V
In silken pyjamas, and propped up on his pillows, Mr. Larry Hughes toyed with coffee and toast, the while he lazily scanned the Daily Mail with its account of the Streetly House robbery. A soft-footed valet was busy in an adjoining dressing-room.
“A light-grey suit, if you please, Tom. And tell Williams to have the Rolls ready not a minute later than twelve.”
“Very good, sir. Will you be in to lunch?”
“I’m doubtful. There’s racing on at Kempton, and I may run down.” Hughes pushed aside the tray and sprang lightly out of bed. “Bath ready?”
“Quite ready, sir.”
“All right. Be back in ten minutes.”
It was at this moment that Detective Inspector Labar rang the bell at the solid Georgian doorway of Mr. Larry Hughes’ Hampstead home. With suave candour the footman who opened the door, informed him of the exact position. Mr. Hughes was in his bath. If the gentleman would care to wait he would find out in due course whether Mr. Hughes would see him. Was the gentleman a friend, or if not was his business of extreme urgency? Mr. Hughes, he knew, had several important engagements.
Labar thrust a card into the man’s hand. “Tell him I shall be glad if he will spare me a few minutes of his time. It is of importance.”
A little doubtfully the servant took the card. So the detective found himself in a big leather chair in a spacious and well-lighted library. All the surroundings spoke of money lavished recklessly, but with scrupulous taste. The lines of books were broken by etchings and occasional paintings that Labar recognised as the finest of their kind. But as he slowly and methodically studied the room, his attention became rivetted on a small photograph that stood obscurely on a mantelpiece. He moved towards it and picked it up for closer scrutiny. Then he did a thing which a C.I.D. man should have realised was pure and simple theft. He placed it carefully in an inside pocket.
Hughes found him in the big leather chair, idly nursing his hat and stick, and came forward with outstretched hand.
“It’s Mr. Labar, isn’t it. Pleased to meet you. I’m not often honoured by visits from detective inspectors. What can I do for you?”
He drew up another divan chair and faced Labar idly attentive. He was Mr. Larry Hughes, gentleman of means, and Labar was a mere policeman in plain clothes. The suggestion was subtle but plain.
Both men knew how artificial the situation was. It was clear to Larry that the other had come to look him over, but whatever the detective inspector suspected he dare not yet shatter the pose. Labar knew that he was a crook, and Hughes knew that he knew. Yet the latter was supremely confident that no one dare breathe the word. What proof could there be?
Labar for the time was quite willing to play the part the other had allotted to him. “I’m not quite sure, Mr. Hughes,” he said with a hint of deference in his tone. “I’ve come to see you because I believe you have some acquaintance with Mr. Gertstein. You will have seen in the papers that there has been a robbery at his place.”
Larry raised his eyebrows and struggled with well-manicured fingers to affix a cigarette in a long amber holder. “I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong shop, Mr. Labar. I know the old boy by sight but I’ve scarcely spoken to him. True, I believe I was introduced to Mrs. Gertstein once—I think it was at Ascot—but that’s the limit of my knowledge of the family.”
“I’m looking up everyone who might by some remote chance throw some light on the affair,” explained Labar.
“Quite.” Hughes was listlessly polite.
“You are not acquainted with anyone associated with the Gertsteins? A Miss Noelson, for instance?”
However a man may use himself to mask his emotions, there is usually some point, as experienced poker players know, at which he betrays himself. Not infrequently, though his face may be immobile, some nervous twitch of the hands, some apparently small mannerism, will reveal itself to the one competent to read.
Larry showed nothing in his face, but his right toe tapped nervously on the soft carpet. Labar marked that movement.
“I’ve never heard of the lady,” said Larry easily, and rising, strolled to the mantel, and placed one arm upon it. His equanimity was to all seeming undisturbed.
Labar smiled, grimly. “Don’t waste your time standing. It was an oversight to leave the photograph there, if you meant to deny that you knew this lady. I have the portrait in my pocket.”
The right toe tapped a quick tattoo, and Larry eyed the other whimsically. He thrust up his hands. “Kamerad,” he cried. “I have heard of the efficiency of Scotland Yard. Now I see it. The merest little white lie, and you pounce, Mr. Labar. I do know Miss Noelson—slightly. I hope to know her better. There’s an admission for you. Can you build something on that? Do you think that she stole the jewels, or did I?”
He smiled superciliously down on the detective, with an indescribable air of polite contempt. Labar, spite of his resolution to hold himself with restraint, was a little stung by the other man’s audacity. Larry had the impudence to play with him.
“If you want it point blank,” he said, quite gently, but with jaw jutting out a trifle, “I’ll tell you that you ran the show. This is quite unofficial, of course, but you know that I know, so what’s the use of keeping up this farce? How deep the girl is in it I am not sure, yet. But I’ll have enough on you in a week to put you where you belong.”
Larry Hughes flung back his head and laughed till exhaustion caused him to desist. “That’s real funny. You don’t look it I’ll admit, but you must be one of those comic sleuths. Shall I do some thought reading, Mr. Labar? You come across a big jewel robbery and your well-known grey matter gets to work. ‘Ah, ah,’ you say. ‘Here is the obvious handiwork of that famous gentleman crook, Mr. Hughes. Let’s go on a fishing expedition, and see what we can bluff out of Mr. Hughes.’ Am I right, sir?” He leaned forward with hand outstretched in burlesque imitation of a vaudeville lightning calculator.
Beneath his ironic tone there was something more serious. His alert mind had hit upon the very reason of Labar’s visit. The inspector had taken a chance, partly because he wished to see what Larry was like in person, partly to try and scare the man into some hasty and incautious step. The bigger men at the Yard would scarcely have approved of the attempt, but Labar had not consulted them. He had acted upon an impulse, and he had realised that he was courting failure—though his mind had not turned to the grotesque and humiliating failure that now seemed probable. After all, failure in this point was to have been expected. He had seen for himself what type of man Larry was. That at least was something gained. Nor could it matter in the least that Larry now knew definitely that he was suspected. That he would know in any event, and the interview could make no difference.
He felt himself a little nearer to probing the relationship between this sleek, gibing crook, and Penelope, but still he was far away from anything definite.
“You’re like all the rest of them,” he said. “You know it all.” He levelled a forefinger. “You’ve got away with it so far, Larry Hughes. I’ll not deny that you’ve got brains. But you’ve got vanity, and that’s where you’ll come a cropper. You may swizzle me, as you have others, but in the end it isn’t me you’re up against. It’s Scotland Yard, it’s Mulberry Street, it’s the Sûreté. It’s every police officer you may pass from here to Timbuktu. You can’t fight men, money and organisation all the time. Think a bit.”
There lurked a humorous twitch at the corner of Larry Hughes’ lips, and there was less cynicism there. “Tell me, did you ever hear of a foxhunter giving up because he might break his neck? If I were a criminal, it’s just conceivable that I might like the game for its own sake.”
“Then I hope you break your neck,” retorted Labar with asperity. “I’ll give you a case in point. When you let amateurs into this bust you slipped a cog. I’ve had Penelope Noelson under observation for the last eighteen hours, and today, she’ll be placed under detention. And I rather fancy she’ll talk.”
The smiling nonchalance of Larry Hughes vanished. He flung cigarette and amber holder with an impatient gesture into the grate, and advanced a step, with clenched hands.
“Don’t be a damned fool, man,” he snarled. “That girl has no more concern with the robbery than the man in the moon. She’s white. The whole thing is pure silliness. What have you got against her?”
“Not a thing. She only tried to bribe me yesterday. She only changed a forged cheque on the Midland Bank. She only tried to sandbag me last night. She only denied that she had ever heard of you, and now I find her photograph in your private room. Oh, I’ve not a thing to hold her on.”
There was a little bead of perspiration on the smooth forehead of the crook. “I don’t believe you are lying to me,” he said earnestly, “but you’re all wrong somehow. That girl has not the faintest strain of crookedness in her. Supposing that all you’ve heard about me is true. Have you known me to do a dirty thing?”
“That’s a large question. They say you keep faith with your confederates.”
“I do more than that. I play the game as I see it. And I give you my word, Mr. Labar, that Penelope Noelson had no hand directly or indirectly in this crime.”
“That won’t help her,” said Labar, grimly.
“Meaning that you want to get at me through her. Well, go ahead and prove something on me, Mr. Inspector. We’re absolutely alone here. Stand very still if you please.”
The blue barrel of an automatic stared at Labar, and Hughes’ finger was tensed on the trigger. “I hate to pull a gun,” he went on, “and I’d hate still more to use it. But you leave me no option. There’s a man of yours out there watching the house, and I don’t want him butting in. So make one single move to your whistle and I’ll blow you full of holes.”
“What’s the game?” demanded Labar, placidly.
“I’ll show you.” Hughes came nearer, and still keeping the detective covered, thrust his left hand into the other’s breast pocket. He withdrew the photograph. “This is my property. See here.” He replaced the automatic in his pocket, and tore the portrait to strips. “That’s that. Just one little bit of evidence against Miss Noelson gone. Now you may go, too.”
Labar took it all gracefully. “Thank you,” he said. “I’ll be back.”
“Oh, no you won’t,” disagreed Hughes. “If you try it I’ll have the servants throw you out. Goodbye, Mr. Labar.”
He accompanied the detective inspector to the front door, and as soon as it had closed behind him, returned and summoned a servant.
“Tom,” he demanded, “did you ever read Bacon?”
“I don’t know that I have, sir.”
“No, I scarcely expected it. He’s not a popular novelist. He says that in preparation it is good to realise dangers, and in action wisest to disregard them. So I shan’t go to Kempton Park today. I’m wanting the car at once, and you’ll come with me. We’re going to disregard a danger.”