XIX
Thalia Accepts an Offer
It took over a week to settle the preliminaries of Brabazon’s insolvency, and at the end of that time, Thalia walked from the bank with a week’s salary in her little leather bag, and no immediate prospects of employment.
Inspector Parr had not minced his words, which he had addressed to her before an impressed audience.
“Only the fact that I saw you come out of Marl’s house and saw him close the door on you, saves you from a serious charge,” he said.
“If it had only saved me from a lecture also, I should have been pleased,” said Thalia coolly.
“What do you make of her?” asked Parr, as the girl disappeared through the swing doors of the office.
“She rather puzzles me,” it was Derrick Yale to whom he had addressed his question. “And the more I think of her, the more I am puzzled. The woman Macroy says that she has been engaged in pilfering since she has been at the bank, but there is no proof of that. In fact, the only person who could supply the proof is our absent friend, Brabazon. Why didn’t you call her as a witness in the prosecution of Barnet?”
“It would be a case of Barnet’s word against hers,” said the detective, shaking his head, “and the case against Barnet was so clear that I didn’t want any further evidence than my own eyes.”
Yale was frowning thoughtfully.
“I wonder,” he said, half to himself.
“What do you wonder?”
“I wonder if this girl could give us a little more information about the Crimson Circle than we have at present. I’m half inclined to engage her.”
Parr muttered something under his breath.
“I know you think I’m mad, but really I have method in my madness. There is nothing to steal in my office; she would be under my eye all the time, and if she were in communication with the Circle, I should certainly know all about it. Besides, she interests me.”
“Why did you shake hands with her?” asked Parr curiously, and the other laughed.
“That is why she interests me. I wanted to get an impression, and the impression I had was of some dark, sinister force in the background of her life. That girl is not working independently. She has behind her—”
“The Crimson Circle?” suggested Parr, and there was the suggestion of a sneer in his tone.
“Very likely,” said the other seriously. “Anyway, I’m going to see her.”
He called at Thalia’s flat that afternoon, and her servant showed him into the pretty little drawing-room. A minute after Thalia came in, and there was a smile in her fine eyes as she recognised her visitor.
“Well, Mr. Yale, have you come to give me a few words of warning?”
“Not exactly,” laughed Yale. “I’ve come to offer you a job.”
Her eyebrows rose.
“Do you want an assistant,” she asked ironically, “acting on the principle that to catch a thief you must employ a thief? Or have you views about my reformation? Several people want to reform me,” she said.
She sat down on the piano stool, her hands behind her, and he knew that she was mocking him.
“Why do you steal, Miss Drummond?”
“Because it is my nature to,” she said without hesitation. “Why should kleptomania be confined to the ruling classes?”
“Do you get any satisfaction out of it?” he demanded. “I’m not asking out of idle curiosity, but as a student of human man and woman.”
She waved her hand round the apartment.
“I have the satisfaction of a very comfortable home,” she said. “I have a good servant, and I am not likely to starve. All these things are particularly satisfying to me. Now tell me about the job, Mr. Yale. Do you want me to be a policewoman?”
“Not exactly,” he smiled, “but I want a secretary, somebody upon whom I can rely. My work is increasing at a tremendous rate; my correspondence is much more than I can cope with. I will add, that there is little opportunity in my office for the exercise of your pet vice,” he added good-humouredly, “and anyway, I’ll take that risk.”
She considered a moment, looking at him steadily.
“If you’re willing to take the risk, so am I,” she said at last. “Where is your office?”
He gave her the address.
“I shall be with you at ten o’clock in the morning. Lock up your chequebook and clear away your loose change,” she said.
“A remarkable girl,” he thought as he was going back to the city.
He spoke no more than the truth when he had told Parr that she puzzled him, and yet he had met with every type of criminal, and probably knew more of criminal psychology than did Parr with all his experience.
His mind strayed to Parr, that unhappy individual whom he knew was in disgrace. How much longer would police headquarters tolerate him after this third failure to deal with the Crimson Circle, he wondered.
Mr. Parr was thinking on the same lines that night. A brief official memo, had awaited him on his arrival at headquarters, and he read it with a grimace of pain. And there was worse to follow, he guessed, and he had good reason for that fear.
The next morning he was summoned to the house of Mr. Froyant, and found Derrick Yale already there.
For all their good relationship, the chase of the Crimson Circle had developed into a duel between these strangely different personalities. It was an open secret in newspaper land that Parr’s impending ruin was due less to the unchecked villainies of the Crimson Circle, than to the superhuman brilliancy of this unofficial rival. To do him justice, Yale did his best to discredit this view, but it was held.
Froyant, for all his meanness and his knowledge of Yale’s heavy fees, had commissioned him immediately after he had received the warning. His faith in the police had evaporated, and he made no attempt to disguise his scepticism.
“Mr. Froyant has decided to pay,” were the words which greeted the inspector.
“Eh, of course I shall pay!” exploded Mr. Froyant.
He had aged ten years in the past few days, thought Parr; his face was whiter, and thinner, and he seemed to have shrunk within himself.
“If police headquarters allow this dastardly association to threaten respectable citizens, and cannot even protect their lives, what else is there to be done, but to pay? My friend Pindle has had a similar threat, and he has paid. I cannot stand the strain of this any longer.”
He paced up and down the library floor like a man demented.
“Mr. Froyant will pay,” said Derrick Yale slowly. “But this time I think the Crimson Circle have been just a little too venturesome.”
“What do you mean?” asked Parr.
“Have you the letter, sir?” demanded Yale, and Froyant pulled open a drawer savagely and slammed down the familiar card upon his blotting-pad.
“When did this arrive?” asked Parr as he took it up, noting the Crimson Circle.
“By this morning’s post.”
Parr read the words inscribed in the centre:
We shall call for the money at the office of Mr. Derrick Yale at 3:30 on Friday afternoon. The notes must not run in series. If it is not there for us, you will die the same night.
Three times the inspector read the short message, and then he sighed.
“Well, that simplifies matters,” he said. “Of course, they will not call—”
“I think they will,” said Yale quietly; “but I shall be prepared for them, and I should like you to be on hand, Mr. Parr.”
“If there is one thing more certain than another,” said the inspector phlegmatically, “it is that I shall be on hand. But I don’t think they will come.”
“There I can’t agree with you,” said Yale. “Whoever the central figure of the Crimson Circle is, he or she does not lack courage. And, by the way,” he lowered his voice, “you will meet an old acquaintance at my office.”
Parr shot a quick, suspicious glance at the detective, and saw that he was mildly amused.
“Drummond?” he asked.
Yale nodded.
“You are engaging her?”
“She rather interests me, and I fancy that she is going to be a real help in the solution of this mystery.”
Froyant came in at that moment, and the conversation was tactfully changed.