Four Square Jane Read online

  “The old man was a blind,” he said, “he was sent in to create suspicion and keep the eyes of the attendants upon himself. He purposely bored everybody with his long-winded discourse on art in order to be left alone. He went into the saloon knowing that his bulky appearance would induce the attendants to keep their eyes on him. Then he came out – the thing was timed beautifully – just as the child came in. That was the lovely plan.

  “The money was dropped to direct all attention on the old man, and at that moment, probably, the picture was cut from its frame, and it was hidden. Where it was hidden, or how the girl got it out is a mystery. The attendants are most certain that she could not have had it concealed about her, and I have made experiments with a thick canvas cut to the size of the picture, and it certainly does seem that the picture would have so bulged that they could not have failed to have noticed it.”

  “But who was the girl?”

  “Four Square Jane!” said Peter promptly.

  “Impossible!”

  Peter smiled.

  “It is the easiest thing in the world for a young girl to make herself look younger. Short frocks, and hair in plaits – and there you are! Four Square Jane is something more than clever.”

  “One moment,” said the Chief, “could she have handed it through the window to somebody else?”

  Peter shook his head.

  “I have thought of that,” he said, “but the windows were closed and there was a wire netting which made that method of disposal impossible. No, by some means or other she got the picture out under the noses of the attendants. Then she came out and announced innocently that she could not find the Romney picture – naturally there was a wild rush to the saloon. For three minutes no notice was being taken of the ‘child’.”

  “Do you think one of the attendants was in collusion?”

  “That is also possible,” said Peter, “but every man has a record of good, steady service. They’re all married men and none of them has the slightest thing against him.”

  “And what will she do with the picture? She can’t dispose of it,” protested the Chief.

  “She’s after the reward,” said Peter with a smile. “I tell you, Chief, this thing has put me on my mettle. Somehow, I don’t think I’ve got my hand on Jane yet, but I’m living on hopes.”

  “After the reward,” repeated the Chief; “that’s pretty substantial. But surely you are going to fix her when she hands the picture over?”

  “Not on your life,” replied Peter, and took out of his pocket a telegram and laid it on the table before the other. It read:

  The Romney will be returned on condition that Mr Tresser undertakes to pay the sum of five thousand pounds to the Great Panton Street Hospital for Children. On his signing an agreement to pay this sum, the picture will be restored.

  Jane

  “What did Tresser say about that?”

  “Tresser agrees,” answered Peter, “and has sent a note to the secretary of the Great Panton Street Hospital to that effect. We are advertising the fact of his agreement very widely in the newspapers.”

  At three o’clock that afternoon came another telegram, addressed this time to Peter Dawes – it annoyed him to know that the girl was so well informed that she was aware of the fact that he was in charge of the case.

  I will restore the picture at eight o’clock tonight. Be in the picture gallery, and please take all precautions. Don’t let me escape this time – The Four Square Jane.

  The telegram was handed in at the General Post Office.

  Peter Dawes neglected no precaution. He had really not the faintest hope that he would make the capture, but it would not be his fault if Four Square Jane were not put under lock and key.

  A small party assembled in the gloomy hall of Mr Tresser’s own house.

  Dawes and two detective officers, Mr Tresser himself – he sucked at a big cigar and seemed the least concerned of those present – the three attendants, and a representative of the Great Panton Street Hospital were there.

  “Do you think she’ll come in person?” asked Tresser. “I would rather like to see that Jane. She certainly put one over on me, but I bear her no ill-will.”

  “I have a special force of police within call,” said Peter, “and the roads are watched by detectives, but I’m afraid I can’t promise you anything exciting. She’s too slippery for us.”

  “Anyway, the messenger–” began Tresser.

  Peter shook his head.

  “The messenger may be a district messenger, though here again I have taken precautions – all the district messenger offices have been warned to notify Scotland Yard in the event of somebody coming with a parcel addressed here.”

  Eight o’clock boomed out from the neighbouring church, but Four Square Jane had not put in an appearance. Five minutes later there came a ring at the bell, and Peter Dawes opened the door.

  It was a telegraph boy.

  Peter took the buff envelope and tore it open, read the message through carefully, and laughed – a hopeless, admiring laugh.

  “She’s done it,” he said.

  “What do you mean?” asked Tresser.

  “Come in here,” said Peter.

  He led the way into the picture gallery. There was the empty frame on the wall, and behind it the half-obliterated label which Four Square Jane had stuck.

  He walked straight to the end of the room to one of the windows.

  “The picture is here,” he said, “it has never left the room.”

  He lifted his hand, and pulled at the blind cord, and the blind slowly revolved.

  There was a gasp of astonishment from the gathering. For, pinned to the blind, and rolled up with it, was the missing Romney.

  “I ought to have guessed when I saw the pin,” said Peter to his chief. It was quick work, but it was possible to do it.

  “She cut out the picture, brought it to the end of the room, and pulled down the blind; pinned the top corners of the picture to the blind, and let it roll up again. Nobody thought of pulling that infernal thing down!”

  “The question that worries me,” said the Chief, “is this – Who is Four Square Jane?”

  “That,” replied Peter, “is just what I am going to discover.”

  4

  Mrs Gordon Wilberforce was a large, yielding lady of handsome and aristocratic features and snow-white hair. It is true that she had not reached the age when one expected hair of that snowy whiteness, and there were people who told with brutal frankness a story that was not creditable to Mrs Wilberforce.

  According to these gossips the lady had attended the salon of a famous beauty doctor, who had endeavoured to restore Mrs Wilberforce’s hair to the beautiful golden hue which was so attractive to her friends and admirers in the late eighties. But the beauty doctor had not had that success which his discreet advertisements seemed to guarantee. One half of Mrs Wilberforce’s hair had come out green, and the other a deep pinky russet brown. Thereupon, Mrs Wilberforce, with great heroism, had ordered the trembling hairdresser to bleach without mercy.

  And in course of time she appeared in her family circle. She explained that her hair had gone white in a night with the worry she had had from Joyce.

  Joyce Wilberforce distressed her mother for many reasons. Not the least of these was the fact that her mother did not understand her, and Joyce did understand her mother.

  They sat at breakfast in their little morning-room overlooking Hyde Park, Mrs Wilberforce and her daughter, and the elder woman was very thoughtful.

  “Joyce,” she said, “pay attention to what I am going to say, and try to keep your mind from wandering.”

  “Yes, mother,” said the girl meekly.

  “Do you remember that maid we discharged, Jane Briglow?”

  “Jane Briglow?” said the girl, “yes, I remember her very well. You didn’t like her manner or something.”

  “She gave herself airs,” said Mrs Wilberforce tartly.

  The girl’s lips curved in a
smile. Joyce and her mother were never wholly in harmony. It was not the first time they had discussed Jane Briglow in the same spirit of antagonism which marked their present conversation.

  “Jane was a good girl,” said Joyce quietly. “She was a little romantic, rather fond of sensational literature, but there was nothing wrong with her.”

  Mrs Wilberforce sniffed.

  “I am glad you think so,” she said, and the girl looked up quickly.

  “Why do you say that, mother?”

  “Well,” said Mrs Wilberforce, “doesn’t it seem strange to you that this horrible burglar person should also be called Jane?”

  Joyce laughed.

  “It is not an uncommon name,” she said.

  “But she is going about her work in an uncommon manner,” said her mother. “All the people she is robbing are personal friends of ours, or of dear Lord Claythorpe. I must say,” she went on with a little shiver of exasperation, “that you take your loss very well. I suppose you realize that a £50,000 necklace intended for you has disappeared?”

  Joyce nodded.

  “Purchased to deck the sacrifice,” she said ironically.

  “Rubbish!” snorted Mrs Wilberforce, “sacrifice indeed! You are marrying Lord Claythorpe’s heir, and Lord Claythorpe was your uncle’s dearest friend.”

  “He is not my dearest friend,” said the girl grimly in a sudden fit of exasperation. “Because one’s been brought up with a person, regarding him almost as a brother, that is no reason why one should marry him. In fact to the contrary. No one has yet accused me of being weak, but I should certainly lose all my self-respect if I allowed myself to be married off in this way.”

  “It seems to me,” said Mrs Wilberforce, “that for a girl who has no other prospects of marriage, you are arguing with great passion. And short-sightedness,” she added.

  “It isn’t a question of wanting to marry someone else,” said Joyce, after a perceptible pause, “it’s merely a question of not wanting to marry Francis.”

  She walked across the room and picked up a silver-framed photograph of the young man under discussion.

  “And I think I’m justified,” she concluded. Mrs Wilberforce was silent.

  “After all, why shouldn’t I marry whom I choose?” said Joyce. “Don’t you realize that Lord Claythorpe is being horribly selfish and that this marriage is being designed for his own purpose?”

  “I realize one thing,” said Mrs Wilberforce angrily, “and that is that you look like being pig-headed enough to ruin your own chances socially, and both of us financially. You know as well as I do, Joyce, that Lord Claythorpe is acting absolutely in accordance with your uncle’s will, and you cannot doubt that your uncle had your best interests

  at heart.”

  “When uncle left his great fortune to me and made the provision that I should not marry anybody who was not the choice of Lord Claythorpe, the trustee of his estate, the poor dear old man thought he was protecting my interests, because he had a most childlike faith in Lord Claythorpe’s honesty. He never dreamt that Lord Claythorpe would choose his own idiot son!”

  “Idiot!” gasped Mrs Wilberforce, “that is an outrageous statement. He’s not one of the intellectuals, perhaps, but he’s a good boy, and one day will become Lord Claythorpe.”

  “So far as I can see,” said the girl, “that’s his only virtue. You can turn the matter about as you like, mother, but there the fact remains. Unless I marry Francis Claythorpe I lose a great fortune. Lord Claythorpe can well afford to give me £50,000 necklaces!”

  Mrs Wilberforce smoothed her dress over her knees patiently.

  “The provision was a very wise one, my dear,” she said, “otherwise you would have married that awful person Jamieson Steele, imagine, a penniless engineer and a forger!”

  The girl sprang to her feet, her face crimson. “You shall not say that, mother,” she said sharply. “Jamieson did not forge Lord Claythorpe’s signature. The cheque which was presented and paid to Jamieson was signed by Lord Claythorpe, and if he repudiated his own signature he did it for his own purpose. He knew I was fond of Jamieson. It was cruel, terribly cruel!”

  Mrs Wilberforce raised her hands in protest. “Do not let us have a scene,” she said, “my dear girl, think of all your money means to me. The years I’ve scrimped and saved to get you an education and put you in a position in society. Perhaps Jamieson was led astray–”

  “I tell you he did not do it,” cried the girl. “The charge against him was made by Lord Claythorpe in order to discredit him and give him a reason for refusing his consent to our marriage.”

  Mrs Wilberforce shrugged her ample shoulders.

  “Well, there’s no sense in going into the question now,” she said, “let us forget all about it. Jamieson has disappeared, and I hope he is living a virtuous life in the Colonies.”

  The girl shrugged her shoulders. She knew it was useless to continue any argument with her mother. She changed the subject.

  “What is this about Jane Briglow?” she asked. “Have you seen her?”

  Mrs Wilberforce shook her head.

  “No,” she said, “but in the night I have been thinking things out, and I have decided that Jane knows something about these crimes. From all the descriptions I have had of this girl I can reach no other conclusion than that she has something to do with the burglaries.”

  The girl laughed.

  “Don’t you think Jamieson may also have had something to do with them?” she asked satirically, and Mrs Wilberforce tightened

  her lips.

  “You have a very bitter tongue, Joyce; I am rather sorry for poor Francis.”

  The girl rose and walked across to the window, staring out across the park, and Mrs Wilberforce eyed her anxiously.

  “You are a queer girl, Joyce,” she said, “you are going to be married tomorrow, and tomorrow you will be a rich woman in your own right. One might imagine that you were going to be hanged.”

  A maid came in at this moment.

  “Lord Claythorpe and Mr Claythorpe,” she announced, and Mrs Wilberforce arose with a beaming face.

  The youth who followed his lordship into the room was tall and lank. A small weak face on an absurdly small head, round shoulders, long and awkward arms – if Joyce did not look like a bride in prospective, this young man certainly had no appearance of being a bridegroom of the morrow.

  He gave Mrs Wilberforce a limp hand and shuffled across to

  the girl.

  “I say,” he said in a high-pitched voice, which ended in a little giggle, “awfully bad luck about losing those pearls, what?”

  The girl looked at him thoughtfully.

  “How do you feel about getting married, Francis?” she asked.

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” he said vaguely; “it really doesn’t make much difference to me. Of course, I shall have to explain to quite a lot of people, and there’ll be a lot of heartaches and all that sort of thing.”

  She could have laughed, but she kept a straight face.

  “Yes, I suppose I have disappointed a number of very charming friends of yours,” she said dryly, “still, they can’t all have this paragon.”

  “That’s what I say,” said Mr Claythorpe, and then giggled again, his hand straying to his pocket.

  This young man had no small opinion of his own powers of fascination, and was, by his own standards, something of a Lothario.

  “What’s so jolly amusing,” he said with a little snigger, “is that not only the people one knows are upset, but quite a lot of unknown people. People, or girls I have quite forgotten are terribly distressed about it. You don’t mind if I show you a letter?” he asked mysteriously.

  She shook her head.

  He took an ornamental case from his pocket, opened it, and produced a heavily scented letter. He unfolded the thick sheet of notepaper, and read:

  I have only just read the terrible news that you are being married tomorrow. Wo
n’t you see me once, just once, for the sake of the happy day long ago? I must see you before you are married. I must take farewell of you in person. Believe me, I will never trouble you again. You used to praise my pretty face; won’t you see it again for the last time? If you will, put an ‘agony’ advertisement in The Times, and I will meet you at the Albert Gate, Regents Park, at nine o’clock tomorrow night.

  “That’s tonight,” explained the young man. “Who is she?” asked the girl curiously.

  “The Lord knows!” said Mr Claythorpe with a cheerful smirk; “of course, dear old thing, I’ll have to see her. I put the advertisement in. You’re sure you don’t mind?”

  She shook her head.

  “I haven’t told the governor,” said the young man, “and I want you to keep it dark. You see he’s a bit old-fashioned in things like that, and he hasn’t got your broad outlook, Joyce. And for heaven’s sake, don’t breathe a word to Father Maggerley; you know what a stick he is!”

  “Father Maggerley,” repeated the girl, “oh, yes, we’re lunching with him, aren’t we?”

  “Personally,” the young man babbled on, “I think it’s a little indecent for a bride and bridegroom to lunch with the fellow who’s going to tie them up. But the governor’s frightfully keen on Maggerley. He’s even dining with us tonight, as well. I hope he doesn’t give me any good advice, or I shall have a few words to say to him.”

  He braced his lean shoulders with a determined air, and again the girl had to suppress a smile.

  She went up to her room soon after, and did not appear until the car had arrived at the door to carry them to Ciro’s. Father Maggerley, who was the fifth member of the party, was a tall aesthetic man, reputed to be very “high church,” and suspected of leanings towards the papacy.

  It was not remarkable that the conversation turned upon Four Square Jane. It was a subject in which Lord Claythorpe was tremendously interested, and as he listened to Mrs Wilberforce’s theories, his lined yellow face betrayed signs of unusual alertness.

  “The police will have her sooner or later,” he said viciously, “you can be sure of that.”

  Francis was bubbling over with good humour. The girl had interrupted him in the morning at the point when he was telling her news, which was no news at all, since he had imparted the information, not once but a dozen times in the course of the past week, that he carried in his pocket the wedding ring which was to unite them. He took it out and showed it to her, a thin circle of shining platinum, but Joyce was not enthusiastic over its beauties, and after a long exposition of his own good taste in jewellery, Francis rambled on to another and equally uninteresting subject.