The Golden Face: A Great 'Crook' Romance

At the Old Bailey six weeks later, the night watchman having fortunately recovered from his injuries, Hugh Martyn was brought before Mr. Justice Harland, and though very ably defended by his counsel, he was quite unable to account for his movements on the night in question.

“I was never there!” the prisoner shrieked across the court to the judge as I sat in the public gallery watching the scene. “I know nothing of the affair – nothing whatever. I am innocent.”

“It is undeniable that the prisoner’s finger-prints were left there,” remarked the eminent counsel for the Treasury, rising very calmly. “We have them here before us – enlarged photographs which the jury have just seen. Gentlemen of the jury, I put it to you that the prisoner is the man who assisted in this dastardly crime!”

The jury, after a short retirement, found Hugh Martyn guilty, and the judge, after hearing his previous convictions, sentenced him to fifteen years’ penal servitude.

But Mr. Justice Harland has never known, until perhaps he may read these lines, that by the ingenious machinations of the super-criminal Rudolph Rayne, Hugh Martyn, who was one of his associates who had quarrelled with him over his share of a bank robbery in Madrid, and had tried to betray me to Benton on Clifton Bridge, had been the victim of a most dastardly treachery, though he was quite unaware of it and believed Rayne to be his friend.

Only many months later I learned, by piecing together certain facts, that old Morley Tarrant was an expert photographer and maker of printer’s “blocks.” Slowly it became plain that Rayne, having been betrayed by the astute American crook, had met him in Edinburgh and with devilish malice aforethought, had contrived to get him to handle the glass cube which served as a paper-weight, and which I had quite innocently conveyed to the old hunchback, who had succeeded in taking the finger-prints and by photography transferring them upon the surgical rubber glove, thin as paper – really a false skin – which Duperré had worn over his hands when he and his associates made an attack upon the bank.

By that means Martyn’s finger-prints were left upon the safe door.

Duperré had previously taken out Martyn, whom one of his friends, a woman, had drugged, so that he lay in that furnished house near Maldon for two days unconscious. Hence he was unable to give any accurate account of his movements on the night in question, or prove an alibi, and was, in consequence, convicted.

Rayne, the man with the abnormal criminal brain, had, by that ingenious coup, not only contrived to spirit away to the Continent a sum of eighty thousand pounds in negotiable securities, but had also sent to a long term of penal servitude the man who had attempted to betray him.

CHAPTER V

CONCERNS MR. BLUMENFELD

The pleasant high road between Leamington and Coventry runs straight over the hills to Kenilworth, but a few miles farther on there are cross-roads, the right leading into Stoneleigh and the left to Kirby Corner and over Westwood Heath into a crooked maze of by-roads by which one can reach Berkswell or Barston.

It was over that left-hand road that I was driving Rayne and Lola in the Rolls in the grey twilight of a wintry evening. We had driven from London, and both Rayne and the girl I so admired were cramped and tired.

“Look!” shouted Lola suddenly as we took a turn in the road. “There’s the lodge! On the left there. That’s Bradbourne Hall!”

“Yes, that’s it, Hargreave!” said Rudolph, and a few moments later I turned the car through the high wrought-iron gates which stood open for us, and we sped up the long avenue of leafless trees which led to the fine country mansion at which we were to be guests.

Bradbourne Hall was a great old-world Georgian house, half covered with ivy, and the appearance of the grave, white-haired butler who opened the door showed it to be the residence of a man of wealth and discernment.

That Edward Blumenfeld, its owner, was fabulously wealthy everyone in the City of London knew, for his name was one to conjure with in high finance, and though the dingy offices of Blumenfeld and Hannan in Old Broad Street were the reverse of imposing, yet the financial influence of the great house often made itself felt upon the Bourses of Paris, Brussels and Rome.

I met the millionaire at dinner two hours later, a tall, loose-built, sallow-faced man of rather brusque manners and decidedly cosmopolitan, both in gesture and in speech. With him was his wife, a pleasant woman of about fifty-five who seemed extremely affable to Lola. Mr. Blumenfeld’s sister, a Mrs. Perceval, was also present.

It appeared that a year before Rayne had met old Mr. Blumenfeld and his wife in an hotel at Varenna, on the Lake of Como, and a casual acquaintance had ripened into friendship and culminated in the invitation to spend a few days at Bradbourne. Hence our journey.

As we sat gossiping over our port after the ladies had left the table, I began to wonder why the grey-eyed master-crook, whom not a soul suspected, was so eager to ingratiate himself with Edward Blumenfeld. The motive was, however, not far to seek. Most men who are personal friends of millionaires manage to extract some little point of knowledge which, if used in the right way and with discretion, will often result in considerable financial gain. Indeed, I have often thought that around a millionaire there is spread a halo of prosperity which invests all those who enter it and brings to them good fortune.

It was evident that the great financier regarded Rudolph Rayne as his friend, for he promised to pay us a visit at Overstow in return.

“Remember what Mr. Blumenfeld has promised us, George!” said Rayne as he turned to me merrily. “Make a note of it!” And the breezy, easy-going man who at the moment was directing all sorts of crooked business in many cities on the Continent sipped his glass of port with the air of a connoisseur, as indeed he was.

That night, after I had gone to my room, Rayne suddenly entered and began to speak to me in a loud tone concerning some letters he wished to write early in the morning. Then, lowering his voice suddenly to a whisper, he added: “I want you to be very nice to Mrs. Blumenfeld, Hargreave. Unfortunately Lola seems to have taken a violent dislike to her. Why, I don’t know. So do your best to remedy what may result in a contretemps.”

Then again he spoke in his usual voice, and wishing me good night left the room.

After he had gone I, full of wonder and apprehension, paced up and down the fine old paneled chamber – for I had been placed in a wing in the older part of the house which was evidently Jacobean. As an unwilling assistant of that super-crook whose agents were at work in the various cities of Europe carrying out the amazingly ingenious plans which, with Vincent Duperré, he so carefully formulated in that great old-world library of his at Overstow, I was constantly in peril, for I felt by some inexplicable intuition that the police must, one day or other, obtain sufficient evidence to arrest all of us, Lola included.

I recollect that Superintendent Arthur Benton of Scotland Yard was ever active in his inquiries concerning the great gang which Rayne controlled.

Had it not been that I was now passionately in love with Lola – though I dared not declare it openly – I should have left my queer appointment long ago. As a matter of fact, I remained because I believed, vainly perhaps, that I might one day be able to shield Lola from becoming their accomplice – and thus culpable.

According to Rayne’s instructions I next day made myself as affable as possible to Mrs. Blumenfeld, but later in the afternoon I had an opportunity of chatting with Lola alone. She wanted to go to a shop in Warwick, and asked me to take her there in the car, which I did. The driver’s seat was inside the car, hence, when alone, she always sat beside me.

“What do you think of Mrs. Blumenfeld?” I asked her as we sped along through the rain.

“Oh! Well, I don’t like her – that’s all,” was her reply, as she smiled.

“I think she’s quite nice,” I said. “She was most charming to me this morning.”

“And she is also charming to me. But she seems so horribly inquisitive, and asks me so many questions about my father – questions I can’t answer.”

“Why not?” I asked, turning to her and for a second taking my eyes off the road.

“Well – you know, Mr. Hargreave – you surely know,” the girl hesitated. “Why are we on this visit? My father has some sinister plans – without a doubt.”

“How sinister plans?” I asked, in pretence of ignorance.

“You well know,” she answered. “I am not blind, even if Duperré and his wife think I am. They forget that there is such a thing as illustrated papers.”

“I don’t follow,” I said.

“Well, in the Daily Graphic three days ago I saw the portrait of a man named Lawrence, well-known as a jewel thief, who was sentenced to ten years’ penal servitude at the Old Bailey. I recognized him as Mr. Moody, one of my father’s friends who often came to see us at Overstow – a man you also know. Why has my father thieves for his friends, unless he is in some way connected with them?”

“Moody sentenced!” I gasped. “Why, he was one of Duperré’s most intimate friends. I’ve met them together often,” I remarked, and then the conversation dropped, and we sat silent for a full quarter of an hour.

“I’m longing to get back to Overstow, Mr. Hargreave,” the girl went on presently. “I feel that ere long Mrs. Blumenfeld, who is a very clever and astute woman, will discover something about us, and then – ”

“And if she does, it will upset your father’s plans – whatever they are!”

“But Mr. Blumenfeld, as a great financier, has agents in all the capitals, and they might inquire and discover more about us than would be pleasant,” she said apprehensively. “I wonder why we are visiting these people?” she added.

I did not reply. I was constantly puzzled and bewildered by the actions and movements of Rayne and his questionable friends.

That evening after dinner, while old Blumenfeld played billiards with his guest, I marked. They played three closely contested games, for both were good players; until at eleven o’clock we all three went to the great drawing-room to bid the ladies good night. With our host I returned to the billiard-room, leaving Rayne to follow. Mr. Blumenfeld poured me out a whisky-and-soda and took a glass of port himself. Then a few minutes later he suggested, that as Rayne had not returned, he and I should have a final game before retiring.

He had made about twenty-five when of a sudden he leaned heavily against the table, his face blanched, and placing his hand to his heart, exclaimed:

“Oh! I have such a pain here! I – I – ”

And before I could run round to his assistance he had collapsed heavily upon the floor.

In an instant I was at his side, but saw that he was already unconscious.

I flew to the door and down the corridor, when luckily I encountered Rayne, who was at that moment returning to us.

In breathless haste I told him what had occurred.

“Good heavens!” he gasped. “Don’t alarm the ladies. Find the butler and get him to telephone for the doctor in secret. I’ll run in and look after him in the meantime,” he said, and hurried to the billiard-room.

I was not long in finding the butler, and quickly we went to the library and spoke to the doctor, who lived about five miles away. He was already in bed, but would, he said, motor over immediately.

On our return to the billiard-room we found, to our relief, that Mr. Blumenfeld had recovered consciousness. He was still lying upon the floor, Rayne having forced some brandy between his lips.

“He’s getting right again!” Rayne exclaimed to the white-haired old servant, and together we lifted our host on to the sofa.

He recovered quite rapidly, and presently he whispered weakly:

“I suppose it’s my heart! A doctor in Rome three years ago said it was rather weak.”

“I’m glad you’re better, my dear fellow,” said Rayne. “I was much worried about you. You were playing with Hargreave, and he alarmed me.”

“I’m cold,” our host said. “Will you shut that window.”

For the first time I noticed the window, which had certainly been closed when we were playing, was open about a foot. Besides, Mr. Blumenfeld’s glass of port, of which he had drunk only half, was now empty, two facts which, however, at the time conveyed nothing to me.

In due course the doctor, an elderly country practitioner, arrived in hot haste, and grave concern, but as soon as he saw his patient he realized that it had been only a fainting fit and was nothing serious. Indeed, within an hour Blumenfeld was laughing with us as though nothing had occurred.

But what had really occurred, I wondered? That window had been opened, apparently to admit fresh air to revive an unconscious man. But surely our host had not drained his port glass after his sudden seizure!

The incident was, at Blumenfeld’s request, hidden from the ladies, and next day he was quite his old self again.

About noon I strolled with Rayne out along the wide terrace which ran in front of the house overlooking the great park, whereupon he said:

“We’ll leave here to-morrow, Hargreave. Duperré is at Overstow. Write to him this afternoon and tell him to send me a wire recalling me immediately upon urgent business.”

“We’ve finished here, eh?” I asked meaningly.

“Yes,” he grinned, “and the sooner we’re out of this place the better.”

So I sent Vincent a note, telling him to wire Rayne at once on receipt of it.

The urgent message recalling Rudolph Rayne to Yorkshire arrived about half-past ten next morning, just as we were going out shooting. Blumenfeld was much disappointed, but his guest pleaded that he had some very important business to transact with his agent who was over from New York and desired to meet him at once. Therefore to Lola’s complete satisfaction the trunks were packed and put into the car, and immediately after luncheon we set forth to Overstow.

On our way back I racked my brain to discern the nature of the latest plot, but could see nothing tangible. Mr. Blumenfeld had been taken suddenly ill while playing billiards with me, and Rayne, when summoned, had done his best to resuscitate him. Yet Rayne’s manner was triumphant and he was in most excellent spirits.

We arrived back at Overstow Hall just before midnight, and he and Duperré held a long conversation before retiring. Of its nature I could gather nothing. As for Lola, she retired at once very cramped and tired.

The whole of the following morning Duperré and Rayne were closeted together, while afterwards I drove Duperré into York, where from the telegraph office in the railway station he sent several cryptic messages abroad, of course posing to the telegraph clerk as a passing railway passenger. Rayne never sent important telegrams from the village post-office at Overstow, or even from Thirsk. They were all dispatched from places where, even if inquiry were made, the sender could not be traced.

“What’s in the wind?” I asked Duperré as he sat by my side on our drive back to Overstow.

“Something, my dear George,” he answered, smiling mysteriously. “At present I can’t tell you. In due course you’ll know – something big. Whenever Rudolph superintends in person it is always big. He never touches minor matters. He devises and arranges them as a general plans a battle, but he never superintends himself – only in the real big things. Even then he never acts himself.”

With that I was compelled to be satisfied. That night we all had quite a pleasant evening over bridge in the drawing-room, until just about ten o’clock Rayne was called to the telephone. When he rejoined us I noticed that his countenance was a trifle pale. He looked worried and ill at ease. He sat down beside Madame Duperré, and after pensively lighting one of his expensive cigars, he bent and whispered something to her.

By what he said the woman became greatly agitated, and a few moments later rose and left the room.

The household at Overstow was certainly a strange and incongruous one, consisting as it did of persons who seemed all in league with each other, the master-criminal whose shrewd, steel-grey eyes were so uncanny, and his accomplices and underlings who all profited and grew fat upon the great coups planned by Rayne’s amazing mind. The squire of Overstow mesmerized his fellows and fascinated his victims of both sexes. His personality was clear-cut and outstanding. Men and women who met him for the first time felt that in conversation he held them by some curious, indescribable influence – held them as long as he cared, until by his will they were released from a strange thraldom that was both weird and astounding.

Whatever message Rayne had received it was evidently of paramount importance, for when Madame Duperré had left the room and Lola had retired, he turned to me and with a queer look in his eyes, exclaimed:

“I expect you’ll have to be making some rather rapid journeys soon, George. Better be up early to-morrow. Good night.” And then dismissing me, he asked Duperré to go with him to the smoking-room.

“I’ve heard from Tracy,” I overheard him say as I followed them along the softly carpeted corridor. “We’re up against that infernal Benton again because of old Moody’s blunder. I never expected he’d be caught, of all men. Benton is now looking for Moody’s guiding hand.”

“Well, I hope he won’t get very far,” Duperré replied.

“We must make certain that he doesn’t, Vincent, or it will go badly – very badly – with us! That’s what I want to discuss with you.”

Of the result of the consultation I, of course, remained in ignorance, but next morning Rayne sent for me and said he had decided to meet his friend Tracy at the Unicorn Hotel at Ripon.

“I telephoned him to the Station Hotel at York during the night,” he added. “He’ll have a lady with him. I want you to drive me over to Ripon and drive the lady back here.”

So an hour later we set out across country and arrived in Ripon in time for lunch.

Gerald Tracy I had met before, a big, stout, round-faced man of prosperous appearance, bald-headed and loud of speech. That he was a crook I had no doubt, but what his actual métier was I could not discover. He met us on the threshold of the old-fashioned hotel in that old-fashioned Yorkshire town, and with him was a well-dressed young woman, Italian or Spanish, I saw at a glance.

When Tracy introduced her to Rayne she was apparently much impressed, replying in very fair English. Her name, I learnt, was Signorina Lacava, and she was Italian.

We all lunched together but no business was discussed. Rayne expressed a hope that the signorina’s journey from Milan had been a pleasant one.

“Quite,” the handsome black-eyed girl replied. “I stayed one day in Paris.”

“The signorina has made a conquest in Milan,” laughed Tracy. “Farini, the commissario of police, has fallen in love with her!”

Rayne smiled, and turning to her, said:

“I congratulate you, signorina. Your friendship may one day stand you in very good stead.”

That the young woman was someone of great importance in the criminal combine was apparent from the fact that she had been actually introduced to its secret head.

It struck me as curious when, after leaving Tracy and Rayne together, I was driving the signorina across the moors to Overstow, that while he hesitated to allow Tracy to go there, yet it was safe for the young Italian woman.

I knew that Benton was still making eager inquiries, and I also knew that Rayne was full of gravest apprehensions. Rudolph Rayne was playing a double game!

On arrival back home, Duperré’s wife received our visitor. Lola had gone to Newcastle to visit an old schoolfellow, and Duperré was away in York so his wife informed me.

Three uneventful days passed, but neither Rayne nor Lola returned. On the third evening I was called to the telephone, and Rayne spoke to me from his rooms in London.

“I can’t get back just yet, George,” he said. “You’ll receive a registered letter from me to-morrow. Act upon it and use your own discretion.”

I promised him I would and then he rang off.

CHAPTER VI

AT THREE-EIGHTEEN A.M

The letter brought to my bedside next morning contained some curious instructions, namely, to take the car on the following Saturday to Flamborough Head, arriving at a spot he named about a quarter of a mile from the lighthouse, where I would be accosted by a Dutch sailor, who would ask me if I were Mr. Skelton. I was not to fear treachery, but to reply in the affirmative and drive him through the night to an address he gave me in Providence Court, a turning off Dean Street, Soho.

That address was sufficient for me! I had once before, at Rayne’s orders, driven a stranger to Dean Street and conducted him to that house. It was no doubt a harbor of refuge for foreign criminals in London, but was kept by an apparently respectable Italian who carried on a small grocery shop in Old Compton Street.

As I was ordered, I duly arrived on that wild spot on the Yorkshire coast. It blew half a gale, the wind howling about the car as I sat with only the red rearlight on, waiting in patience.

Very soon a short, thick-set man with decidedly evil face and seafaring aspect, emerged from the shadows and asked in broken English whether I was Mr. Skelton. I replied that I was and bade him jump in, and then, switching on the big headlights, turned the car in the direction of London.

From what I had seen of the stranger I certainly was not prepossessed. His clothes were rough and half soaked by the rain that had been falling, while it became apparent as we talked that he had landed surreptitiously from a Dutch fishing-boat early that morning and had not dared to show himself. Hence he was half famished. I happened to have a vacuum flask and some sandwiches, and these I divided with him.

A long silence fell between us as with difficulty in keeping myself awake I drove over the two hundred odd miles of wet roads which separated us from London, and just before nine o’clock next morning I left the car in Wardour Street and walked with the stranger to the frowsy house in Providence Court, where to my great surprise Gerald Tracy opened the door. He laughed at my astonishment, but with a gesture indicative of silence, he merely said:

“Hallo, Hargreave! Back all right, eh?”

Then he admitted the Dutchman and closed the door.

Tracy was evidently there to hold consultation with the stranger whose entrance into England was unknown. He would certainly never risk a long stay in that house, for the stout, bald-headed man had, I knew, no wish to come face to face with Benton or any other officer of the C.I.D.

Certainly something sinister and important was intended.

On calling at Half Moon Street, after having breakfasted, I found Duperré there.

“Rayne wants you to go down to the Pavilion Hotel at Folkestone and garage the car there,” he said. “He and I are running a risk in a couple of night’s time – the risk whether Benton identifies us. We both have tickets for the annual dinner of the staff of the Criminal Investigation Department, which is to be held in the Elgin Rooms.”

“And are you actually going?” I asked, much surprised.

“Yes. And our places are close to Benton’s! He’ll never dream that the men he is hunting for everywhere are sitting exactly opposite him as guests of one of his superiors.”

Boldness was one of Rudolph Rayne’s characteristics. He was fearless in all his clever and ingenious conspiracies, though his cunning was unequaled.

As I drove down to Folkestone I ruminated, as I so often did. No doubt some devilish plot was underlying the acceptance of the high police official’s invitation to the staff dinner.

Its nature became revealed a few days later when, on opening my newspaper one morning, being still at Folkestone waiting in patience, I read a paragraph which aroused within me considerable interest.

It was to the effect that Superintendent Arthur Benton, the well-known Scotland Yard officer, had, after the annual dinner a few nights before, been suddenly taken ill on his way home to Hampstead, and was at the moment lying in a very critical condition suffering from some mysterious form of ptomaine poisoning, his life being despaired of.