no
GRIM VENGEANCE
on this point very seriously. He looked a little surprised.
"You really want it, sir? H'm! I don't guarantee
the lad. He may be a cough-drop for all I can tell.
Know him from Adam by the costume, of course, but
otherwise not."
"I'll take the risk; you do the rest," Sir Clinton re-
assured him.
At the Black Bull, Rex was fortunate enough to run
up against Dr. Roca in such a way as to make the in-
troduction of Sir Clinton seem a matter of mere chance.
When they came face to face, Sir Clinton was surprised
to find something familiar in the features of his new
acquaintance.
"Surely we must have met before?" he suggested.
"I'm almost certain I've seen your face somewhere,
Dr. Roca."
Roca smiled as though he saw some jest which was
concealed from the others.
"In bad company, perhaps?" he inquired innocently.
"I understand you are in the police, Sir Clinton."
But his remark had given the late Chief Constable
the clue for which he was searching in his memory.
"It was in bad company," he confirmed, in an in-
different tone. "You had a moustache then, hadn't
you? Shaving it off has made a lot of difference."
Roca smiled again.
"Sometimes a white sheep gets mixed up with a flock
of black ones."
A flash of comprehension passed over Sir Clinton's
face.
"League of Nations, you mean, perhaps?" he de-
manded.
"Exactly," Roca admitted. "I go by the name of
7-DH at headquarters."


THE AGENT 7-DH III
"H'm! That explains it, then."
Sir Clinton's tone was non-committal.
"Rather an unpleasant job, I should think," he
added, as though to keep the conversation going.
Roca nodded apathetically.
"A labour of love, in my case."
Then seeing Sir Clinton's brows twitched ever so
faintly, he hastened to make his meaning clearer.
"I see I've made what you English call a pun, I
think."
"Something of the sort," Sir Clinton agreed coldly.
Roca's face cleared.
"That was not what I meant at all. With me, the
business is a sort of mission, you understand — a kind
of crusade. I feel strongly . . ." He pulled himself up
for a moment, then went on with an assumption of
indifference. "You know the Centre, Sir Clinton. Now,
I am what you would call 'a decent sort of person' —
like most people. Which side am I likely to be on: for
the Centre or against it?"
Sir Clinton shrugged his shoulders as though dis-
missing the subject. Rex had listened to the conversa-
tion with growing astonishment, which betrayed itself
on his face. He was evidently completely out of his
depth, and was about to put a question when Sir Clinton
spoke again.
"I think you and I might have a talk later on, Dr.
Roca," he suggested, in a tone which definitely excluded
Rex from the matter.
Roca acquiesced with a gesture, and, as though
recognising that this particular subject was closed, he
began to speak of Raynham Parva and its surround-
ings.
"I suppose you're merely a bird of passage here?"


112
GRIM VENGEANCE
Sir Clinton inquired a short time later. "Drove past in
a car and happened to like the look of the place?"
"No," Roca explained. "I came by train from
Micheldean Abbas, some stations down the line. I am
looking for someone, as it happens; and I got word
that he might be in this neighbourhood."
Sir Clinton nodded, and glanced at his watch.
"Well, I must be going. I'll ring you up, Dr. Roca."
Then a thought seemed to strike him.
"I think, if I were you, I'd be inclined to say nothing
about the Centre in the meantime — to anyone."
Roca acquiesced with a gesture.
"I mentioned it to you merely to explain my position,
since you evidently knew me and might have got
wrong impressions."
"I understand," Sir Clinton admitted.
Then, with a nod of farewell to Rex, he went down
to his car.


CHAPTER VIII: THE CENTRE AND MAR-
CELLE BARRERE
Sir Clinton had no intention of letting the grass grow
under his feet before he learned more about his latest
acquaintance. The telephone put him in touch with Dr.
Roca that evening; and on the following morning he
drove to the Black Bull Hotel to keep the appointment
they had made. While Roca was being informed of
his arrival, Sir Clinton went to the desk; and, learning
that Rex Brandon had ^one out fishing earlier in the
day, he left a note telling him that Johnnie expected
his first lesson that afternoon.
When Dr. Roca appeared, Sir Clinton admitted to
himself that the doctor's personality made a favourable
impression. He succeeded in being cordial without ef-
fusiveness; and there was nothing furtive in the reserve
which underlay his outward affability. It suggested,
rather, the normal mental poise of the medical man
accustomed to deal with grave situations as they arise.
"Any particular part of the country you'd like to
see?" Sir Clinton inquired perfunctorily as they went
out to the motor.
He had brought the car mainly because it offered the
best chance of completely private conversation; and
his question had been put merely out of politeness.
Much to his surprise, Roca apparently had a clear pref-
erence; and the nature of his choice was rather unex-
pected.


ii4
GRIM VENGEANCE
"That's very good of you," the doctor hastened to
say. "I've been looking at a map of the district in the
hotel smoke-room, and I noticed, marked on it, a thing
I'd like to see, if it's all the same to you. It's called the
Bale Stones."
"Then we'll look it up," Sir Clinton agreed readily.
He opened the door-pocket and was extracting a map
when Roca stopped him with a gesture.
"It's all right," he explained. "I memorised the map.
I had meant to make the thing an excuse for a longish
promenade. If it suits you, I'll give you directions at
the turns in the road. The place is about seven miles
out from the village. I suppose that's not taking you
too far?"
"Not at all!" Sir Clinton replied as he started the
engine. "What sort of thing is it? I don't know much
about this district, since I only arrived a couple of
nights ago."
"I bought a guide-book and looked it up," Roca
answered, taking a cigar-case from his pocket. "It's
quite a landmark in this part of the country — a sort
of miniature Stonehenge. When I was already so near
it, I thought it might be worth the walk. But this is a
much easier way, thanks to your kindness."
"You're interested in archaeology?" Sir Clinton in-
quired.
"I find it interesting to compare your ancient monu-
ments with those in my own country."
"South America?" asked Sir Clinton at a venture.
"Yes, I was born in Las Flores, but I've been in the
north also."
Sir Clinton relaxed his pressure on the accelerator
and let the car slow down a trifle. He did not intend to
reach the Bale Stones until he had got some informa-


THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRERE 115
tion out of the doctor. Dropping archaeology abruptly,
he made a frontal attack.
"You said you were known as 7-DH, doctor. I didn't
care about discussing that sort of thing before young
Brandon; but I'm curious to know how a man of
your type got mixed up in a business of that kind.
You don't seem to fit in, if I may pay you the com-
pliment."
Roca smiled, as though his mind had been relieved
by Sir Clinton's words.
"I think you have changed your mind about me a
little, Sir Clinton. Otherwise, I cannot quite under-
stand how you come to have, in your car with you, the
. . . the pot-companion, shall we say? of Noel le
Bosco, La Pioche, and Angiola la Grecque, those dis-
tinguished ornaments of the White Slave Trade."
Sir Clinton neither confirmed nor denied Roca's as-
sertion.
"One of my hobbies is an interest in humanity in
general," he said, rather drily. "It puzzles me that a
man of your stamp should turn out to be 7-DH."
Roca's amusement seemed to have vanished.
"My employers tell me that the reports of 7-DH
have been very useful," he said indifferently. "They
are, at any rate, cheap. I pay my own expenses."
"Indeed?"
Sir Clinton's tone betrayed a mild surprise at this
rather unlooked-for piece of information. Roca pulled
at his cigar for a moment or two without speaking;
but at last he seemed to make up his mind on some
question.
"You have the knack of generating confidence in a
stranger, Sir Clinton," he began, turning to the ex-
Chief Constable. "In a small way, I have that gift


u6
GRIM VENGEANCE
myself; otherwise 7-DH would have secured much less
information. But that is beside the point."
Sir Clinton nodded. He began to wonder if Roca
really meant to allow himself to be drawn so easily.
The doctor's next words relieved his anxiety.
"I speak entirely in confidence, of course, as one
official to another. In a way, I can hardly help myself;
for already you have penetrated so far into my affairs
by a mere chance. Unless I tell you something more,
you will be inclined to be suspicious; and I cannot
afford to have people speculating at large round the
links between 7-DH and Dr. Esteban Roca. That
might destroy the usefulness of 7-DH; and it might
. also hamper Esteban Roca in his private affairs, which
would be a much more serious state of things from my
point of view. Much more serious."
He broke off to direct Sir Clinton into a side-road
which appeared at this point.
"We go along here for about a couple of miles," he
explained. "The next turn-off is at a cottage beside a
plantation."
Sir Clinton glanced at the milometer dial.
"I studied medicine at Cordoba," Roca continued,
"and for a time I was in practice. I did not need the
money — I was an orphan left with more than sufficient
for my needs; but I had an idea that I was doing hu-
manity a little service by giving it good advice and a
few drugs for next to nothing. Perhaps I was. Who
knows?"
Sir Clinton disregarded the rhetorical question and
waited patiently for Roca to come to business. The
doctor evidently guessed what was in his companion's
mind, for he laughed shortly.
"You think this very unimportant, Sir Clinton? But


THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRERE II7
it has a bearing on the rest of the story, so I tell it to
you. I had my illusions, you see. And, by and by, I
had a desire to increase my knowledge. I suppose most
young medical men — the ambitious ones, at any rate
— have, at the back of their minds, a picture of them-
selves standing beside the sick-bed of some King or
President and drawing a valuable life back from the
grave by their supreme skill. A pretty conceit, isn't
that true? It was mine, once."
There was a faint undertone of irony in his voice,
as though he were himself sneering at his youthful
visions.
"I determined to become a specialist — a great spe-
cialist, naturally. That comes cheap enough in dreams,
of course. The price for all seats is the same in that
theatre. So I threw up my little practice and set out
for Paris — slipping from one dream into the next."
He glanced at Sir Clinton's face.
"I fear I bore you," he said apologetically. "Noth-
ing is so tiresome as other people's dreams. But I am
coming to the point. I landed in Paris and set about a
post-graduate course. I was, to be sure, much older
than the ordinary carabines — the medical student —
but I was not too old to enjoy myself; and I had plenty
of work — work which I enjoyed. And always there
was the dream, you understand."
He sighed almost imperceptibly, and paused for a
moment, though with a complete absence of theatri-
cality.
"Then I met a girl — Marcelle Barrere. And by and
by I found that a second dream had fused itself upon
the older one. I fell in love, you understand? It hap-
pens to most of us. Marcelle fell in love with me. That
happens to most of us also. Like myself, she was an


n8
GRIM VENGEANCE
orphan. It was all plain sailing, as you English say. I
had enough money to make things smooth; I had the
dream of a career, you understand? and now I had
someone else to share my dream and make it seem
more real. And I had my little Marcelle, and yet other
dreams. Most auspicious. I think we turn to the left
here."
Sir Clinton swung the car into the by-road which
Roca indicated.
"And then, by some little accident, the dream turned
into a nightmare. Curious, is it not?"
His voice had gradually taken on a tone of irony, as
though he wished to guard himself from ridicule by
sharing in the jest himself.
"Even now I cannot recall precisely what led up to
it. It seems strange, doesn't it? that one can't remem-
ber the beginning of an affair which changed one's
life. Things happen like that, it appears. Anyhow,
Marcelle and I quarrelled over some trifle, some little
thing or other. We were both over-sensitive, probably.
You know how it is. She broke off our engagement and
I was too proud to give in. Things slipped out in anger,
of course. They always do. It's quite common. I must
have hurt her feelings badly. She refused to speak to
me again — a very ordinary lover's tiff, as you see. It
happens every day."
He paused again and examined the landscape.
"I think those must be the Bale Stones just round
the turn of the road," he pointed out. "Yes, there they
are, on the other side of the hedge. That's most con-
venient."
Sir Clinton pulled up the car and waited for a cue.
He was quite prepared to listen to the rest of Roca's
story. A certain stoicism in the man's voice had touched


THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRERE II9
him during the narrative. No Englishman would have
told such a tale to a stranger; but Roca had managed
to tell it without alienating sympathy. There was
something more than a little pathetic in his attempt to
cover his real feelings with a mask of irony; and that
saved him from any appearance of lachrymosity.
Roca seemed to overlook Sir Clinton's tacit offer to
hear the rest of the tale immediately. Instead of con-
tinuing, he opened the door and stepped out of the car;
so Sir Clinton had no choice but to follow him. The
doctor walked over to the hedge and inspected the
megaliths in what seemed a very casual manner.
"Very interesting," he commented in a tone which
almost suggested boredom.
"I think we can get into the field," Sir Clinton
pointed out. "There's a gap in the hedge farther
down."
He moved off along the road, and Roca followed him
perforce. But when they reached the standing stones,
it was evident that Roca's interest in them was en-
tirely superficial. Sir Clinton, who was always
thorough, made a careful inspection of the relic; and,
for his own amusement, endeavoured to guess at the
uses to which the temple had been put. Roca watched
him taking rough bearings of the temple axis and ex-
amining the whorl markings on the altar-stone; but
the whole affair was obviously of no direct interest to
the doctor. When Sir Clinton had satisfied his curi-
osity, Roca showed no reluctance to return to the car;
and soon they were on the road again.
"Suppose we go a bit farther out?" Sir Clinton pro-
posed. "It's rather early to turn home again."
He started the engine and then turned to Roca.
"And the rest of your story?"


THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRERE 121
pride in my pocket and went to the place where she
stayed. I was very full of penitence and ready to do
anything if I could only get her back once more. It
must have happened thousands of times last year to
different people.
"You can imagine me climbing the stairs — she lived
on the third floor — and how I felt that each step was
bringing me nearer to my dreams again. Very funny,
indeed. I rang the bell, and her landlady came to the
door. 'Mademoiselle Marcelle has left here. She was
married on Tuesday and has gone away.'
"One does not describe these things, you know. If
one's audience cannot picture them for itself, no de-
scription would make them clear. I went away like a
man in a nightmare, praying that I might wake up to
real life again. I tried to throw myself into my other
dream — the great career of usefulness, you remember
— but now that dream seemed very faint and small,
like a picture away down a long dim gallery. The
reality had gone out of it. It never came back.
"I made inquiries in a dull sort of way. One cannot
help being curious to know what has happened, after
one has been badly shattered. She had, of course, mar-
ried this compatriot of mine — Ramon Zarrilla was his
name; and they had sailed almost immediately for my
country. And that was all.
"Time passed. Most men have the strength of mind
to get over these things, but I suppose I have less te-
nacity than the usual run. Or perhaps more tenacity —
it's difficult to say. You are a very good listener, Sir
Clinton."
The late Chief Constable refrained from comment.
He could see that it was a case of now or never, and
he kept silent lest he should break the chain of thought


122
GRIM VENGEANCE
in Roca's mind. The doctor glanced at his face, and
seemed to be encouraged by its expression.
"Time passed," Roca went on. "I turned back to
my work, but it had now become a mere mechanical
task. All the joy had gone out of it. That also is a
fairly common experience, I think. Then, at last, there
came a letter from Marcelle. There was no address,
and from the writing I could see that she was very
fll.
"It was another common story — though less com-
mon than the rest. After her marriage she and her hus-
band had sailed for the Argentine. They had touched
at Montevideo and transhipped there to the Mihano-
vich. You do not know the Mihanovkh, Sir Clinton?
She starts about ten o'clock at night. Very gay indeed,
the Mihanovich, decked out with illuminations like an
Eastern bride with her jewels. She is well known on
the Rio del Plata, steaming through the night.
"I have often imagined what happened. It was not
in the letter, of course, except for a hint or two. The
Mihanovich gets in at eight in the morning. The illumi-
nations have all gone out. It is time to think of every-
day life, to plunge into business and leave romance be-
hind. Bread and butter, as you English would say. I
picture my little Marcelle there at the rail, beside this
husband whom she has taken in a fit of pique, watch-
ing Buenos Ayres coming closer and closer. Then the
disembarkation on a strange soil, the people about her
speaking an unknown tongue, the loneliness creeping
on her and making her more and more dependent upon
this husband. A drive to a station, tickets procured,
which she never sees and which would mean nothing
to her even if she had been permitted a glimpse of the
name of the station on them. Then a long train journey,


THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRERE 123
another station crowded with an alien people, another
taxi, a house. Home at last!"
Roca bit savagely at his cigar, and waited until he
could recover control over his voice.
"Home?" he continued. "Well, hardly that, per-
haps, unless one calls a prison 'home.' You can guess
the rest, Sir Clinton. The awakening, the revolt, re-
fusals — then the 'discipline treatment.' My little Mar-
celle learned it all. She was not an easy case for them;
she caused them a lot of trouble. But of course the
system wins in the end. She was much too valuable a
consignment to waste. And so, at last, a shameful sur-
render. Then, months of the life you know about . . ."
He broke off with a gesture which left the rest to
Sir Clinton's imagination.
"Typhoid released her in the end. She wrote to me
from the hospital. I sailed by the next boat, but of
course I was too late. She died very soon after she had
written her letter to me."
Roca glanced again at Sir Clinton's profile, and as
he continued his voice took on again the tinge of irony
which had faded out during the later part of his nar-
rative.
"I arrived too late. Naturally I made some in-
quiries, but one learns little. The Centre can afford to
pay for people's silence when it requires it. I made
very little fuss — in fact, I posed as an acquaintance of
some relation of hers, someone who had only a casual
interest in the case at all. I had been thinking hard on
the boat, you see. I had nothing else to do, during the
voyage.
"There was nothing to be done from the outside.
The Centre talks freely enough when you get inside;
but it keeps quiet so far as outsiders are concerned.


124
GRIM VENGEANCE
I could pick up nothing of any value. And I meant to
get my information by hook or crook. I owed this
Ramon Zarrilla — and others — a debt, and I hoped to
pay it in time. Of course he had vanished from the
scene almost as soon as he had delivered the article,
handed over the Franchucha to her new owners. I
could not get on his track from the outside.
"That was how I became 7-DH, Sir Clinton. I knew
that the League of Nations was taking a hand in the
game. They had an organisation for procuring in-
formation— a set of spies, if you like to call it that.
Playing a lone hand, I did not see much chance of
tracking down the men I wanted to find; but, if I en-
rolled with the League, I would have the help of their
machinery when I wanted it. I would have access to
the information which they were gathering together
from all quarters. A man working single-handed can
do very little with the Centre; but it was different
when I came into touch with the League's people. A
bit of news here, a scrap of information picked up
yonder: they all began to fit together and help me to
work back along the trail which led from the hospital
to Paris. The agent 7-DH proved invaluable to Dr.
Esteban Roca, I can assure you.
"That was how you happened to come across me in
Paris. You see, 7-DH was especially useful because he
was a medical man. People will talk to a doctor more
freely than to any other kind of man — except a
priest, perhaps. And 7-DH was known to be a broken-
down doctor who had just missed prison for some af-
fair or other. He'd been just a shade too clever for the
police, it appeared. Everyone knew that on the best
authority, because 7-DH made rather a boast of it
himself. Of course, that case had finished his practice


THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRERE 125
in decent circles; so he had come down a bit in the
world and gone among people who weren't so particu-
lar — and so on."
"You took me in completely when I saw you," Sir
Clinton admitted frankly.
Roca acknowledged this with a gesture.
"I must have been successful," he said, without a
trace of boasting in his manner. "I became quite a
valuable character among the group of the Centre.
There's no general organisation of the Centre; but
they play into each other's hands; and with my reputa-
tion I got myself passed on from one caftane to an-
other. Who would suspect the broken-down doctor,
who was so useful when he wasn't drunk? Sometimes
it was handy for a souteneur or a madame to have a
medical who could be called in and who wouldn't chat-
ter. After my experiences, I can quite imagine that
doctors may be useful even in hell. And, of course,
through the other people I scraped acquaintance with
the group of commissionnaires. They interested me
most, naturally. A false marriage is one of their habit-
ual methods for procuring a beefsteak . . ."
"Beefsteak?" Sir Clinton demanded. "Slang, I sup-
pose?"
"Yes. Same thing as 'article,' or 'package' or 're-
mount.' Argot of that kind is useful when it comes to
writing or telegraphing, you understand. I continue.
I supposed that I should find my friend Zarrilla among
the commissionnaires eventually; but by and by I got
on a fresh track. Behind the main machinery of the
Centre stood a handful of men — prosperous fellows
who seldom take a direct part in the business itself.
They do the planning and supply the capital, mainly.
My information, bit by bit, began to point in that di-


THE CENTRE AND MARCELLE BARRERE 127
that the police would catch you at it. Think that over."
Roca's smile did not include the expression in his
eyes when he acknowledged the advice.
"I take it that our talk has been confidential. Your
recognition of me forced my hand, isn't that true?
Otherwise I should hardly have wearied you with my
story."
Sir Clinton had given his warning and saw no rea-
son to labour the point. He was about to dismiss the
subject, when a thought struck him.
"Have you any friends in this neighbourhood, Dr.
Roca?"
Roca shook his head.
"None among the population, at any rate," he said.
"One of my friends . . ."
He broke off abruptly, as though he had made a
slip.
"Is it not time that we were returning to Raynham
Parva?" he inquired, as if to cover his mistake.
Sir Clinton had sized up Roca and was quite sure
that there was nothing further to be gained by fishing
for information. In a short time, he dropped his com-
panion at the Black Bull and turned his car towards
Fern Lodge. But as he drove along the street, he was
evidently perplexed. An obvious suspicion had lodged
itself in his mind, despite the doctor's denials; and it
had grown stronger during the interview.
The murderer of Quevedo had known where to find
the jugular vein without fumbling; and Roca was a
medical man. The incident by the roadside on the night
of his own arrival at Raynham Parva suggested more
than a little when it was connected up with the opera-
tions of 7-DH. And Roca's one mistake in the course
of the interview threw some light on the possibilities


128
GRIM VENGEANCE
in the case. If Roca had a confederate who nosed out
information for him, then the doctor himself need not
have appeared at Raynham Parva in order to secure
previous knowledge of Quevedo's movements on that
fatal night. And Roca had admitted the existence of
a friend whom no one had identified.
"H'm!" Sir Clinton mused. "That doctor's a cool
card; and I can't say I'd blame him much if he's taken
the law into his own hands. Any man gets outside the
normal decencies when he utilises a girl's trustfulness
in order to trap her and send her down into that hell;
and if Roca was keen on this girl, I can't pretend to
condemn his methods too much. Something with boil-
ing oil in it wouldn't be too harsh treatment for gentry
of that sort. All the same, I wish Roca hadn't made
that slip. It's going to give me a pretty little moral
problem to solve in the near future, I'm afraid."
But a more immediate puzzle was in his mind just
then. He could not understand Roca's behaviour at the
Bale Stones. Why had the doctor been so manifestly
anxious to visit the monument; and yet, when he
reached it, shown not the slightest interest in it? Sir
Clinton had no key to the riddle.


CHAPTER IX: THE CYPHER TELEGRAM
As he drove along the main street of Raynham Parva,
Sir Clinton caught sight of Constable Peel on the pave-
ment; and something tempted him to pull up.
"Well, Peel," he demanded as the constable came to
the side of the car. "How's the investigation going?
Got on the track of your homicidal friend yet?"
Constable Peel seemed uncertain as to how he
should take this remark. He glanced dubiously at Sir
Clinton, as though not very sure of his ground; but
his love of hearing his own voice evidently overcame
his scruples almost immediately.
"The sergeant's working away, sir," he confided in
a slightly acid tone. "But I haven't seen much in the
way of results — and that's a fact. He's been out on
several wild-goose chases, so far as I know; and that's
about all. This new foreigner here, the one at the
Black Bull, he gave him a fine set back, from all I've
heard."
"Dr. Roca, you mean?"
"That's him. Ledbury, he went off to see this doctor;
and he came back with a flea in his ear, he did. I saw
that for myself. Ledbury didn't report that conversa-
tion in full to me, you make take your oath — I beg
pardon, sir! I mean he said nothing about it. But I
heard a few things from the Black Bull people. There's
one or two of them that hears a lot more than visitors
think."


I3O GRIM VENGEANCE
"So Sergeant Ledbury found he'd made a mistake?"
"He did so, sir. This Roca has no car — I could've
told Ledbury that myself if he'd taken the bother to
ask me. I was at the station when he arrived by the
train. He'd got no luggage bar a suitcase with him.
When Ledbury asked him where he been staying be-
fore he came here, he was quite open about it. He came
up from Micheldean Abbas. He'd been there for the
best part of a week, it seems, staying at the inn."
"Micheldean Abbas is just down the line, isn't
it?"
"Yes, sir. Fourth station. Then Ledbury asked Roca
about Quevedo, and he said he'd never heard of any-
one of that name. Then he hesitated a bit, or some-
thing; and Ledbury pressed him a bit harder. Then he
admitted that he did know somebody called Quevedo,
and the sergeant he thought he'd got on to something
good. But it turned out that Roca was thinking of some
fellow Quevedo that wrote books in the time of Shake-
speare. That was a bit of a leg-pull for the sergeant! I
did laugh when I heard it."
"So it turned out a blank end?"
"Dead blank, sir. Ledbury, of course, he believes
in being thorough; and I heard him ring up Michel-
dean Abbas later on in the day. The inn people con-
firmed the story about Roca's movements. When the
murder was being done, he was in bed and asleep."
He hesitated for a moment.
"You'd see what the coroner's jury brought in, sir?
Death by misadventure! That's a good 'un, knowing
what we know. But Ledbury, he must have squared the
coroner or something; for none of the real stuff came
out in the evidence he gave; and I got the tip not to
give the show away, either."


132 GRIM VENGEANCE
"Like your new nephew-in-law?" Estelle demanded
carelessly.
"I haven't seen much of him yet," Sir Clinton con-
fessed. "I'll take your opinion till I get more expe-
rience."
"Oh, he's all right. A bit swalmy, you know."
"Swalmy?"
"Oh, you know what I mean. Rather . . ."
A vague gesture completed her description.
"Thanks. My own thought put neatly into words,"
Sir Clinton interjected.
It was curious, he reflected, that Estelle seemed to
have the same difficulty as himself in defining the im-
pression left by Francia. Perhaps she, like himself, was
influenced by a tinge of jealousy, now that a fresh
figure had supplanted her to some extent in Elsie's af-
fections. Whatever was at the root of it, Estelle evi-
dently did not take whole-heartedly to Francia.
"A case of 'I do not like thee, Dr. Fell'?" he in-
quired jestingly.
"Something of the sort," Estelle answered, with a
touch of seriousness in her voice which made Sir Clin-
ton prick up his ears. "But it's rather mean to say
that," she added quickly, "after he's been so decent in
inviting me to take a trip out to the Argentine with
them."
"You're going, then?"
Estelle nodded.
"Daddy's been rather hard to persuade — can't lose
his dear daughter, you know. But Elsie turned him
round her finger in the end; so it's all fixed up. If these
girls are really good sorts, it'll be quite a happy party.
I'm looking forward to it."
Sir Clinton seemed to think that this called for no


THE CYPHER TELEGRAM I33
comment, and in a few minutes they reached Fern
Lodge.
During lunch, Sir Clinton found himself fully oc-
cupied in listening to a detailed account of Johnnie's
fishing experiences in the morning; and he took little
part in the general conversation at the table. Francia,
he noted, seemed to be exerting himself to please Es-
telle; but it was difficult to see whether he was making
much progress or not. She seemed much more interested
in the Anstruther girls; and Sir Clinton was not ill-
pleased to find that she evidently liked them.
When the meal was over, Francia excused himself
almost at once, pleading that he had to attend to some
business correspondence. The rest of the party went
out to the lawn before the house; but Johnnie soon
detached himself to return to his fishing.
"I'll take a walk down to the lake later on and see
what you're doing," Sir Clinton promised. "Rex will
be here shortly, Johnnie. I'll send him on as soon as he
turns up. See that you pay attention to what he tells
you. He's a first-class fisherman and you'll learn a lot."
He watched the boy take the path down to the boat-
house, and then turned his attention to the conversa-
tion which was going on around him.
"How's the play getting on?" he heard Elsie ask,
addressing her question to the two sisters.
Linda Anstruther shook her head in mock despair.
"We seem to spend half our time in tearing up what
we've written. Noreen suffers from too many ideas, and
she hates to see any of them left out; so we'go back and
back over it again and again to see if we can't fit them
in."
She glanced at Sir Clinton, and apparently guessed
that he had not heard of the matter before.


134
GRIM VENGEANCE
"We thought it would be a good idea to supplement
the musical part of our show with a sketch or two," she
explained to him shyly. "So we've been trying to work
up two or three dialogues. It's not so easy as we
thought."
"I sympathise with you," Sir Clinton condoled. "I've
always hated paper-work of any description. Chronic
paralysis in the pen is one of my troubles."
"It's so difficult to be downright colloquial when
one has a pen in one's hand, I find," Noreen Anstruther
put in. "I used to think one just sat down and wrote;
but somehow everything comes out as if it was on stilts
— not a bit natural."
"Why not try over one or two of your sketches?" Sir
Clinton suggested. "You've got a ready-made audience
here. When you came to act the things, you'd soon see
any weak points."
Linda Anstruther seemed to shrink a little from the
idea.
"Mr. Francia very kindly offered to look over the
things some time and let us know whether they would
do. He knows the type of stuff that would suit, you see.
What we really ought to do is to get them translated
into Spanish and learn them up so that we could patter
them off, even if we didn't really understand what we
were saying. The accent would be dreadful, of course;
but no one expects much in that way from a foreigner."
"You don't speak Spanish, then?" Sir Clinton in-
quired.
"Not a word of it, either of us. That's what makes it
difficult."
"Rather awkward, going out to a strange country
without knowing the language, isn't it?" Sir Clinton
suggested.


THE CYPHER TELEGRAM 135
"Of course. But Mr. Francia's very kind. He's prom-
ised to look after us until we find our feet out there.
He'll do all the interviewing and so forth, at first; and
he says we'll soon pick up all the Spanish we need for
our work."
Sir Clinton did not pursue the subject; and the girls
fell upon a fresh topic which allowed him to drop out
of the conversation.
"What about some tennis?" he heard Elsie suggest
a little later on. "We'll leave you here, uncle. You're
too much of a handicap for the partner that gets
you."
Sir Clinton acquiesced in his exclusion.
"What I like about you, Elsie, is that your remarks
give one so much to think over. The ambiguity of that
last sentence will keep me busy till tea-time, and even
then I won't be too sure of the exact meaning."
"We'll leave you to ponder, then. Come on, Estelle.
You brought your racquet, didn't you?"
The four girls rose and went off towards the tennis-
court, leaving Sir Clinton and Mrs. Thornaby together
on the lawn.
"I've asked young Rex Brandon to come across this
afternoon," Sir Clinton intimated to his sister. "He'll
be here any minute now."
Mrs. Thornaby glanced across at her brother with a
certain doubt in her face.
"Do you think that was the kindest thing to do?" she
inquired.
"I should think so," Sir Clinton retorted in a care-
less tone. "The thing's done now. He may as well swal-
low his dose at once and get it over. Nothing like seeing
with your own eyes. I asked him on purpose, jusi to
bring things home to him bluntly."


136 GRIM VENGEANCE
"It seems rather a brutal cure, doesn't it? Rex was
very fond of her, Clinton."
"He's still fond of her; that's the trouble. He's not
the changeable sort."
"And yet you think you'll cure him by showing him
the two of them together? Sometimes I doubt if you
know so much about human nature after all, Clinton."
Sir Clinton shrugged his shoulders as though argu-
ment were useless.
"Ask him to tea, anyhow," he said, as he dismissed
the subject. "He's going down to the lake first of all to
give Johnnie a few hints."
Just as he spoke, the figure of Rex Brandon appeared
round a bend in the approach to Fern Lodge. He
seemed to be coming reluctantly; but when he caught
sight of Sir Clinton and Mrs. Thornaby, he pulled
himself together, waved to them, and quickened his
steps.
"Your pupil's down by the lake," Sir Clinton ex-
plained, after they had talked together for a few min-
utes. "He's in a great state of excitement, so you'd
better cut along and not keep him waiting."
Mrs. Thornaby obeyed her brother's instructions;
and after a very obvious hesitation Rex accepted her
invitation; then he set off in search of Johnnie.
"Sound stuff, Rex," Sir Clinton commented, with a
tinge of regret in his voice, as he watched the athletic
figure disappear among the bushes which fringed the
boat-house path. "H'm! I seem to have finished my
cigarettes. I'll go and get some more."
He moved across the lawn and entered the house.
His stock of cigarettes was in the smoke-room; and he
went there to refill his case. But just as he entered the


THE CYPHER TELEGRAM I37
door, the telephone bell rang and he picked up the
receiver.
"Yes? Fern Lodge speaking."
"Can I speak to Mr. Francia?" a voice demanded
over the wire.
"Is that you, Dr. Roca?" Sir Clinton asked, since
he thought he recognised the voice.
Rather to his surprise, the wire suddenly went dead
and there was no answer. He rang several times, and
finally the girl at the exchange intervened to tell him
that his interlocutor had rung off. Quite evidently Roca
had been taken aback by having his voice recognised at
Fern Lodge; but, though he puzzled over the matter
for a time, Sir Clinton could not hit upon any reason
for this behaviour. It was plain enough that Francia
was the man of whom Roca had spoken, the man from
whom he expected to get the information for which he
had come to Raynham Parva; for otherwise the tele-
phone call was unaccountable. Without fathoming the
matter, Sir Clinton felt uncomfortable. Francia was
becoming rather too much of an enigma to him; and
some of the possible solutions raised disquieting
thoughts in his mind.
He put down the telephone and crossed the room to
the window which looked across the verandah towards
the lake. He soon picked up the figures of Rex and
Johnnie, evidently absorbed in the study of the art of
casting. Sir Clinton found the sight reassuring. Rex
was obviously taking his post as instructor very se-
riously; and that meant that his mind would be oc-
cupied until tea-time. He would have no time to brood
over the might-have-beens; and that was a clear gain.
Sir Clinton leisurely filled his cigarette-case and went


138 GRIM VENGEANCE
out to rejoin his sister. As he reached the front door,
he saw a telegraph-boy approaching on a bicycle, and
he strolled down the avenue to meet him.
"Telegram for Sir Clinton Driffield, sir," the mes-
senger announced in answer to an inquiry. "You, sir?"
He fumbled in his pouch, handed over the wire, made
a gesture of thanks for the tip Sir Clinton handed
over, and then waited for the envelope to be opened. Sir
Clinton unfolded the sheets of a long telegram and
glanced at the opening words.
"Planisphere, transit equatorial, right ascension,
asteroid, ecliptic . . ."
Sir Clinton folded the sheets and put them into his
pocket.
"All right. There's no answer," he told the boy, who
remounted his bicycle and rode off again.
Sir Clinton had recognised the code, which was one
that had been supplied to him for use while he was on
the Continent recently; but without the key it was im-
possible for him to decipher the message. Re-entering
the house, he went up to his own room, locked the door,
and set to work with the help of a small volume. The
communication, he found, dealt with some details of a
report which he had sent in after his return from the
Continent. Apparently some amplifications of one or
two points were desired. He drafted a reply which he
put into cypher with the help of his book and copied
out on some telegram forms which he took from an
attache case. Then, after burning his rough drafts, he
placed his answer in his pocket and went downstairs
again. There was no particular need to get his wire
off immediately. Any time that evening would do quite
well.
Mrs. Thornaby had left the lawn; and, after a glance


I40 GRIM VENGEANCE
the taint of White Slave traffic, then the whole business
was inexplicable.
As to Quevedo's death, Sir Clinton had no doubts on
the matter at all. Roca and his confederate were at the
back of that affair; for nothing else seemed capable of
fitting the facts which he knew. One or other of them
had done the murder.
And, as he followed this line of thought, Sir Clinton
came again to a problem which had been exercising his
mind since the morning. What was his own position in
the case? Since he had resigned, he was no longer an
official and could look on the affair from a more aloof
standpoint; but that hardly covered the whole ground.
He had been drawn into assisting Ledbury in the Que-
vedo case and had uncovered the neatly concealed
tracks of Roca and his accomplice, which would never
have been detected except for his intervention. Could
he draw back now, if he were asked to go further with
his assistance? If he did, would his refusal not lead to
Ledbury suspecting something? Ledbury was by no
means a fool; and he was hardly likely to turn off from
a track merely because Sir Clinton declined to go any
further along it with him. Sir Clinton recalled the fact
that Ledbury had checked even his own statements
about his doings on the night of the Quevedo murder,
although on the face of things there could be no con-
nection between the two.
Then there was Roca himself, whether he was the
actual murderer or not. Sir Clinton had had only one
interview with the doctor, and yet Roca had established
something which almost amounted to sympathy be-
tween them. Despite his acquaintance with the seamy
side of human nature, Sir Clinton had retained a cer-
tain protective attitude of mind when women came into


THE CYPHER TELEGRAM 141
a case. He hated the thought of a woman being ill-used;
and he had every sympathy with the feelings of Roca
when he thought of the sufferings of an unwilling girl in
the Argentine infernos. This was hardly a case in which
one could stand above the battle on a platform and
deprecate the employment of crude methods to square
the account. If Quevedo had really been mixed up in
the White Slave traffic, Sir Clinton was enough of a
realist to waste no energy in censuring the final act in
the business. At the same time, as a member of the gen-
eral public, he had a moral duty imposed upon him: he
ought not to become an accessory after the fact by sup-
pressing information which had come into his posses-
sion. That was where the shoe pinched.
A man with a deep and genuine grievance might well
be tempted to take the law into his own hands and run
the risks involved in a private act of vengeance. But
had an outsider the right to shield a murderer merely
on the strength of a pathetic story which might, after
all, be the merest pack of plausible lies? Sir Clinton
did not think that Roca had told him a false tale; but
nevertheless he recognised well enough that no proof
whatever had been advanced in support of Roca's story.
All that he had to go upon was his own impression of
the doctor.
Then, again, he had really very little against Roca
except the merest suspicion. Possibly if he dropped a
hint to Ledbury, something might come out of it —
though Ledbury seemed to have made very little of his
inquiry into the doctor's affairs already. It would prob-
ably take a smarter man than Ledbury to carry the
thing through against a man of Roca's calibre; and, if
Sir Clinton intervened at all, he would be almost mor-
ally bound to see the business through by giving the


142 GRIM VENGEANCE
sergeant his assistance. Could he decently go so far as
that, on the strength of mere suspicion?
Worst of all, he recognised that this matter was one
which would admit of no delay in the decision. Roca
might vanish from Raynham Parva at any moment;
and, if he once got away, the chance of laying hands on
him would shrink considerably.
"This is a damned difficult business," Sir Clinton
admitted to himself as he walked by the lakeside. "I
wish I'd never touched it. And the worst is that this is
only the first link in a chain. I wish I could be sure
where the other end of the chain's lying. There'll be a
lot of dirty water stirred up before it all comes to the
surface: that's certain."
He continued his review of the case until his watch
told him it was time to go up to the house for tea.


THE RESPONSIBILITY
H5
view of the front door. When Francia appeared under
the porch, Sir Clinton was puzzled to see something in
Rex's face which suggested recognition; but, when the
two men were introduced to each other, Rex betrayed
no previous knowledge of the man who had supplanted
him. Sir Clinton was on the alert to read Rex's
thoughts, if possible; but Rex kept control of his fea-
tures, and it was hard to say whether or not he dis-
liked his successful rival more now that he had seen
him in the flesh.
They had hardly finished handing round the cups
when Staffin appeared again.
"There's somebody ringing you up on the telephone,
sir," she intimated to Francia. "He didn't give any
name — just asked to speak to you."
Quite obviously, this took Francia by surprise. He
seemed puzzled, as though he could not understand
why anyone should call him up. He excused himself
hastily and went off to the house.
"Roca again," Sir Clinton inferred; and his brow
darkened slightly as his earlier perplexities thrust
themselves up in his mind once more.
When the Argentiner returned after a short interval,
Sir Clinton scanned his face with interest; but Francia
betrayed nothing very marked in his expression. It was
clear enough that the message, whatever it was, had
given him something to think over; for, although he
joined in the conversation, it was always with an al-
most absent-minded air, as though he was trying to
keep two lines of thought in his mind at one time.
"Some more tennis?" Elsie suggested when they had
finished tea. "Care to play, Rex?"
Rex Brandon glanced down at his well-worn tweeds
and shook his head.


146
GRIM VENGEANCE
"Don't feel in the dress for it, somehow, Elsie. I'll
umpire for you, if you like."
"I'll come too," Sir Clinton said lazily, getting up
from his chair as he spoke. "My comments are always
appreciated in the best circles."
"If you'd teach me that service of yours, instead of
telling me all the things I shouldn't do, you'd be more
of a help, Uncle Clinton," Estelle pointed out. "I can't
catch the knack of it, somehow; and it would be worth
a good deal to me if you could put me up to it."
"Another time," Sir Clinton decided. "Come along.
I'll run you home in my car afterwards, so you can ex-
haust yourself as much as you like on the courts."
Rex Brandon folded up some camp-chairs and pre-
pared to carry them round the house; Sir Clinton
collected a number of cushions; and the group moved
away towards the tennis-courts. Sir Clinton sat down
beside his sister, while the girls went down to play;
Rex took up his position; whilst Francia, a little way
off, seemed to be divided between watching the game
and puzzling over the problem which had been sprung
upon him. Sir Clinton could see his appraising glances
following the girls' movements almost mechanically
whilst he evidently was cudgelling his brain in search
of some idea which evaded him.
"Roca's given him something to think over, evi-
dently," was Sir Clinton's silent conclusion. "But what
it is one can't make out. I wish I knew."
He glanced at Rex Brandon's face and found it
rather tired. Rex was endeavouring to play the part he
had assigned to himself, but his eyes were following
Elsie more than they should have done; and once Sir
Clinton found him giving a wrong decision because his
attention had obviously been elsewhere at the critical


THE RESPONSIBILITY 14.7
moment. It was impossible to tell from his features
whether Sir Clinton's experiment had been successful
or not; but once a stray glance in the direction of
Francia, aloof and self-absorbed, betrayed clearly
enough that Rex felt no attraction for his supplanter.
It was so charged with dislike — or something even
stronger — that Sir Clinton began to wonder whether,
after all, he had been quite wise in forcing the two
men into contact.
The players were so evenly matched that time
passed without anyone realising how quickly it had
gone; and when at last Estelle came up and glanced
at her wrist-watch, which she had left in Sir Clinton's
charge, she made an exclamation of dismay.
"I'd no notion it was so late. I've got some letters
to write which must catch to-night's post. I'll need to
fly."
"I'll have the car round for you immediately," Sir
Clinton assured her. He glanced at his own watch.
"You've heaps of time to write letters and still catch
the post, if you don't hang about too much."
"Hurry, then," Estelle urged him, beginning to put
her racquet into its case.
"I'll give you a lift to the Black Bull, Rex," Sir
Clinton said, as he rose to his feet.
Linda Anstruther suddenly remembered something
which had slipped her memory.
"Don't forget you promised to lend me that dress-
pattern, Miss Scotswood."
Estelle made a mental calculation before replying.
"I've just got time for it, I think. Suppose you come
over with me in the car now. Then I can show you the
thing itself as well as give you the pattern. You'd
better see what it looks like when it's finished."


148
GRIM VENGEANCE
"That's ever so nice. I'd love to see it."
When Sir Clinton brought the car round, he found
Francia waiting with the others.
"I've just remembered I want something in the vil-
lage," the Argentiner said half-apologetically. "Your
car's a five-seater, isn't it? Would you mind giving me
a lift? I'll walk back."
Sir Clinton nodded, and his four passengers got on
board; Estelle and Linda Anstruther eagerly discussing
"some point in the dress-pattern, whilst Francia re-
mained silent, as though he were still perplexed by his
mysterious problem. Rex, in the front seat with Sir
Clinton, seemed disinclined to talk.
In a few minutes the car reached the outskirts of
Raynham Parva; and Francia, leaning forward,
touched Sir Clinton on the shoulder and asked to be
let out. Sir Clinton put on his brakes at once and al-
lowed his guest to alight; but as he drove on again
he could not help speculating on Francia's errand.
"He might as well have let me put him down at the
door of the place he wanted," he mused. "Funny idea,
asking for a lift and then getting me to drop him a
quarter of a mile from the shops. Didn't want me to see
where he was going, evidently; and banked on the fact
that I'd have to go straight on with the girls."
He leaned back and inquired from Estelle where
she was staying.
"First on the right, once you're past the church,"
she directed him. "Then it's the fourth house on the
left. You'll know it by the sundial on the lawn.
Daddy's not at all pleased about it. You see, I per-
suaded him to come here — against his better judg-
ment, he says — because Elsie was coming to Raynham
Parva this summer. And now Elsie's going off to for-


THE RESPONSIBILITY 149
eign parts and taking me with her. So poor old Daddy
is left marooned in this place. 'Not a decent golf-course
within fifteen miles,' as he says tragically."
"You youngsters have very little thought for your
elders," Sir Clinton observed, knowing that he would
get a rise.
• "Our elders have a way of evening things up, any-
way," Estelle retorted. "They seem to spend all their
time thinking about us — mostly with disapproval. If
you knew what a fuss there was before I was permit-
ted— permitted, if you please! —to take this trip to
Buenos Ayres, you'd have some notion of the waste of
good grey matter that goes on nowadays. However,
it's all fixed up. I said to Daddy: 'Well, I'm going out
with a proper chaperon and all that sort of thing; and
you've known Elsie, and Mrs. Thornaby, and Uncle
Clinton all your life; so you can't start getting the
squakes about respectability, and so on and so forth.'
So he gave in at that, not having a leg to stand on."
Sir Clinton laughed shortly.
"You young parasites give a lot of trouble."
"Parasite? Me?" Estelle demanded indignantly.
"Who's a parasite?"
"Everyone's a parasite who doesn't do something
for the rest of the world."
"Indeed?" Estelle produced a sound like a sup-
pressed snort of indignation. "Well, if I am a parasite,
at least I'm a polite one, so I won't say what I think of
that remark."
"Quite right," Sir Clinton turned to Rex. "Sorry I
passed the Black Bull in the heat of that argument.
I'll drop you on the way back."
Rex nodded his acquiescence in this suggestion, and
Sir Clinton, once past the church, turned as he had been
s


GRIM VENGEANCE
directed and pulled up in front of an old garden, be-
yond which could be seen an ivy-covered house. Estelle
stepped out of the car and turned to Sir Clinton.
"You can run away and play, if you like. I'm highly
displeased with you, if it's any joy to you to know it.
Parasite, indeed! If you noticed the way people glare
after me in the street, you'd realise the amount Of
aesthetic pleasure I bring into folks' drab lives — same
as any other great artist. Doesn't that justify my ex-
istence?"
"There may be something in it," Sir Clinton con-
ceded, though in a sceptical tone. "Now I'll come back
in a quarter of an hour for Miss Anstruther, so don't
waste time."
As the car passed down the main street of Raynham
Parva on its way to the Black Bull, Rex raised him-
self slightly in his seat.
"There's Francia," he pointed out. "Are you going
to pick him up?"
Sir Clinton saw the figure of the Argentiner emerge
from the druggist's shop and turn towards Fern Lodge.
Evidently he had not caught sight of the car.
"No, I think I'll leave him to get home on his ten
toes," Sir Clinton decided.
Rex seemed to hesitate for a moment before speak-
ing again.
"You seem to have become great pals with my cere-
monious friend," he said at last.
"Roca?"
"Yes. By the way, I happened to be talking to Roca
outside the hotel this morning when a fellow passed up
the street. I could see by Roca's expression that he
recognised the bird, so quoth I: T thought you knew
nobody round about here, doctor.' To which sez 'e, very


THE RESPONSIBILITY
boldly and in a tone intended to convince: 'No more
I do,' — or words to that effect. But he knew that bird
all right, none the less and notwithstanding. So I drew
in my feelers, not wishing to seem intrusive. When I got
to the tea-table this afternoon, there was my bird sit-
ting at it: Francia. What do you make of that?"
Rex's hostility to Francia was almost unconcealed
now; and his attempt to cover it with his mask of
flippancy failed completely. Quite obviously he sus-
pected something, he knew not exactly what. Sir Clin-
ton had not quite bargained for this development in
his game.
"Roca's a decent sort of person, so far as I know,"
he pointed out, leaving Rex to draw any conclusions
he chose from this testimonial. "By the way, Rex, I
wish you'd come up to Fern Lodge this evening after
dinner. You've nothing to do down here at the hotel;
and you'll be an asset with us. There's an odd girl in
the party; and, if you come, we can always fill in
some time with dancing. They've a portable wireless,
I know."
"Girls are no treat to me," said Rex grudgingly.
"Well, say you're doing me a favour, then."
"Oh, if you put it that way," Rex consented with
marked reluctance.
Sir Clinton, having got his way, refrained from la-
bouring the point.
"Seen Roca to-day?" he asked casually, as though
merely seeking a fresh subject for conversation.
"He's flitted," Rex explained. "I saw his suitcase
going down the street towards the station this after-
noon. He was carrying it."
"You're sure he's gone?" Sir Clinton demanded,
rather taken by surprise at the news.


152
GRIM VENGEANCE
"Fresh woods, etc." Rex replied. "As a matter of
fact, he bade me adieu — or adios, it may have been,
perhaps — at the close of our morning interview. We'll
knock up against him on the steppes of Uranus or some
other likely place when the weather's favourable. Till
then . . ."
Sir Clinton had drawn up the car before the Black
Bull, and now his eye wandered to the clock on the
dashboard.
"Well, ta-ta," he said. "I've got to call at the post
office before I go back for that girl."
He drove away before Rex had time to reconsider
the question of the visit to Fern Lodge later in the day.
At the post office he despatched the wire which he had
already written out in cypher, and then he took the
car back to Estelle's house and blew his horn at the
gate. Linda Anstruther did not keep him waiting long.
Almost immediately, the two girls appeared at the door
and Estelle accompanied her new friend to the gate.
"You're forgiven," she announced graciously. "At
least, I'll overlook it if you'll admit I'm not a parasite
and that I do some good in the world. I've put on my
new evening dress to prove my aesthetic value. At least,
I put it on to show it to Miss Anstruther, and you're
getting the benefit. Isn't it pretty?"
"Beautiful," said Sir Clinton half jestingly, though
in reality he admired both the dress and its wearer.
"Oh, raving again, of course!" Estelle complained
in a mock-weary voice. "It's quite embarrassing when
you let yourself go like that. Get the habit of modera-
tion, dear, especially before third parties."
"Time you went off to your correspondence," Sir
Clinton reminded her.
He opened the door of the front seat for Linda and


THE RESPONSIBILITY 153
she took her place beside him. Estelle stood at the gate
and watched them as they drove down the road; and
Sir Clinton, glancing back, admitted to himself that she
was certainly justified in her boast about her aesthetic
effect.
"It's a shade early to go back to Fern Lodge," he
suggested to the girl at his side. "There's nothing to do
there except hang about until the dressing-gong goes.
Suppose we take a short run round? You haven't seen
the country hereabouts, have you?"
"I'd like to," Linda agreed, "if it's not going to bore
you."
"Not a bit. We'll go up this road and see what it
looks like farther on."
He turned into a side-road and soon passed beyond
the outskirts of Raynham Parva. For a time, neither
of them spoke. Linda Anstruther was apparently of the
type which does not think it necessary to chatter con-
tinuously in order to pretend interest. At last, however,
she broke the silence; and her subject proved an un-
expected one to Sir Clinton.
"I've been feeling just a shade ashamed of myself
since I came down here," she volunteered shyly, as
though she realised she was overstepping the normal
bounds and yet felt herself forced to risk a snub.
Sir Clinton's method was always to allow people to
talk without interjecting leading questions. Linda
glanced at his face and apparently was encouraged by
its expression.
"The fact is, Sir Clinton, I came down here feeling
more than a bit distrustful, so I owe all of you an
apology. I suppose I ought to be content to do my
apologising inside; but somehow . . . well, you've all
been so nice to me, and I felt a bit of a little beast over


THE RESPONSIBILITY
155
to see what sort of people you were. A spy on you,
in fact. It seemed all right from my point of view."
"Quite sound," Sir Clinton reassured her. "What's
wrong with that? I'd do the same myself."
"So I felt when I came down. I just wanted to see
what sort of people Mr. Francia's friends were. One
can judge him by that. And when I got here, everyone
was so kind. Mrs. Thornaby's a dear. And no one
could have been nicer to us than Mrs. Francia. One
can't help getting to like her more and more. And,
of course, when I heard her uncle was a retired Chief
Constable, I knew everything was all right, and that
I'd been misjudging Mr. Francia in the most awful
way. And, naturally, I felt beastly uncomfortable at
having been so suspicious about him when he was only
going out of his way to do us a good turn. In fact, I
felt like a worm over it all. Do you see how I felt?"
"Most likely I'd have felt something of the sort my-
self," Sir Clinton assured her, "though I doubt if I'd
have had the courage to own up to it as you've done."
He turned away from that aspect of the subject.
"So it seems that my sister, my niece, and myself are
the guarantors in this business?" he inquired in a faintly
quizzical tone.
"If you like to put it that way," Linda answered. "I
know you'd never let your niece — and Miss Scots-
wood — go off out there . . ."
She broke off, evidently feeling she was getting back
on to thin ice. Sir Clinton made no attempt to force
her into clarity. He dismissed the whole subject.
"What about those sketches you and your sister
were putting together?" he asked.
"We've written a few. They sound quite good; but
I expect that's just because we wrote them ourselves.


i56
GRIM VENGEANCE
Once we've got one or two more finished, we're going
to give them to Mr. Francia to look over and see if
they'd be suitable."
Sir Clinton did not press the conversation further;
and at last he turned the car towards Fern Lodge.
Occasionally Linda made a remark; but neither of
them talked for talking's sake. As the car entered the
Fern Lodge grounds, Linda's eye fell upon the trip-
dial of the milometer.
"Two hundred and seventeen miles!" she said.
"You haven't done all that to-day, surely?"
Sir Clinton leaned forward and pressed the stud
which brought the figures back to zero.
"No, I must have forgotten to reset it," he explained.
"That mileage includes my trip up from town as well
as the running round I've done since I got here."
He drew up at the house door, allowed Linda to
alight, and then took the car round to the garage. Now
that he was alone, his face showed much more clearly
the traces of the anxious thoughts which his problems
were raising in his mind. With his resignation from the
Chief Constableship, he had looked forward to complete
freedom from responsibility; but now he began to won-
der whether in his official career he had ever been faced
with a moral responsibility such as had been thrust
on his shoulders in the last few days.
First had come the Quevedo murder and his suspi-
cions of the part which Roca might have played in that
affair. Already he had delayed over-long in making up
his mind in the matter; for Roca had left Raynham
Parva now, and the chance of tracing him was growing
less as the hours went by. Sir Clinton had few illusions,
and he recognised that he was already falling into the
category of an accessory after the fact, if Roca was


THE RESPONSIBILITY 157
really the murderer. That problem brooked no delay.
Then a more personal matter demanded attention,
one which was hedged round with even sharper thorns.
Roca and Quevedo were linked through the White
Slave traffic; Quevedo and Francia were confessedly
business associates, and it was no use burking the fact
that this "business" might be the traffic itself. Roca's
communication with Francia on the telephone would
hardly admit of any other interpretation. And, through
Elsie's marriage to this foreigner, Sir Clinton and his
sister had been drawn into that shameful ambit.
Putting things at their worst, the whole affair was
clear enough. Francia had gone through a ceremony of
marriage with Elsie. Whether that ceremony was genu-
ine or not, Sir Clinton had no means of guessing. Fran-
cia might be a bigamist for all one knew. In any case,
he had established himself as Elsie's husband, and had
gained sufficient influence over her to control her move-
ments. There was nothing unwarranted in a husband
going back to his own country and taking his wife with
him.
But, still putting things at the worst, other steps had
followed. Francia had manoeuvred matters so as to get
Estelle invited out to Buenos Ayres. It had been done
cleverly enough; the young bride had been used as a
lure to bring the other girl into the net; no one would
be likely to suspect anything. And the affair had not
stopped there. The two Anstruther girls had also been
involved and their suspicions calmed by putting Elsie
to the front. Nothing could be more respectable or less
likely to seem underhand.
At that point, Sir Clinton himself had been drawn
directly into the toils. As Linda Anstruther had told
him bluntly, it was his position which had been one of


i58
GRIM VENGEANCE
the governing factors in her decision to rely on Francia.
He had, quite unconsciously, become a guarantor of
the whole scheme. And, now that he knew this, he
could hardly stand aside and wash his hands of any
responsibility.
What could be done? Francia's guilt was no more
than a matter of suspicion as yet. The whole thing
might be quite above-board. In that case, to raise open
trouble would mean losing Elsie for good; she would
never forgive him for throwing such a charge at her
husband unless he had evidence in support, and strong
evidence, too. Investigation? But, as Roca had told him,
people of Francia's type had ostensible businesses
which would stand examination. And an investigation
which broke down would ruin him with Elsie just as ef-
fectually as a baseless charge. It was no good thinking
of cabling inquiries to Buenos Ayres, evidently.
Yet if he allowed the party to leave the country,
what guarantee had he against disaster? What had
happened to Marcelle Barrere in the same case? It
would be merely the landing of four "articles" instead
of one. Sir Clinton set his teeth as he recalled Roca's
picture of the landing of Marcelle and her transfer to
an up-country inferno. Suppose that happened to Elsie
and Estelle?
There was very little time left in which to act, even
if he could determine his course of procedure imme-
diately. On the one hand there was the obvious disaster
if his suspicions were correct; on the other stood the
unforgivable offence which he would commit in the
eyes of Elsie if he happened to be mistaken.
"What's needed here is a deus ex machina," he re-
flected; and at that the thought of Roca and his con-
federate crossed his mind. Roca had possibly squared


THE RESPONSIBILITY
159
an account with Quevedo; but was that the whole of
the bill? After Quevedo was dead, Roca had admitted
that he was expecting further information about the
people who had wronged him. That certainly suggested
that he had more debts to pay; and his telephone calls
furnished further evidence in the matter. When he first
rang up, he had recognised Sir Clinton's voice answer-
ing, and at once, hoping that his own voice had not
been identified, he had rung off. That meant that he
did not wish his communication with Francia to be
known, if this could be avoided. He had rung up again
later and had given his message to the maid, who was
not likely to interrogate him as Sir Clinton might have
done.
Then Sir Clinton recalled Rex's news. Roca must
have left Raynham Parva before he telephoned at all,
since Rex had seen him leaving the village early in the
afternoon and the telephone message had been much
later in the day. For a while Sir Clinton pondered over
this sequence of incidents, and before long he evolved
an hypothesis which might fit the facts when they came
to light. A grim smile crossed his face as he forecast
one possible chain of events.
Prophecy with only half the facts on the table had
never appealed to Sir Clinton; so, rejecting his hy-
pothesis for the time being, he considered his personal
problem from a fresh angle. It would be extremely
awkward to drop his affairs in England at that junc-
ture; but there was really no vital objection to his
leaving the country for a short time. So long as he
could book a passage on Elsie's boat, no harm could
come to her or her companions. If Francia was above-
board, Sir Clinton would find all correct when the party
reached its destination; whilst, if anything underhand


GRIM VENGEANCE
was in prospect, bis presence would make the scheme
impossible.
"It's too big a risk to let these girls run," he reflected
finally. "I'll have to change my mind and go with them;
and I'd better see about booking my passage at once.
But in the meantime, I ought to get on Roca's track if
it's possible. I think I could induce him to be a bit
franker about things now."
He shook off his preoccupation and set himself dur-
ing the evening to keep the Anstruther girls amused.
Rex appeared later, and had evidently made up his
mind to present an indifferent aspect as well as he could.
He attached himself to Noreen Anstruther almost ex-
clusively; and it was only now and again that Sir Clin-
ton's sharp eyes detected glances which Rex turned
on Francia and Elsie. Estelle's arrival seemed to
brighten up the party; and by half-past ten Sir Clin-
ton's suggestion of some dancing met with approval.
He went in search of the portable wireless, and was
about to fix it up in the hall, where there was room for
three couples to dance, when he heard Francia com-
plaining of thirst.
"A cocktail?" the Argentiner proposed. "I have the
recipe for an excellent one for just such an occasion.
May I prepare it?"
He turned to Mrs. Thornaby, and, receiving her per-
mission, rang for one of the servants and gave instruc-
tions as to the ingredients which he required.
"It should be made with tamarinds," he explained
regretfully. "And of course we have no tamarinds. But
I think I can make it good enough without that."
He set to work when the maid had brought the re-
quisites, and, when he had completed his task, he
brought each of the party a glass in turn. Sir Clinton


THE RESPONSIBILITY l6l
sipped his doubtfully and put it down. Francia drank
his own with evident enjoyment; and Rex seemed to
find the mixture to his taste also. The girls speculated
vaguely on the ingredients, and Francia wrote out his
recipe for Estelle's benefit.
"Now I really feel inclined to dance," Francia de-
clared with a gesture of invitation to Elsie.
Sir Clinton switched on the portable set, and, find-
ing on his return that Estelle and the younger Anstru-
ther girl were without partners, he invited the stranger,
with a jesting apology to Estelle for leaving her out.
For the best part of an hour they danced, exchanging
partners from time to time so that all the girls had
their turn. Suddenly Sir Clinton noticed that his niece
looked pale.
"What's wrong, Elsie?" he demanded, as she stopped
dancing and went to sit down beside her mother.
"Nothing much," was the reply. "I feel a bit sickish.
Perhaps it's the heat of the night."
Her gesture indicated that she wished to be left in
quietness; so Sir Clinton abstained from worrying her
with questions. But after a few minutes she seemed to
feel worse rather than better. She called her husband
over to her side, and Sir Clinton, without intending it,
chanced to catch her words.
"I think I'll go to bed now, Vincent. I feel beastly
seedy all of a sudden; I can't think why. Would you
mind taking the dressing-room to-night and leaving me
to myself?"
Francia gave a nod of agreement, though his face
suggested that he was none too well pleased with the
arrangement. He murmured a few words in a caressing
tone; but Elsie was evidently in no mood for verbal
comfort.


GRIM VENGEANCE
"I'll get off upstairs, then," she said, rising from her
chair as she spoke. "I feel dizzy, somehow. I can't
think what's come over me."
She moved rather unsteadily into one of the adjoin-
ing rooms and rang the bell there. Then, on her way
back, she bent over her mother and spoke to her in a
low voice, apparently asking Mrs. Thornaby to give the
necessary directions about the dressing-room to the
maid who had been summoned. Reassuring her mother
with a faint smile, Elsie crossed over to the stair.
"Good night, everybody," she called. "I'll be all
right — just a bit out of sorts. You needn't worry. Don't
stop dancing."
She seemed more than a little giddy; and Francia,
excusing himself to his partner, ran up the steps and
gave her his arm. Together they disappeared round the
turn of the stair. Almost as they did so, the fox-trot
music stopped; and the loud-speaker remarked sud-
denly: "That was a cough-drop from the Savoy Dance
Band."
Sir Clinton took advantage of the pause. By a skil-
ful move he engaged his partner in conversation with
Mrs. Thornaby whilst he unobtrusively secured the
cocktail glass which Elsie had used, and concealed it
behind one of the palms which stood in the hall. He
had suspicions about his niece's sudden sick turn; and
it seemed worth while to preserve any evidence which
the glass might yield.
"Just one more," Estelle proposed. "After that I'll
have to get home. You haven't got a car, Rex? All
right, I'll give you a lift down to the village."
Francia came downstairs as they were dancing; and
immediately afterwards Estelle and Rex took their de-
parture. As he stood on the steps at the front door,


THE RESPONSIBILITY 163
watching them drive away, Sir Clinton suddenly rec-
ollected something which he had forgotten. Johnnie
had come to him that morning with a cheap air-gun.
The spring had collapsed, and Johnnie had turned to
his uncle in the hope that he might be able to patch up
the toy; but the thing had been put aside in the smoke-
room and had passed out of Sir Clinton's mind. Having
nothing further to do, since the Anstruther girls were
saying good night, he bethought himself of the air-gun
and made his way to the smoke-room.
With the help of a screw driver which he found on the
Meccano table, Sir Clinton dismantled the gun easily
enough and extracted the broken spring. Since only a
small section had been broken off, he had some hopes
that the remainder might still be long enough to serve;
but, when he tested it, he found that it would not work
smoothly.
"Nothing for it but to get a new one," he decided,
leaning the useless gun against the Meccano table. "It's
such a cheap make that it's not worth while buying a
fresh spring to replace this one. I'll send off an order
for a new gun to-morrow."
He replaced the screw driver on the Meccano table
along with the fragment of broken spring, switched off
the lights, and then, finding that everyone else had pre-
ceded him, went upstairs to bed.


CHAPTER XI: AN OLD LINE IN MURDERS
When Sir Clinton came downstairs next morning, he
found his sister at breakfast.
"How's Elsie feeling now?" he inquired, as he helped
himself from the side-table.
"She seems to be all right again," Mrs. Thornaby
replied, "I've persuaded her to stay in bed till after
breakfast; but there was really no need even for that.
She's been sick, though; and there's no use in her get-
ting up and running about until she's had a rest."
Sir Clinton was obviously relieved.
"Queer turn she took," he commented briefly. "Must
have swallowed something that disagreed with her."
He had hardly finished breakfast when the telephone
bell rang in the smoke-room and Staffin brought word
that someone wanted to speak to him. Sir Clinton put
down his unlighted cigarette and went to the instru-
ment.
"Is that you, Sir Clinton?" inquired a voice which
he recognised as Sergeant Ledbury's. "I'm sorry to
trouble you, sir, but I'd take it as a favour if you'd
spare me a short time. I've got another motor case on
my hands this morning — a suicide, it might be, this
time."
Sir Clinton considered for some seconds before an-
swering. It was hardly his business now to spend his
time in assisting the police in affairs which did not di-
rectly concern himself; and he felt more than a little
inclined to refuse point-blank to give his help.


GRIM VENGEANCE
night, clearly enough. Who could it have been?
Sir Clinton stepped out of his car and made a careful
examination of the lock on the door of the garage.
There were no signs to show that it had been forced in
any way. Whoever opened it must have used the proper
key or else must have picked the lock. The key, Sir
Clinton knew, was left at night in a drawer in the hall,
so that it was available to anyone in the house. He
made a rapid review of the people at Fern Lodge; his
sister, Francia, Johnnie, Elsie, Staffin . . .
The convergence of two apparently isolated trains of
events in the past twenty-four hours led him to a con-
clusion which made his brow darken. Now he felt that
he could make a shrewd guess at what lay behind Elsie's
sudden sick turn; and as the possible developments of
the situation unfolded themselves in his mind, his face
showed how black he feared they might be. This was
going to be something very much worse than anything
he had anticipated, unless the whole idea turned out to
be moonshine. And that, he felt, was hardly likely,
though it was still on the cards.
Sir Clinton stepped back into his car, re-set the trip-
dial of the speedometer to zero, and drove out of the
garage. He had no need to inquire his way to the Bale
Stones; his trip thither in Roca's company was still
fresh in his mind, and he took the route which they
had followed on that occasion. As he drew near the last
turn-off before actually reaching the Stones, a police-
man stepped from the side of the road and signalled
him to pull up.
"Sir Clinton Driffield, sir?" the man inquired, as
Sir Clinton brought the car to a standstill. "That's all
right, sir. Just drive on. The sergeant's waiting for
you. I've orders to keep wheeled traffic off this road,


AN OLD LINE IN MURDERS 167
sir. That's why I stopped you, not being sure it was
you."
He saluted and fell back to the roadside, whilst Sir
Clinton let his car move on. A glance at the dry surface
of the road was enough to show that there was but little
to be hoped in the way of tracing the tracks of motor-
wheels on it; but evidently the sergeant was taking no
chances of having a possible clue destroyed by cars
passing along that particular stretch of highway.
When he approached the neighbourhood of the Bale
Stones, Sir Clinton pulled up his car and got out, so
as not to superimpose his wheel-tracks on any which
might have been left on the road. As he walked on
towards the corner round which he knew the Bale
Stones lay, Sergeant Ledbury made his appearance and
came forward to greet him.
"Glad you've come, sir," he said, with obvious grate-
fulness. "It's an ugly business, this one — uglier even
than the other affair. The look of the body . . . ughl"
"No use being squeamish, sergeant. It's all in the
day's work, for you, you know. But if you think it's
going to upset my high-strung nerves, I suppose I'd
better wish you good day now and go home again."
"Wait till you see him," the sergeant advised gloom-
ily. "It's no treat."
"Most encouraging mood you seem to be in, now
you've got me here," Sir Clinton commented. "If you'd
breathed something like that over the 'phone, I might
have thought twice about it. However, since I'm on the
spot, suppose we waste no time. What's happened?"
Ledbury pulled out a notebook; but it seemed merely
a reserve in case of need, for he was able to give his
account of the affair without reference to his jottings.
"First thing we heard about it, sir, was from the


i68
GRIM VENGEANCE
driver of a post office mail van that takes this road
with the early morning mail. When he came along, he
found the wreck of a car standing by the roadside —
just round the corner there — all burned and still smok-
ing in places. He got down from his seat and went over
to have a look at it. One look did him, it seems. I don't
wonder much, either. It must have been a rum start to
come up against a corpse like that, all on one's lone-
some in the early morning."
Sir Clinton's face showed that he preferred facts to
psychological imaginings, and the sergeant hastily
dropped the gruesome and returned to plain narrative.
"The van-driver scuttled back to his motor and
drove hell-for-leather into Raynham Parva to give us
the news, since we are in charge of this district. He was
considerably shaken up by what he'd seen. That was
about half-past seven this morning."
Sir Clinton nodded to show that he had noted the
time.
"As soon as I could," Ledbury went on, "I got hold
of some constables and we all came out here on our
bicycles. I suppose I've no authority to close a road;
but I chanced it, and posted men to turn anyone off
until we'd finished with things and got the place cleared
up a bit. You probably met one of 'em down the road?"
"Yes, go on."
"We borrowed a big weather-proof sheet from the
nearest farm to cover the thing up; and then we had
time to get down to business. When we reached the
wreck of the car, it was quite hot still; so I take it that
it must have been set alight in the late small hours, sir.
If the blaze had gone up earlier, someone would've
seen it and come to find out what it was."
"Say three, or four o'clock, then, at a guess?"


AN OLD LINE IN MURDERS 169
"Round about there," Ledbury agreed. "Well, I'll
go on. To start with, it looked as if it might have been
an accident, like the Quevedo business. Car catching
fire and burning the driver, you see, sir. But two sec-
onds' thinking knocked that on the head. No live man
would sit still in an open car and let himself be burned
to death, when he could jump over the side in a tick.
If it had been a saloon, he might have been choked by
fumes all of a sudden — but not in an open car."
"Unless he was a cripple?" Sir Clinton suggested
slyly.
"Well, he wasn't a cripple, so that finishes that,"
Ledbury retorted. "I'm giving you things just as they
came to hand, sir, if you don't mind. The next thing we
did was to lift the body out of the driving-seat — a nice
job that was! —and go over the remains of the car.
Uncomfortable, we found it. The metal was still pretty
hot, here and there."
He exhibited a large burn on his hand by way of
proof.
"We didn't get much of interest for a while. You
see, sir, the fire had destroyed practically everything
that would burn. Clothes, papers, anything of that
sort: all gone up the flue. But at last, as I was grub-
bing round in the bottom of the wreck, I picked up this
pistol."
He produced from his pocket a tarnished Colt auto-
matic.
"You can handle it if you like, sir," he said, as he
offered it to Sir Clinton. "After it had been through
that fire, there wasn't much good looking for finger-
prints on it."
Sir Clinton took the weapon into his own hands and
turned it over cautiously. The blue-black finish was all


170 CRIM VENGEANCE
discoloured by the heat through which it had passed;
and the cartridges in the magazine had evidently been
ignited by the rise in temperature, for the stock of the
pistol was badly wrenched and the end of the magazine
had been blown away in the explosion.
"What do you make of it?" Sir Clinton inquired as
he finished his initial scrutiny.
"Not much, except that he was carrying arms —
which isn't over common in this country. I expect he
set fire to the car and then shot himself, thinking that
the fire would destroy the traces of what he'd done."
Sir Clinton subjected the pistol to a more minute
examination.
"The safety-catch is on," he pointed out. "Do you
think a man who had just shot himself fatally would
take the trouble to snick that into place?"
Ledbury looked doubtful when this piece of evi-
dence was brought to his notice.
"It hardly sounds likely," he had to admit.
Sir Clinton gripped the pistol and endeavoured to
pull back the slide; but the fire had caused a jam, and
he was only able to force the breech open to the extent
of about half an inch. He peered down into the cavity
which was thus exposed and then turned the weapon
so that the sergeant could see into the hole.
"No cartridge-case there, sergeant."
"Quite so," Ledbury confirmed. "It would be ejected
when he fired the shot."
"And another cartridge would have been forced up
into the breech immediately," Sir Clinton completed
the description.
"That's so," Ledbury conceded. "There ought to be
a cartridge-case there."


1^2 GRIM VENGEANCE
case I read in the papers a while back — the fellow who
poisoned himself in a burning car. I've been a bit too
previous, it seems."
"Let's keep clear of preconceptions," Sir Clinton sug-
gested. "Now what about the rest of the facts? Any-
thing left of the car that might be useful?"
"Yes, sir, there's one point. The car's burned to bits,
except for the metal parts; but I noticed that it's been
carrying what looks like a pair of false number plates
screwed on top of the ordinary ones. The fires licked
all the lettering off, of course, but the metal plates are
there, right enough. He must have wanted to conceal
something, or he wouldn't have been playing that
game."
"He couldn't have foreseen this state of affairs,
then," Sir Clinton speculated. "First, because in any
case the numbers would be burned off by the fire. Sec-
ond, because the identity of the car will be easy enough
to establish from the number stamped on the engine.
It won't have been effaced with the heat."
"You mean that he was using false number plates to
cover up something he was doing with the car and
that he never meant to commit suicide at all, sir?"
Sir Clinton turned an expressionless face on the ser-
geant.
"I haven't seen any evidence for suicide yet," he
pointed out mildly.
"Then you think it's another murder case, sir?"
"I haven't seen any evidence for murder, yet," Sir
Clinton varied his phrase. "Your brain's too swift for
me, sergeant. I simply can't follow these leaps of intui-
tion. Give me the facts first. We haven't even got the
length of the body, and you expect me to give an opin-
ion about the cause of death."


AN OLD LINE IN MURDERS 173
The sergeant's face showed that here he thought he
had a surprise in store.
"We've examined the body, sir." He made a wry
grimace at the recollection. "Everything was burned
off it except some ash and a few bits of cloth which
might have been the seat of his breeches. Protected
from the main flames for a good while, you see, sir. And
of course we picked up the clips of his suspenders and
things like that. But anything in the way of papers had
been burned completely; and he didn't seem to have
any identifiable metal stuff in his pockets. One or two
coins we found — that was all. But amongst the stuff
in the car we picked up his wrist-watch, with the strap
burned through; and on the back of that his name was
engraved."
"Ahl Very fortunate, that."
"His name, sir, was Roca — that Dr. Roca who was
staying at the Black Bull the other day."
"Indeed?"
Sir Clinton seemed hardly so surprised as the ser-
geant had anticipated.
"You'll be able to tell us something about him, sir?"
Ledbury inquired, with an air of innocence which was
rather overdone. His little eyes were fastened on Sir
Clinton's face as though he suspected something.
"I met him twice, sergeant. He was a medical man,
a South American . . ."
"Like Quevedo, sir?" the sergeant interjected. "You
do seem to have a knack of running up against these
South Americans, don't you? It was you that met Que-
vedo on the road that night he was murdered, I remem-
ber."
Sir Clinton laughed unaffectedly.
"Two South Americans meet with violent deaths.


174
GRIM VENGEANCE
Driffield has met these two South Americans. Therefore
Driffield is a suspicious character. Is that the chain of
reasoning, sergeant? It seems a bit weak in some links."
Ledbury joined shamefacedly in Sir Clinton's laugh;
but he did not take his gimlet eyes from the face of the
late Chief Constable; nor did he disclaim the suspi-
cions in words.
"I'd like to hear some more about this Roca," he
reminded Sir Clinton.
"You're quite right to suspect everybody," Sir Clin-
ton admitted. "But it must make investigation a bit
complex when you cast your net as wide as all that,
sergeant. About Roca, now. He had private means, I
believe. I didn't know he had a car. He was interested
in archaeology — to some slight extent, I gathered.
From some things he let fall, as from one official to
another, it appeared that he was a secret agent investi-
gating the White Slave traffic."
"Oh, indeed? Was he?" the sergeant inquired with
a slight start. "Now that might be a useful bit of news."
"He had some grudge against the traders," Sir Clin-
ton added, to complete his summary of his conversa-
tion with Roca.
"He had? That's interesting."
The tone of the sergeant's voice suggested something
different from the actual words; and he still kept his
eyes fixed on Sir Clinton, as though he expected to
detect a sign of uneasiness in his manner. Sir Clinton
suppressed a desire to laugh. It was evident that Led-
bury really had at the back of his mind a vague sus-
picion, based on the coincidence that Sir Clinton had
come across the two dead men since he arrived in the
village. It was apparently part of the sergeant's policy
to suspect everyone who had the slightest connection


176
GRIM VENGEANCE
their account, was it likely that he would meet him
on the public road? Hardly, since they would be liable
to interruption from any passing car. And if one went
off the road, what easily described place was there in
the neighbourhood except the stone circle itself? That
was the obvious spot for two strangers to meet, an
unmistakable rendezvous. Sir Clinton paused for a
moment before answering Ledbury. He reflected that
Ledbury prided himself on thoroughness; and that
sooner or later the sergeant would examine the stone
circle in the course of his general policy. It would be
just as well to direct his attention to it now, and see
what he made of it.
"Let's try this field first of all, then," Sir Clinton
suggested, leading the way to the gap in the hedge
which gave access to the Bale Stones.
Ledbury followed him without demur; and in a few
moments they had reached the circle of monoliths. As
the sergeant came into the ring, he uttered a suppressed
exclamation and pointed to the altar stone, on the upper
surface of which a brownish mark stood out. Ledbury
ran forward and bent over the slab.
"Here you are, sir!" he ejaculated, beckoning to
Sir Clinton. "See! there's been a patch of blood on
this stone and somebody's wiped it away. You can see
the trace of the scrubbing he gave it. But he didn't do
the job thoroughly; and some of the blood's trickled
into these little grooves — these spirals in the slab, sir
— so he didn't go deep enough to swab the liquid
away."
Again the look of suspicion came into his face.
"It's wonderful how you manage to suggest things
that turn out to be right, sir," he added, with some-
thing in his tone that hinted at more than irony.


AN OLD LINE IN MURDERS 177
"Meaning that 'He who hides knows where to seek,'
sergeant?" Sir Clinton replied, rather to Ledbury's dis-
comfort.
"You're putting words into my mouth, sir," he an-
swered rather grumpily. "I didn't say anything like
that."
"No? Language is a queer thing."
Sir Clinton waved the matter aside. He had not quite
made up his mind what line to follow.
"The way I look at it," Ledbury said, in a reflective
tone, "is this way. This is where Roca was shot, clear
enough. Then he was carried down to his car — I ex-
pect we'll be able to find some blood on the trail when
we get to work on it. Then he was bundled into the car,
petrol was spilled over everything, a match sent the
whole thing up in a blaze, and that was that. Then the
murderer came back here and cleaned up things as
well as he could. It wasn't a bright moonlight night,
last night, so he most likely couldn't see very well what
he was doing, and so he left these traces behind him.
Then he hopped into his own car and cleared off. Or
most likely he didn't set fire to the car until he was
ready to leave himself. Or something like that, any-
how."
"He had a car, then?" Sir Clinton asked.
"Oh, yes, he had a car. I've found bits of its track
here and there down the road," Ledbury explained.
"That's why I put the pickets on — to keep other
wheels off the road till I'd time to photograph this
track."
He shouted to one of his constables to bring a sheet;
and, when the man arrived, Ledbury rigged up a rough
protection over the blood patches on the altar stone.
"I think that's all we need do here," he suggested,


178 GRIM VENGEANCE
as he finished his task. "Is there anything else you'd
like to see, sir?"
"Nothing in particular," Sir Clinton replied, rather
absent-mindedly. "What do you propose to do next?"
"I've telephoned round the country already, asking
for information from all the hotels and garages about a
car of this make that Roca was driving. It must have
been garaged somewhere for the last week. One bit of
paint had escaped bad damage, so I was able to give
its colour; and the make's recognisable even after the
fire. Perhaps we'll get some news soon. And I'm going
to ask the doctor who does the P.M. — I wish him joy
of his job, I do — to look out for any smashed bones.
There's no real proof yet that he was shot, you know."
Sir Clinton recognised Ledbury's acuteness in this
last proposal. The sergeant was by no means a negligi-
ble factor in the affair.
"Well, I think I'll get off now," he intimated, getting
up from the altar stone on which he had seated himself.
"I've given you all the help I can."
"Very suggestive your visit's been, sir," Ledbury as-
sured him, with the plainest intimation of a double
meaning in his tone. "It's wonderful how much you've
given me to think about."
He accompanied Sir Clinton towards his motor.
"These are the tracks the murderer left, sir," he
pointed out. "Very faint, they are; but quite unmis-
takable, you see. They'll be a useful clue, perhaps."
Sir Clinton, glancing at the tracks on the road, sup-
pressed a start only with difficulty. He recognised the
markings well enough.
"Good luck, sergeant!" he said carelessly, as he
opened the door of his car and settled himself in the


AN OLD LINE IN MURDERS
179
driving-seat. "Mind standing back a bit while I turn?
Thanks."
When he had gone some twenty yards on his way, he
turned round. The sergeant was stooping over the road,
evidently comparing the traces on it with one another.
"H'm! So he's spotted that? And now he knows it
was my car that was here last night. This is getting a
bit complicated," Sir Clinton commented inwardly. "I
wonder what his next move will be."
Feeling more than a little disquieted, he drove to the
post office in Raynham Parva, entered the telephone
box, and called up a reliable friend who lived in the
next county.
"Will you send me a wire immediately," he re-
quested, giving his address. "Word it this way: 'Meet
me in main street Micheldean Abbas about four o'clock
this afternoon.' Sign it with your own name. . . .
You'll get it off at once? Thanks."
He rang off, and immediately called up Estelle.
"That you, Estelle?"
"Yes, Uncle Clinton."
"I want you to do me a favour and to keep quiet
about it, please."
"Right! No words of mine shall betray your guilty
secret, etc., etc. What is it you want?"
Despite her flippant tone, Sir Clinton knew that he
could trust her to carry out his orders.
"Nothing much. Will you ring up at once and invite
the whole lot of us, even Johnnie, over to your house for
the afternoon. The whole lot, remember, myself in-
cluded. And don't take any excuses. We've simply got
to come. You understand? You'll easily be able to fake
up some sort of excuse. I leave that to you."


CHAPTER XII: FRANCIA'S ATTACHE CASE
When Sir Clinton made his appearance at the lunch-
table, he found that his confederate had not failed him.
"Where have you been?" Elsie demanded. "I've been
hunting for you all round the place."
"Oh, just out and about," Sir Clinton answered
vaguely.
He had no desire to give a more definite account of
his morning's doings. Murders, and especially murders
of a gruesome type, were subjects which he preferred to
deal with in their proper environment. Certainly the
lunch-table was the last place for the discussion of such
matters. He glanced casually at Francia, who was
seated on the other side of the table; but, except for a
certain heavy-eyed look, the Argentiner showed no sign
of anything abnormal.
"Feeling all right again, Elsie?" Sir Clinton de-
manded in order to change the subject completely.
"Quite all right, thanks. It was just a sick turn, and
I can't make out how I got it."
"Good! And what's this stop-press news you're burn-
ing to distribute?"
"Cross my hand with silver, kind sir, and I'll tell
you who'll pour out your tea for you this afternoon."
"Oh, no, you won't," was Sir Clinton's unspoken
comment. Aloud, he asked: "Well, who is it?"
"It's Estelle. She rang up a few minutes ago and
invited the whole lot of us over there this afternoon.


francia's attache case 183
Johnnie's to go too; he can flog the stream at the end
of their garden."
"I'm going to catch something there," Johnnie broke
in excitedly. "I've seen trout in it — great big ones.
Mr. Scotswood told me he once saw a two-pounder in
one of the pools."
Elsie ignored her brother completely.
"I told Estelle it was a futile notion to drag seven
people across the country to visit one girl — especially
as I'm sure Mr. Scotswood would far rather go off and
play golf — and I advised her to come here instead.
But you know she's always been pig-headed. She said
her tennis-courts were better than ours . . ."
"So they are," Johnnie interjected, only to be sup-
pressed at once.
"Then at last she broke down and admitted that
she'd ordered dozens and dozens of cream cakes for tea.
Of course, unless they're eaten, the cream will go
wrong. So that finished it. She got her own way. But
I'll see those cream cakes even if I can't eat them. I
believe they were just an excuse she thought of at the
last moment."
Sir Clinton gave Estelle a good mark for her fertility
in expedients. She had certainly managed to carry out
orders well.
"So we're all going off there in the afternoon?" he
inquired, secure in the knowledge that his spurious
telegram would arrive in time to let him escape the
expedition. "We're going to play tennis, you said?"
"There'll be eight of us, counting mother and Mr.
Scotswood. You'll play, of course, mother?"
Before his sister could reply, Sir Clinton bethought
himself of the effect his obstention would have.
"A bit short on the male side, aren't you?" he


francia's attache case 185
be sure I was coming, since you didn't get hold of me
when she telephoned her invitation," Sir Clinton
pointed out. "Use your tact, and simply say I'm sorry
I can't join you."
"Why not say it yourself?" Elsie demanded. "You'll
have to drive over. It's too big a party to cram into
one car, so we'll need yours to take half of us."
"I hadn't thought of that," Sir Clinton confessed.
"It's all right, though. I don't need to be in Micheldean
Abbas until four o'clock. I'll take you over to Estelle's
before that."
He paused for a moment; then a fresh thought
seemed to strike him.
"You'd better scurry off and get hold of Rex at
once," he suggested to his niece. "You'll need him now,
since I'm dropping out, because even with him you'll be
a man short."
Elsie nodded; and, as they rose from the table, she
went into the smoke-room to telephone to the Black
Bull. Sir Clinton detained his sister by a sign while the
remainder of the party quitted the dining-room.
"By the way, Anne, I shan't be back here until I
come to pick up you people on my way home. It's a pity
to keep the maids hanging about on a fine day like this.
Suppose you let them all off for the afternoon?"
"So long as they get back in time to look after our
dinner, I don't mind," his sister acquiesced.
She shot an inquiring glance at him.
"You're getting very soft-hearted, these days, Clin-
ton."
"I've always believed in treating subordinates well,"
he defended himself; but he examined his sister's face
closely to see if there was anything behind her re-
mark.


i86
GRIM VENGEANCE
Apparently, however, Mrs. Thornaby had merely
thrown out her suggestion at random, for she failed to
follow up the subject. Before any more was said, Elsie
passed along the hall.
"It's all right," she said, catching sight of her uncle.
"I persuaded him — after he'd made a bit of a fuss, for
some reason or other. He's got very punctilious, all of a
sudden — Rex. One would have thought, to hear him,
that I'd asked him to force himself on a stranger. He
objected because Estelle herself hadn't invited him —
as if that mattered."
"Did you arrange about picking him up as we pass?"
"Of course. It's all settled."
Sir Clinton's gesture of approval was purposely
patronising.
"Very nice," he said in the tone of one commending
a stupid but well-meaning subordinate. "And now that
I've made all the arrangements, Elsie, I think I can
take a rest for a while, till it's time for us to start."
He turned away before his enraged niece could find
words to express her thoughts about this last remark,
and walked out of the front door. He had no desire to
encounter Francia at that juncture, so he took the path
down to the lake, meaning to keep away from the others
until it was time to drive them over to Estelle's house.
His morning's experiences had given him enough to
think over; but he put them resolutely out of his mind
and concentrated his thoughts on an earlier problem.
On the night when he arrived at Fern Lodge, his
plans for the future had been cut and dried; but more
recent happenings had thrown a fresh light on things,
and Sir Clinton was not the man to pursue a course
doggedly for the mere reason that he had chosen it and
had too much pride to allow himself to deviate from a


i88
GRIM VENGEANCE
sary for him to go back and take the car out of the
garage.
As he reached the front of Fern Lodge, he found
Elsie bringing Mrs. Thornaby's car up to the front
door, where some of the party were already waiting.
"Hurry up, uncle," his niece advised him. "I'll take
the ones who are here, and you can pick up the rest."
Sir Clinton brought out his own car before the first
party had time to embark, and the two motors set off
in company. On the road to Raynham Parva they over-
took the Fern Lodge maids walking towards the
village; and Sir Clinton felt a certain relief at finding
that his sister had acted on his suggestion about letting
the girls take the afternoon off.
When they reached their destination, they found that
Estelle had come down to the gate to welcome them.
She exchanged a glance of intelligence with Sir Clinton
as he drew up his car, and a suppressed smile hinted
that she regarded the success of her manoeuvres as
amusing.
"What's all this I hear?" she demanded, with a very
fair imitation of annoyance. "Elsie says you've faked
up some engagement or other to get off spending the
afternoon here. It's a sample of police manners, I
suppose?"
"Something of the sort," Sir Clinton agreed. "Nui-
sance, isn't it? The loss is yours, which makes me
sorrier still, of course."
"Well . . ."
She pretended to be breathless at this suggestion. Sir
Clinton gave her no time to complete her phrase.
"You'll have quite enough of me before long," he
said consolingly. "I'm thinking of changing my mind
and taking the trip to South America with you."


francia's attache case 189
He shot a glance at Francia as he spoke; but the
Argentiner's control over his features seemed perfect,
for he betrayed nothing to show that this decision put
him out in any way.
"You will? Really?" Estelle exclaimed in obvious
delight. "Hear that, Elsie? Your esteemed and dod-
dering uncle means to inflict his company on us. He'll
sit about the decks with some more of the prehistorics
and comment angrily on the manners of the new
generation, and enjoy himself simply no end. We must
arrange to shock him, or he won't enjoy himself a
scrap."
She turned back to Sir Clinton.
"Well, I'll book you for the first dance we have on
board, Uncle Clinton," she announced, in a tone which
showed her real pleasure at learning that he was coming
with them.
Sir Clinton did not wait for any further discussion.
With a warning gesture, he re-started his engine, turned
his car, and drove off towards the main street of the
village, leaving Elsie and Estelle exchanging congratula-
tions on his change of plans.
^Once out of sight, he slowed down the car and moved
along the street till he came to the ironmonger's shop,
where he stopped and got out.
"I've lost one of my keys," he explained to the shop-
keeper. "Most annoying, since I want to get the thing
open, and it's locked, I find. I suppose you could let
me have something that would do — a bunch of
assorted keys, or a pick-lock or two, if you happen to
have them. It's most important that I should get the
thing open at once."
The ironmonger had recognised him, apparently.
Sir Clinton's arrival had furnished a certain amount of


190 GRIM VENGEANCE
gossip in the village which did not often find a well-
known man among its visitors.
"I'll send a man up to fix it for you as soon as I can,
Sir Clinton."
"Oh, don't bother about that. I think I'm in good
enough practice to manage the thing myself."
His smile convinced the shopman that the picking of
locks was part of the normal work of a Chief Constable.
"I'm sure you are, sir," he agreed, with a knowing
look, as he bustled about to procure what Sir Clinton
wanted. "Here's some keys for you to look over and
see the size you want. I'll get you some false keys in a
moment, too."
On his return, he found his customer looking du-
biously at the assortment on the counter.
"A bit stupid of me," Sir Clinton confessed. "I for-
got to measure the size of the keyhole; and I can't be
quite sure of the kind of key I need. Do you mind if I
take the lot? I'll let you have them back in an hour or
so."
The ironmonger readily agreed; and Sir Clinton set
off for Fern Lodge again, armed with a very fair selec-
tion of keys. He let himself in with his latch-key and
went up to his own room, where he extracted from a
suitcase a pair of rubber gloves. Putting these on,
and taking the keys, he made his way to the room
which Elsie and Francia shared.
Normally, nothing would have persuaded Sir Clinton
to break the ordinary rules of hospitality and to pry
into other guests' affairs; but this was no ordinary
occasion, and too much was at stake to allow him to
respect conventions. His niece's life might be in the
balance, and he had no intention of abstaining from the
task before him merely because it involved breaking


francia's attache case 191
some of the unwritten rules of society. Things had got
to such a pitch that he intended to learn, by hook or
crook, all that could be discovered about Francia's
affairs.
He set about the business methodically, knowing
that he would have the house to himself for some hours
to come; but his work proved very much simpler than
he had anticipated. None of the drawers or cupboards
in the bedroom was locked; and it was obvious that he
was hardly likely to find anything important in the
open.
A large attache case attracted his attention; and, on
trying its catch, he found it locked. Two or three of the
ironmonger's keys failed to open it; but in a very
short time Sir Clinton found one which fitted, and the
case clicked open. Placing it on the floor near the
window, Sir Clinton bent over it and memorised the
appearance of the top layer of papers which was ex-
posed; and when he felt quite certain that he could re-
place them in exactly the original arrangement, he
began carefully to remove them and distribute them on
the carpet in a definite order which would make repack-
ing simple. He removed paper after paper without read-
ing them and then, as he lifted those in the last layer, he
came across what he had expected to find: an automatic
pistol. Along with it, on the bottom of the attache case,
lay a small bottle with a druggist's label.
Sir Clinton picked up the bottle, examined the label,
and placed the bottle aside. The druggist had not mis-
led him; for this phial in Francia's case contained the
same preparation of ipecacuanha as had been supplied
to himself when he asked for a repeat order. Evidently
his surmise as to the origin of Elsie's sick turn had been
accurate. That was so much cleared up, at any rate.


192
GRIM VENGEANCE
He turned next to the automatic pistol. The smooth
surface of the weapon was of the kind which takes
finger-prints sharply, and Sir Clinton congratulated
himself on the fact that he was wearing rubber gloves.
They were a relic of his police career; and they had
certainly come in handy on this occasion.
He gingerly loosed the catch of the magazine, slipped
out the container from the butt of the pistol, and
counted the cartridges. There were two short of a full
load.
"One in the barrel now, I suppose," Sir Clinton re-
flected.
He slid back the jacket of the pistol far enough to let
him look into the breech, and, on turning the weapon
towards the window, he caught a glimpse of the brass
of the cartridge-case.
"So he must have fired one shot, evidently," Sir
Clinton noted.
He lifted the pistol to his nostrils and sniffed at the
muzzle. A faint, but unmistakable odour of pistol-
fumes was easily recognisable. Sir Clinton's face
showed more than a trace of contempt.
"Hadn't even the thoroughness to clean his pistol
after firing," he reflected acidly. "A man might at
least have the thought to keep his tools in good condi-
tion. The acid will eat into his rifling, apart altogether
from the value of the reek of the powder as a clue. I
seem to have over-estimated the fellow."
He replaced the pistol along with the bottle in the
attach^ case, and then began a methodical study of the
papers which he had laid out upon the floor. As he
finished each one, he replaced it in its proper position
in the case. Some of the documents he glanced over
without much apparent interest; but as he read on his


CHAPTER XIII: THE GOVERNMENT MIS-
SION
Inspection of his wrist-watch showed Sir Clinton
that he had still plenty of time in hand before it would
be necessary to go back to Estelle's and pick up her
visitors. He went downstairs, hesitated for a moment
in the hall, and then entered the smoke-room, which
had become his favourite lounging-place at Fern Lodge.
The most comfortable chair stood between the fireplace
and the window overlooking the verandah; but the sun
was shining brilliantly upon this very spot, so Sir
Clinton stepped across the room to draw the curtains
and shield the place from the direct rays. When he
reached the window, he paused for a moment, gazing
out over the still surface of the little lake; then his
eyes fell on the shelf which formed the sill of the
window, and mechanically he began to straighten out
the books which stood upon it. Books were among his
weaknesses, and he hated to see them untidy.
When he had reduced the confusion to some
semblance of order, he drew the curtains sufficiently
to protect the chair from the sun; then, taking a
cigarette from his case, he sat down to review the whole
series of events which had led him up to his present
position. Although some pieces were still lacking from
the puzzle, all the facts in his possession fitted neatly
together if certain assumptions were allowed.
Roca, by some means or other, had tracked to Rayn-


196
GRIM VENGEANCE
ham Parva two of the people concerned in the fate of
Marcelle Barrere; and he had succeeded in squaring
his account with one of them — Quevedo. That seemed
plain sailing, except for the fact that Roca must have
had reliable information about Quevedo's movements
on the night of the killing, although he himself had not
appeared in the village until after the murder had been
committed. That implied a confederate who played the
spy on the commissionnaire and passed on to the doctor
the information which he needed. The identity of this
confederate Sir Clinton put aside for the present, since
he had no data from which to draw an inference.
The fact that Roca had been able to produce an
alibi for the night in question did not trouble Sir
Clinton much. Ledbury had been satisfied with the
evidence of the people at the inn at Micheldean Abbas,
who had testified that Roca had been in bed at the
time of the murder. That simply meant that he had
gone to his room and locked the door. But a door is
not the only means of exit from most rooms; there is
generally at least one window also: and the fact that
his room was upstairs was not likely to prove much
hindrance to a man like the doctor, if he wished to
leave the house unobserved. The sergeant had made a
slip when he accepted that alibi as conclusive.
Then there was the question of the car which un-
doubtedly Roca had used when he put an end to Que-
vedo. Roca professedly had no motor — certainly he
had brought none to the inn at Micheldean Abbas or to
the Black Bull. But, if he had a confederate, the
problem of the car had its obvious solution. The
doctor's accomplice could have brought the car into
Micheldean Abbas by appointment, handing it over
to Roca, and receiving it back again after the killing of


THE GOVERNMENT MISSION 197
Quevedo. Or he might even have been present at the
murder itself.
After the death of Quevedo, the doctor had evidently
turned to the second task which he had set himself;
and the two telephone messages which he had sent to
Fern Lodge were sufficient to indicate clearly enough
the identity of his second quarry: Francia. Roca had
evidently intended to utilise the inn at Micheldean
Abbas once more to provide him with an alibi; and he
had left Raynham Parva on the afternoon before the
night of his own death in order to avoid any suspicion
falling upon him owing to his presence on the actual
spot. He had, in all probability, rung up from some
country call-office; and he had expected in this way to
leave no trace of his communication with his victim. A
letter would have been dangerous, since it might have
been preserved, and eventually might have fallen into
the hands of the police.
What bait Roca had offered to attract Francia to the
Bale Stones was an immaterial matter now. The activi-
ties of agent 7-DH might easily have suggested some-
thing which would serve the purpose. Probably the doc-
tor, posing as one of the Centre agents, had proposed to
supply Francia with an "article" or a tender "beef-
steak" at a remunerative rate. But the matter was of
no importance, since clearly enough Francia had not
been deceived. Quevedo's death had put him on the
alert. He had suspected something in it beyond the
ostensible motor accident; and he had been on bis
guard when he went to the stone circle.
The next point to be fitted in was Francia's visit to
the druggist. There seemed to be very little difficulty
in accounting for that. Roca had made his appointment
in the small hours of the morning — probably alleging


198
GRIM VENGEANCE
some quite reasonable excuse for such an unheard-of
time. Francia, having his own suspicions, would find
that the hour suited the course of action he had planned,
and would agree to it readily. Then he would be faced
with the obvious fact that he shared a room with Elsie.
If he got up in the middle of the night and left the
house, she might awake and miss him — and the whole
affair would come out. But if Elsie turned ill, what
could be more natural than that Francia should spend
the night in the dressing-room and so be free from her
observation? She herself would probably suggest the
arrangement, if she felt sick. Sir Clinton was not an
expert in pharmacology, but he knew that ipecacuanha
is comparatively slow in its action. Francia had forced a
card by his offer to make a tamarind cocktail — with
no tamarinds — which he alone could concoct. He had
dropped some of his drug into Elsie's glass, knowing
that it would not act for half an hour or so — long
enough to conceal the direct connection between the
cocktail and her sickness. In a new kind of drink, she
would be prepared for an unfamiliar taste, and hence
the tang of the ipecacuanha would not attract her
attention.
As to what happened in the night, Sir Clinton could
do no more than sketch out an imaginary course of
events. Francia had waited till the household was
asleep. Then he had come downstairs, secured the
garage key from the drawer in the hall where it was
left at night, let himself out of the house, and taken
Sir Clinton's car from the garage. He had chosen it
instead of Mrs. Thornaby's saloon because a touring
car would be less likely to be remembered by anyone
who happened to notice it on the roads at that time of
night. He had overlooked the danger of the trip-dial q£


200
GRIM VENGEANCE
any case; and the first alternative seemed the more
likely. Probably Roca had presumed too hurriedly
that his own real identity was unknown to the Argen-
tiner and had taken a risk for which he had paid with
his life.
The rest was easy enough. Francia had carried the
body down to Roca's car, poured petrol over it from
the spare tins, cleaned up the blood on the altar-stone,
set fire to the car, and then gone off to Fern Lodge
again, overlooking the evidence of the milometer dial
once more when he put up the car.
"It's no use trying to guess what gave Roca away,"
Sir Clinton reflected. "Nobody's ever likely to puzzle
that out. And it doesn't matter very much, in any case."
Satisfied that he had arrived at approximately ac-
curate conclusions about the course of past events, Sir
Clinton then turned his mind to the future; and here he
found a much more intricate series of problems await-
ing him, some of which demanded almost immediate
solutions.
Two major possibilities presented themselves at once
to his mind: either Francia would escape detection or
he would be arrested for the murder of Roca.
In the first case, the obvious thing would be for
Francia to leave the country as soon as possible. All
his arrangements were already made, his berth had
been booked long in advance, and, if he got clear away,
it was doubtful if anyone would think of him as flying
from justice, unless they already had some ground for
suspicion. And what grounds had the police for suspect-
ing Francia? As Sir Clinton reflected, he himself had
discovered all the really telling evidence against the
Argentiner: his relations with the White Slave traffic,
Roca's telephone calls, the use of the drug to clear


202 GRIM VENGEANCE
If Francia fell into the hands of the law and Sir
Clinton supplied the evidence in his possession, then
Francia would undoubtedly be convicted. No jury could
do anything but bring in a verdict of guilty with the
facts before them. Everything fitted together far too
neatly to leave any room for doubt. But this meant
that Elsie would be stamped as the wife of a murderer
and a trader in women — for the whole story of
Francia would come out if the police once began to
investigate his career. That was an ugly possibility for
Sir Clinton: to publish the very evidence which would
put a stain upon his niece. On the other hand, if he
suppressed the evidence, he would be deliberately con-
niving at the escape of a murderer from his proper
punishment.
An awkward dilemma for a late Chief Constable!
On the one side, a sensitive girl made miserable for life
owing to the action of one of her nearest relations; on
the other, a late high official voluntarily thwarting the
course of justice.
Sir Clinton ground his cigarette-stub in the ash-tray
at his side, got up restlessly, and walked over to the
window to look out. He drew back the curtains again
and gazed out over the lake; but it was evident that
his eyes saw very little of the scene before him. He
threw back the two valves of the casement and leaned
out, as though he found the room too close. Then,
mechanically restoring the window to its original state,
he fingered the row of books in front of him, glancing
aimlessly from title to title, but obviously paying no
real attention to the names which he read.
At last a thought struck him. There was still another
possibility, one which he had overlooked. Suppose that
before the police got upon Francia's track, something


THE GOVERNMENT MISSION 203
happened to Francia himself? That would be a solution
of the problem. Roca's confederate was still lurking
somewhere in the background. What if he took a hand
in the game and eliminated Francia? The police would
have no reason for pushing the Roca case into public
view then, since they could not secure a conviction. He
himself could offer his evidence if necessary — but only
if it was necessary in order to get the whole matter
hushed up. Elsie would come out of it with her credit
safe, since the most that anyone could do would be to
pity her for the loss of her husband. The whole White
Slave business would be buried onte for all. And when
Elsie had got over the shock of Francia's death, Rex
would have a chance of coming into his own if he
played his cards properly.
"I wish I could find out something about that con-
federate of Roca's," Sir Clinton mused. "If he had any
direct interest in the affair, he may be the man to carry
the business through by avenging Roca. If he does, I
certainly sha'n't lend a hand in bringing him up for
it."
This fresh view of the case seemed to have relieved
his mind considerably. At least it gave him an excuse
for delaying the choice between the two horns of the
original dilemma; for if the confederate meant busi-
ness he would obviously act before Francia slipped
away out of the country. Sir Clinton decided that in
the meantime he would keep his own counsel, so far as
the evidence against Francia was concerned.
He turned back to his original problem again. There
was now no doubt in his mind as to Francia's character;
and clearly there must be a break between Elsie and
her husband sooner or later. If the whole thing came
to light in this country, or even if he was able to


204
GRIM VENGEANCE
prove—as he suspected — that Elsie's marriage had
been merely one of Francia's business deals involving
bigamy, Elsie would suffer. But there was an alter-
native scheme which had marked advantages. Suppose
the whole party went out to South America as arranged
and that he sprang his mine as soon as they had landed.
It would be easy enough to come home again with the
story that Francia had been taken ill suddenly and had
died almost on their arrival. Estelle could be counted on
to back up the tale when all the facts were laid before
her; and, from his knowledge of the two Anstruther
girls, he thought he could reckon on their gratitude
when they found the fate from which he had saved
them. It would be a complex affair and would involve
a good deal of hard lying; but he knew that he himself
would not stick at a mere lie or two when it was a case
of ensuring Elsie's happiness.
"That seems to cover the ground," he said to himself
at last. "If I draw blank with the confederate, and
Francia's still alive by the time we've got to leave for
South America, then I'll go with them and arrange to
explode my mine under Mr. Francia as soon as the
proper occasion presents itself. We'll be clear of every-
one who knows us then, and we can fix things up to
suit ourselves. I'll undertake that Francia won't come
back to this country to give the show away. I have the
whip-hand of him there, with the evidence I could hand
over to the police as soon as he turned up."
His reflections seemed to have ended in cheering him
up; for now he briskly set about effacing any traces of
his stay in the house during the afternoon. He picked
up the ash-tray which he had used, threw the contents
into the garden, and replaced it in its original position.
Then he went across to the window and examined it


THE GOVERNMENT MISSION 205
carefully, as though to make sure that it was precisely
the same as when he had entered the room. Satisfied on
this point, he collected the bunch of keys and pick-
locks and went out to get his car.
In the village, he stopped at the ironmonger's, and,
handing over the keys, paid the man's charges. As he
crossed the pavement on the way to his car, Constable
Peel happened to pass along; and Sir Clinton hesitated
for a moment so as to give him the chance of speaking
if he wished to do so. The constable seemed only too
glad of the opportunity.
"Good afternoon, sir," he said tentatively.
"Good afternoon, Peel. Got everything cleared up
now at the Bale Stones?"
"Oh, yes, sir. We finished up there before very long.
The body's in safe keeping, waiting for the P.M., sir.
And the sergeant's been working double tides. Wonder-
fully zealous, he is. He spares no pains."
Something in the tone of the constable's voice sug-
gested that he thought little of the results of his superi-
or's zeal. Sir Clinton gave him the opportunity of
amplifying his criticism. It was no time to consider the
niceties of etiquette.
"Has he found out anything?" he asked, half-
indifferently. "He dragged me into the affair much
against my inclination, so I suppose I may as well hear
what's come out of it all."
"Well, you were quite right about its being a murder,
sir," Peel hastened to inform him, with a malicious
expression in his eyes. "Ledbury, he's had to admit
that he made another bloomer and that you put him
straight a second time. Suicide, says he! Why, when we
came to examine that corpse really careful like, there
was the mark of the shot square in the back. That was


THE GOVERNMENT MISSION 207
at all. The garage people can't give any clear descrip-
tion themselves — they never noticed the man partic-
ularly; but they're sure it wasn't anyone like Roca."
Sir Clinton nodded as though in mere politeness;
but actually he was keenly interested. Here was Roca's
confederate appearing at last in the solid flesh. Hitherto
he had been a purely hypothetical figure; and Sir
Clinton was not sorry to find the accuracy of his con-
jectures established by this evidence.
"Roca was on the tall side, if he was anything,"
Constable Peel continued. "Now these garage people
say the car — if it was the same car, which the sergeant
hasn't proved yet — was brought in by a man who was
middle-sized at the most. In fact, sir, that's about all
the description they can give of him; so there you have
it! A lot of help that'll be to anyone! A middle-sized
man! Why, nearly every stranger that comes to this
village is what you'd call middle-sized."
He seemed to be struck by the acuteness of this ob-
servation, and apparently racked his memory for ex-
amples.
"That Mr. Brandon, now, that's staying at the Black
Bull," he went on, "he's middle-sized. Then there's a
Mr. Scotswood that's taken a house for the summer —
he's middle-sized too. And the commercial traveller
that stopped here last week or so, he was middle-sized.
A funny bloke, that was, sir. He kept the bar of the
Black Bull in fits, he did. Amusing wasn't the name for
it, I heard. But he wasn't so good at his business, they
say. Didn't sell a pennyworth of stuff in the place to
my knowledge."
He broke off and glanced up the street.
"And this little pest that's coining along now, sir,


208
GRIM VENGEANCE
you'd call him middle-sized too. You'll see, he'll stop
and ask me some of his silly questions. He always
does."
Sir Clinton followed the direction of the constable's
glance and caught sight of an unmistakably middle-
sized man moving towards them on the opposite pave-
ment. He was dressed in loud-patterned tweeds, which
seemed incongruous with his short, tripping steps and
general air of bird-like alertness. Catching sight of the
constable's uniform, he turned at once in their direction
and crossed the road. Constable Peel made an inarticu-
late sound of disgust.
"Didn't I tell you he would?" he demanded in an
undertone. "I'm fair polluted out of my life with him
and his questions, and here he comes with more of
them."
His forebodings were speedily justified. The stranger
came up to them; and, with a jerky gesture which
seemed to ask Sir Clinton's permission to interrupt, he
at once addressed the constable.
"Good afternoon. A very pleasant day, very pleasant.
By the way, constable, if it wouldn't be troubling you
too much, I'd like to ask you something."
His voice had a chirping intonation which enhanced
the effect of his other bird-like characteristics; and his
eager glances from face to face inevitably suggested the
curiosity of a sparrow.
Constable Peel, with an air of gloom, gave his per-
mission with a nod.
"Then perhaps you could tell me this," the stranger
went on. "Yesterday evening I was walking along the
right of way beside the wood on Staff Hill. Naturally
I inspected the wood as I went by; and I was struck by
the amount of wild life in it. A very interesting spot,


210
GRIM VENGEANCE
garies. He'll know what's what, then; and I expect he'll
give you permission. You write to Mr. Keppel, High
Thorn, Raynham Parva; that's all you need do, Mr.
Yarrow."
Yarrow put his hand into a pocket of his loud
tweeds, drew out a notebook, and made a jotting of the
address. But, to the constable's evident disappointment,
he did not replace the notebook.
"There's just another thing I'd like to ask," he
explained, his glance taking Sir Clinton into his con-
fidence as well. "The other day, I walked up the road
over yonder" — he pointed vaguely — "and I saw a
little lake with a house at the end of it. With my tele-
scope, I made some observations. I noticed on the
water some specimens of the Gallinula chloropus.
These I should like to examine at closer quarters, if
possible. But perhaps the owner of the house might ob-
ject to my going there."
Constable Peel hastened to divert the stream of in-
formation from himself.
"That would be the lake beside Fern Lodge, sir," he
suggested. "This is Sir Clinton Driffield, here. He's at
Fern Lodge. He'd perhaps be able to say."
"Charmed to meet you, Sir Clinton. Most oppor-
tune," Yarrow said effusively. "Would there be any ob-
jection to my going down to the lakeside to study the
habits of the water-fowl? I am, as you can guess, an
amateur naturalist. Very much of an amateur, I'm
afraid — merely a beginner. But keenly interested,
now that I have begun. If you could give me
leave . . ."
"So long as you don't come near the house itself, I
can see no harm in it," Sir Clinton interjected, cutting


THE GOVERNMENT MISSION 211
short Yarrow's explanations. "If anyone offers to
hinder you, give them my name. It'll be all right."
He glanced at his watch.
"It's later than I thought. By the way, Peel, there's
one other thing I want to know ..."
His gesture politely excluded Yarrow from the con-
versation, and the amateur naturalist reluctantly sep-
arated himself from the group.
"I've nothing to say," Sir Clinton admitted, as he
watched Yarrow retreating along the pavement. "But
I thought perhaps you'd like a rest, Peel."
The constable glared malevolently after the figure of
the naturalist.
"That's him, sir. Talk, talk, talk, and dashed little
in it all when you come to put it through a sieve. He's
fair got on my nerves. Thanks for shaking him off."
"Anything further that Sergeant Ledbury's un-
earthed?"
"Ledbury?" Constable Peel brought his mind back
to the original theme of conversation. "Oh, Ledbury's
had another bad drop. You'll remember how he went
off and interviewed Roca over the Quevedo business,
sir? And how he found Roca had been in bed when
Quevedo got his dose. Well, when they overhauled
Roca's luggage, what d'you think they found amongst
it?"
"A rope or a rope-ladder, I expect," Sir Clinton
suggested.
Constable Peel stared at his companion with some-
thing as near admiration as was possible to his nature.
"The very thing, sir!" he admitted. "Wonderful
guess, that. Yes, he had a rope-ladder in his suitcase.
That was how he got out of the window and none of the


212
GRIM VENGEANCE
inn-people suspected he'd been out. Simple, wasn't it?"
"Pretty nearly obvious," Sir Clinton assured him.
"And that's all up to date?"
"That's all, sir," Peel concurred, after consulting his
memory. "But that was a nice drop for the sergeant,
after all his fuss. There's fussers and fussers, in this
world," he continued peevishly. "That man Yar-
row . . ."
"Sorry I must go, Peel," Sir Clinton interrupted
hastily as he retreated to his car. He had obtained all
the useful information which the constable seemed to
have; and the charm of Peel's company hardly at-
tracted him in itself.
At Estelle's he found the major section of the party
ready to return to Fern Lodge; but Johnnie was still
engrossed in his fishing and had to be dragged away
from the stream almost by main force. He had actually
secured five fish in the afternoon; and was exceedingly
bitter at being interrupted, since he had just had a rise
when he was summoned away.
"I'd have caught it with the next cast, I'm sure," he
protested, with the eternal optimism of the true angler.
Despite his almost tearful pleadings for "just one
more cast," he was bundled into the car, clutching his
rod in one hand and his rather dishevelled catch in the
other.
When they reached Fern Lodge, a telegraph boy was
just leaving the door, and Sir Clinton found that the
message was for him. Tearing open the envelope, he
scanned the form and saw that the message opened
with: "Altazimuth, declination, meteorite, focus . . ."
He put it in his pocket, glanced at his watch, and found
he had just time to decipher it before dressing for din-
ner, since the message was very short. Rather bored by


THE GOVERNMENT MISSION 213
the prospect, he went slowly up to his room and set
about his task.
When decoded, the communication proved to be an
order — or at least a demand so urgent that it was
practically an order. His services were again required
on the Continent, and he was to be at a certain spot
without fail on a given date. With a certain foreboding,
Sir Clinton refreshed his memory from his pocket-
book, and found that his misgivings were accurate. He
would have to be in Central Europe on the very day
when the S. S. Malta left Havre; and his business
would detain him until it was too late to overtake her
in the course of her voyage down the Spanish coast.
The Government wire had cut clean across his plans.
"H'm!" he reflected. "That shortens the time avail-
able for Roca's confederate to take a hand in the game,
if he wants to. I wish I could run across him and give
him a polite hint."
He smiled grimly at this idea as he began to slip the
links into the cuffs of a dress shirt. While he was thus
engaged, his quick ear caught the sound of Johnnie's
easily recognisable step coming up the stair; and he
went to the door of his room to summon his nephew.
"Here, Johnnie! Cut along and get me some stout
thread. Your mother will give you some. Say it's the
thick stuff for sewing on buttons that I want. She'll
know what I mean."


CHAPTER XIV: THE LETTER WITH THE
PARIS POSTMARK
Sir Clinton, coming down early for breakfast, arrived
in the hall just as Staffin took the letters from the post-
man. He held out his hand for the bundle of corre-
spondence, and began in a leisurely fashion to pick out
his own share, when his eye was caught by an envelope
addressed to Francia. A glance at the stamps revealed
the Paris postmark, and Sir Clinton moodily speculated
on the nature of the contents. Probably some more of
Francia's "business correspondence," he concluded,
with a faint twitch of his brows.
He put the letter down and was proceeding to sort
out the remaining envelopes when Johnnie came
downstairs at a run, clearing the last four steps at a
bound.
"Here's a letter for you, Johnnie," Sir Clinton ob-
served, flicking over to his nephew an envelope ad-
dressed in a sprawling and immature hand.
"It's from Spink Faraday," Johnnie announced, after
studying the calligraphy of his schoolmate. "He prom-
ised to write to me about some rabbits."
He tore open the letter, read it in a hurry, and
seemed relieved by what he learned from the contents.
"I was afraid something had gone wrong about these
rabbits," he explained, as he caught his uncle studying
his face. "It's all right, though."
His eye wandered to the spot where Sir Clinton had
laid down Francia's letter.
"Foreign stamps! They must have changed the


LETTER WITH PARIS POSTMARK 215
colour of the French forty centimes. This one's different
from the ones I've got already. I wonder if he'd give
me these if I asked for them? Do you think he would,
uncle?"
Johnnie's stamp-collection contained nothing of in-
terest to an expert philatelist. Despairing of ever
acquiring rarities like the two-penny post office Maur-
itius or an early Moldavian issue, he had taken a line
of his own and become seized with the ambition to have
the biggest collection in his school. Quantity, not qual-
ity, was what he concentrated upon; and all was fish
that came to his net. He hesitated longingly over the
Paris letter before he could tear himself away and join
his uncle in the breakfast room.
During the meal, Sir Clinton seemed busy with his
thoughts; and he answered only abstractedly when his
nephew addressed him. Just as they were about to rise
from the table, the door opened and Francia came in,
with the letter in his hand.
"I say, Vincent" — Johnnie attacked him in a tone
blending courtesy with determination — "would you
let me have these foreign stamps, please? I'd like them.
I haven't got a specimen of that French forty centime
yet for my collection."
Francia agreed without hesitation, opened the letter
at once, and handed the envelope to Johnnie. The letter
itself he slipped into one of the side-pockets of his
jacket before sitting down at the table. Sir Clinton, not
feeling eager to talk to his niece's husband at this par-
ticular juncture, rose from his chair, paused for a mo-
ment to light a cigarette, and moved out of the room. It
seemed needless to put an unnecessary strain upon
himself to conceal his real feelings towards Francia,
as he would have to do if he fell into conversation.


LETTER WITH PARIS POSTMARK 21"]
it at once. It's only after they've forgotten it a little
and can come back to it with a fresh eye that they can
give it fair judgment. I expect you're in the cold-fit
stage just now. Are these the sketches?"
"Yes, I've just been re-reading them, and they do
seem simply rubbish — not a bit good. I'm almost
ashamed to show them to Mr. Francia now; and we've
promised to let him have them to-day."
With a glance which asked permission, Sir Clinton
leaned over and took up the papers.
"You've certainly been industrious," he observed, as
he picked up the heavy bundle and made a pretence of
weighing it in his hand. "Look here, Miss Anstruther,
I'd like to read these, if you'll let me. I'm not an ex-
pert; but I go to a show now and again, and I've a fair
notion of what catches a foreign public. Do you mind if
I see them? I'll hand them on to Mr. Francia this after-
noon, without fail."
His desire to help seemed so genuine that Linda
Anstruther made no futile protestations.
"Well, if you would take the trouble," she said in a
tone of mingled gratitude and shyness. "I'm honestly
depressed about the stuff, now I come to read it over;
and I'd really like a candid opinion about it. Only, you
will be candid, won't you? It's no good telling us the
things are first-rate when you really think they're
hopeless."
"When you ask for my opinion, you'll get it quite
frankly," Sir Clinton assured her in a voice which
satisfied her completely.
He patted the loose sheets into a neat pile and kept
them in his hand.
"By the way," he asked, "are there any special ar-
rangements for this afternoon? I haven't come across


218
GRIM VENGEANCE
any responsible members of the family yet to-day."
"Mrs. Francia said she's going to ask some people
over to play tennis. There'll be enough to fill the two
courts — if you play." She counted the party on her
fingers. "There's Miss Scotswood, Mr. Scotswood, and
Mr. Brandon from the village; then there's yourself
and Mr. Francia, that makes five; Mrs. Francia, six;
and my sister and myself, eight. Mrs. Thornaby doesn't
want to play. You see, we're depending on you, Sir
Clinton. You'll play, won't you?"
Sir Clinton seemed almost in doubt for a moment. He
glanced at the horizon, from which the heat-haze had
cleared almost completely.
"It'll be frightfully hot," he pointed out, with no
great enthusiasm in his tone. "My impression is that
we'll all have had enough of it pretty soon. Of course
I'll play as long as I'm wanted — delighted to get a
game."
Quite obviously the prospect of tennis on a blazing
afternoon had few charms for him. He considered for a
moment or two.
"Suppose we work it in this way," he suggested.
"We can play for the best part of an hour. By that
time, most of us will want a rest — certainly Mr. Scots-
wood will, if I know him. You and your sister have
never been out on the lake yet. I'll take you in a boat
for a short time, if you like — until tea appears. Mean-
while, if Mr. Francia has nothing better to do, he can
look at your sketches; and that leaves four to go on
playing if they want to. Would you care for that?"
"If you don't think Mrs. Francia would mind . . ."
Linda consented doubtfully. "It doesn't seem quite
right to be making arrangements behind her back,
does it?"


LETTER WITH PARIS POSTMARK 210.
"I'll make it all right with her," Sir Clinton assured
her. "In fact, if the day develops as it seems to be going
to do, I shouldn't wonder but the rest of the party will
take the second boat out themselves. The lake will be
the only decently cool place this afternoon."
Before Linda could raise any further objections,
Johnnie flew out of the house with a long paper parcel
in his hand.
"It's come, uncle!" he called, as he rushed up to
them, waving his prize.
"Your new air-gun?" Sir Clinton inquired. "Here,
pass it over and I'll cut the string for you."
He drew out his penknife as he spoke; and Johnnie
set to work to unwrap the little weapon.
"Oh! A new box of darts, and a big box of slugs as
well!" he exclaimed, as the paper tore apart under his
eager fingers. "Thanks ever so much, uncle! I forgot
to say anything about slugs and darts when you said
you'd get me a new gun. It's awfully good of you to
have thought about them."
He disengaged the air-gun from its last wrappings
and examined it with the eye of a connoisseur.
"Did you ever shoot with an air-gun, Miss Anstru-
ther?" he demanded, loading the toy as he spoke.
"No, but I should like to."
"You would? Well, come on now with me and I'll
show you how," Johnnie invited her cordially. "I've
got a target stuck up at the back of the garage, and
we can shoot with darts. Are you coming too, Uncle
Clinton?"
His uncle shook his head.
"No, Johnnie. I've some reading to do just
now."
"Then come on, Miss Anstruther," Johnnie directed.


222
GRIM VENGEANCE
two girls; but apparently he thought it time to break
up the party, for he moved over to the little group.
"Where's my cigarette-case?" Elsie demanded. "Oh,
I left it in my room. Nuisance, that."
Rex offered his own case, but she shook her head.
"I can't smoke any brand but my own favourite,"
she said, after a glance at his cigarettes. "And if I
don't smoke, these mosquitoes are sure to begin to bite.
They come up in hundreds from the lake."
She hurried off up the path towards the house.
"That's a good notion about a smoke-screen," said
Estelle, warding off an enterprising mosquito with a
gesture. "Give me a cigarette, please, Rex. I'm not so
refined as some people, and I expect I'll survive your
tobacco, no matter what it may be."
She took a cigarette from his case and allowed him to
light it for her.
"That seems to discourage them," she said, blowing
a cloud of smoke in the direction of several mosquitoes
which were hovering near her.
Sir Clinton disliked to see Francia beside any decent
girl, and he deftly inserted himself into the conversa-
tion with the Anstruther sisters, though without appear-
ing to force himself on the party. After a few minutes
desultory talk, he seemed to recollect his promise to
Linda Anstruther, and glanced at his watch as though
to gauge the time which they had in hand.
"It's just four o'clock," he said.
Then, turning to Noreen Anstruther, he added:
"Care to have a row on the lake, Miss Anstruther?
Your sister's going out with me in one of the boats, and
you might come too. It'll be cool on the water; and
parts of the lake are rather pretty."
Noreen hesitated for a moment, consulting her sister


224 GRIM VENGEANCE
Francia. "I'll bring you the stuff in a minute. I have it
upstairs."
In a very short time he reappeared with the pile of
manuscript in his hands.
"It'll pass the time for you until tea," he said in a
tone which made it quite clear that he expected Francia
to begin reading at once. "I'd take that chair there, if
I were you. It has the light behind you from the veran-
dah window; and there's a table handy, if you want to
put down the sheets you're finished with."
Francia held out his hand, took the manuscript, and
sat down. He seemed frankly bored with the task
which had been set him; but quite obviously he did not
care to risk friction with Sir Clinton.
"Clever girls, those," Sir Clinton went on in a casual
tone, as though to efface any impression which his firm-
ness might have left. "One or two of these sketches
are not at all bad — quite funny. H'm! That sun's
shining directly on your paper."
He stepped to the window behind Francia and drew
the curtains across it to shield the Argentiner from the
blaze of the afternoon sun.
"That right?" he asked, when he had adjusted the
curtains. "Want a pencil to make notes with? They'll
probably expect a detailed criticism, you know. Read
the one about the two girls at lunch, first of all. It's
really not bad."
Francia made a vague gesture as though he were
already engrossed in his reading and wished to be free
from further interruption. Manifestly, he bore a grudge
against Sir Clinton for defeating his scheme to join the
party. Sir Clinton suddenly bethought him of the fact
that there were two boats, and that the Argentiner had
probably intended to detach one of the girls and take


LETTER WITH PARIS POSTMARK 225
her out alone in the second boat. He turned at the
door, and there was a faint touch of malice in his smile
as he examined Francia engaged in his uncongenial
task.
Sir Clinton hurried after the girls, but they had evi-
dently been waiting at the boat-house for a minute or
two, for they had brought out cushions and placed them
in the stern seats of one of the skiffs. Sir Clinton
steadied the boat while the girls stepped on board;
then, getting in himself, he pushed off, and picked up
his oars. After a few strokes he paused and drew out
his cigarette-case, which he offered to his passengers.
"You're not smoking yourself, Sir Clinton," Linda
pointed out as she selected a Virginian from the mixed
contents of the case.
"No, I must have put my cigarette down somewhere
when I was in the house. It doesn't matter," he assured
her. "One can't smoke comfortably when one's row-
ing."
Noreen Anstruther trailed one hand in the water.
"Well, it is cooler here," she said thankfully. "What
a day!"
"We'll go over yonder, if you like, under the shade
of the trees," Sir Clinton suggested, as he took up his
oars again.
Linda glanced lazily over the smooth waters.
"I don't see Johnnie anywhere about. Isn't he fish-
ing?"
"No, his new air-gun's keeping him busy, I expect,"
Sir Clinton explained. "Nothing but a fresh toy would
keep him away from the lake. I expect he's gone off
intent on slaughter, somewhere; for I haven't seen him
since lunch. I don't think he'll do much harm."


CHAPTER XV: THE BURSTING OF THE
BUBBLE
When Elsie left the remainder of the party beside the
tennis-courts, she went straight to the drawing-room of
Fern Lodge, where she believed she had left her
cigarette-case. A cursory search failed to reveal it any-
where in the room, however; and she passed to the
smoke-room, thinking that possibly she might have laid
it down on one of the tables when she had gone in there
to telephone some orders before lunch. Again she drew
blank; and for a moment or two she stood racking her
memory for some clue. At last she remembered having
put it down on her dressing-table earlier in the day,
and she could not recall having used it since then.
She went lightly up the stairs and, crossing the hall,
entered her room. The cigarette-case was there, lying
on the dressing-table; and she moved over to pick it
up, glancing out of the window at the empty lawns
before the house as she did so. Almost without think-
ing, she opened the case, and extracted a cigarette
which she put between her lips. Then it occurred to her
that she had no matches, and she went to the mantel-
piece in search of some; but when she lifted the box
there, she found it empty.
Men always carry matches, she reflected; and she
turned to the wardrobe where her husband's clothes
were kept. When she opened the door, the nearest gar-
ment was the jacket which Francia had worn that


THE BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE 22^
morning and which he had replaced on its hanger when
he changed into tennis-flannels in preparation for the
afternoon's play. Elsie slipped her hand into one of the
pockets at random, felt a match-box under her fingers,
and tried to extract it; but apparently it had become
entangled with a paper; and in order to get at the
vestas she had to pull out the paper first. She trans-
ferred it to her left hand and continued her search for
the match-box.
It was the contents of the envelope with the Paris
postmark which she had come upon thus accidentally.
Francia had thrust it into his jacket-pocket at the
breakfast-table, since it was hardly the sort of docu-
ment which he felt safe in reading with someone at his
elbow. After breakfast, when he was alone, he had
taken it out, run his eye over it, and replaced it in his
pocket. There were some questions in it which required
answers, otherwise he would have destroyed it imme-
diately. As it was, he retained it until he could put it
under lock and key in his attache case; and when the
time came to change into flannels he had overlooked
it and hung up his coat in the wardrobe with that damn-
ing piece of evidence at the mercy of anyone. But for
the chance that Elsie needed a match, it would have
been perfectly secure.
Elsie was devoid of any inquisitiveness and it was
her nature to trust people; so she had never manifested
the slightest curiosity about the business correspond-
ence of her husband. As she stood beside the wardrobe,
fumbling in the jacket-pocket, it was by the merest
accident that her eyes fell on the paper she held in her
left hand, and she read, half-unconsciously, one of the
sentences of the letter.
That sentence was enough. Francia's correspondent


THE BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE 229
She had been so proud of Francia; and so much in
love with him. Ten minutes before, she had reckoned
herself one of the happiest girls alive; and to have the
flagrant proof of his depravity thrust upon her in this
brutal fashion seemed more than her nerves could bear.
If she could only break down and let all this pent-up
emotion find its escape I And at last she got the relief
she wanted and lay curled up in the armchair, her face
in her hands, and her whole frame shaken by the vio-
lence of her weeping.
The fit did not last long. She sat up, wiped her eyes
with her handkerchief, and, finding it insufficient for
this emergency, she got up and hunted for another in a
drawer. The action seemed to steady her nerves; and
she sat down again with a cooler mind. The letter had
fallen on the floor, but she picked it up again, and once
more read it from start to finish.
The third reading made things no better. The bubble
of her illusion had burst, and nothing could ever re-
shape it. Her husband — that! She shivered with dis-
gust as she thought of him. What cut most deeply now
was a phrase in the letter which showed that Francia
had been laughing at her behind her back. While she
had been giving him all she had, he had been grinning
in amusement at her innocence and simplicity; and he
had made a joke of it to this creature from whom the
letter came. All she had meant to Francia was some-
thing which he could sell at a good price. His love-
making had been a sham from the start — just a few
moves in the game. That wounded her pride as well as
her heart; and somehow this second stab seemed to
bring her into a cooler frame of mind.
Elsie had inherited some of the characteristics which
served Sir Clinton well in his work; and, now that the


230 GRIM VENGEANCE
first storm of her emotion had blown over, she began to
collect herself and think ahead. She folded up the letter
and put it away in a drawer. As she was about to turn
the key in the lock, a fresh idea occurred to her. She
hated Francia now; all her love for him seemed sud-
denly to have been transmuted into its opposite in the
short space since she had entered the room; and, with
something of her uncle's clarity, she bethought herself
that Francia might have other damning letters in his
possession. These would be worth having in any case.
She had not got to the length of considering clearly
what her next step would be; but some instinct urged
her to secure all possible weapons against the brute
who had treated her like that.
As she glanced round the room, her eyes caught
Francia's attache case, standing in one corner. That
would be where he would keep confidential matter, ob-
viously; because she knew that he never locked up
any of the places in which he kept the rest of his
belongings.
She picked up the attache case, and brought it to the
dressing-table. The catch refused to open, and she
looked round for some lever which would serve to
wrench up the hasp. A shoehorn-buttonhook seemed
fit for the work; and for a moment or two she strug-
gled with the fastening. It gave way suddenly at last,
and she opened the attache case. The sight of the
papers satisfied her that she had got what she wanted.
One by one she picked them up and glanced over
them; but only here and there did she find anything
she could understand. A good many of the documents
were in Spanish, which she could not read; but there
were several in French and English; and as she read
them her loathing and hatred for Francia increased.


THE BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE 231
She was almost cold by now. The first shock was
over; and anger was mingling with the bitterness of
her disappointed love. What beasts men were! Why,
no beast could ever sink so low as this man whom she
had adored. And all the time he had been laughing in
his sleeve, sharing the joke with his confederate, get-
ting ready to sell her into something worse than slav-
ery. She bit her lip as she thought of it. And not only
she, but Estelle and the other girls were to be dragged
into the net. She was to be the bait that caught them.
She recalled phrases he had used, stored up uncon-
sciously in her memory because she loved him, which
now seemed to carry a fresh significance. And to think
that she had lived side by side with that! She would
never feel clean again; the very touch of such a reptile
was contaminating.
Elsie had very vague ideas about the divorce laws. In
her set in London, divorce had been looked upon as un-
important; and she had never had the curiosity to
inquire into the subject. She had no definite knowledge
of the value of the papers in the attache case; but since
they had come into her possession she felt she might as
well make them secure. One or two documents still
remained in the case. She lifted them out, and caught
sight of what lay below them. Then, making up her
mind, she took up the contents of the case, crossed over
to the open drawer, and put the papers under lock and
key. After that, she closed the attache case and re-
placed it in its original position. As she did so, a curi-
ous expression crossed her face. It seemed a needless
precaution; for, if she could prevent it, Francia would
never enter that room again.
The sound of voices under the window roused her
from her absorption. She heard her uncle speaking;


232 GRIM VENGEANCE
and the sound gave her back some of the courage she
had lost. Here was someone who would stand by her
and see her through her troubles. She could throw the
whole thing on his shoulders, make him shield her from
any harm. At least there was one man in the world she
could trust implicitly.
The voices fell silent; and in a moment she recog-
nised Sir Clinton's light step on the stairs. He passed
her door and went to his own room, further along the
hall. She had a sudden impulse to call him in as he
passed back again; but it died out almost as soon as it
entered her mind. She felt it would be better to wait
before appealing to him. He would always be there to
help when he was needed.
She crossed to the window overlooking the lake and
gazed out vaguely while her mind worked furiously, re-
viewing the whole situation. Dimly realising that anger
hurt less than disappointed hopes, she concentrated her
thoughts on the wound to her pride, and succeeded in
lashing herself into bitterness against her husband.
That was better than brooding over the wreck he had
made of her life.
Sir Clinton's figure came into her range of vision as
he left the house and went down to join the Anstruther
girls at the landing-stage; then he disappeared among
the bushes which fringed the path. A few moments later
Elsie saw the boat, with the three of them in it, push
out on to the lake.
She turned back to the dressing-table and picked up
the thing she had taken from the bottom of Francia's
suitcase. For a moment she examined it curiously.
Then, leaving the room, she went softly down the stair.
At the front door she paused and looked about her,
fearing that someone might come upon her at this time


THE BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE 233
when she especially wished to avoid people. Seeing no
one about, she walked along the front of the house
towards the steps leading up to the verandah outside
the smoke-room window.


CHAPTER XVI: A SURPRISE FOR SIR CLIN-
TON
Behind her outward flippancy, Estelle possessed a
fund of shrewdness and discernment, and her mind
had been exercised in the last day or two upon the situ-
ation presented to her by the affairs of the group which
centred round Fern Lodge. The glamour which Francia
exercised upon Elsie had no influence on Estelle; and,
although she had done her best to like the Argentiner
for his wife's sake, she could not succeed in rousing
herself to any enthusiasm over him. Though she had
been careful to conceal her real opinion from Elsie, in
her own mind she had summed up Francia with the
vague phrase: "Not quite it, and more than a bit of the
other thing." And the fact that she perceived a kin-
dred feeling in Sir Clinton had helped to reinforce her
own views on the subject.
Rex was the man who ought to have married Elsie.
Estelle, with even better sources of information than
Sir Clinton possessed, was quite convinced that things
would have taken that turn inevitably if it had not been
for the sudden incursion of Francia into the field. Rex
certainly was not the sort of man she would choose for
her own husband; but that very fact enabled her to
appreciate him all the more accurately; and she was
convinced of one thing: Rex would never let a girl
down. Somewhere at the root of his simple character
lay a stratum of fundamental decency — even in her


A SURPRISE FOR SIR CLINTON 235
own mind she shrank from using the word "chivalry"
— which would make him an asset to any girl who re-
lied on him. Francia did not leave that impression on
her, for all his attentiveness and surface courtesy.
Where Estelle parted company with Sir Clinton was
in the matter of inviting Rex to Fern Lodge. Without
being able to formulate her reasons, she inclined un-
consciously to Mrs. Thornaby's view; and she felt that
Sir Clinton was running unnecessary risks of friction
by bringing Rex into so much direct contact with Fran-
cia. Her vague distrust of the Argentiner made her ap-
prehend trouble between him and Elsie, sooner or
later; and if trouble arose when Rex was on the spot
. . . She did not feel inclined to probe the possibilities.
Rex had one of those deceptive tempers which flash
up only at times of deep disturbance, and it was often
difficult to say where things would stop if once he were
roused.
She had caught Rex's expression as he glanced after
Elsie when she left the group to go up to the house for
her cigarette-case; and she had mentally filed that
along with the very different look which was on his face
as he watched Francia attaching himself to the An-
struther girls and Sir Clinton. Though she laughed at
herself for over-imaginativeness, she could not help
fancying that there was danger in the air when two
such opposite feelings were lodged in a single mind.
"Care to take me for a row on the lake, Rex?" she
inquired lazily. "I don't mind going, if you're very
keen."
Rex shook his head.
"Nothing doing, when you put it in that tone of
voice," he answered, meeting her with her own weap-
ons.


236
GRIM VENGEANCE
Estelle waved her cigarette disconsolately.
"How manners degenerate — all except mine. Now
a couple of generations ago you'd have said: 'Indeed,
you honour me too much, my dear Miss Scotswood.
Permit me to procure a duenna for you, and then con-
duct you to the wherry.' Or something like that.”
"I daresay,” Rex answered abstractly. “They all
had no-trump hands in the politeness game then."
Estelle saw that he was disinclined to talk, so for a
time she devoted her whole attention to discouraging
the mosquitoes by means of her cigarette-smoke. At
last, thinking that Rex would be none the worse of
having his attention diverted from his thoughts, she
broke the silence.
“Elsie seems to have been a long while looking for
that cigarette-case.”
Rex woke up suddenly at the sound of her voice.
“Yes, hasn't she!”.
Then he seemed to recollect something, and his face
clouded.
“Confound it! I'd forgotten I had a sort of half-
engagement to-night.”
Seeing that Estelle seemed curious, he added in
explanation:
“There's a weirdish bird staying at the Black Bull
- a fellow Yarrow. He's by way of being interested in
the wild life of the countryside — so he tells everyone.
An Amateur Naturalist, in capitals. Accent on the ad-
jective, I should think; for the beggar would be hard
put to it to tell a dragonfly from a kingfisher, so far as
I've gathered. I half promised I'd give him the benefit
of my expert knowledge — take him for a stroll in the
evening and explain the difference between a frog and
a toad, and all that sort of thing. I'll need to put him


A SURPRISE FOR SIR CLINTON 237
off, or he'll be hanging round the place waiting for me
all evening. He's no call to complain, really, for we
fixed up nothing definite; but I'd better ring up the
Black Bull and leave a message for him."
He rose to his feet with a gesture, asking her permis-
sion to go and send his message.
"Give me another cigarette, please?" Estelle begged,
as he was about to leave her. "These mosquitoes are a
bit too enterprising."
He offered his case and she helped herself to a ciga-
rette, which he lit for her. Then he took one himself
and struck a second match.
"Turkish?" Estelle inquired. "A bit heavy for me;
but anything's better than a mosquito-bite."
"An Abdullah won't do you much harm," he reas-
sured her as he turned away.
Estelle watched him take the path up to the house.
"This party's going the way of the Ten Little Nigger
Boys," she reflected. "It seems to dwindle as one looks
at it. I'll be Old Maid in a minute or two if this goes
on."
She crossed the grass and took a chair beside her
father and Mrs. Thornaby; but she felt no inclination
to join in their conversation. The heat of the afternoon
was apparently having its effect on Mr. Scotswood, for
by degrees his contributions to the talk were approach-
ing the monosyllabic stage. Estelle leaned back and
amused herself by warding off the cloud of midges and
mosquitoes which had gathered about the party.
Suddenly, across the hot, still lawns, came the re-
port of a firearm, muffled but unmistakable.
"What's that?" Mr. Scotswood ejaculated, starting
up from his chair as the sound reached his ears.
"A shot, it sounded like," Estelle's eyes showed


238 GRIM VENGEANCE
something which looked like fear, though it was not of
herself she was thinking. "Come on, Daddy. I think it
came from the house."
She started to her feet and took a step or two before
her father could restrain her.
"You stay where you are!" Mr. Scotswood directed
in a tone that admitted no disobedience. "I'll go and
find out what it was."
Estelle hesitated. Then, glancing at Mrs. Thornaby's
face, she saw in its expression a counterpart of her own
emotion. She allowed her father to go off alone, and
turned to her hostess.
"It may have been only Johnnie with his air-gun,"
Mrs. Thornaby suggested, but her tone betrayed that
she did not take her own supposition seriously.
Estelle made no pretences.
"That wasn't an air-gun," she said. "But who'd be
firing a gun up here? There's nothing to shoot at."
And she cast an anxious glance after the retreating
figure of her father as he cut across the lawn in the
direction of the house.
As Mr. Scotswood drew near the front door of Fern
Lodge he heard a fresh and even less reassuring sound:
the scream of a girl in panic; and on the doorstep he
encountered Staffin flying from the house, her face a
mask of terror. Deftly he intercepted her.
"What's all this about?" he demanded, in the same
tone that he might have used in inquiring why his after-
noon tea had been overlooked.
His apparent calmness brought Staffin up sharply
and avoided the attack of hysteria which he had
dreaded.
"Oh, sir, I heard shooting in the smoke-room; and
when I went to the door, there was Mr. Francia lying


A SURPRISE FOR SIR CLINTON 239
on the floor and Mr. Brandon standing over him. And
there was a great pool of blood on the hearthrug. Oh,
such a shock I got! I'll never forget it as long as I live.
I won't dare to go to sleep at night for fear of dreaming
about it . . ."
Mr. Scotswood had little patience with useless emo-
tion. He took the terrified girl by the arm, swung her
round, and directed her towards the path leading down
to the boat-house.
"Go down to the lake and wave to Sir Clinton. He's
out in a boat there. Tell him to come up here imme-
diately. Now get off, and don't waste any time."
Staffin responded to this mechanically. Evidently she
had feared that he might want her to go back into
the house again; and the prospect of getting away was
a relief. She set off immediately; and Mr. Scotswood,
after seeing that she was obeying his orders, stepped
into the hall. At the end of it he caught sight of two
terrified faces; and his first act was to send the maids
back to their own quarters. Then he turned the handle
of the smoke-room door and walked in with a steady
step.
Staffin had given him the essentials of the scene in
two sentences. Francia's body was lying contorted on
the hearthrug before the fireplace; and from its at-
titude there was little difficulty in seeing that, if he
had died quickly, the end had not been painless. His
flannels were splashed with blood and a great pool was
slowly extending itself on the floor. Bending over the
body was Rex Brandon, and at the sound of the open-
ing door he swung round and turned upon the intruder
a face which puzzled Mr. Scotswood even at that
extraordinary moment. Horror and amazement seemed
to have had their moulding influence on Rex's expres-


24O GRIM VENGEANCE
sion; and in addition there was something which hinted
at a hardening resolution struggling to the front in the
turmoil of conflicting emotions. Somehow, Mr. Scots-
wood had not expected a murderer to look quite like
that, if he were caught red-handed. Then, suddenly,
Rex gained control over his countenance; and he
straightened himself up with a sullen look on his face
which obliterated the earlier expression.
"What's all this about?" Mr. Scotswood repeated.
He could not help giving himself a good mark for the
way in which he was succeeding in repressing his own
emotions in this unexpected situation.
Rex gulped for a moment before he could find his
voice.
"He's been shot," he said at last, with a gesture
towards the body at his feet.
Mr. Scotswood's glance followed the gesture and he
shivered slightly. After an instant's inspection of Fran-
cia's body, he turned his eyes again to Rex's face.
"Damn it, man!" he broke out. "Did you do it?"
Rex's face hardened at the question, but he made no
reply. Mr. Scotswood was suddenly impressed by the
strangeness of the whole affair. His world seemed to
have been given a twist since he had heard the shot a
couple of minutes before. Here he was, with a dead
man at his feet, asking a boy whom he had known for
years the plain question: "Did you do it?" And the boy
did not take the trouble to reply! What was one to
make of it? There seemed to be no key to this puzzle,
for Mr. Scotswood had no inkling of the state of af-
fairs brought about by Elsie's marriage. To him, the
whole situation was inexplicable to the verge of incred-
ibility. He had come up in the car that afternoon with
a sane youth who had discussed batting averages in the


A SURPRISE FOR SIR CLINTON 243
he had hitherto seemed to give him; and under the
scrutiny Rex's face grew even more dogged in its ex-
pression. Quite obviously, he had determined to with-
hold any explanation whatever; and Sir Clinton could
make nothing of this decision. Mr. Scotswood, studying
the two faces before him, imagined that Sir Clinton
really had discounted the possibility of Rex's guilt and
was doing his best to help; but at the same time Rex's
sullen refusal to give information seemed inexplicable
on any hypothesis except that of culpability.
With a gesture which betrayed his dissatisfaction,
Sir Clinton turned away and began methodically to
examine the room. He went first to the open windows
and glanced out, as though to gauge what could be seen
by a person standing outside and looking into the
smoke-room; but he was careful to disturb nothing.
The row of books on the window-shelf was half con-
cealed by the section of the curtain which was still
drawn; and Sir Clinton inspected them sideways, ap-
parently without finding anything worth noting.
Turning round, he came next to the cane chair in
which Francia had been sitting when he was killed.
There was a splash of blood on the back of it; and, in
the centre of the stain, the cane had been smashed and
torn by the passage of the bullet. Mr. Scotswood saw
Sir Clinton's glance pass back from the bullet-hole to
the window; and he inferred that the shot must have
travelled in a line joining the casement to the chair.
As he stood watching the late Chief Constable's
proceedings, an adventitious thought crossed Mr.
Scotswood's mind. Here he was, thrust by accident
into the position of a Watson to Sir Clinton's Holmes;
but Watson never seemed to have felt as he himself felt
at this moment. Watson could encounter all the acces-


244 GRIM VENGEANCE
sories of a violent death without turning a hair. In fact,
he hardly noticed them, so far as one could gather from
his accounts. Mr. Scotswood, on the other hand, was
acutely conscious of the spreading pool of blood on
the floor, the contorted body on the hearthrug, and the
cold detachment with which Sir Clinton was going
about his work.
"I suppose it's sound enough," he reflected incon-
sequently. "Watson was a sawbones, so blood wouldn't
disturb his nerves as it disturbs mine."
Sir Clinton's glance went back to Rex's face for a
moment; and again Mr. Scotswood read in his expres-
sion a perplexity which seemed the counterpart of his
own feelings. So far as Mr. Scotswood's knowledge
went, there was not the slightest reason for Rex to
disagree with Francia, much less to shoot him. They
had been perfectly polite to one another when they
were playing tennis together not twenty minutes before.
And yet, if Rex had not killed the Argentiner, why did
he remain silent under what was practically an accusa-
tion? Mr. Scotswood felt that he was completely out of
his depth. Unless . . . but he dismissed the idea that
Rex could be a homicidal maniac whose madness had
come suddenly to the surface. That was out of the
question.
His attention went back to Sir Clinton, who was
obviously hunting on the floor for something which he
could not find. Mr. Scotswood had not given a thought
to the weapon, up to that moment, but now he seized
the opportunity of doing something, and he joined in
the search.
"You can't find the pistol?" he demanded, as he
began to ferret about on the floor near Sir Clinton.
As he uttered the remark, he heard a faint sound


A SURPRISE FOR SIR CLINTON 245
behind him; and, turning round, he found Rex staring
at him with hate and dismay written plainly on his
white, set face.
"There's no pistol here," Sir Clinton said, rising to
his feet and mechanically dusting the knees of his
trousers.
Mr. Scotswood was puzzled for a moment by this.
Then a wave of relief passed over his mind.
"Of course not," he said, meeting Rex's stare. "The
shot must have been fired through the window."
He had expected to see Rex's face brighten at the
announcement of this positive proof of his innocence;
but, instead of that, the expression on Rex's features
seemed to grow more sullen. He relaxed his lips mo-
mentarily as though to say something; then, appar-
ently, he thought better of it and remained silent. Mr.
Scotswood, turning to Sir Clinton to see how he was
taking the remark about the pistol, found him examin-
ing Rex's face in an abstracted fashion as though he
were thinking of something which puzzled him com-
pletely. A few seconds passed before Sir Clinton spoke.
"I'll have to ring up the police, Rex. Can't you be
frank with us? It's really the safest thing in the end.
You can talk to me alone, if you like. I must have the
facts if I'm to be of any use to you. Once Ledbury gets
this business into his hands, you'll have to speak,
whether you like it or not."
Rex shrugged his shoulders almost impatiently.
"I've nothing to say," he repeated in the same
dogged tone.
Sir Clinton made a gesture of despondency.
"Then there's nothing for it," he said.
After a final glance round the room, he moved over
to the telephone on the table beside the door. As he did


ledbury's investigation 249
hardly suppressed eagerness. "Now you can make a
clean breast of it, Rex. It's quite safe; you know I
won't give you away. Quick! Ledbury may be on top
of us at any moment."
His new method of approach yielded exactly the
same success as his earlier ones. Rex simply shook his
head, not even taking the trouble to put his refusal into
words. Sir Clinton seemed dashed by this rebuff. He
retreated a step or two and sat down on the arm of one
of the big chairs. Mechanically he put his hand into
his pocket, pulled out his cigarette-case, placed a
cigarette between his lips, and held out the case to
Rex, who refused the offer with another head-shake.
"Smoking might steady your nerves," Sir Clinton
pointed out, as he struck a match for his own cigarette.
"You're all jarred up. Bound to be."
Then his eyes caught Rex's glance wandering to-
wards the body, which lay almost at their feet.
"Oh, it's that, is it? Don't waste any grief over that.
Not worth it, really."
If the brutality of these sentiments was intended to
show Rex where his sympathies lay, Sir Clinton's latest
line of approach ended, like the others, in a cvl-de-sac.
Rex refused to let himself be drawn; and Sir Clinton,
recognising that it was hopeless to question him fur-
ther, smoked in silence until a noise of boots on the
parquet of the hall announced the arrival of Ledbury
and his subordinates. Sir Clinton got up.
"You're a young fool," he said, in a tone completely
devoid of heat. "But from what I've seen here, I don't
think you'll come to much harm, if that's any encour-
agement."
If Rex had any intention of replying to this, he got
no opportunity. The door opened, and Sergeant Led-


250
GRIM VENGEANCE
bury appeared on the threshold. His little gimlet eyes
passed from the white, sullen face of Rex to that of Sir
Clinton, who had composed his features instantane-
ously as the handle turned. Only after that inspection
did the sergeant look at the body on the floor. He went
forward, knelt down, and subjected the corpse to a
careful examination without saying anything. Then,
after making a jotting or two in his notebook, he rose
to his feet and spoke impersonally.
"Better take things in their order, p'raps. That maid
in the hall seemed to know something about the start of
affairs. Might begin with her, if there's any place one
can talk in. Not here, of course."
He cast a glance at Francia's body as he spoke,
evidently to amplify the meaning of his last phrase.
Then, moving to the door, he made a gesture as though
ushering his two companions out into the hall. Rex
obeyed mechanically; and Sir Clinton followed him.
Ledbury waited until they were out of the room, then
he called to Peel, who was posted near the front door,
and put him in charge of the smoke-room.
Sir Clinton led the way to the drawing-room, fol-
lowed by Rex and the sergeant. Apparently Mr. Scots-
wood had fulfilled his mission, for there was no one to
be seen about the house. In a moment or two, Staffin
appeared in answer to the sergeant's summons. Led-
bury looked her up and down critically as she came in
— a process which did not seem to reassure her much.
She threw a glance at Sir Clinton, as though begging
for his support against the rigour of officialdom.
"Now, then," said Ledbury in a tone which sounded
like an attempt to ingratiate himself with the girl,
"we're not going to bother you more than we can


ledbury's investigation 251
help, you understand? But we want to know what-
you've seen about this murder in there."
He pointed crudely with his thumb over his shoul-
der to indicate the smoke-room.
The girl was obviously anxious to tell what she knew,
but apparently she had difficulty in determining where
her story should begin.
"Better start about lunch-time," Ledbury advised,
seeing her difficulty. "Just begin about lunch-time and
tell us all you can remember."
This seemed to give Staffin the help she needed.
"There was just the usual people at lunch," she
began. "Sir Clinton, there, Mrs. Thornaby, Master
Johnnie, and Mr. and Mrs. Francia, and the two Miss
Anstruthers."
"Did you notice anything remarkable about them?"
the sergeant demanded as he noted the names in his
book.
Staffin shook her head.
"There was nothing different from other days. Later
on in the afternoon, Mr. Scotswood and Miss Scots-
wood came in a car. They brought Mr. Brandon here
with them. Then they all went down to the tennis-
courts."
The sergeant nodded encouragingly. Sir Clinton,
with a faint touch of amusement, noted that Ledbury
did not think it worth while to lick his pencil in dealing
with this witness.
"The next thing I saw," Staffin went on, "was when
I went into the pantry opposite the smoke-room door.
I was cleaning silver and the pantry door was a bit
open, because it was stuffy in there with all this heat. I
heard voices, and then Mr. Francia came past my door


GRIM VENGEANCE
and went into the smoke-room. That would be some-
where about four o'clock, I should think; but I don't
know for certain."
• "It was four o'clock," Sir Clinton confirmed.
"Then, in a minute or two, I heard Sir Clinton come
down the stairs, and he went into the smoke-room
too."
Ledbury seemed to prick up his ears at this, and
threw an involuntary glance at Sir Clinton. Their eyes
met for a moment; then, at the sight of the smile on
Sir Clinton's lips, Ledbury looked disconcerted and
turned back to the maid.
"They were in the smoke-room together for a
minute or two, and I heard them talking," Staffin
went on.
"Ordinary voices, or angry?" the sergeant demanded,
keeping his face averted from Sir Clinton.
"Oh, just ordinary," Staffin answered.
"Quite ordinary," Sir Clinton confirmed, his smile
growing slightly more accentuated as he met the eyes
of Ledbury. "I'll tell you all about it in a moment, if
you wish."
"Well, what happened after that?" the sergeant de-
manded, as though to cover his annoyance at having
mistaken the situation.
"Sir Clinton came out of the room again, leaving Mr.
Francia behind."
"Anyone else in the room except him?" Ledbury
asked, as though he feared she might have overlooked
something.
"Nobody that I knew of," Staffin answered frankly.
"Nobody at all," Sir Clinton testified. "He was quite
alone when I left him in the room."
"Well, what next?" the sergeant urged.


ledbury's investigation 253
Apparently he was anxious to get away from the
point, since he had betrayed himself in a slip.
"Not very long after Sir Clinton had gone out of the
front door," Staffin pursued, "I saw Mr. Brandon here
go into the smoke-room and shut the door behind him."
Ledbury swung round and studied Rex's face with
increasing interest for a second or two; but this time
he was careful not to say anything which might betray
what he thought.
"The next thing I heard," Staffin went on in obedi-
ence to a gesture of the sergeant, "was the telephone
bell ringing and then Mr. Brandon speaking. I didn't
hear what he said, of course, through the door."
She paused, as though the next part of her story was
harder to tell. •
"After that, I heard a shot behind the door and a
horrid noise — an awful noise . . ."
"Come, come nowl None o' that," said the sergeant.
"Just say what you heard and be done with it. You
heard a noise? A cry, or what?"
"Somebody hurt and calling out," Staffin described
it. "And a noise like something falling on the floor."
"A big thing? A man's body?"
Staffin pulled herself together with an effort which
evidently cost her a good deal. For a moment or two
she seemed to be racking her memory for the exact
details.
"Yes, a noise like a man falling in a lump. But there
was another noise too, like ... I can't think exactly
what it was like. Oh, well, like a brass candlestick fall-
ing, or something of that sort. That's as near as I can
remember it. I'd know it again if I heard it. That's all
I can say."
Ledbury looked rather glum at this description.


ledbury's investigation 257
"Ah! Just so! You think so?" said Ledbury, with
a tinge of discomfort in his tone. "Well, I'll have a look
at the smoke-room now."
"You'd better see Mr. Scotswood," Sir Clinton sug-
gested. "Then you'll have all the evidence of witnesses
in your hands."
The sergeant agreed, and Mr. Scotswood was sum-
moned. He gave his account of what he had noticed
when he burst into the smoke-room; and, as his narra-
tive drew near its close, Ledbury evidently felt surer of
his ground. He threw a look at Sir Clinton as much as
to say that the case was now clearer than ever.
"There's one thing I ought to add," Mr. Scotswood
wound up. "Neither Sir Clinton nor I could find the
pistol anywhere in the room. In fact, I'm sure it wasn't
there."
"So am I," Sir Clinton threw in.
"We went over the place together, side by side," Mr.
Scotswood elaborated, "and, if one of us had missed it,
the other would have been sure to find it. I was most
careful in searching."
"Just so!" Ledbury said non-committally. "We'll
need to have a look for it."
At the door of the smoke-room, Mr. Scotswood
turned away. Quite obviously he had no desire to re-
examine the scene of the tragedy. When Sir Clinton and
the sergeant were left to themselves, Ledbury's first act
was to subject Francia's body to a minute inspection.
"Shot in the back it seems," he said, looking up at
last, "and the bullet's made fair hay of him in front.
Must have been a heavy one to do all that damage."
"Or an expanding one?" Sir Clinton queried.
"Or an expanding one, as you say, sir," Ledbury


258
GRIM VENGEANCE
admitted after a pause for consideration. "Anyhow,
the shot was fired in this room, that's clear. I can smell
the stink of the powder strong enough."
"Quite so," Sir Clinton answered, but the tone of his
voice left it in doubt whether he agreed with the ser-
geant or was merely amusing himself by turning Led-
bury's favourite non-committal expression against its
author.
Ledbury showed no sign that he had noticed the faint
caricature of his own manner. He rose to his feet and
went across to the window which looked out on the
verandah.
"You were in here with the deceased, weren't you,
before Brandon came in?" he demanded. "Is this win-
dow just as it was when you were in the room?"
"I was in the room before Mr. Brandon entered it,
certainly. When I left it, both curtains were drawn
across the window, which was open. Your eyes will as-
sure you, sergeant, that one of these curtains has been
slid aside since then, leaving a clear view out into the
garden. It was in that state when I came back into the
room after being summoned up from the lake. Quite
clear, I trust?"
Ledbury seemed to take the hint about Rex's name.
"Then it must have been drawn back by either the
deceased or Mr. Brandon?"
"How should I know, sergeant? It's drawn aside;
I see that with my own eyes. I didn't see who drew it."
"Has anything else been disturbed that you know
of?"
Sir Clinton noticed a distinct change in the sergeant's
manner, which was reflected in the tone of his voice. In
their previous intercourse, Ledbury had been in the
position of a more or less docile pupil; but now it was


264 GRIM VENGEANCE
spring. I suppose that's one of the Meccano bits too?"
Sir Clinton took it from his hand and examined it.
"No," he reported. "That's a broken bit of an old
air-gun spring. Here's the other bit lying on the table."
"A fish-hook and two ordinary pins," Ledbury con-
tinued, handing up his prizes for examination. Then his
voice shot up a couple of tones. "Ah! here's something!
A cartridge-case!"
"Let's have a look at it," Sir Clinton requested after
the sergeant had inspected his catch in the light from
the window. "H'm! A .38 by the look of it."
He threw a glance at the body on the hearth-rug.
"An ordinary .38 wouldn't have made a mess of him
like that. They must have filed the tip off the bullet and
turned it into a dum-dum, to judge by the results. That
seems suggestive, sergeant."
Ledbury welcomed the return of Sir Clinton's earlier
tone.
"What do you make of it, sir?"
Sir Clinton shrugged his shoulders faintly.
"One might make a guess. If it had been an ordinary
bullet, Francia might have lived long enough to say
something. The makeshift dum-dum didn't give him
much opportunity to split on anyone, if he'd a mind
to."
This was evidently a fresh light on the situation to
Ledbury. He made no reply, however; but went down
again on his knees and resumed his search.
"Here's the stub of a cigarette, sir."
"What's the make?" Sir Clinton asked, with a certain
eagerness in his voice.
"Abdullah's the word on it, sir. Turkish blend."
Sir Clinton's eagerness died out.
"Too common in this house to be much help," he


MAN WITH THE TELESCOPE 267
Clinton confessed blandly. "Not mine, by any chance,
are they?"
Ledbury was evidently annoyed by this; and he
hastened to stab at what he thought would be a weak
spot in Sir Clinton.
"No, they're not yours. As soon as I saw them, I
telephoned down and got one of my men to take young
Brandon's finger-prints . . ."
"Better go cautiously, sergeant," Sir Clinton inter-
rupted, spoiling Ledbury's effect completely. "You
seem to be treating your prisoner rather too much like
a convict. He's not that yet, remember. There's still a
trial to come — if it ever comes."
"Well, anyways, I had his prints sent up here with a
man on a bicycle, so as to lose no time; and when I
compared them with the prints on this pistol here . . ."
"They were identical, of course. When a man picks
up a pistol and throws it out of an open window, it's
only to be expected that he'd leave his finger-prints
on it."
"And when a man fires a pistol, he leaves his finger-
marks on it too, doesn't he?" Ledbury suggested with
more than a touch of tartness in his tone. "Brandon
fired that shot. That's my belief, and you won't shake
it."
Sir Clinton's eyebrows lifted slightly.
"A bit unsafe, isn't it, when you count chickens in
the shell? There's one you needn't reckon on, sergeant:
a conviction of Rex Brandon for this murder. You've
made the biggest blunder of your life over this business.
And now come along with me, and I'll prove it to you."
Ledbury's confidence was badly shaken by the
certitude of Sir Clinton's tone. Once again, uneasy feel-
ings began to surge up in his mind; and it was with


MAN WITH THE TELESCOPE 269
may, as he appreciated the bearing of this discovery
on his case against Rex. "You think that means the
shot was fired from outside the room, sir?"
Sir Clinton had evidently grown tired of sarcasm.
"You've asked what I think about things before,
sergeant. Use your own wits for a change. Anything
peculiar about the position of the hole, for instance?"
Ledbury examined the tear in the cloth attentively
for a few seconds, then he turned round. By this time,
all trace of bumptiousness had vanished from his man-
ner.
"Meaning that it's low down, sir, rather below the
level of the casement."
"Yes. Can you see how that could happen?"
Ledbury pondered for some moments.
"You mean that a man was outside with the pistol,
and when he pushed it against the curtain the cloth
ran up on the muzzle, and the farther he pushed it into
the room, the lower down on the curtain the hole would
be?"
"Or else the curtain was waving in a draught. Either
would fit. So much for the curtain. Now for the tele-
phone. What's the length of the cord attaching the
mouthpiece to the desk-stand?"
Ledbury extracted a measuring-tape from his pocket
and took the length of the cable.
"Three and a half feet, sir."
"How far is it from the stand to the dead man's
chair — the back of the chair — roughly?"
Ledbury measured the distance with his eye.
"Close on thirty feet," he estimated.
"So no man could stand behind this chair and talk
into the mouthpiece at the same time?"
"No."


MAN WITH THE TELESCOPE
sergeant had laid down on the table when he came into
the smoke-room.
"Do you make anything of that, sir?" he asked,
rather humbly. "Does it suggest something to you?"
Sir Clinton gave an almost imperceptible shrug, as
though the matter were almost outside his purview.
"On the face of it, one or two things look clear
enough," he said. "The shot wasn't fired by Mr. Bran-
don; and yet Mr. Brandon's are the only finger-prints
on it, so far as one can see. Therefore the man who
handled it before Mr. Brandon took special care not
to leave his prints on it. Premeditated crime, evidently.
And done by someone who takes trouble to think things
out.
"The bullet came through the curtain; the cartridge-
case was on the floor; and the window was open. One
might infer that whoever fired the pistol was just out-
side the window, leaning in over the sill, perhaps. The
pistol itself must have been inside the window at the
moment of firing, or else the cartridge-case would have
been on the verandah, since the ejector works back-
wards and sideways in its throw. That seems to dispose
of the possibility of the shot having been fired from
any distance outside the window, quite apart from the
fact that a man at a distance couldn't see through
the curtain to aim, whereas a man actually at the win-
dow would be able to peep through any gap between
the drawn curtains. By the way, know anything about
these automatics, sergeant?"
Ledbury shook his head.
"Never had much to do with them," he confessed.
"They're neat bits of machinery," Sir Clinton ex-
plained. "See that little pawl that can be moved up
to engage in the notch in the sliding jacket? If that's


MAN WITH THE TELESCOPE 273
make of her hearing Mr. Brandon say: 'Go away! At
once!' That'll want explaining."
A flash of comprehension lighted up his face.
"You've explained away Mr. Brandon very neatly,"
he said slowly. "Mighty neatly indeed, you've ex-
plained him away. But p'raps I was a bit hasty in
taking your advice and letting him out of the jug.
What about his being an accomplice, ex post facto —
shielding the real criminal, like? How would you look
at that, sir?"
"I shouldn't look at it at all," Sir Clinton said, tak-
ing hardly any trouble to conceal his contempt for the
idea. "Use your brains, sergeant."
The flame of suspicion was blazing up in Ledbury's
eyes now even stronger than before. With a complete
disregard of Sir Clinton's implied warning, he picked
up the telephone, rang up the police station, and made
some inquiries. From what he heard, Sir Clinton gath-
ered that Rex had been set at liberty and had immedi-
ately set off for Fern Lodge.
The sergeant put the telephone back on its bracket
with a gesture of relief.
"No harm done yet," he said half-aloud. "I'll lift
him when he turns up here."
At that moment there came a knock on the door of
the smoke-room; and, in answer to Ledbury's sum-
mons, one of the constables put his head into the room.
"There's a Mr. Yarrow wants to speak to you, ser-
geant. He says he's got some important information to
give you. It won't keep, he says."
"All right, I'll see him — in the drawing-room, say."
He turned to Sir Clinton with a politeness which
seemed rather forced. "I suppose you've no objection


274
GRIM VENGEANCE
to our using your room, sir. Perhaps you'd like to hear
this new evidence?"
If the last sentence was ironical, Sir Clinton was
apparently obtuse, for he took it at its face value.
"Certainly, sergeant," he agreed, following Ledbury
from the smoke-room.
Waiting in the hall was the amateur naturalist,
dressed in his incongruous loud tweeds. Ledbury ush-
ered him into the drawing-room; and, almost before
the door was closed behind them, Yarrow had launched
eagerly into a long detail-encumbered narrative.
Stripped of its irrelevancies, his story ran thus. That
afternoon, taking advantage of Sir Clinton's permis-
sion, he had come up to the lake to study the habits of
the water-fowl—Gallinula chloropus; and for that
purpose he had brought his new telescope. He installed
himself under cover of some trees and kept a look-
out on the lake. About four o'clock, he noticed two
girls on the landing-stage. Shortly afterwards, Sir
Clinton joined them, and the party went out in one of
the boats. Yarrow confessed quite frankly that he had
spied on them through his telescope — "merely with the
friendliest interest." Then, tiring of this, he turned his
glass towards Fern Lodge.
From his position, he could see the verandah and
also the porch of the house; and when he brought the
front door into his field of view he caught sight of a
girl standing on the steps — "a very pretty girl, brown-
haired, and dressed in a flimsy frock—a tennis-
costume or something of the sort." She had riveted his
attention immediately, and he tried to keep her in sight.
"But 1 am unused to my telescope, or any telescope, and
I find difficulty in holding the instrument steady and in
keeping my second eye closed." From the spasmodic


MAN WITH THE TELESCOPE 277
"Magnifies a good deal, doesn't it? I suppose you
couldn't get much into your field of view?" he asked.
"The window itself, and a bit of the wall on either side,
perhaps?"
"Yes," Yarrow confirmed, evidently flattered by the
praise of his instrument's power. "That's just what I
saw; the window with the girl's figure and perhaps a
yard of wall on each side of it, just as you say."
Sir Clinton turned to Ledbury.
"If you're thinking of calling Mr. Yarrow as a wit-
ness, sergeant, you'd better impound the telescope. It'll
be an important exhibit at the trial."
Yarrow began at once to protest against the con-
fiscation of his telescope; but the sergeant made short
work of his objections. Ledbury had got all he wanted
from Yarrow, and now he practically turned him out
of the room under the pretext that he had better put
his statement in writing immediately. A constable took
charge of the naturalist and led him off in search of
writing materials so that he could put his narrative on
paper in another room.
Closing the door, Ledbury came back and con-
fronted Sir Clinton. He made no effort to conceal his
satisfaction with the latest development of the case.
"Greatest bungle of my life?" he said softly, as
though merely thinking aloud. " 'A very pretty girl, in
a tennis-frock, and brown-haired.' There was four girls
here this afternoon. Two of 'em was on the lake when
the shot was fired. Another of 'em was Miss Scotswood
— and she's fair-haired. So that leaves Mrs. Francia.
She's 'a pretty girl, brown-haired, in a tennis-frock.'
I begin to see a bit o' light in this case."
He paused in his soliloquy and stared hard at Sir
Clinton with an expression of triumph on his face.


28o
GRIM VENGEANCE
I shall do my best to persuade her to tell you every-
thing she can, without reservation of any sort."
The sergeant took his eyes from Sir Clinton's face
and stared thoughtfully at his own boots for some sec-
onds. This was the last move that he had expected;
and he could not help feeling that it must conceal a
trap of some sort. Nobody in Sir Clinton's place would
voluntarily throw the girl open to this attack, unless
he had something clearly in view which would turn
the affair to his advantage. Try as he would, Ledbury
could not conceive why this suggestion had been put
forward at all.
"I'll send to fetch her," he agreed reluctantly, in the
end. "But understand, sir, I've my duty to do. I'll
have to arrest her, whether she makes a statement or
not. I'll send someone to look for her now."
He left the room to make his arrangements. Sir
Clinton followed him out into the hall and, rather to
the sergeant's surprise, entered the smoke-room, where
a constable was again on guard. He stayed there only a
couple of minutes; and Ledbury encountered him once
more as he returned to the drawing-room. Just at that
moment, Rex Brandon appeared in the porch and came
forward to intercept them. He ignored Ledbury com-
pletely.
"What's happened since they took me away?" he
demanded, going up to Sir Clinton, with a white and
anxious face. "What game are they up to now?"
"Sit down there for a little, Rex," Sir Clinton or-
dered, evading any answer to the question. "You can't
wait in the dining-room — it's occupied by a Mr. Yar-
row, who mustn't be disturbed. Find a chair here in
the hall. I'll need you in a few minutes."
He paused, and then added:


THE FRENCH METHOD
"You're a good sort, Rex."
Ledbury overheard the low-toned sentence. Evi-
dently it gave him something to think about, for his
brows knitted as though he was making a violent ef-
fort to grasp something which eluded him. The whole
affair, as he saw it, had taken on an increasingly sus-
picious aspect. He had an uneasy feeling that all these
people were in league together to hoodwink him; and
yet he knew that there had been no opportunity for a
private consultation between uncle and niece since the
firing of the fatal shot. For all his guessing, he could
not imagine what Sir Clinton had up his sleeve.
They waited impatiently for a long time before any-
thing happened. Sir Clinton seemed to have no desire
to say a word; and Ledbury was only too glad to have
an opportunity of reconsidering the whole case in the
hope that he might be able to forestall Sir Clinton's
coming move. At last steps sounded in the hall, the
door opened, and Elsie was ushered in. As she entered,
the voice of Rex sounded in the hall.
"Don't say a word, Elsie I For God's sake, don't tell
them anything!"
Sir Clinton stepped swiftly to the door.
"Leave things to me, Rex," he said decisively.
"We'll need you in a minute or two. Till then, keep
quiet."
He closed the door and turned to Elsie; and as his
eyes fell on her, he was astonished, for all his forebod-
ings, at the change in her whole aspect. At four o'clock
she had been a care-free creature in the height of hap-
piness; now, as she turned her haunted eyes upon him,
he could almost feel in his own flesh the work that
anguish, shock, horror, and terror had wrought on her
in the interval. His little Elsie, the child who used to


THE FRENCH METHOD 283
"I came out of the front door," she repeated, keep-
ing her eyes on her uncle's as she spoke. "Then I went
along towards the verandah. I wasn't feeling quite
well . . ."
"Never mind about that," Sir Clinton inter-
jected.
Something in her eyes suggested that here they
might be on thin ice, though he could not understand
what she actually meant.
"Tell us what you saw, and what you did — nothing
more."
Elsie nodded faintly to show she understood. Quite
obviously she was nearly at the end of her nervous
strength.
"I sat down on the garden seat just below the steps
leading up to the verandah. I wasn't feeling ... I
wanted to be alone, I don't know how long I sat there.
I don't, really."
"Never mind about that," Sir Clinton advised her.
"What was the next thing you did?"
"The next thing that happened was I heard the
sound of a shot. It seemed to come from the smoke-
room. There was a horrible cry, too. I thought someone
had had an accident."
In the pause that followed, Sir Clinton heard Led-
bury turn over a page of his notebook in which he
was evidently writing furiously in an attempt to keep
pace with the narrative. Sir Clinton dared not take his
eyes away from Elsie's for fear of directing her atten-
tion to the uniformed figure.
"And then?" he asked gently.
"When I heard the shot, I ran up the verandah steps
and along the verandah to the nearest window of the
smoke-room. The curtains were drawn."


284 GRIM VENGEANCE
"Yes?" Sir Clinton encouraged her, for he knew the
next sentences would be the worst.
"Then suddenly one curtain was torn back — and
there was Rex face to face with me at the window. I
saw a black pistol in his hand. He tried to keep me
from seeing what was on the floor; but I could see it
was Vincent's body. Then Rex said: 'Go away! At
once!' or something like that."
She stopped abruptly and seemed to collapse in the
chair. It was some time before Sir Clinton, even with
all his efforts, could bring her back again to a state in
which she could give a coherent narrative.
"I didn't know what I was doing," she continued at
last. "I knew Rex had shot Vincent. I couldn't tell
why. Everything seemed to be happening in a night-
mare . . ."
"Don't bother about that," Sir Clinton urged sooth-
ingly. "Keep to what you did."
"I ran away along the verandah, down the steps,
and down one of the paths —the one that leads to the
summer-house. I just got to the summer-house. Then I
expect I fainted. I can't remember anything after that
for a long time. When I came to again, I was in the
summer-house. I tried to walk, but I was too sick and
faint to do it. The police found me there."
She halted for a moment.
"Are you sure . . . are you really sure no harm'U
come to Rex?"
Sir Clinton seized the opportunity to divert her mind
from the main tragedy.
"Rex thought you'd fired the shot yourself. And
when we questioned him, he stood in and allowed the
blame to be thrown on his shoulders instead. No one
could have done more for a . . . friend."


THE FRENCH METHOD 2%$
As Sir Clinton had hoped, this swung Elsie's
thoughts into a fresh channel. Manifestly it threw the
whole affair into a new light, and her mind concen-
trated on a re-interpretation of the facts.
"Rex did that for me?" she asked half-wonderingly.
"Rex did that," Sir Clinton echoed. "Now that's all
we want with you just now, Elsie. Go upstairs and lie
down. You're absolutely worn out. I'll come up to you
very soon and tell you all about it if you wish."
He gave her his hand and helped her to her feet.
Then, as he was about to lead her to the door, a
thought struck him.
"Get me that picture from the wall there," he or-
dered Ledbury, pointing to a sketch framed in passe-
partout. "Clean the glass carefully and keep your fin-
gers off it."
Ledbury obeyed; and Sir Clinton took the glass
from him.
"Now, Elsie, I want you to grip this — first with
your right hand, and then with your left — as if you
were catching the end of a door and swinging it open."
He held the little frame vertically in the air, ready
for her to catch. Elsie hesitated for a moment, as
though in sudden mistrust. Then, after a glance at her
uncle's face, she did as he wished. Her exhaustion
touched her attitude with a trace of the unquestioning
obedience of a little child, and Sir Clinton found some-
thing uncomfortable in the reminiscence.
"Now, that's all, Elsie. I'll see you upstairs," he
said, putting the passe-partout carefully on a table.
"You're not fit to go up yourself."
Ledbury seemed for a moment inclined to object to
this, but after a look at Sir Clinton's face he decided to
let things take their course. Even yet, he had not been


286
GRIM VENGEANCE
able to see a plain solution of all this tangle; and he
could not repress the feeling that some gigantic game
of bluff was being played upon him. Here was a man
murdered, and two people on the very spot — within a
couple yards of the body — and Sir Clinton was trying
to persuade him that neither had a hand in the crime.
Absurd on the face of it! And yet . . .
He was still pondering over the problem when Sir
Clinton returned, bringing Rex Brandon with him.
"Now, Rex, the plain truth and the whole truth,
please. I've cleared you completely; and we need your
evidence to clear Elsie. Tell us exactly what happened
from the time you went into the smoke-room up to the
moment when Staffin looked through the doorway."
Rex listened with a heavy cloud of suspicion on his
face.
"I think I'll say nothing," he said bluntly. "You've
no power to force me to make a statement?"
"None at all," Sir Clinton agreed. "But Elsie has
told her story — after she learned that you were cleared
— and we need your confirmation of it in the details.
If we don't get that, it'll be more difficult to prove that
she had no hand in the thing. The only way you can
do her harm is by refusing to tell us the whole truth —
leaving out nothing, whatever."
Rex scanned Sir Clinton's face for a moment.
"Well, I can trust you, I suppose," he said at last.
"Only, I hope you're not making a ghastly mistake
over it. I'll tell you what you want, now you've put it
that way. Where do I begin?"
"You went into the smoke-room . . ." Sir Clinton
prompted.
"Yes, I went into the smoke-room and shut the door.
Francia was reading some papers in the chair by the


THE FRENCH METHOD 287
window. I didn't interrupt him. I sat down at the tele-
phone and called up the Black Bull. There was a mes-
sage I wanted to leave for a man Yarrow, so I spoke
to the girl at the desk in the hotel!"
Sir Clinton nodded.
"That's all been checked already," he told Rex.
"Now, go on with what happened next."
"I was in the middle of talking to her," Rex con-
tinued, "when suddenly there was a bang — a pistol-
shot — and a cry. I swung round in my chair just in
time to see Francia's body fall to the floor. He writhed
a bit . . ."
"What did you do?" Sir Clinton demanded, bring-
ing him back to the main line.
"I must have dropped the telephone when I started
up out of my chair. The shot had come through the
window. By the way, I forgot that. Just as Francia
fell out of his chair, I heard the pistol drop on the floor.
I got up and went over. Francia was done for — any-
one could see that at a glance. My eye caught the pis-
tol lying behind his chair, and I stooped and picked it
up. I wasn't very quick in thinking just then, a bit
dazed by the suddenness of it all, I expect. It was a
second or two before it dawned on me that the mur-
derer must have been behind the curtain — the curtains
over the window, I mean. So I jerked one of them
aside and looked out, hoping to see the beggar running
away."
He halted abruptly.
"Is that enough?"
Sir Clinton shook his head.
"The next is the important bit."
Rex paused for some moments, evidently in grave
doubt.


288
GRIM VENGEANCE
"Elsie told you what happened next?" he demanded.
"We know all about it," said Sir Clinton impatiently.
"The only thing that counts is that your story and hers
should check each other. Don't fake a single detail.
You understand?"
"Oh, very well," Rex answered. "I'm in the dark
about it all; but I'll take your word for it. When I
pulled back the curtain, Elsie was standing behind it,
out on the verandah."
"We know that," Sir Clinton repeated.
"Well, what was I to think?" Rex continued. "On
the face of it, she'd shot him. The noise of the pistol
would bring a crowd in no time. I hadn't much time
to grasp the affair and I blurted out: 'Clear out!' or
something of that sort to her, to get her off the spot
before anyone came. She seemed frozen or numbed or
something. Couldn't act herself, it seemed. But she
took what I said, and she went off along the verandah
towards the front of the house."
"That fits perfectly," Sir Clinton assured him. "It's
all right. Now what next?"
Sir Clinton's manner seemed to satisfy Rex that he
was doing no harm.
"Well, there I was left standing with the pistol in my
hand. I had enough wits left to see what things would
look like if anyone came into the room. So I hove the
pistol clean out of the window amongst the bushes,
meaning to collect it later on and bury it, or some-
thing."
Rex saw Ledbury start slightly at this last phrase;
but a glance at Sir Clinton's face revealed that the ex-
Chief Constable attached no importance to the point,
and Rex continued:
"I'd hardly got it out of my hands than the maid


29O GRIM VENGEANCE
in the evidence you gave us. You didn't notice the re-
port of a pistol — or a cry?"
Yarrow shook his head.
"No," he admitted, as though he feared he was mak-
ing a mistake, "I can't say that I heard anything —
at least, at the time I didn't think of a pistol-shot, so it
doesn't look as if I heard the report, does it?"
"Another point," Sir Clinton pursued hurriedly, in
order to cut short the naturalist's habitual verbosity.
"We'd like to know how much detail your telescope
showed. Could you see the rings on the girl's hand, for
instance?"
"No, I couldn't have done that," Yarrow protested.
"The image was far too small to see things of that
sort."
"H'ml" Sir Clinton commented doubtfully. "I want
to get this clear. Could you see her hands? Could you
have seen if she'd had gloves on, or anything like that?
Or if her hand was open or shut?"
"Oh, I could have seen that sort of thing clearly
enough," Yarrow hastened to assure him. "If she'd
been wearing gloves, I'd have noticed it. And I could
see when she gripped the casement to keep herself
from falling. That was quite obvious."
Sir Clinton nodded.
"Would you mind adding these points to your writ-
ten statement, Mr. Yarrow?" he asked, as he made
a gesture to show that he had no more questions to
put.
The naturalist agreed effusively, and Ledbury
ushered him out of the room. Rex's face showed that
all this had been quite beyond him; he had not heard
Elsie's statement and could not put two and two to-
gether. All he had gathered was that some of Sir Clin-


292 GRIM VENGEANCE
Francia didn't strip off a pair of gloves after firing the
shot; because Yarrow's evidence proves she had no
gloves and because she would hardly be likely to strip
off gloves specially in order to make a finger-print on
the window, would she? It follows, sergeant, that she
didn't fire the pistol. And I've proved that Mr. Bran-
don didn't fire it. So where are you?"
Ledbury's hand stole up to scratch his ear; but it
was clear enough that this time the action was in-
voluntary and not merely a piece of camouflage. He
was apparently completely puzzled.
"What do you make of it yourself, sir?" he de-
manded. "It fair beats me. There's no denying that. I
chuck my hand in."
Sir Clinton did not trouble to triumph over the ser-
geant, although the occasion might have justified it.
"Ever hear of the French method — reconstituting
the crime, they call it? Suppose we try something of
the sort, and we'll have a real test of whether this no-
tion of mine's practicable or not. Mr. Brandon will
represent himself; you can play the part of Mrs.
Francia, and, since the murderer's role demands a bit
of accurate timing, I'll take it myself to save explana-
tion. You, sergeant, will go and sit on the garden seat
near the foot of the steps leading to the verandah. I'll
go down among the bushes. Mr. Brandon will go and
sit at the telephone table. I'll draw the curtain over
this window, so that everything will be exactly as it
was."
As Rex was moving off to take up his position, Sir
Clinton stopped him.
"Everything has to be just as it was when the shot
was fired. Shut the French window after you, and draw
that curtain across it. Now when I, representing the


294
GRIM VENGEANCE
"See now how it could have been done, sergeant?"
he asked.
"I'm not just sure yet," Ledbury replied. "You were
really on the verandah, for I heard your voice plain
enough from that direction. And yet I didn't see you
when I got up there. And I'd have seen you plain if
you'd bolted for the bushes."
Rex joined them at this moment.
"Simple enough," Sir Clinton explained. "I could
reach the verandah without your seeing me, sergeant,
because the corner of the verandah hid me from you as
I crossed the space between the bushes and the balus-
trade. I got up to the window unobserved. I peeped
through the curtains, then I shoved the cigarette-case
inside the sill, low down; and I was careful to keep my
shadow off the thin curtain, or Mr. Brandon would
have seen it. I then pretended to fire, and dropped the
pistol on the floor.
"In the real affair, Mr. Brandon got a bad shake-up,
naturally. He wasn't likely to be over-observant. Now
what I did, as soon as I'd given the signal, was simple
enough. I just took a step or two along the verandah
and slipped into the deep recess of the French window.
When you came tearing up the steps, I was already
under cover so far as you were concerned. And at my
back was the heavy curtain of the French window,
which transmitted no shadow that Mr. Brandon would
have noticed.
"Then came the scene at the window, and you
rushed off to the steps while Mr. Brandon turned back
into the room. All I had to do was to move off the
verandah at the opposite end from you, taking care to
keep outside the range of the window where Mr. Bran-
don was, until I got under cover of the bushes."


296
GRIM VENGEANCE
criminal offence when it's done within legal hours,
sergeant. And suspicions aren't much good alone, you
know."
He felt for his cigarette-case mechanically and found
it missing. The action seemed to remind him of a point.
"Of course the murderer, whoever he was, had gloves
on so as to leave no marks on the pistol. And, as there
were no marks on it, he might think it safer to leave
the weapon behind rather than risk being found with
it in his possession if he were spotted."
Ledbury nodded to show that he grasped this point.
Then he turned to Rex.
"I'm not quite sure what your position is, sir. You
may hear more of this, I'm afraid. You're an accom-
plice ex post facto, you see."
Sir Clinton made no attempt to conceal a smile.
"An accomplice of whom, sergeant? Mr. Brandon
connived at Mrs. Francia's escape. But Mrs. Francia
is a witness in the case and not a criminal. I don't
quite see where the felony comes in, really."
"You have me there," Ledbury admitted, scratch-
ing his ear furiously. "That's a way I hadn't looked at
it, but it's right enough now you point it out."
"One more thing," Sir Clinton added. "I hate to
leave loose ends. The murderer knew that Francia was
in the smoke-room. How could he have found that
out? you might ask. Simple enough. Suppose he was
lurking amongst those bushes when I came up to the
house at four o'clock. We stood at the front door and
I offered to give Francia these sketches to read. We
both went into the house. He'd have no difficulty in
overhearing what I said. He'd know Francia would be
left alone. And when I pulled the curtain of the smoke-
room window, he'd see me there and guess Francia was


THE FRENCH METHOD
297
there also. As soon as he saw me leave the house again
by the front door, he'd know the coast was clear."
"That would be it, likely enough," Ledbury ad-
mitted. "It does fit neatly together, now you've ex-
plained it. I wish I'd seen what that deep recess
meant."
Sir Clinton's hand made another futile search in his
pocket.
"You might hunt up that case of mine for me, Rex.
You know whereabouts it fell when you pitched it out
of the window. And when you've found it, please wait
for me. I must go up and see how Elsie's feeling."
He turned to Ledbury.
"You'll get everything put through now, sergeant?
There'll be an inquest, of course. I'll have to give evi-
dence there, I take it. But, beyond that, I hope I'll
never hear another word about this case. I've had all
the experiences I'm in need of this time; and I hope
I'll never touch criminal work again."


IN SAFE DEPOSIT 299
Sir Clinton addressed the envelope of this letter to
his lawyer, one of the few men whom he trusted im-
plicitly. Then he picked up the written sheets bearing
his witnessed signature and re-read his statement once
more, to ensure that no errors had crept in.
"Since by mischance an innocent man might be ac-
cused of the murder of the late Vicente Francia at
Fern Lodge, Raynham Parva, I leave the following
statement of the case, for use in the event of my un-
foreseen death.
"There fell into my hands certain documents prov-
ing beyond doubt that Vicente Francia was engaged in
the White Slave traffic; that he had gone through a
ceremony of marriage with my niece merely to further
his trade; and that he was planning to secure three
other girls as well, using my niece as his bait.
"Further, I had clear evidence that he murdered
the late Dr. Esteban Roca at the Bale Stones, near
Raynham Parva. Since Francia's death, I have com-
municated this evidence to the police; and, owing to the
death of the murderer, the case has been dropped with-
out the public learning the inner history of the affair.
"With all this evidence in my hands, I had four
courses open to me:
"i. To stand aside completely. The four girls would
then have accompanied Francia to the Argentine,
where they would have been wholly at his mercy. The
Centre's organisation is quite good enough to compass
the complete disappearance of a girl out there. Nat-
urally, I dismissed this course immediately.
"2. To interview privately. This would have saved a
public scandal; but, since my niece was married to
Francia, it would have left her tied for life to him and


IN SAFE DEPOSIT
301
ciable risk in order to wipe out a thing like Francia.
Consequently I spent some thought upon the problem
of providing myself with a complete alibi; and finally
I worked out a detailed scheme.
"In the first place, I timed the smouldering of one
of my cigarettes when it had been lit and laid down on
the edge of a shelf. I then obtained some strong thread
and soaked it in a solution made from chlorate of
potash tabloids. When dry, it was converted into quite
a good slow-match which could be ignited at a smoul-
dering cigarette.
"I then removed from Francia's attache case the
automatic pistol he had used in the murder of Roca. To
avoid repetition, I may say that in handling the pistol
I was always careful to wear rubber gloves so as to
avoid finger-prints.
"My young nephew had broken his air-gun, and, on
opening it up, I found the spiral spring broken in two.
The smaller fragment fortunately proved suitable for
my purpose. I compressed this bit of spring — a pow-
erful one — and fastened it, still compressed, by means
of a bit of the slow-match thread which I had pre-
pared. This compressed spring I jammed between the
trigger and trigger-guard of the automatic pistol so
that when the thread gave way the spring drove back
the trigger and fired the pistol. One end of the slow-
match thread was utilised to tie down the safety-catch
embodied in the pistol-grip, since otherwise the pistol
would not have been fireable.
"The other end of the slow-match thread I laid
across a smouldering cigarette.
"This arrangement provided me with the means of
exploding the pistol at a given moment, even though I
myself were at a distance. I may say that I tested and


IN SAFE DEPOSIT 303
thread which had been used to tie down the safety-
catch on the pistol-grip. It is unnecessary to go into
details; but I had fixed up the thread in such a way
that the slow-match burned along to a control-knot
and made the operation certain. The result of this was
that the spring and the thread, which might have sug-
gested something if they had been discovered, were
dropped on the floor when the pistol went off; and the
rest of the slow-match burned away so rapidly that in
a moment or two all trace of it was gone and the main
bit of evidence was destroyed. Luckily, my young
nephew is rather careless with his Meccano fittings,
and, as a number of these were strewn over the floor
beside the table, the bit of spring seemed merely one
of these odds and ends — the more so since the rest of
the spring was lying amongst his Meccano toys on the
table.
"When the pistol exploded, the sliding jacket of it
flew backwards, and struck the back of the book-shelf;
and of course this resulted in the pistol being jerked
from its position and thrown forward, so that it fell on
the floor. This concealed the fact that it had been on
the book-shelf at all.
"There were only two possible flaws in the scheme.
One was that Francia might smell the cigarette smoul-
dering behind him and might get up to see where it
was. This seemed hardly on the cards, since he was
smoking a similar cigarette himself when I left him,
and the fumes of the one would cover the smell of the
other.
"The second flaw lay in the possibility of someone
coming into the room and throwing back the window-
curtains. But that, when I arranged the affair, was so
unlikely in the short time allowed for the action of the









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