Phase
II
The Private Secretary
The snow lingered. Though hoses washed it out of the highways, in every side street great mounds lay unmelted, and the park was dingily white. Reggie shivered as he got out of his car in Scotland Yard, and he scurried upstairs and put himself as close as he could to Lomas’s fire—ousting Superintendent Bell.
“I’m waiting for you,” said Lomas quietly. “There’s a new fact. Three thousand pounds has been paid into Sandford’s account. It was handed in over the counter in notes of small amounts yesterday morning. Cashier fancies it was paid in by a stoutish man in glasses—couldn’t undertake to identify.”
“It’s a wicked world, Lomas. That wouldn’t matter so much if it was sensible. Some day I will take to crime, just to show you how to do it. Who is Sandford, what is he, that such queer things happen round him?”
“I don’t know so much about queer, sir,” said Superintendent Bell. “I suppose this three thousand is his share of the swag.”
“That’s what we’re meant to suppose,” Reggie agreed. “That’s what I resent.”
“You mean, why the devil should he have it put in the bank? He must know his account would be watched. That’s the point I took,” said Lomas wearily.
“Well, sir, as I was saying, it’s the usual sort of thing,” Superintendent Bell protested. “When a city gang has bought a fellow in a good position and got all they can get out of him, it often happens they don’t care any more about him. They’d rather break him than not. It happened in the Bewick affair, the Grantley deal—” He reeled off a string of cases. “What I mean to say, sir, there isn’t honour among thieves. When they see one of themselves in a decent position, they’ll do him in if they can. Envy, that’s what it is. I suppose we’re all envious. But in my experience, when a fellow isn’t straight he gets a double go of envy in him. I mean to say, for sheer spiteful envy the crooks beat the band.”
Reggie nodded. “Do you know, Bell, I don’t ever remember your being wrong, when you had given an opinion. By the way, what is your opinion?”
Superintendent Bell smiled slowly. “We do have to be so careful, sir. Would you believe it, I don’t so much as know who did the open-air work in the Coal Ramp. There was half a dozen firms in the boom, quite respectable firms. But who had the tip first, and who was doing the big business, I know no more than the babe in arms.”
“Yes, there’s some brains about,” Lomas agreed.
But Reggie, who was watching the Superintendent, said, “What’s up your sleeve, Bell?”
The Superintendent laughed. “You do have a way of putting things, Mr. Fortune.” He lit a cigarette and looked at his chief. “I don’t know what you thought of Mr. Sandford, Mr. Lomas?”
“More do I, Bell,” said Lomas. “I only know he’s not a man and a brother.”
“What I should describe as a lonely cove, sir,” Bell suggested. “Chiefly interested in himself, you might say.”
“He’s a climber,” said Lomas.
“Well, well! Who is Sandford—what is he, that all the world don’t love him?” Reggie asked. “Who was his papa? What was his school?”
“Well, now, it’s rather odd you should ask that, sir,” said Superintendent Bell.
“He didn’t have a school. He didn’t have a father,” said Lomas. “First he knows he was living with his widowed mother, an only child, in a little village in North Wales—Llan something. He went to the local grammar-school. He was a kind of prize boy. He got a scholarship at Pembroke, Oxford. Then Mrs. Sandford died, leaving him about a pound a week. He got firsts at Oxford, and came into the Home Civil pretty high. He’s done well in his Department, and they can’t stand him.”
“Good brain, no geniality, if you take my meaning,” said the Superintendent.
“I hate him already,” Reggie murmured.
“That’s quite easy,” said Lomas. “Well, he’s a clever second-rater, that’s what it comes to.”
“Poor devil,” Reggie murmured.
“There’s swarms of them in the service. The only odd thing about Sandford is that he don’t seem to have any origins. Like that fellow in the Bible who had no ancestors—Melchizedek, was it? Well, Mrs. Sandford had no beginning either. She wasn’t native to Llanfairfechan—that’s the place. She came there when Sandford was a small kid. Nobody there knows where from. He says he don’t know where from. Nobody knows who his father was. He says he don’t know. He says she left no papers of any sort. She had an annuity, and the fifty pounds a year she left him was in Consols. He never knew of any relations. Nobody in Llan-what’s-its-name can remember anybody ever coming to see her. And she died ten years ago.”
“You might say it looked as if she wanted to hide,” said Superintendent Bell. “But, Lord, you can’t tell. Might be just a sorrowful widow. It takes ’em that way sometimes.”
“Has anybody ever shown any interest in Melchizedek?” said Reggie.
“O Lord, no! Nobody ever heard of him out of his Department. And there they all hate him. But he’s the sort of fellow you can’t keep down.”
“Poor devil,” Reggie murmured again.
“You won’t be so damned sympathetic when you’ve met him,” Lomas said. A slip of paper was presented to him. “Hallo! Here’s Kimball. I thought he was leaving me alone too long. Well, we’ve got something for him today.”
“He has a large fat head”: thus some perky journalist began a sketch of the Rt. Hon. Horace Kimball. And he faithfully reported the first elementary effect of seeing Mr. Kimball, who looked a heavy fellow, with the bulk of his head and neck supported on a sturdy frame. But on further acquaintance people discovered a vivacity of movement and a keenness of expression which made them uncomfortable. Yet he had, as I intend you to observe, a bluff, genial manner, and his cruellest critics were always those who had not met him. For the rest, he aimed at a beautiful neatness in his clothes, and succeeded.
He rushed in. “Well, Lomas, if we don’t make an end of this business, it’ll make an end of us,” he announced, and flung himself at a chair. “Anything new?”
“I have just been discussing it with Mr. Fortune.”
“That’s right. Want the best brains we can get.” He nodded his heavy head at Reggie. “What do you make of it?”
“I don’t wonder you find it harassing,” Reggie said.
“Harassing! That’s putting it mildly. I’ve lost more sleep over it than I want to think about.” He became aware that Reggie was studying him. “Doctor, aren’t you?” he laughed ruefully. “I’m not a case, you know.”
“I apologize for the professional instinct,” Reggie said. “But it does make me say you ought to see your doctor, sir.”
“My doctor can’t tell me anything I don’t know. It’s this scandal that’s the matter with me. You wouldn’t say I was sentimental, would you? You wouldn’t take me for an innocent? Well, do you know, I’ve been in business thirty years, and I’ve never had one of my own people break faith with me. That’s what irritates me. Somebody in my own office, somebody close to me, selling me. By God, it’s maddening!”
“Whom do you suspect?” said Reggie.
Kimball flung himself about, and the chair creaked. “Damn it, man, we’ve had all that out over and over again. I can’t suspect anyone. I won’t suspect anyone. But the thing’s been done.”
“As I understand, the only people who knew the scheme were yourself and Sandford, your secretary?”
“I’d as soon suspect myself as Sandford.”
“Yesterday three thousand pounds in notes was paid by somebody, who didn’t give his name, into Sandford’s account,” said Lomas.
“Great God!” said Kimball, and rolled back in his chair, breathing heavily. “That’s what I wouldn’t let myself believe.”
“Have you got any brandy, Lomas?” said Reggie, watching his pallor professionally. Lomas started up. Reggie reached out and began to feel Kimball’s pulse.
“Don’t do that,” said Kimball sharply, and dragged his hand away. “Good Lord, man, I’m not ill! No, thanks, Lomas, nothing, nothing. I never touch spirits. I’ll be all right in a moment. But it does rather knock me over to find I’ve got to believe it was Sandford.” He struggled out of his chair, walked to the window, and flung it up and dabbed at his forehead. He stood there a moment in the raw air, took a pinch of snuff, and turned on them vigorously. “There’s no doubt about this evidence, eh? We can’t get away from it?”
“I’m afraid we must ask Sandford for an explanation,” said Lomas.
“Most unpleasant thing I ever did in my life,” Kimball said. “Well, there’s no help for it, I suppose. Still, he may have a perfectly good explanation. Damn it, I won’t make up my mind till I must. I’ve always found him quite straight—and very efficient too. Cleverest fellow I ever had about me. Send for him then; say I’ll be glad to see him here. Come now, Lomas, what do you think yourself? He may be able to account for it quite naturally, eh?”
“He may. But I can’t see how,” Lomas said gloomily. “Can you?”
“I suppose you think I’m a fool, but I like to believe in my fellows,” said Kimball, and they passed an awkward five minutes till Sandford came.
He looked a good young man. He was rather small, he was very lean, he wore eyeglasses. Everything about him was correct and restrained. But there was an oddity of structure about his face: it seemed to come to a point at the end of his nose, and yet his lower jaw looked heavy.
He made graded salutations to Kimball his chief and to Lomas. He looked at Reggie and Superintendent Bell as though he expected them to retreat from his presence. And he turned upon Kimball a glance that bade him lose no time.
Kimball seemed to find some difficulty in beginning. He cleared his throat, blew his nose, and took another pinch of snuff. “I don’t know if you guess why I sent for you,” he broke out.
“I infer that it is on this matter of the gamble in coal shares,” said Sandford precisely.
“Yes. Do you know of any new fact?”
“Nothing has come before me.”
“Well, there’s something I want you to explain. I dare say you have a satisfactory explanation. But I’m bound to ask for it.”
“I have nothing to explain that I know of.”
“It’s been brought to my knowledge that yesterday three thousand pounds in notes was paid into your account. Where did it come from?”
Sandford took off his eyeglasses and cleaned them, and put them on again. “I have no information,” he said in the most correct official manner.
“Good God, man, you must see what it means!” Kimball cried.
“I beg your pardon, sir. I have no notion of what it means. I find it difficult to believe that you have been correctly informed.”
“You don’t suppose I should take up a charge like this unless I was compelled to.”
“There’s no doubt of the fact, Mr. Sandford,” said Lomas gloomily.
“Indeed! Then I have only to say that no one has any authority to make payments into my account. As you have gone into the affair so carefully, I suppose you have found out who did.”
“He didn’t give his name, you see. Can you tell us who he was?” Lomas said.
“I repeat, sir, I know nothing about the transaction.”
“And that’s all you say?”
“I need hardly add that I shall not accept the money.”
“You know the matter can’t end there!” Kimball cried. “Come, man, you’re not doing yourself justice. Nothing could be worse for you than this tone, can’t you see that?”
“I beg your pardon, sir. I do not see what you wish me to say. You spoke of making a charge. Will you be so good as to state it?”
“If you must have it! This boom was begun on information which only you had besides myself. And immediately after the boom this large sum is paid secretly into your account. You must see what everybody will say—what I should say myself if I didn’t know you—that you sold the plan, and this money is your price. Come, you must have some explanation for us—some defence, at least.”
“I say again, sir, I know nothing of the matter. I should hope that what scandal may say will have no influence upon anyone who knows my character and my career.”
“Good God, man, we’re dealing with facts! Where did that three thousand pounds come from?”
“I have no information. I have no idea.”
For the first time Reggie spoke. “I wonder if you have a theory?”
“I don’t consider it is my duty to imagine theories.”
“Do you know anyone who wants to ruin you? Or why anyone should?”
“I beg your pardon. I must decline to be led into wild speculations of that kind.”
Kimball started up. “You make it impossible to do anything for you. I have given you every chance, remember that—every chance. It’s beyond me now. I can only advise you to consider your position. I don’t know whether your resignation will save you from worse consequences. I’ll do what I can. But you make it very hard. Good morning. You had better not go back to the office.”
“I deny every imputation,” said Sandford. “Good morning, sir.”
Half apologetically Kimball turned to the others. “There’s nothing for it, I suppose. We’ll have to go through with it now. You’ll let me have an official report. The fellow’s hopeless. Poor devil!”
“I can’t say he touches my heart,” said Lomas.
Kimball laughed without mirth. “He can’t help himself,” he said, and went out.
“I shouldn’t have thought Kimball was so human,” said Lomas.
“Well, sir, he always has stuck to his men, I must say,” said Superintendent Bell.
“I wonder he could stick to Sandford for a day.”
“That Mr. Sandford, he is what you might call a superior person,” Bell chuckled. “Funny how they brazen it out, that kind.”
“Yes, I don’t doubt he thinks he was most impressive. Well, Fortune, there’s not much here for you, I’m afraid.”
Reggie had gone to the window and was fidgeting there. “I say, the wind’s changed,” said he. “That’s something, anyway.”