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2024-10-29 19:42:56Theatre crows were pressing along Piccadilly and s
down through the Haymarket, pouring into buses and tubes and taxis. Dark massy clouds were sailing in sullen sqaudrons across the moon and there was a warm smell of rain in the air.
"Rather a good show, wasn't it? I thought that new girl was awfully clever----wonderfully versatile for a newcomer."
A tall and very beautiful girl, with a mass of shinning brown hair crowning the clear contour of her face, glance up at her mother for confirmation as they made their way to the car park behind Leicester Square.
"very clever indeed, Mercia. and quite charming she actually contrived not to look ugly even when singing the highest of her top notes. A decided accomplishment".
Both women were beautifully gowned , the younger one in a swathing miracle of silver tissues which in the electric glare of the great arc lamps, flashed an occasional glint if powder blue. her mother was dressed more sedately. She carried herself with a regal air and she looked her part splendidly from the crown of her Bond Street coiffured head to the tips of her satin shoes.
She glanced half-humorously at her daughter whose eyes were busily ranging ahead among the crowds of cars and people.
"Not expecting to see Mr. Dain tonight, are you?" she asked banteringly.
Mercia was guilty of a sudden suspicion of a blush.
"No." She laughed. "I was looking for the car --- I don't think Mr. Dain knew I was going to a theatre tonight. And it's doubtful if he would look for me here. He---he isn't very fond of crowds."
"Is he calling tonight, dear?"
"I don't think so; I really don't think so. He's such a-----such a-----how can I put it?-----such an unusual sort of man you know. Quite unlike anything I've ever experienced."
"Shy?"
"Oh no; not quite that. But----reserved somehow. I never feel that I know anything about him. I always get the curious impression that whenever he's talking, he is never talking about the thing that is really in his mind. Odd, isn't it?"
"One of the oddities if a superfluity of brains my dear."
"I expect that's it. He seems to exist in the midst of a tremendous preoccupation. and yet, somehow-----"
Mercia's voice trailed off on a note of worried indecision.
Her mother, motherly observant and maternally discreet in every way saw the signs of difficulties ahead and gave the conversation a deft half twist, not enough to be too obvious but just enough to get back to firmer ground.
"He's a frightfully busy man isn't he?" She said casually.
"What new marvel is he engaged upon now? something highly startling, I suppose?"
Mercia smiled. " I don't know at all," she said; " he very rarely speaks of his tasks----he doesn't like talking about possibilities at all until they're a fait accompli. I wouldn't be surprised though if he isn't trying to find a way of preventing ladders in silk stockings. something utterly impossible, I'll be bound. Look-----there's our car."
She signalled to the chauffeur and a minute later they were whirling away to Greydene, the great house on the Northern Heights where Mercia, twenty-five years earlier, had first opened her infant eyes to the world. they were still talking about Valmon Dain and the queer mixture of nature's that went to the moulding of his personality when they sat down to supper.
And Dain, silent in the shadowed gloom of his room above Kingsway, took off a pair of headphones and withdrew a contact key from a tiny polished dial to which his phones were connected. There was scarcely a sound in the room, save the dull humming of the dynamos.
His brow was damp with perspiration, for the room was oppressively hoy. There was a quiet speculative look in his eyes when he put the instruments down and he was muttering to himself disjointedly, ad though his real thoughts were having a harassing tug-of-war with some other matter of pressing importance.
"Lyall, Lyall," he muttered. "There can't be two Willard Lyall in London... at least , not in Highgate.... and in that area.... and the Yard won't be through again for another hour..... Willard Lyall.... doesn't seem possible.... and the Yard got intimation no. 34 by the nine o'clock delivery... in a fearful stew about it....phew, it's hot tonight... never dreamed it was so late.. half past eleven... and they went to the Royal tonight... they said so... They'll be an hour yet before they retire... might have time if I rushed... just about... the Yard will have to go hang... pity... great pity... might have got a line on Lyall... be too late then... oh, well"
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The man they couldn't Arrest Visiting Lyall's Family
He put his headphones on again and connected his contract key with another little nickel dial on which the single ting of a bell had just sounded. For many seconds he listened with straining intentness, his left hand fiddling about abstractedly among the mass of cross-connecting wires by his shoulder.Then he muttered, "Bah!-----nothing but a sheaf of drunk and disorderly is!"He pulled off his phones, tossed them on to a baize-covered table, and went out. patent locks clicked into place as the door closed behind him.He hurried downstairs and let himself out into the fresh windy sweep of kingsway."Taxi," he called, as a driver looked inquiringly at him from the kerb."Where to sir?" The driver reached behind to open the door."Greydene---Mr. Willard Lyall's house, Highgate," He said as he climbed in. "it's just off the main road. I'll stop you when you get there."For some minutes, Dai
The man they couldn't Arrest Convincing Mr. Lyall
"But that brings me to a point. I am going down to Brighton early next. The Government are conducting some experiments in connection with a night range-finding instrument I submitted to them a few weeks ago. it will be quite interesting. Battleship firing all over the place, destroyers zipping along out of the darkness and letting fly with white-head torpedoes at illuminated targets, giant explosions shaking the sky. would you all care to come with me?""Oh I'd love to ." Mercia's delight was obvious."You will be my guests on board the official yacht. you can all come down in my car : start away from here about eight. By half-past ten we can be on board and heading out to the sea. firing begins at midnight. By four in the morning you can be safely tucked up in bed in Greydene here, or I can book you a suite if rooms at Brighton.""It all sounds too thrilling for words.""Can I make it a definite date then?""So far as i am concerned, y
The man they couldn't Arrest Confirming Lyall's Identity
Good Lord!" he muttered under his breath; what a perfectly appalling situation. Lyall, Willard Lyall a member of the silver Arrow Group and father of Mercia! And I've sent him to pentonville. I've shut him up in a penal cell just as surely as though I turned the key in him myself. the Yard will act on intimation no 34 with absolute certainty. they always have acted on my cards ever since intimation no 4 anyway, when even officialdom began to realise that.....phew! Delivery and Shaughnessy have already got the net out. they're closing in on Lyall as surely as darkness closes over the day."He tried to untangle the maze, but his jaded brain could find no pin-point of light. The posting of that letter had amassed around him a mountain of such unscalable difficulties that he felt himself getting tinier and more abjectly helpless with every minute that passed.In moments of crisis, a man is apt to resort to panic measures and in so doing it is just possible that
The man they couldn't Arrest The ghost information
" Yes, I dare say," said Delbury snappishly; "but that won't bring us any nearer to getting our hands on the ghost, will it?""Ahhhr! leave the man alone. it's after doing you a good turn, he is" snorted Shaughnessy.There was silence for a minute, and then Delbury declared his unbelief in the existence of this newcomer, Lyall."Who is he?" he demanded. "Eh? Who is he? Is he the new leader of this gang of ruffians, or Is he just one of the mob? I've searched every file in the records and there isn't a trace of a Lyall big enough to be in with the silver Arrows. The only one recorded at all isn't in the possibilities. He's doing a four years stretch in pentonville and won't be out till next year.""I'm game to bet that there is a Lyall in that bunch when we get the handcuffs on 'em , anyway." said Shaughnessy grimly."thirty-four times the ghost has come through with the goods. and we've landed 'em every time. I'm game
The man they couldn't Arrest A warning for Williard Lyall
Willard Lyall came down to breakfast and glanced at his mail. it was a fairly large pile, but nothing more than usual. Mercia often twitted him with the fact that he seemed to do most of his business by correspondence at home.He tossed one or two letters aside, matters of small moments, thrust one or two others into an inside pocket without opening them and then picked up a plain post-card. it was addressed to him in neat, upright capitals and note the London post-mark across the stamp. The date of posting was blurred and scarcely decipherable. He turned it over in curiously . on the reverse side also in black print letters, was a single sentence.A slow frown spread over his face as he read it. His hand shook and he dropped the card suddenly to the table. There was a sickly, unhealthy pallor crawling slowly over his skin, but the dark brows had come down over his eyes like a thunder cloud. He read the extraordinary thing again and a lo
The man they couldn't Arrest Suspected Squealers
Throughout breakfast Lyall was very quiet and uncommunicative. To cover his very unusual mealtime restraint he pretended a deep absorption in his morning papers. As soon as he had left the house, Mercia and her mother exchange meaning glances. "Dad seems very reserved this morning mum," said Mercia. "Probably worried about business affairs, my dear," said Mrs. Lyall. "You will come to know men in times as well as I do. And I think I know Willard very well. When a man is having a harassing time in the city, he resorts to silence." Mercia shrugged."I don't think it's mere worry," she said quietly. "I've seen dad when he has had worry before. I've seen him when he has been like a bear with a sore head. But I've never seen him like he was this morning when I came into the breakfast room. I know dad, and it seemed to me that he had received some awful shock."Mrs. Lyall looked very perturbed."A shock
The man they couldn't Arrest Unknown spy
"You see," continued Lyall ; "it means that somewhere in London there is an UNKNOWN SPY who knows as much about my movements as I do myself. It must be obvious to even the meanest intelligence that he is fully aware of my intentions regarding the Duchess of Renburgh's jewels. It is or ought to be equally obvious that he has already notified the police of my intentions or perhaps I ought to say our intentions. otherwise why should he warn me? And again, why has he warn me and not the others? But chiefly, who the devil is he?"The cold, chill note had gone out of Lyall's voice. His easy assumption of casual detachment fell away and he uttered the last words with a rasping asperity."I've been thinking matters over very closely this morning," he went on, "and I've come to the conclusion that here, I'm this warning is a clue to the biggest mystery we have ever known. here is a connecting link with something that has been gnawing at my thoughts for weeks." He br
The man they couldn't Arrest Another surprise Letter
Two miles away In an office high up among the roofs in kingsway, Valmon Dain removed a contact key from a red-lit dial and mopped his forehead."So!" he muttered, and dabbed at his forehead again. "murder, is it? eh? Well that is a word that is guaranteed to put a different colour on anything."He sat down gingerly on the edge of a chair and lost himself in a teeming intensity of thought.His mind had gone on ahead of the days and he too was standing in the black darkness of the area by the kingsland mews. He saw the dark figures slinking along from shadow to shadow, elusive as the ghost of flitting bats. saw them mustering in the silence and waiting, waiting for the man who would not be there.And then the sudden uprising of other shadows from the blackness avenging shadows which advanced with malignant swiftness from nowhere. the quick sharp scuffle, and then the fierce passionate denunciation of Willard Lyall, the traitor, the m
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Landring Dent
Lazard deftly charged the weapon with three small needles, which he took from a little gold ornament on his watch-fob. The needles were extremely thin, and about three-quarters of an inch long. They were wet when he lifted them from the little trinket, and he exercised scrupulous care in the way he handled them. He did not touch them with his fingers, but fed them into the tube with a pair of tweezers. Then he fitted a rubber shield over the trigger and slipped it back into his pocket. The cab was already half-way up Kingsway. He carefully wiped the gold trinket on a piece of cotton-wool, and burned the wool on the floor of the cab. It burned with a bright blue flame that flared up instantly, burned fiercely for a second, and as quickly died. He tapped the window, and the cab pulled in to the kerb. "I don't exactly know where Denburh House is, sir," said the driver apologetically. "All right; you've passed it. I'll walk back," said the Count, and paid him off
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Delbury's voice
Dain rested for a few minutes from the pressing grip of his headphones, and then plugged in on a combination he knew by heart. He had got the pitch in on a combination he knew by heart. He had got the pitch of his instrument so perfectly attuned to that particular room that he got a first-class result without further experiment. In a moment there were voices in his headphones-three of them, talking rapidly. He recognized them all. They were Delbury, Shaughnessy, and the Chief. Dain pulled a notebook over and took a verbatim note of all that he required. "I'm asking for a warrant right now, chief." The voice was Delbury's vibrant with conviction. "You're satisfied about Dain?" "Absolutely. I wasn't at first, but I am now. I'm certain that as soon as we've arrested Dain we shall begin to get a start on the solution to the mystery of the Ghost. It's all wrapped up in this plain as a
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The only break in the chain of silence was when, in a few seconds, the clear treble of the telephone girl's voice came on at the exchange with her businesslike "Number please?" Lazard pulled the instrument nearer to him. "This is the Count Lazard speaking," he said suavely. "I'm sorry to trouble you, miss, but I think there must be something wrong with my telephone. Has anyone been trying to ring me up?" "I couldn't remember offhand, sir, but I don't think so," replied the girl politely. "Nobody has called me and failed to get through?" "No, sir; not during the last hour, at least." "Just one more question, miss. Could you tell me if there is a crossed wire on your switchboard-one which throws a connection across to my line from another exchange?" "Just a moment, s
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Dain tried a new series. At his tenth attempt he fell headlong into it. His hands were as near to trembling with excitement as ever they had been in his life as he reached out for his headphones. There was not the faintest doubt about the identity of that wheezy guttural voice. It was Tansy's. And he was talking half-earnestly, half-awakely, to another voice, a voice which was remarkable for its cold, inscrutable imperturbability. Dain glanced up at his dails to see into whose house the connection was made. He gasped with unbelief, and then came the realization that he knew that quiet voice, that voice with it's timbre of utter aloofness from emotion or excitement. It had a personality of it's own. It seemed to give out the impression that nothing could shake its serene imperturbability. If all London collapsed in the night, if the stars burst or the heavens fell, that voice would be heard discussing the matter with the cold detachment of an histori
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Dain's single weakness
Valmon Dain waited until the sound of Delbury's voice ceased in the study. All that came to him after that was the sound of quiet weeping, heart broken sobs that came gently over the whispering wires. And he knew that Delbury had gone. He glanced at his watch. "Time for a morsel of lunch," he muttered. "Delbury will be twenty minutes at the very least before he gets back to the Yard-probably half an hour before he's through to the chief." He opened a glass of tongue and ate with his headphones still on. He had fixed up a little electric-cooker in a corner above one of the purring dynamos, not a very elaborate contraption but quite sufficient for the simple needs of a man who was condemning himself to solitary companionship for the next few weeks. He made a mental note to take out a suitcase with him and lay in a safe supply of provisions. The ante-room outside he was already rearrangi
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The Cryptic message for Williard Lyall
Mercia turned the scale in their own favour by substantiating her mother's declaration. "Surely you have told us horrors enough to know that we shouldn't be squeamish about hearing the rest?" she said bravely. "That a mystery exists and a very sinister one is obvious to even the meanest intelligence. If you won't tell us, Mr. Delbury, you leave us no other alternative than to make personal application to Scotland Yard itself, a recourse which would be extremely unpleasant for me to take, but one which I should not have the slightest hesitation in doing." "Delbury sighed and brushed his fingers through his hair."Very well, ladies," he said, in a tone of regretful resignation. "But whatever I tell you, I insist, is told you with the underlying proviso that it may not be true."Mrs. Lyall inclined her head the merest fraction."perhaps you could help me in the matter," said Delbury, running swiftly over his notes. "can you remember with
- The man they couldn't Arrest
How does he know that I'm here???
"Give me that telephone," said Mercia quietly."You're going to play the game straight---- by me?" Asked Delbury, with a searching look into her eyes."I am going to play straight--- by my father," replied Mercia, in a voice so faint that the detective barely heard it.He surrendered the telephone in silence."is that you, Mr. Dain? Mercia speaking. You wanted to speak to me," she said, striving to master the quiver in her voice."Yes, this is Valmon Dain, here," The voice at the other end was unemotional, almost coldly precise. Mercia felt an inward shudder at the cold austerity of it. Dain, even in the midst of tragedy, with the black shadow of the law looming great and omnipotent above him, was still the man of frosty restraint, the man with his thoughts and feelings under icy control. "I cannot talk to you personally," he went on steadily. "Something has happened which, were I to show myse
- The man they couldn't Arrest
Daddy! Murdered?
"Daddy? murdered?" Mrs. Lyall scarcely breathed the words. A mist of utter incredulity had clouded her brain. she could not bring herself even to associate the two words, much less to believe them. The detective had made a ghastly mistake. something was ludicrously, shockingly wrong. "But- but, Mercia," she gasped. "In God's name, tell me what he told you. Daddy murdered- why, the very idea of it is imbecilic. who on earth would want to murder him? Why it's absurd; the man's mad." And all the time she spoke the devil's of doubt were gnawing at her very heart. The whole mass of that doubt were nights mysteries were piling up their forces in her brain to convince her that something very dreadful had happened. "I---- I believe it, mumsy." Mercia spoke dully, her eyes still looking fixedly ahead at the opposite wall. "I think I believed it the moment I opened my eyes this morning. There seemed to be something in the in the air. I couldn't sleep. I d
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Becoming more complicated
"why not?""well, I knew that he had gone out to Hendon, you see.""oh!" Delbury looked his surprise. "And how did you know that?" he asked. "A man rang up---- somebody I've never seen or heard of before rang up and asked me if dad had got home yet from Hendon. That was the first I knew that he had not gone to bed all night.""What?" Delbury jumped. "A man rang up?" he snapped."Who was it?""I don't know. I'd tell you if I did. A coarsely spoken man; he referred himself as the gent from Notting hill." "Good Lord! Tansy," breathed Delbury. "so that's where he got the wire from. miss Lyall, do you know that by answering that telephone you have let one of the worst criminals in London slip through our fingers?""I wasn't aware of it, but I couldn't help it even if I did. But in what way does all this concern my father? I think I have answered quite enough of your questions. And really I cannot tax my anx
