The Joker ds(e-3 Read online

  Mr Harlow’s house was a rather ugly three-storey building which occupied a small island site, possibly the most valuable in Park Lane, though the actual entrance was not in that exclusive thoroughfare, but in the side street. He opened the door with a key and walked into the hall. The door to the library faced him. There were some letters on the table, which he scanned through rapidly, opening only one. It was from Ellenbury; and just then Mr Harlow was annoyed with Ellenbury; he had supplied erroneous information about Aileen Rivers, and had made him look a fool.

  He read the letter carefully, and then dropped it in the fire and watched it turn black.

  ‘A useful man, but a thought too anxious. It was a mistake perhaps to keep him so taut. He must be let down,’ Mr Harlow decided. A little of his own confidence must be infused into his helper. Too great a desire to please, too present a fear of failure: those were Ellenbury’s weaknesses.

  He pressed an ivory bell on his desk, sat down, reached to the wall, slid back a panel and took out a small black bottle, a siphon and a glass. He poured out barely more whisky than was enough to cover the bottom of the tumbler, and filled it to the top with soda-water. The glass was half-empty when Mrs Edwins, his housekeeper, came in without knocking. A tall, yellow-faced woman, with burning black eyes, she showed nothing of the slowness or decrepitude that might have been expected in a woman near seventy.

  ‘You rang?’

  Miss Mercy’s maid of other days had a voice as sharp and clear as a bugle note. She stood before the desk, her hands behind her, her eyes fixed on his.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, turning over his letters once more. ‘Is everything all right?’

  ‘Everything.’

  Like a bugle note and with some of a bugle’s stridency.

  ‘Couldn’t we keep a servant in the house?’ she asked. ‘The hours are a little too long for me. I didn’t get to bed until one o’clock yesterday, and I had to be up at seven to let them in.’

  It was a curious fact that no servants slept at No. 704, Park Lane. There was not a house of its size, or an establishment of such pretensions, in all the country where every servant slept out. Mr Harlow’s excuse to his friends was that the room space was too valuable for servants, but he denied this by hiring an expensive house in Charles Street for their accommodation.

  ‘No, I don’t think it is necessary,’ he said, pursing his lips. ‘I thought you understood that.’

  ‘I might die, or be taken ill in the night,’ said Mrs Edwins dispassionately, ‘and then where would you be?’

  He smiled. ‘It would be rather a case of where would you be, I think.’ he said in excellent humour. ‘Nothing has happened?’

  She considered her answer before she replied. ‘Somebody called, that was all,’ she said, ‘but I’ll tell you about that afterwards.’

  He was amused. ‘A good many people call. Very well—be mysterious!’

  He got up from his chair and walked out of the room, and she followed. There was a tiny elevator in the hall, big enough for two, but she declined this conveyance.

  ‘I’ll walk,’ she said, and he laughed softly.

  ‘You were complaining about feeling tired just now,’ he retorted as he closed the grille before the little lift.

  He pressed the top button, the elevator moved swiftly and noiselessly upwards and came at last to a stop on the third floor, where he stepped out to a square-carpeted landing from which led two doors. Here he waited, humming softly to himself, until the woman came in sight round the bend of the stairs.

  ‘You’re an athlete,’ he said pleasantly and, jerking out a pocket-chain, selected a small key and opened the door on the left.

  It was a big and artistically furnished apartment, lit from the cornice by concealed light and from the floor by two red-shaded lamps. In one corner of the room was an ornate wooden bed of red lacquer decorated with Chinese paintings in gold. At a small Empire desk near one of the windows, which were heavily curtained, sat a man. He was almost as tall as Stratford Harlow; and the features which would have arrested the attention of a stranger were his big, dome-shaped forehead and the long golden-yellow beard which, in spite of his age—and he must have been as old as Harlow himself—was untinged with grey.

  He was reading, one thin hand on his cheek, his eyes fixed upon the book that lay or the desk, and not until Mr Harlow spoke did he look up.

  ‘Hallo, Marling!’ said Stratford Harlow gently.

  The man leaned back in his chair, closed the book, mechanically marking his place with a thin tortoise-shell paper-knife.

  ‘Good evening,’ he said simply.

  ‘Time you had your walk, isn’t it?’

  There was a second door in the room and towards this Mr Harlow glanced.

  ‘Yes, I suppose it is,’ said the man, and rose.

  He wore a short dressing-jacket of dark blue velvet; his feet were encased in red morocco slippers. His glance strayed back to the closed book as though he were reluctant to have his reading interrupted.

  ‘The Odes of Horace,’ he said; ‘an English translation, but full of errors.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ smiled Mr Harlow. ‘It’s rather late for Horace.’

  The woman was standing by the door, stiffly erect, her hands folded in front of her, her dark eyes on her master.

  ‘Do you know who you are, my friend?’ he asked.

  The bearded man put his white hand to his forehead.

  ‘I am Saul Marling, a graduate of Balliol,’ he said.

  Mr Harlow nodded.

  ‘And—anything eke?’ he asked.

  Again the hand went up to the dome-shaped forehead.

  ‘I forget…how absurd! It was something I saw, wasn’t it?’ he asked anxiously.

  ‘Something you saw,’ agreed Mr Harlow, ‘just before Miss Mercy died.’

  The other heaved a sigh.

  ‘She died very suddenly. She was very kind to me in all my little troubles. Awfully suddenly! She used to sit on the chair talking to you, and then one night after dinner she fell down.’

  ‘On the floor,’ nodded Mr Harlow, almost cheerfully. ‘But you saw something, didn’t you?’ he encouraged. ‘A little bottle and some blue stuff. Wake up, Marling! You remember the little bottle and the blue stuff?’

  The man shook his head.

  ‘Not clearly…that was before you and Mrs Edwins took me away. I drank the white powders—they fizzed like a seidlitz powder—and then…’

  ‘To the country,’ smiled Harlow. ‘You were ill, my poor old fellow, and we had to prescribe something to quieten you. You’re all right?’

  ‘My head is a little confused—’ began the man, but Harlow laughed, caught him almost affectionately by the arm and, opening the narrow door, led his companion up a flight of steep stairs. At the top of this was another door, which Mr Harlow unlocked. They were on the roof of Greenhart House, a wide, flat expanse of asphalt confined within a breast-high parapet. For half an hour they walked up and down arm-in-arm, the bigger man talking all the time. The fog was thick, the street lamps showed themselves below as patches of dull yellow luminosity.

  ‘Cold? I told you to put on your scarf, you stupid chap!’ Mr Harlow was good-humoured even in his annoyance.

  ‘Conic along, we’ll go down.’

  In the room below he fastened the door and gazed approvingly round the comfortable apartment. He took up one of the eight volumes that lay on a table. They still wore the publishers’ wrappers and had arrived that day.

  ‘Reading maketh a full man—you will find the Augustan histories a little heavy even for a graduate of Oxford, eh? Good night. Marling—sleep well.’

  He locked the door and went out on to the landing with Mrs Edwins. Her hard eyes were fixed on his face, and until he spoke she was silent.

  ‘He’s quite all right,’ he said.

  ‘Is he?’ Her harsh voice was disagreeable. ‘How can he be all right if he’s reading and writing?’

  ‘Writing?’ he asked quickly. ‘What?’


  ‘Oh, just stuff about the Romans, but it reads sensible.’

  Mr Harlow considered this frowningly. ‘That means nothing. He gives no trouble.’

  ‘No,’ she said shortly. ‘I get worried,’ she went on, ‘but he’s quiet. Who is Mr Carlton?’

  Harlow drew a quick breath. ‘Has he been here?’

  She nodded. ‘Yes—this afternoon. He asked me if I was Miss Mercy’s old maid—she must have died soon after he was born.’

  ‘He’s older than that—well?’

  ‘I thought it was queer, but he said he’d been asked to trace Mr Saul Marling.’

  ‘By whom?’

  She confessed her ignorance with a look. ‘I don’t know; but it was a proper inquiry. He showed me the papers. They were from Eastbourne. I told him Marling was dead. “Where?” he said. “In South America,” I told him.’

  ‘Pernambuco,’ emphasised Mr Harlow, ‘in the plague epidemic. Humph! Clever…and unscrupulous. Thank you.’

  She watched him pass into the elevator and drop out of sight, then she went into the second room that opened from the landing. This too, was pleasantly furnished. Turning on the lights she sat down and opened a big chintz bag.

  From this she took an unfinished stocking and adjusted her knitting needles. And as her nimble fingers moved, so did her lips.

  ‘Pernambuco-in the plague epidemic,’ she was saying.

  CHAPTER 6

  AILEEN RIVERS lived in Bloomsbury, which had the advantage of being near her work. She had spent a restless night, and the day that followed had been full of vexation. Mr Stebbings, her immediate chief, was away nursing a cold; and his junior partner, with whom she was constantly brought into contact that day, was a tetchy and disagreeable man, with a habit of mislaying important documents and blaming the person who happened to be most handy for their disappearance.

  At six o’clock in the evening she locked up her desk with a sigh of thankfulness, looking forward to a light dinner and an early bedtime. Through her window she had seen the car drawn up by the kerb, and at first had thought it was waiting for a client, so that she was a little surprised, and by no means pleased, when, as she came down the steps of the old-fashioned house where the office was situate, a young man crossed the broad sidewalk towards her and lifted his hat.

  ‘Oh, you!’ she said in some dismay,

  ‘Me, or I, as the case may be; I’m not quite certain which,’ said Jim Carlton. ‘And your tone is offensive,’ he said sternly. ‘By rights Elk or I should have been interviewing you at all sorts of odd hours during the day.’

  ‘But what on earth can I tell you?’ she asked, exasperated. You know everything about the burglary—I suppose that is what you mean?’

  ‘That is what I mean,’ said Jim. ‘It is very evident that you know nothing about policemen. You imagine, I suppose, that Scotland Yard says “Hallo, there’s been a burglary in Victoria. How interesting! Nobody knows, anything about it, so we’ll let the matter drop.” You’re wrong!’

  ‘I’m much too hungry to talk.’

  ‘So I guessed,’ he said. ‘There is an unpretentious restaurant at King’s Cross, where the sole bonne femme is worthy only of the pure of heart.’

  She hesitated. ‘Very well,’ she said a little ungraciously. ‘Is that your car? How funny!’

  ‘There’s nothing funny about my car,’ he said with dignity, ‘and it is not my car. I borrowed it.’

  It was a clear night of stars and there was a touch of frost in the air and, although she would not have admitted as much for untold wealth, she enjoyed the short run that brought them to the side entrance of a large restaurant filled with people in varying stages of gastronomic enjoyment.

  ‘I have booked a table,’ he said, piloting her through an avenue of working jaws to a secluded corner of the annexe.

  The atmosphere of the place was very satisfying. The pink table-lamps had a soothing effect, and she could examine him at her leisure. In truth it had been one of the sources of irritation of that very unhappy day that she could not quite remember what he looked like. She knew that he was not repulsive, and had a misty idea that he was rather good-looking, but that his nose was too short. It proved on inspection to be of a reasonable length. His eyes were blue and he was a little older than she had thought. Half her disrespect was based on the illusion of his youth.

  ‘Now ask all your horrid questions,’ she said as she took off her gloves.

  ‘Number one,’ he began. ‘What did Harlow offer you when I so discreetly withdrew last night?’

  ‘That has nothing to do with the burglary,’ she answered promptly. ‘But as it wasn’t very important, I will tell you. He offered me a position.’

  ‘Where?’ he asked quickly.

  She shook her head.

  ‘I don’t know. We didn’t get as far as that; I told him I was perfectly happy with Mr Stebbings—who, by the way, used to be the lawyer of the Harlow family.’

  ‘Did you tell him that?’ He thrust his head forward eagerly.

  ‘Why, no—he told me, though of course I knew,’ she said. ‘He knew, the moment I mentioned Stebbings’s name.’

  ‘Was he impressed?’ he asked after a pause and she laughed.

  ‘How ridiculous you are! Seriously, Mr—‘she paused insultingly.

  ‘Carlton,’ he murmured; ‘half-brother to the hotel but no relation to the club.’

  ‘You worked that one last night,’ she said.

  ‘And I shall work it every night you pretend to forget my name! Anyway, it is a confession of crass ignorance which no modern young woman can afford to make. I am one of the most famous men in London.’

  ‘I think I’ve heard you say that before,’ she said mendaciously. ‘Now tell me seriously, Mr Carlton—’

  ‘Got it!’ he murmured.

  ‘What do you want to know about the burglary?’

  ‘Nothing,’ was the shameless reply. ‘As a matter of fact, I have saved you a great deal of trouble by supplying headquarters with all the details they need. Your uncle emerges tomorrow; do you know that?’

  ‘Tomorrow?’ she said, with a pang of apprehension.

  ‘And Elk is going to meet him and take some of the sting out of his anger. I suppose he will be very angry?’

  ‘He’ll be furious,’ said the girl, troubled. And then, with a quick sigh, ‘I’ll be awfully glad when he has “emerged,” as you call it. He allows me two pounds a week for my trouble, but I can well spare that.’

  ‘Arthur Ingle ought to be ashamed of himself to drag you into the light which shines so brightly upon the unjust,’ he said. ‘There is only one thing I want to know about him, and perhaps you can tell me—was your uncle a great speculator?’

  ‘I don’t think so. But really I don’t know. He never spoke to me about any investments. Is that what you mean?’

  ‘That is just what I mean,’ said Jim. He found it difficult to put the question without offence. ‘You’ve had interviews with him and I dare say you’ve discussed his business to some extent. I shouldn’t ask you to betray his confidence and I don’t suppose for one minute you will. Did he ever talk about foreign gilt-edged investments?’

  She was shaking her head before he finished the question.

  ‘Never,’ she said. ‘I don’t think he knows much about them. I remember the first time I saw him at Dartmoor he told me he didn’t believe in putting money in shares. Of course, I’m well aware he has money, but you know that, too, and I suppose it is stolen money that he’s—’

  ‘Cached—yes,’ said Jim.

  He was very serious. It was the first time she had seen him in that mood and she rather liked it.

  ‘Only one more question. You don’t know that he is in any way connected with a firm called Rata?’

  And, when she confessed that she had never heard of such a firm, his seriousness was at an end.

  ‘And that’s the whole of the questionnaire, back page and everything!’

  He leaned back
to allow the burly waiter to place the dish on the table. ‘Sole bonne femme is good for the tired business girl. Will you have wine, or just the Lord’s good water?’

  After this he became his old flippant self. He made no further allusion to her uncle; and if he talked a great deal about himself, it was interesting, for he talked shop, and Scotland Yard shop is the second most interesting in the world. He lived at his club.

  ‘I’d better give you the telephone number in case you ever want me.’ He scrawled the address on the back of the menu and tore off the corner.

  ‘Why should I want you?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ve just got a feeling that you might. I’m a hunch merchant—do you know what a hunch merchant is?’

  She could guess.

  ‘Premonitions are my long suit, telepathy my sixth sense, and I’ve got a hunch…perhaps I’m wrong. I hope I am.’

  Once or twice he had looked at his watch, a little furtively, she thought, yet it seemed that he was prepared to break any appointment he had made, for he lingered over his coffee until she brought a happy evening to an abrupt close by putting on her gloves. As they were driving back to her rooms: ‘I haven’t asked you very much about yourself. That is the kind of impertinence which really scares me,’ he said, ‘but I gather that you’re unmarried—and unengaged?’ he asked.

  ‘I have no followers,’ she said without embarrassment, ‘and I hope that confession will offer no encouragement to the philandering constabulary!’

  He chuckled for fully a minute.

  ‘That’s good,’ he said at last.’ “Philandering constabulary” is taken into use for special occasions. You’re the first woman—’