The Doctor of Pimlico: Being the Disclosure of a Great Crime

"I will see Mrs. Caldwell, and get her tickets changed," he said. "Do you understand, Enid? There are reasons—very strong reasons—why you should not travel across France!"

"No, I don't," declared the girl. "You are mysterious again. Why don't you be open with me and give me your reasons for this suggestion?"

"I would most willingly—if I could," he answered. "Unfortunately, I cannot."

"I don't think Mrs. Caldwell will travel by the roundabout route which you suggest merely because you have a whim that we should not cross France," she remarked, looking straight at him.

"If you enter France a disaster will happen—depend upon it," he said, speaking very slowly, his eyes fixed upon her.

"Are you a prophet?" the girl asked. "Can you prophesy dreadful things to happen to us?"

"I do in this case," he said firmly. "Therefore, take my advice and do not court disaster."

"Can't you be more explicit?" she asked, much puzzled by his strange words.

"No," he answered, shaking his head, "I cannot. I only forewarn you of what must happen. Therefore, I beg of you to take my advice and travel by the alternative route—if you really must go to Italy."

She turned towards the fire and, fixing her gaze upon the flames, remained for a few moments in thought, one neat foot upon the marble kerb.

"You really alarm me with all these serious utterances," she said at last, with a faint, nervous laugh.

He rose and stood by her side.

"Look here, Enid," he said, "can't you see that I am in dead earnest? Have I not already declared that I am your friend, to assist you against that man Weirmarsh?"

"Yes," she replied, "you have."

"Then will you not heed my warning? There is distinct danger in your visit to France—a danger of which you have no suspicion, but real and serious nevertheless. Don't think about spying; it is not that, I assure you."

"How can I avoid it?"

"By pretending to be unwell," he suggested quickly. "You cannot leave with Mrs. Caldwell. Let her go, and you can join her a few days later, travelling by Ostend. The thing is quite simple."

"But–"

"No, you must not hesitate," he declared. "There are no buts. It is the only way."

"Yes; but tell me what terrible thing is to happen to me if I enter France?" she asked, with an uneasy laugh.

The man hesitated. To speak the truth would be to explain all. Therefore he only shook his head and said, "Please do not ask me to explain a matter of which I am not permitted to speak. If you believe me, Enid," he said in a low, pleading voice, "do heed my warning, I beg of you!"

As he uttered these words the handle of the door turned, and Lady Elcombe, warmly clad in furs, came forward to greet the novelist.

"I'm so glad that I returned before you left, Mr. Fetherston," she exclaimed. "We've been to a most dreary play; and I'm simply dying for some tea. Enid, ring the bell, dear, will you?" Then continuing, she added in warm enthusiasm: "Really, Mr. Fetherston, you are quite a stranger! We hoped to see more of you, but my husband and daughter have been away in France—as perhaps you know."

"So Enid has been telling me," replied Walter. "They've been in a most interesting district."

"Enid is leaving us again to-morrow morning," remarked her mother. "They are going to Nervi. You know it, of course, for I've heard you called the living Baedeker, Mr. Fetherston," she laughed.

"Yes," he replied, "I know it—a rather dull little place, with one or two villas. I prefer Santa Margherita, a little farther along the coast—or Rapallo. But," he added, "your daughter tells me she's not well. I hope she will not be compelled to postpone her departure."

"Of course not," said Lady Elcombe decisively. "She must go to-morrow if she goes at all. I will not allow her to travel by herself."

The girl and the man exchanged meaning glances, and just then Sir Hugh himself entered, greeting his visitor cheerily.

The butler brought in the tea-tray, and as they sat together the two men chatted.

In pretence that he had not been abroad, Walter was making inquiry regarding the district around Haudiomont, which he declared must be full of interest, and asking the general's opinion of the French new fortresses in anticipation of the new war against Germany.

"Since I have been away," said the general, "I have been forced to arrive at the conclusion that another danger may arrive in the very near future. Germany will try and attack France again—without a doubt. The French are labouring under a dangerous delusion if they suppose that Germany would be satisfied with her obscurity."

"Is that really your opinion, Sir Hugh?" asked Fetherston, somewhat surprised.

"Certainly," was the general's reply. "There will be another war in the near future. My opinions have changed of late, my dear Fetherston," Sir Hugh assured him, as he sipped his tea, "and more especially since I went to visit my daughter. I have recently had opportunities of seeing and learning a good deal."

Fetherston reflected. Those words, coming from Sir Hugh, were certainly strange ones.

Walter was handing Enid the cake when the butler entered, bearing a telegram upon a silver salver, which he handed to Sir Hugh.

Tearing it open, he glanced at the message eagerly, and a second later, with blanched face, stood rigid, statuesque, as though turned into stone.

"Why, what's the matter?" asked his wife. "Whom is it from?"

"Only from Blanche," he answered in a low, strained voice. "She is in Paris—and is leaving to-night for London."

"Is Paul coming?" inquired Enid eagerly.

"No," he answered, with a strenuous effort to remain calm. "He—he cannot leave Paris."

The butler, being told there was no answer, bowed and withdrew, but a few seconds later the door reopened, and he announced:

"Dr. Weirmarsh, Sir Hugh!"

CHAPTER XXI

THE WIDENED BREACH

When Sir Hugh entered his cosy study he found the doctor seated at his ease in the big chair by the fire.

"I thought that, being in the vicinity, I would call and see if you've recovered from your—well, your silly fit of irritability," he said, with a grim smile on his grey face as he looked towards the general.

"I have just received bad news—news which I have all along dreaded," replied the unhappy man, the telegram still in his hand. "Paul Le Pontois has been arrested on some mysterious charge—false, without a doubt!"

"Yes," replied Weirmarsh; "it is most unfortunate. I heard it an hour ago, and the real reason of my visit was to tell you of the contretemps."

"Someone must have made a false charge against him," cried the general excitedly. "The poor fellow is innocent—entirely innocent! I only have a brief telegram from his wife. She is in despair, and leaves for London to-night."

"My dear Sir Hugh, France is in a very hysterical mood just now. Of course, there must be some mistake. Some private enemy of his has made the charge without a doubt—someone jealous of his position, perhaps. Allegations are easily made, though not so easily substantiated."

"Except by manufactured evidence and forged documents," snapped Sir Hugh. "If Paul is the victim of some political party and is to be made a scapegoat, then Heaven help him, poor fellow. They will never allow him to prove his innocence, unless–"

"Unless what?"

"Unless I come forward," he said very slowly, staring straight before him. "Unless I come forward and tell the truth of my dealings with you. The charges against Paul are false. I know it now. What have you to say?" he added in a low, hard voice.

"A great deal of good that would do!" laughed Weirmarsh, selecting a cigarette from his gold case and lighting it, regarding his host with those narrow-set, sinister eyes of his. "It would only implicate Le Pontois further. They would say, and with truth, that you knew of the whole conspiracy and had profited by it."

"I should tell them what I know concerning you. Indeed, I wrote out a full statement while I was staying with Paul. And I have it ready to hand for the authorities."

"You can do so, of course, if you choose," was the careless reply. "It really doesn't matter to me what statement you make. You have always preserved silence up to the present, therefore I should believe that in this case silence was still golden."

"And you suggest that I stand calmly by and see Le Pontois sentenced to a long term of imprisonment for a crime which he has not committed, eh?"

"I don't suggest anything, my dear Sir Hugh," was the man's reply; "I leave it all to your good judgment."

Since they had met in secret Weirmarsh had made a flying visit to Brussels, where he had conferred with two friends of his. Upon their suggestion he was now acting.

If Paul Le Pontois were secretly denounced and afterwards found innocent, then it would only mystify the French police; the policy pursued towards the Sûreté, as well as towards Sir Hugh, was a clever move on Weirmarsh's part.

"What am I to say to my poor girl when she arrives here in tears to-morrow?" demanded the fine old British officer hoarsely.

"You know that best yourself," was Weirmarsh's brusque reply.

"To you I owe all my recent troubles," the elder man declared. "Because—because," he added bitterly, "you bought me up body and soul."

"A mere business arrangement, wasn't it, Sir Hugh?" remarked his visitor. "Of course, I'm very sorry if any great trouble has fallen upon you on my account. I hope, for instance, you do not suspect me of conspiring to denounce your son-in-law," he added.

"Well, I don't know," was the other's reply; "yet I feel that, in view of this contretemps, I must in future break off all connection with you."

"And lose the annual grant which you find so extremely useful?"

"I shall be compelled to do without it. And, at least, I shall have peace of mind."

"Perhaps," remarked the other meaningly.

Sir Hugh realised that this man intended still to hold him in the hollow of his hand. From that one false step he had taken years ago he had never been able to draw back.

Hour by hour, and day by day, had his conscience pricked him. Those chats with the doctor in that grimy little consulting-room in Pimlico remained ever in his memory.

The doctor was the representative of those who held him in their power—persons who were being continually hunted by the police, yet who always evaded them—criminals all! To insult him would be to insult those who had paid him so well for his confidential services.

Yet, filled with contempt for himself, he asked whether he did not deserve to be degraded publicly, and drummed out of the army.

Were it not for Lady Elcombe and Enid he would long ago have gone to East Africa and effaced himself. But he could not bring himself to desert them.

He had satisfied himself that not a soul in England suspected the truth, for, by the Press, he had long ago been declared to be a patriotic Briton, because in his stirring public speeches, when he had put up for Parliament after the armistice, there was always a genuine "John Bull" ring.

The truth was that he remained unsuspected by all—save by one man who had scented the truth. That man was Walter Fetherston!

Walter alone knew the ghastly circumstances, and it was he who had been working to save the old soldier from himself. He did so for two reasons—first, because he was fond of the bluff, fearless old fellow, and, secondly, because he had been attracted by Enid, and intended to rescue her from the evil thraldom of Weirmarsh.

"Why have you returned here to taunt and irritate me again?" snapped Sir Hugh after a pause.

"I came to tell you news which, apparently, you have already received."

"You could well have kept it. You knew that I should be informed in due course."

"Yes—but I—well, I thought you might grow apprehensive perhaps."

"In what direction?"

"That your connection with the little affair might be discovered by the French police. Bézard, the new chief of the Sûreté, is a pretty shrewd person, remember!"

"But, surely, that is not possible, is it?" gasped the elder man in quick alarm.

"No; you can reassure yourself on that point. Le Pontois knows nothing, therefore he can make no statement—unless, of course, your own actions were suspicious."

"They were not—I am convinced of that."

"Then you have no need to fear. Your son-in-law will certainly not endeavour to implicate you. And if he did, he would not be believed," declared the doctor, although he well knew that Bézard was in possession of full knowledge of the whole truth, and that, only by the timely warning he had so mysteriously received, had this man before him and his stepdaughter escaped arrest.

His dastardly plot to secure their ruin and imprisonment had failed. How the girl had obtained wind of it utterly mystified him. It was really in order to discover the reason of their sudden flight that he had made those two visits.

"Look here, Weirmarsh," exclaimed Sir Hugh with sudden resolution, "I wish you to understand that from to-day, once and for all, I desire to have no further dealings with you. It was, as you have said, a purely business transaction. Well, I have done the dirty, disgraceful work for which you have paid me, and now my task is at an end."

"I hardly think it is, my dear Sir Hugh," replied the doctor calmly. "As I have said before, I am only the mouthpiece—I am not the employer. But I believe that certain further assistance is required—information which you promised long ago, but failed to procure."

"What was that?"

"You recollect that you promised to obtain something—a little tittle-tattle—concerning a lady."

"Yes," snapped the old officer, "oh, Lady Wansford. Let us talk of something else!"

Weirmarsh, who had been narrowly watching the countenance of his victim, saw that he had mentioned a disagreeable subject. He noted how pale were the general's cheeks, and how his thin hands twitched with suppressed excitement.

"I am quite ready to talk of other matters," he answered, "though I deem it but right to refer to my instructions."

"And what are they?"

"To request you to supply the promised information."

"But I can't—I really can't!"

"You made a promise, remember. And upon that promise I made you a loan of five hundred pounds."

"I know!" cried the unhappy man, who had sunk so deeply into the mire that extrication seemed impossible. "I know! But it is a promise that I can't fulfil. I won't be your tool any longer. Gad! I won't. Don't you hear me?"

"You must!" declared Weirmarsh, bending forward and looking straight into his eyes.

"I will not!" shouted Sir Hugh, his eyes flashing with quick anger. "Anything but that."

"Why?"

"My efforts in that direction had tragic results on the last occasion."

"Ah!" laughed Weirmarsh. "I see you are superstitious—or something. I did not expect that of you."

"I am not superstitious, Weirmarsh. I only refuse to do what you want. If I gave it to you, it would mean—no I won't—I tell you I won't!"

"Bah! You are growing sentimental!"

"No—I am growing wise. My eyes are at last opened to the dastardly methods of you and your infernal friends. Hear me, once and for all; I refuse to assist you further; and, moreover, I defy you!"

The doctor was silent for a moment, contemplating the ruby on his finger. Then, rising slowly from his chair, he said: "Ah! you do not fully realise what your refusal may cost you."

"Cost what it may, Weirmarsh, I ask you to leave my house at once," said the general, scarlet with anger and beside himself with remorse. "And I shall give orders that you are not again to be admitted here."

"Very good!" laughed the other, with a sinister grin. "You will very soon be seeking me in my surgery."

"We shall see," replied Sir Hugh, with a shrug of his shoulders, as the other strode out of his room.

CHAPTER XXII

CONCERNING THE BELLAIRS AFFAIR

What Walter Fetherston had feared had happened. The two men had quarrelled! Throughout the whole of that evening he watched the doctor's movements.

In any other country but our dear old hood-winked England, Fetherston, in the ordinary course, would have been the recipient of high honours from the Sovereign. But he was a writer, and not a financier. He could not afford to subscribe to the party funds, a course suggested by the flat-footed old Lady G–, who was the tout of Government Whips.

Walter preferred to preserve his independence. He had seen and known much during the war, and, disgusted, he preferred to adopt the Canadian Government's decree and remain without "honours."

His pet phrase was: "The extent of a Party's dishonours is known by the honours it bestows. Scraps of ribbon, 'X.Y.Z.' or O.B.E. behind one's name can neither make the gentleman nor create the lady."

His secret connection with Scotland Yard, which was purely patriotic and conducted as a student of underground crime, had taught him many strange things, and he had learnt many remarkable secrets. Some of them were, indeed, his secrets before they became secrets of the Cabinet.

Many of those secrets he kept to himself, one being the remarkable truth that General Sir Hugh Elcombe was implicated in a very strange jumble of affairs—a matter that was indeed incredible.

To the tall, well-groomed, military-looking man with whom he stood at eleven o'clock on the following morning—in a private room at New Scotland Yard—he had never confided that discovery of his. To have done so would have been to betray a man who had a brilliant record as a soldier, and who still held high position at the War Office.

By such denunciation he knew he might earn from "the eyes of the Government" very high commendation, in addition to what he had already earned, yet he had resolved, if possible, to save the old officer, who was really more sinned against than sinning.

"You seem to keep pretty close at the heels of your friend, the doctor of Vauxhall Bridge Road!" laughed Trendall, the director of the department, as they stood together in the big, airy, official-looking room, the two long windows of which looked out over Westminster Bridge.

"You've been in France, Montgomery says. What was your friend doing there?"

"He's been there against his will—very much against his will!"

"And you've found out something—eh?"

"Yes," replied Fetherston. "One or two things."

"Something interesting, of course," remarked the shrewd, active, dark-haired man of fifty, under whose control was one of the most important departments of Scotland Yard. "But tell me, in what direction is this versatile doctor of yours working just at the present?"

"I hardly know," was the novelist's reply, as in a navy serge suit he leaned near the window which overlooked the Thames. "I believe some deep scheme is afoot, but at present I cannot see very far. For that reason I am remaining watchful."

"He does not suspect you, of course? If he does, I'd give you Harris, or Charlesworth, or another of the men—in fact, whoever you like—to assist you."

"Perhaps I may require someone before long. If so, I will write or wire to the usual private box at the General Post Office, and shall then be glad if you will send a man to meet me."

"Certainly. It was you, Fetherston, who first discovered the existence of this interesting doctor, who had already lived in Vauxhall Bridge Road for eighteen months without arousing suspicion. You have, indeed, a fine nose for mysteries."

At that moment the telephone, standing upon the big writing-table, rang loudly, and the man of secrets crossed to it and listened.

"It's Heywood—at Victoria Station. He's asking for you," he exclaimed.

Walter went to the instrument, and through it heard the words: "The boat train has just gone, sir. Mrs. Caldwell waited for the young lady until the train went off, but she did not arrive. She seemed annoyed and disappointed. Dr. Weirmarsh has been on the platform, evidently watching also."

"Thanks, Heywood," replied Fetherston sharply; "that was all I wanted to know. Good day."

He replaced the receiver, and, walking back to his friend against the window, explained: "A simple little inquiry I was making regarding a departure by the boat train for Paris—that was all."

But he reflected that if Weirmarsh had been watching it must have been to warn the French police over at Calais of the coming of Enid. No action was too dastardly for that unscrupulous scoundrel.

Yet, for the present at least, the girl remained safe. The chief peril was that in which Sir Hugh was placed, now that he had openly defied the doctor.

On the previous evening he had been in the drawing-room at Hill Street when Sir Hugh had returned from interviewing the caller. By his countenance and manner he at once realised that the breach had been widened.

The one thought by which he was obsessed was how he should save Sir Hugh from disgrace. His connection with the Criminal Investigation Department placed at his disposal a marvellous network of sources of information, amazing as they were unsuspected. He was secretly glad that at last the old fellow had resolved to face bankruptcy rather than go farther in that strange career of crime, yet, at the same time, there was serious danger—for Weirmarsh was a man so unscrupulous and so vindictive that the penalty of his defiance must assuredly be a severe one.

The very presence of the doctor on the platform of the South Eastern station at Victoria that morning showed that he did not intend to allow the grass to grow beneath his feet.

The novelist was still standing near the long window, looking aimlessly down upon the Embankment, with its hurrying foot-passengers and whirling taxis.

"You seem unusually thoughtful, Fetherston," remarked Trendall with some curiosity, as he seated himself at the table and resumed the opening of his letters which his friend's visit had interrupted. "What's the matter?"

"The fact is, I'm very much puzzled."

"About what? You're generally very successful in obtaining solutions where other men have failed."

"To the problem which is greatly exercising my mind just now I can obtain no solution," he said in a low, intense voice.

"What is it? Can I help you?"

"Well," he exclaimed, with some hesitation, "I am still trying to discover why Harry Bellairs died and who killed him."

"That mystery has long ago been placed by us among those which admit of no solution, my dear fellow," declared his friend. "We did our best to throw some light upon it, but all to no purpose. I set the whole of our machinery at work at the time—days before you suspected anything wrong—but not a trace of the truth could we find."

"But what could have been the motive, do you imagine? From all accounts he was a most popular young officer, without a single enemy in the world."

"Jealousy," was the dark man's slow reply. "My own idea is that a woman killed him."

"Why?" cried Walter quickly. "What causes you to make such a suggestion?"

"Well—listen, and when I've finished you can draw your own conclusions."

CHAPTER XXIII

THE SILENCE OF THE MAN BARKER

"Harry Bellairs was an old friend of mine," Trendall went on, leaning back in his padded writing-chair and turning towards where the novelist was standing. "His curious end was a problem which, of course, attracted you as a writer of fiction. The world believed his death to be due to natural causes, in view of the failure of Professors Dale and Boyd, the Home Office analysts, to find a trace of poison or of foul play."

"You believe, then, that he was poisoned?" asked Fetherston quickly.

The other shrugged his shoulders, saying: "How can that point be cleared up? There was no evidence of it."

"It is curious that, though we are both so intensely interested in the problem, we have never before discussed it," remarked Walter. "I am so anxious to hear your views upon one or two points. What, for instance, do you think of Barker, the dead man's valet?"

Herbert Trendall hesitated, and for a moment twisted his moustache. He was a marvellously alert man, an unusually good linguist, and a cosmopolitan to his finger-tips. He had been a detective-sergeant in the T Division of Metropolitan Police for years before his appointment as director of that section. He knew more of the criminal undercurrents on the Continent than any living Englishman, and it was he who furnished accurate information to the Sûreté in Paris concerning the great Humbert swindle.