The Red Widow: or, The Death-Dealers of London

"I see you are dubious of the whole affair!" exclaimed Gerald. "I've only come here to tell you what I know."

"And I thank you for coming," replied the detective. "But we cannot act upon your mere suspicions. You must bring us something more tangible than that before we institute inquiries. I regret it," he added; "but we cannot help you. If you had any direct evidence of incendiarism it would be different."

And, thus dismissed, Gerald Durrant descended the stairs with heavy heart and hopeless foreboding, and walking out, made his way back to Wimbledon Park, where Marigold lay dying.

CHAPTER XXVIII

AT THE WINDOW

On that same afternoon the Red Widow was seated with Boyne in Lilla's pretty drawing-room in Pont Street.

She had come there hurriedly in response to a telephone message from Boyne's wife, and they were now holding a council of war to decide upon their actions in future.

"The only danger that can possibly threaten us is that infernal French girl and her lover," Boyne assured them, as he leaned back lazily in a silken easy chair, and puffed at his cigarette. He was smartly dressed with a white slip in his waistcoat, fawn spats, and patent leather shoes. "At the present moment they hold their tongues in the hope of squeezing more money from us. Meanwhile we shall collect the sum assured upon dear Augusta, and quietly leave England for a little while. A pity the sum is not larger," he added.

"I was only thinking the same the other day," said Ena. "But how about that girl Ramsay?"

"Oh, the end ought to be to-day, or at least to-morrow. I've made secret inquiries in Wimbledon Park, and I hear that the doctor gave her up a day or so ago," he said grimly.

"That will be another distinct peril removed," remarked Lilla. "It serves the girl right for being too inquisitive."

"And the man Durrant cannot be back yet, eh?" asked Ena.

"No," was Boyne's reply. "I see by the papers that the ship has arrived at Cape Town. Even if he escaped there, and found his way back, he could not arrive in London for another three weeks or more. So when he does return – if he ever does – he will find Marigold silent in her grave, that a disaster has occurred in Bridge Place, and that we are no longer in London."

"And Lionel?" asked the Red Widow.

"Oh, we have nothing to fear from him. He's only a gibbering idiot who believes my story that he committed a crime – killed a little girl named Maggie – although he was quite innocent. I made him wear a hood whenever he saw me, and I did the same. He believed me to be a man named Wisden, the witness of his crime! And because of that he executed in blind obedience every order I gave him. The fact that for months he never saw my face impressed him, and thus the terror of the police has so got upon his unstrung nerves that he is fast going from bad to worse. As a bacteriologist he is, of course, wonderful. He was marked out as a coming man by the professors at the Laboratory at Oxford, before he took to drugs and his brain gave way."

"Where is he now?" asked Ena.

Boyne explained the man's hiding-place, adding: "I've given him money to go on with. When that is finished – well, we will consider what we shall do."

"We shall want him again, no doubt," laughed Ena.

"Probably," said Boyne. "But remember, if there are any awkward inquiries – as there may be if we can't settle completely with Céline – then we must be absent from London for a year or two."

"That's a pity," declared the Red Widow. "Recollect what I said regarding that woman Vesey, whose hair is almost similar to mine. I met her at Brighton some time ago, and we became very chummy. She has a place in Gloucestershire. And that other woman Sampson. Both affairs would be so easy – ten thousand each."

"I know, my dear Ena, but let us square up this present deal first. That solicitor in the City is horribly slow. He is out of town till to-morrow. Time is going on. Each day brings us nearer open hostilities with Céline, therefore I suggest that Lilla should remain to receive the money and settle up, while you and I get away. I propose going to Spain, and you – well, you know Sweden well. Why not slip over to Stockholm? We will all meet again, say, at Trouville in six weeks' time, and hold another consultation," suggested the man.

"Yes," Lilla said. "That's all very well. But it means that I'm to be left alone to face Céline!"

"Well, it's the only way," declared her husband. "It is not wise for all of us to await the payment. I agree that the solicitor might easily have obtained a settlement of the claim ere this – especially as it is not disputed. But the more respectable the solicitor the slower he is."

"Are you sure that the fire at Bridge Place has aroused no suspicion?" asked Ena. "After a fire there's always an inquiry as to how it originated."

"Yes, when the place is insured. But mine was not – intentionally," Boyne replied, with a grin. "We couldn't afford that upstairs laboratory to be discovered. Besides, there was enough stuff in the tubes to kill a whole town – all sorts of infectious diseases, from anthrax to bubonic plague. Lionel dabbled with them, and gleefully cultivated them with his broth and his trays and tubes of gelatine."

"Well, as long as you are quite certain we are not watched, I don't care," said the handsome woman, who was so often seen at table at the Ritz, the Carlton, and the Berkeley. "If we were, it would be most dangerous to meet, even as we are doing now."

"Bah! You are both growing very nervy!" laughed Boyne derisively. "It is so foolish. Nothing serious can happen. Even when the French girl grows greedy, we can always settle with her. Between us we have laid up a nice little nest-egg for the future. I reckoned it out yesterday. The game is one of the few which is worth the candle."

"And the people in their graves are better off!" laughed Lilla, who was utterly heartless and unscrupulous.

Boyne rose and obtained a fresh cigarette, while his wife rang the bell for tea.

The latter was brought in upon a fine old Sheffield plate tray, and Lilla poured it out.

When the man-servant had gone, the Red Widow, turning to Boyne's wife, said:

"I really think, Lilla, after what Bernie has suggested, that I shall plead illness and get away. I shall tell my friends I am going to Sicily, but instead I shall run over to Stockholm. I know lots of friends there. Indeed, we might carry on our affairs there later. The Scandinavian is a good insurance company."

"English companies are better," Boyne declared. "I have little faith in foreign insurance companies. They always want to know just a little too much to suit our purpose. I've studied them all. My first case was in Milan eight years ago, and it nearly ended in disaster. I had to clear out suddenly and leave my claim – which has never been paid. And I wasn't clumsy, I assure you. I got the stuff from old 'Grandfather' of Frankfurt."

"Oh! 'Grandfather.' I've heard his name before," said Ena. "He sells tubes, doesn't he?"

"Sells them! Of course he did – and still does. You have to be well introduced, and he charges you very high, but his stuff is first-class – quite as good as Lionel's. 'Grandfather' I met once in the Adlon, in Berlin – a funny old professor with long hair. But, by Jove! he must have made a big fortune by this time. He charged a hundred pounds for a single tube of anthrax, sleeping sickness, or virulent pneumonia – and double for a certain poison which creates all the post-mortem symptoms of heart-disease, and cannot be detected."

"Well now?" asked Lilla, sipping her tea from the pretty Crown Derby cup. "What are we to do?"

"As Bernie suggests, I think," said Ena. "I'll get away, and next day Bernie can go to Paris, and on by the Sud Express to Madrid."

"Then on to Barcelona," said Boyne. "I'm known there as Mr. Bennett. I've stayed once or twice at the Hôtel Colon."

"No. I really can't be left alone," said Lilla. "As soon as you have gone that girl Céline will call."

"Don't see her, dear," urged the Red Widow.

"Oh! That's all very well, but I can't be out each time she comes. I should be compelled to see her. And no doubt she would have the man with her. Then, when she found out that you had both gone, she would turn upon me."

"No, no," laughed Boyne. "You will have money ready to give her if she turns very hostile, so as to afford us further time. Their only game is blackmail. They suspect something concerning the old man at Chiswick – thanks to talking too loud in the presence of one's servants. It ought to be a lesson to us all."

"It is, Bernie," said the Red Widow, rising from her chair and crossing the room to get her handbag which she had left on the sofa by the window.

As she took it up, she chanced to glance out into the street.

"My God!" she gasped. And next second she sprang from the window. Her face was white as paper. "My God!" she repeated, reeling, and steadying herself by the back of a chair.

"What's happened?" asked Boyne, springing up.

"No, no! For Heaven's sake, don't go near the window. He has seen me – I'm sure he recognised me!"

"Who?"

"Emery – that solicitor in Manchester! He – he – knows me as – as Augusta Morrison – the dead woman!"

"And did he see you?" cried Boyne in a low, hoarse voice. "Are you certain?"

"Well – no – I – I'm not absolutely certain. He was looking up at the house, and he's coming here."

At that second the front door electric bell rang.

All three started.

"Why is he here?" asked Lilla. "Are inquiries already on foot?"

"If they are, then our game is up," declared Ena. "You must receive him, Lilla, but you must deny all knowledge of me. You know nothing of Augusta Morrison."

"But he may call at Upper Brook Street," said Boyne quickly. "You must not return there."

"Did he recognise me? That's the question," asked Ena, still pale to the lips.

A second later the man entered with a card upon his salver – the card of the Manchester solicitor, Mr. Emery.

"Oh!" exclaimed Lilla, taking it up. "Oh, yes – show him up."

Then as soon as the man had left, Ena slipped upstairs into one of the bedrooms to hide, in company with Bernard Boyne.

When the young Manchester solicitor was ushered in, he found the tea-things cleared – which had been effected several minutes before – and Lilla rose to greet him.

"I believe you are Mrs. Braybourne," he said, bowing. "My name is Emery. I am the solicitor who effected a policy on the life of the late Mrs. Augusta Morrison in your favour. My client, I hear, with much regret, has died, and I understand from the company that you have put in your claim."

Mrs. Braybourne admitted that it was so, and offered her visitor a seat.

"I came this morning from Manchester, in order to consult with your solicitor," he went on. "Mrs. Morrison was a personal friend of mine, and she told me that she had, since her husband's death, discovered that she was indebted to Mr. Braybourne, hence her insurance on the assignment of the policy."

"It came as a great surprise to me," said Lilla, with her innate cleverness. "I had not the pleasure of knowing Mrs. Morrison, though I met her husband several times, years ago. My late husband was a friend of his."

"So she told me when we were together at Llandudno," Emery said. "It was certainly very generous of her to try and make reparation for some wrong which her husband did to Mr. Braybourne. But I confess I am somewhat surprised."

"At what?" asked the pseudo widow.

"Well – she gave me the impression that you were a person of limited means. But that does not appear so," he said, glancing around the luxurious little apartment.

Lilla smiled quite calmly. She was uncertain whether her very unwelcome visitor had recognised Ena through the window as his client, the false Augusta Morrison.

"Of course, I have no idea what Mrs. Morrison told you concerning myself. I only know that my late husband was interested in certain business transactions with Mr. Morrison up in Scotland," she said, with an air of ignorance.

"True, Mrs. Braybourne; but how is it that you have instructed your solicitors here to press a claim of which you now declare you had no knowledge?"

For a second Lilla was cornered; but her quick woman's wit came to her aid, and smiling quite calmly, she said:

"Well, to tell you the truth, a solicitor of Mrs. Morrison in London wrote me quite recently, explaining in strict confidence the position and the efforts your client had made to make reparation for her husband's swindling. All I know is that Mr. Morrison's business morality left a great deal to be desired, and we came very near ruin. Indeed, we should have been ruined, had it not been for assistance I received from my father."

"In what way?" asked the keen young lawyer.

"Well – I think I need not go into such details," said the clever woman with whom he was confronted. "Your client, no doubt, admitted to you her husband's double-dealing and how he very nearly ruined us. It was because of that Mrs. Morrison of Carsphairn insured her life in my favour."

Young Mr. Emery nodded, but his lips curled in a smile of incredulity. He paused for several moments, his gaze fixed upon the woman.

"Well," he said at last, "I have been at the head office of the company to-day, after I found that your legal adviser was absent, and – well, to tell you the truth, they are not altogether satisfied."

"Who?" asked Lilla, in surprise.

"The insurance company."

"Why?"

Again Mr. Emery paused, again he fixed his eyes upon the woman before him. He slowly rose from his chair and walked to the fireplace, whereupon he drew himself up. Placing his hands in his trousers pockets, he said, in a changed voice:

"Mrs. Braybourne, just because I have interested myself, rather unduly perhaps, in the affairs of my late client, Mrs. Morrison, I find myself confronted by several problems. I want you to assist me to solve at least one of them."

"And what is that?" asked Lilla, quite calmly.

"Simply this," he said, fixing his dark eyes upon her. "I want you to explain the fact why, as I came along the street, I should see, standing here in your window, my late client, Mrs. Augusta Morrison?"

CHAPTER XXIX

ON THIN ICE

Lilla drew herself up, and looked her unwelcome interrogator full in the face with unwavering gaze.

"Mrs. Morrison?" she echoed. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, madam, that as I approached this house Mrs. Morrison was looking out of the window."

Lilla laughed. Though greatly perturbed, she had been forewarned, and preserved an outward calm.

"Really, Mr. Emery," she laughed, "you must be mistaken. I have not the pleasure of knowing Mrs. Morrison. I only knew her husband, who came to see us several times when we lived in Kensington. His wife lived in Scotland, but I was never acquainted with her."

"Do you mean to insist that you have never seen her?"

"Never in my life – to my knowledge," was the frank reply.

"But I insist that my eyes have not deceived me, and that she was in your window a few minutes ago."

Again Lilla laughed.

"Well, Mr. Emery, though you and I have never met before, I can't help thinking that you are – well, just a little eccentric," she said. "You come here and declare that you have seen at my window a woman who is dead."

"Ah, but is she really dead, Mrs. Braybourne?" asked the shrewd young man, who had of late been getting together an extensive legal practice in Manchester.

"My dear Mr. Emery, ask yourself," Lilla replied. "I understand that the poor lady's sister was present at the end and took a last look at her before the coffin was screwed down. Surely her sister would know her? I am, of course, in utter ignorance of the facts, But I think, before you make such foolish mistakes as you are doing, you had better inquire – don't you?"

Her argument was rather disconcerting. Charles Emery felt certain that he had seen the face of the dead woman at the window. Yet, if it were true that her sister had seen her in her coffin, then surely his eyes had deceived him.

Upstairs Boyne and Ena stood together in breathless wonder at what was in progress below. Boyne knew how clever his wife was, and how, when faced with difficulties, she always became so calm and innocent. Of that he had had proof many times. Their marital relations had been such that he had long ago felt she was a super-woman in the art of deception.

But here she was faced with a perilous problem, and both Ena and he knew it.

They stood together, conversing in whispers.

"Trust Lilla," said Boyne in a low voice. "She will wriggle out of anything. Besides, she had the tip that the fellow may have recognised you."

Below the young solicitor and Lilla were still in open hostility.

Emery had grown angry. The woman had accused him of an undue suspicion.

"Lots of people, especially those who are spooky, believe in a sixth sense," she said. "Surely you don't believe in it, do you, Mr. Emery? I do not. Do you really insist that in my window you have seen the face of a woman who is dead and buried? If so – well, you've got the sixth sense, and it would be more profitable to you to go into the Other World Combine – which, I believe, is being formed – than to practise law. Personally, I only wish I had a sixth sense. Oh, what a lot concerning other people's affairs I should know – eh?"

And she laughed lightly, as though highly amused.

Emery stood in silence. She could see that he was still unconvinced. The situation was one of the most perilous they had ever faced.

"To tell you the truth, Mrs. Braybourne, I'm not at all satisfied," said the young man frankly. "I feel confident that the woman's face I saw at your window was that of Mrs. Augusta Morrison."

"How utterly ridiculous!" declared the clever adventuress. "If Mrs. Morrison's sister and other relatives saw her at the nursing home before and after her death they must have recognised her. How therefore, can the lady possibly be alive? It's silly to imagine such a thing!"

"Well," he asked, "who first informed you that the late Mrs. Morrison had assigned her life policy to you?"

"A man I know named May, who was a friend of my husband and of the late Mr. Morrison."

"And how did he know, pray?"

"How can I tell? He knew Mrs. Morrison, I believe, and he used to stay at her house-parties at Carsphairn. Possibly she might have told him."

"When did you see him?"

"I haven't seen him lately," she replied quickly, a fiction ready to her lips. "He rang me up about three days after Mrs. Morrison's death and told me of the sad event, of which I, of course, was in complete ignorance. Then he told me that she had insured her life for my benefit. I asked him how he knew that; but he only laughed and said that he knew, and would send, me particulars of the assignment of the policy, and that I had better take steps at once to establish my claim – which naturally I did, after receiving a few notes of the assignment. I made out a full account of my late husband's dealings with Mr. Morrison – how he had very nearly brought us to ruin – and placed them with the notes of the assignment in the hands of my solicitor, who, I suppose, in due course approached the insurance company. Previously, however, I had heard of the fact from another source – a solicitor – as I have already told you."

"H'm!" Emery grunted. Then, after a pause, he asked:

"Do you happen to know a certain lady living in Upper Brook Street named Mrs. Pollen?"

"Pollen? Pollen?" repeated Lilla. "The name sounds familiar. She's a society hostess – a woman who often has her photograph in the picture papers, isn't she?" she asked, with well-affected ignorance.

"I think not. I've never seen her portrait in the papers. She was, however, a friend of Mrs. Morrison."

"I'm afraid I know nothing of Mrs. Morrison's friends. My husband knew some of them, of course. And I have to thank Morrison for bringing ruin to us. He made huge profits over these business deals and bought Carsphairn, while my husband went under and would have been down and out had it not been for my family, who assisted him on his legs again."

"Well, in any case, you seem to live in very easy circumstances to-day, Mrs. Braybourne," he remarked, glancing around the luxurious room.

"Oh, I don't know," Lilla laughed lightly. "In London we put all the goods in the window – you don't up in Lancashire."

An awkward pause ensued.

"Well, Mrs. Braybourne," he said at last, "I cannot conceal from myself that there are certain peculiar circumstances which must be cleared up."

"About what?" she asked in pretended innocence.

"About this curious claim of yours. The assignment of the policy was, of course, in my hands, and it is not at all clear how your mythical friend Mr. May gained knowledge of what the late Mrs. Morrison desired to keep secret."

"As I've told you, Mr. May gave me particulars regarding it, which I duly handed to my solicitors. If Mrs. Morrison, in a fit of remorse for her husband's sharp practice, as it seems, chose to insure her life for my benefit, I don't see, Mr. Emery, why you should raise any objection," she protested. "She was your client, I presume?"

"She was," he replied. "And because I also acted as agent of the insurance company, I now consider it my duty to put all the facts before them, together with my allegation that the dead woman is actually in this house, or was when I entered here."

"Really, you are most insulting!" declared Lilla with well-feigned indignation. "I think it gross impertinence and a breach of professional etiquette that you should come here to see me and accuse me of lying when the matter is in the hands of my solicitor."

"Ah, Mrs. Braybourne. Pardon me, please; I only wish to straighten things out," he said blandly. "At present they are a little too tangled to suit me," he went on. "When I have given over the facts to the company my responsibility is at an end. Your solicitor returns to London to-morrow, and I will have a consultation, with a view to a settlement – in some way or other," he added in a meaning tone.

Then he bowed coldly and took his departure.

The instant he had left, the trio of dealers in secret death held a hurried and excited council.

"The game is up!" declared Ena, her countenance blanched to the lips. "The Fates are against us. How dare we press our claim further, and if we do not, then our failure to do so is self-condemnation."

"He's a shrewd young chap. He certainly recognised you – curse it!" cried Boyne.

"We must get away," said Lilla. "We all of us have old Jackie James's passports. And it only remains for us to clear out at once."

"Old Jackie's passports" to which she had referred were those cleverly fabricated since the war by an old man named James who lived at Notting Hill Gate, and who had at one time been a notorious forger. He now made a very excellent living by supplying crooks and criminals of all classes with false passports in neat little blue books, on which then photograph was fixed, and he himself embossed it with the stamp bearing the British royal arms and the words "Foreign Office," as well as the rubber date stamp, at an inclusive cost of fifteen pounds each.

These passports were beautifully printed in Bilbao, in Spain, together with the British red sixpenny stamp, but completed ready for the purchaser at Notting Hill Gate.

"Though I never like leaving good money behind," said Boyne, "I must admit that our luck is quite out this time, and we must all lie doggo for a bit."

"Ena must not return to Upper Brook Street, for Emery is certain to go there," Lilla said.

"Curse the fellow!" cried the Red Widow. "It's all my fault! I ought to have exercised more care, but Bernie has always been so cocksure that everything was plain sailing."

"No," he protested. "Surely I can't be accused of your indiscretions, Ena. I've done my best – just as we all have done – but we've fortunately received warning in time that the game is at an end – at least, for a little while. We can resume it in France, or probably in America later on. All that remains now is for us to swiftly and quietly fade out and leave them all guessing."

"One good feature is that the girl Ramsay will not be able to tell them anything," said Lilla. "I've always doubted her from the first. She's a cunning little cat."