The Voice from the Void: The Great Wireless Mystery

“Of course I won’t say anything,” laughed the girl. “The fact is, I’ve had a row with the housekeeper and have given in my notice. I leave this day week.”

This news was to the woman very reassuring. “You’re quite certain you took the right key?” she asked.

“Quite. I looked at the maker’s name before I pressed it into the wax,” she answered. “But I’d like to see Mr Elton again before I leave Richmond.”

“He’ll be back in a couple of days, and then he will write to you. I’ll tell him. Good-night, and thanks.”

And the woman with the little box in her muff moved away well satisfied.

A quarter of an hour later she met Allen outside Richmond Station, and placing the little box in his hands, explained that the girl was leaving her place the following week.

“Excellent! We’ll delay our action until she’s gone. I suppose I’d better see her before she goes, so as to allay any suspicion.” Then, opening the box, his keen eye saw that the impression was undoubtedly one of a safe key.

Indeed, next morning, he took it to a man in Clerkenwell who for years had made a speciality of cutting keys and asking no questions, and by the following night the means of opening the safe at Underhill Road was in Allen’s hands.

The man who lived by the blackmailing of those whom he entrapped – mostly women, by the way – was nothing if not wary, as was shown by the fact that he had sent Freda to act as his messenger. If the girl had told the police the woman could have at once declared that she had never seen the girl before, though if the little box had been found upon her, explanation would have been somewhat difficult. But the gang of which the exquisite adventurer Gordon Gray was the alert head always acted with forethought and circumspection; the real criminal keeping out of the way and lying “doggo” proof was always rendered as difficult as possible.

Gray had gone over to Brussels, which accounted for Willowden being closed. He had a little piece of rather irritating business on hand there. Awkward inquiries by the police had led to the arrest of a man who had sent word in secret that if his wife were not paid two thousand pounds as hush-money, he would tell what he knew. And the wife being a low-class Belgian woman from Namur, Gray had gone over to see her and to appease her husband by paying the sum demanded.

Crooks are not always straight towards each other. Sometimes thieves fall out, and when in difficulties or peril they blackmail each other – often to the advantage of the police.

Roddy and Barclay had met, the latter having told his young friend of the arrangements he had made with His Excellency and the Kaid, and also shown him the map which had been given to him.

At sight of this the young fellow grew very excited.

“Why, it gives us the exact location of the workings,” he cried. “With this, a compass and measuring instruments I can discover the point straight away. The old man is no fool, evidently!”

“No, the Moors are a clever and cultivated race, my dear Roddy,” the elder man replied. “As soon as the Kaid brings over the necessary permits and the concession you can go ahead. I will keep the map in my safe till then, when I will hand all the documents over to you.”

This good news Roddy had told Elma one evening when they had met clandestinely – as they now so often met – at a spot not far from the lodge gates at Farncombe Towers.

“How jolly lucky!” the girl cried. “Now you’re only waiting for the proper permits to come. It’s really most good of Mr Barclay to help you. He must be an awfully nice man.”

“Yes, he’s a topper – one of the best,” Roddy declared. “Out in South America he did me a good turn, and I tried to repay it. So we became friends. He’s one of the few Englishmen who know the Moors and has their confidence. He’s a bachelor, and a great traveller, but just now he’s rented a furnished house in Richmond. He’s one of those rolling stones one meets all over the world.”

The young man waxed enthusiastic. He loved Elma with all his heart, yet he wondered if his affection were reciprocated. She had mentioned to him the close friendship which had sprung up between her father and Mr Rex Rutherford, and how he had dined at Park Lane. But at the moment he never dreamed that her grace and beauty had attracted her father’s newly-made friend.

As for Roddy’s father, he remained calm and reflective, as was his wont, visiting his parishioners, delivering his sermons on Sundays, and going the weary round of the village each day with a cheery face and kindly word for everybody. Nothing had been done concerning his property in Totnes as the woman Crisp had threatened. It was curious, he thought, and it was evident that the ultimatum he had given Gray had caused him to stay his hand.

Yet as he sat alone he often wondered why Gray and that serpent woman should have so suddenly descended upon him, and upon Roddy, to wreak a vengeance that, after all, seemed mysterious and quite without motive.

The hot blazing summer days were passing, when late one balmy breathless night – indeed it was two o’clock in the morning – a man dressed as a railway signalman, who had been on night duty, passed along Underhill Road, in Richmond, and halted near the pillar-box. Underhill Road was one of the quieter and more select thoroughfares of that picturesque suburb, for from the windows of the houses glorious views could be obtained across the sloping Terrace Gardens and the wide valley of the Thames towards Teddington and Kingston.

A constable had, with slow tread, passed along a few moments before, but the signalman, who wore rubber-soled black tennis shoes, had followed without noise.

The watcher, who was Dick Allen, saw the man in uniform turn the corner under the lamplight and disappear. Then slipping swiftly along to a good-sized detached house which stood back from the road in its small garden, he entered the gate and dived quickly down to the basement – which, by the way, he had already well surveyed in the daytime.

Before a window he halted, and turning upon it a small flash-lamp, inserted a knife into the sash and pressed back the latch in a manner that was certainly professional. Having lifted the sash he sprang inside and, guided by the particulars he had learnt from the maid Lily, he soon discovered the door of the safe, which was let into the wall in a stone passage leading from the kitchen to the coal-cellar.

He halted to listen. There was no sound. The little round zone of bright light fell upon the brass flap over the keyhole of the dark-green painted door of the safe, wherein reposed the secret of the rich emerald mine in the great Sahara Desert.

He took the bright little false key, which was already well oiled, and lifting the flap inserted it. It turned easily.

Then he turned the brass handle, which also yielded. He drew the heavy door towards him and the safe stood open! The little light revealed three steel drawers. The first which he opened in eager haste contained a number of little canvas bags, each sealed up. They contained specimens of ore from various mines in Peru and Ecuador. Each bore a tab with its contents described.

In the next were several pieces of valuable old silver, while the third contained papers – a quantity of documents secured by elastic bands.

These he turned over hurriedly, and yet with care so as not to allow the owner to suspect that they had been disturbed. For some time he searched, until suddenly he came upon an envelope bearing upon its flap the address of the Hôtel du Parc at Marseilles. It was not stuck down. He opened it – and there he found the precious map which showed the exact position of the ancient Wad Sus mine!

For a few seconds he held it in his hands in supreme delight. Then, taking from his pocket a blank piece of folded paper he put it into the envelope, and replacing it among the other documents which he arranged just as he had found them, he closed the safe and relocked it.

A second later he stole noiselessly out by the way he had come, the only evidence of his presence being the fact that the window was left unfastened, a fact which his friend Lily’s successor would, he felt sure, never notice.

But as, having slowly drawn down the window, he turned to ascend the steps a very strange and disconcerting incident occurred.

Chapter Fifteen

The Master-Stroke

Mr Richard Allen found himself, ere he was aware of it, in the strong grip of a burly police constable.

“And what ’ave you been up to ’ere – eh?” demanded the officer, who had gripped him tightly by the coat collar and arm.

“Nothing,” replied Allen. “I fancy you’ve made a mistake!”

“I fancy I ’aven’t,” was the constable’s reply. “You’ll ’ave to come to the station with me.”

“Well, do as you please,” said Allen with an air of nonchalance. “I’ve done nothing.”

“I’m not so sure about it. We’ll see what you’ve done when you’re safely in the cells.”

Cells! Mr Richard Allen had already had a taste of those – on more than one occasion – both in England and abroad. It was, after all, very humiliating to one of his high caste in crookdom to be arrested like a mere area sneak.

“I don’t see why I should be put to the inconvenience of going to the station,” the cosmopolitan remarked.

“Well, I do, mister, so there’s all the difference!” replied the other grimly, his eyes and ears on the alert to hail one of his comrades, a fact which the astute Mr Allen did not fail to realise. The situation was distinctly awkward, not to say alarming, for in his pocket he had the precious map.

Suddenly they were about to turn the corner into the main road when the prisoner, who had gone along quite quietly, even inertly, quickly swung round and snatched at the policeman’s whistle, breaking it from its chain and throwing it away.

It was done in a moment, and next second with a deft movement he tripped up his captor, and both fell heavily to the pavement. He had taken the constable unawares, before he could realise that he had a slippery customer to deal with. The constable, however, would not release his hold, with the result that they rolled struggling into the gutter, the policeman shouting for assistance.

A man’s voice answered in the distance, whereupon Allen’s right hand went to his jacket pocket, and then swiftly to the face of his captor, who almost instantly relaxed his hold as he fell into unconsciousness. The prisoner had held a small capsule in his captor’s face and smashed it in his fingers, thus releasing an asphyxiating gas of sufficient potency to render the constable insensible.

Quick as lightning Allen disengaged himself, and dragging the senseless man across the pavement into the front garden of a small house exactly opposite, closed the gate, picked up his hat, and then walked quietly on as though nothing had occurred.

As he turned the corner he came face to face with another constable who was hurrying up.

“Did you hear my mate shouting a moment ago, sir?” asked the man breathlessly.

“No,” replied Allen halting. “I heard no shouting. When?”

“A few moments ago. The shouts came from this direction. He was crying for help.”

“Well, I heard nothing,” declared Allen, still standing as the constable, proceeding, passed the gate behind which his colleague lay hidden.

Then Allen laughed softly to himself and set out on the high road which led to Kingston.

“A narrow shave!” he remarked to himself aloud. “I wonder what Barclay will say when they go to Underhill Road!”

Not until eight o’clock in the morning did a milkman going his round find the constable lying as though asleep in the little front garden. He tried to rouse him, but not being able to do so, called the nearest policeman who summoned the ambulance. At first the inspector thought the man intoxicated, but the divisional surgeon pronounced that he had been gassed, and it was several hours later, when in the hospital, that he managed to give an intelligible account of what had occurred.

About noon an inspector called upon Mr Barclay at Underhill Road, but he had gone out.

“Did you find any of your basement windows open when you got up this morning?” he asked the housekeeper, who replied in the negative. Then the new parlour-maid being called declared that she had fastened all the windows securely before retiring, and that they were all shut when she came down at seven o’clock.

The inspector went away, but in the evening he called, saw Mr Barclay, and told him how a man lurking against the kitchen window had been captured, and explained that he must be a well-known and desperate thief because of the subtle means he had in his possession to overcome his captors.

“My servants have told me about it. But as they say the windows were fastened the man could not have committed a burglary,” replied Mr Barclay. “The house was quite in order this morning.”

“But it is evident that the fellow, whoever he was, meant mischief, sir.”

“Probably. But he didn’t succeed, which is fortunate for me!” the other laughed.

“Well, sir, have you anything particularly valuable on the premises here? If so, we’ll have special watch kept,” the inspector said.

“Nothing beyond the ordinary. I’ve got a safe down below – a very good one because the man who had this house before me was a diamond dealer, with offices in the City, and he often kept some of his stock here. Come and look at it.”

Both men went below, and Mr Barclay showed the inspector the heavy steel door.

The inspector examined the keyhole, but there were no traces of the lock having been tampered with. On the contrary, all was in such complete order that Mr Barclay did not even open the safe.

“It’s rather a pity the fellow got away,” Mr Barclay remarked.

“It is, sir – a thousand pities. But according to the description given of him by Barnes – who is one of the sharpest men in our division – we believe it to be a man named Hamilton Layton, a well-known burglar who works alone, and who has been many times convicted. A constable in Sunderland was attacked by him last winter in an almost identical manner.”

The inspector made a thorough search of the basement premises, and again questioned the fair-haired parlour-maid who was Lily’s successor. She vowed that she had latched all the windows, though within herself she feared that she had overlooked the fact that one of the windows was unlatched in the morning. Yet what was the use of confessing it, she thought.

So there being no trace of any intruder, the inspector walked back to the station, while Mr Barclay smiled at the great hubbub, little dreaming that in place of that precious map there reposed in the envelope only a plain piece of paper.

That afternoon Dick Allen arrived at Willowden. Gray was away motoring in Scotland, where he had some little “business” of the usual shady character to attend to. Freda had gone to Hatfield, and it was an hour before she returned. During that hour Allen smoked and read in the pretty summerhouse at the end of the old-world garden, so full of climbing roses and gay borders.

Suddenly he heard her voice, and looking up from his paper saw her in a big hat and filmy lemon-coloured gown.

He waved to her, rose, and met her at the French window of the old-fashioned dining-room.

“Well?” she asked. “What luck, Dick? I worried a lot about you last night. I felt somehow that you’d had an accident and to-day – I don’t know how it was – I became filled with apprehension and had to go out. I’m much relieved to see you. What’s happened?”

“Nothing, my dear Freda,” laughed the good-looking scoundrel. “There was just a little contretemps– that’s all.”

“Have you got the map?”

“Sure,” he laughed.

“Ah! When you go out to get a thing you never fail to bring it home,” she said, with a smile. “You’re just like Gordon. You’ve both got the impudence of the very devil himself.”

“And so have you, Freda,” laughed her companion, as he stretched himself upon the sofa. “But the little reverse I had in the early hours of this morning was – well, I admit it – rather disturbing. The fact is that on leaving the house in Richmond a constable collared me. He became nasty, so I was nastier still, and gave him a Number Two right up his nose. And you know what that means!”

“Yes,” said the woman. “He won’t speak much for eight hours or so. I expect he saw the red light, eh?”

“No doubt. But I’ve got the little map here, and Barclay retains a sheet of blank paper.”

“Splendid!”

Then he drew it from his pocket and showed it to her.

“Oh! won’t Gordon be delighted to get this!” she cried. “It will gladden his heart. The dear boy is a bit down, and wants bucking up.”

“Where’s Jimmie?” asked Allen. “Tell him to get me a drink. I suppose he’s back by this time?”

The handsome woman in the lemon-coloured gown rose and rang the bell, and old Claribut, servile and dignified, entered.

“Hulloa! Dick!” he exclaimed. “Why, where have you sprung from? I thought you were in Nice!”

“So I was. But I’m in Welwyn now, and I want one of your very best cocktails – and one for Freda also.”

The old man retired and presently brought two drinks upon a silver salver.

“I shan’t be in to dinner to-night, Jimmie. I’m motoring Dick to London presently. I’ll be home about midnight. But I’ll take the key. Any news?”

“Nothing, madam,” replied the perfectly-mannered butler. “Only the gas-man came this morning, and the parson called and left some handbills about the Sunday school treat you are going to give next Thursday.”

“Oh! yes, I forgot about that infernal treat! See about it, Jimmie, and order the stuff and the marquee to be put up out in the field. See Jackson, the schoolmaster; he’ll help you. Say I’m busy.”

“Very well, madam.”

“Well!” laughed Allen, “so you are acting the great lady of the village now, Freda!”

“Of course. It impresses these people, and it only costs a few cups of tea and a few subscriptions. Gordon thinks it policy, but, by Jove! how I hate it all. Oh! you should see Gordon on a Sunday morning in his new hat and gloves. He’s really a spectacle!”

“Ah! I suppose a reputation is judicious out here,” her companion laughed.

“Yes. But I’ll drive you back to town,” she said. “We’ll dine at the Ritz. I want to meet a woman there. Wait a minute or two while I change my frock. I think you’ve done wonders to get hold of that map. Gordon will be most excited. He’ll be in Inverness to-morrow, and I’ll wire to him.”

“Guardedly,” he urged.

“Why, of course,” she laughed. “But that poor old bobby with a dose of Number Two! I bet he’s feeling pretty rotten!”

“It was the only way,” declared the cosmopolitan adventurer. “I wasn’t going to be hauled to the station and lose the map.”

“Of course not. Well, have another drink and wait a few minutes,” the woman said, whereupon he began to chat with old Claribut.

“I suppose the Riviera looks a bit hot and dusty just now,” remarked Jimmie, the butler.

“Yes. But Freda’s a wonder, isn’t she?” remarked Allen. “I’ve been asking her about that girl Edna. What has become of her?”

“I don’t know, Dick. So don’t ask me,” Claribut answered, as he smoked one of Gordon’s cigars. Truly that was a strange menage.

“But surely you know something,” Allen said. “No, I don’t,” snapped old Jimmie.

“Ah! you know something – something very private, eh?” remarked the wily Dick. “I suppose you are aware that old Sandys has a firm of inquiry agents out looking for her?”

“Has he really?” laughed Claribut. “Well, then let them find her. Who has he called in?”

“Fuller – who used to be at the Yard. You recollect him. He had you once, so you’d better be careful.”

“Yes, he had me for passing bad notes in Brussels,” remarked the old man grimly. “So old Sandys is employing him?”

“Yes, and the old man is determined to know the whereabouts of Edna Manners.”

“I don’t think he’ll ever know. But how came you to know about it?”

“I have a pal who is a friend of Fuller’s – Jack Shawford. He told me. Sandys suspects that something serious has happened to the girl.”

At this Claribut became very grave.

“What makes him suspect it? He surely doesn’t know that the girl was acquainted with that old parson Homfray!”

“No. I don’t think so,” was the reply.

“Ah! That’s good. If he had any suspicion of that, then Fuller might get on the right track, you know, because of this mining concession in Morocco.”

“What connexion has that with the disappearance of the pretty Edna?” asked his fellow crook, in ignorance.

“Oh! it’s a complicated affair, and it would take a long time to explain – but it has!”

“Then you know all about Edna and what has happened! I see it in your face, Jimmie! Just tell me in confidence.”

But the wary old man who had spent many years in prison cells only smiled and shook his head.

“I don’t interfere with other people’s affairs, Dick. You know that. I’ve enough to do to look after my own.”

“But where is Edna? Is she – dead?”

The old man merely shrugged his shoulders with a gesture of uncertainty and ignorance.

Chapter Sixteen

The Light of Love

It had been all summer – endless, cloudless summer in England, from the time of the violets to the now ripening corn. And there was no foreboding of storm or winter in the air that glorious day.

It was yet quite early in the morning, and high on the Hog’s Back, that ridge of the Surrey Hills that runs from Farnham towards Guildford, the gentle coolness of daybreak had not left the air.

Roddy and Elma had met for an early morning walk, she being again alone at the Towers. They had been walking across the fields and woods for an hour, and were now high up upon the hill which on one side gave views far away to the misty valley of the Thames, and on the other to Hindhead and the South Downs. The hill rose steep and sombre, its sides dark with chestnut woods, and all about them the fields were golden with the harvest.

They were tired with their walk, so they threw themselves down upon the grassy hillside and gazed away across the wide vista of hills and woodlands.

“How glorious it is!” declared the girl, looking fresh and sweet in a white frock and wide-brimmed summer hat trimmed with a saxe-blue scarf.

“Delightful! This walk is worth getting up early to take!” he remarked with soft love laughter, looking into her wonderful eyes that at the moment were fixed in fascination upon the scene.

Since that day months ago when he had declared his affection, he had never spoken directly of love, but only uttered it in those divers ways and words, those charms of touch and elegance of grace which are love’s subtlest, truest, and most perilous language.

Slowly, as she turned her beautiful eyes to his, he took her soft little hand, raising it gallantly to his lips.

“Elma,” he said after a long silence, “I have brought you here to tell you something – something that perhaps I ought to leave unsaid.”

“What?” she asked with sudden interest, her eyes opening widely.

“I want to say that I dislike your friend Mr Rutherford,” he blurted forth.

“Mr Rutherford!” she echoed. “He is father’s friend – not mine!”

“When I was at Park Lane the other night I noticed the marked attention he paid you – how he – ”

“Oh! you are awfully foolish, Mr Homfray – Roddy! He surely pays me no attention.”

“You did not notice it, but I did!” cried the young man, whose heart was torn by fierce jealousy.

“Well, if he did, then I am certainly quite unaware of it.”

His hand closed fast and warm upon hers. “Ah!” he cried, his eyes seeking hers with eager wistfulness, “I do not wonder. Once I should have wondered, but now – I understand. He is rich,” he said softly and very sadly. “And, after all, I am only an adventurer.”

“What are you saying?” cried the girl.

“I know the truth,” he replied bitterly. “If you ever loved me you would one day repent, for I have nothing to offer you, Elma. I ought to be content with my life – it is good enough in its way, though nameless and fruitless also, perhaps. Yes, it is foolish of me to object to the attentions which Mr Rutherford pays you. He returned from Paris specially last Wednesday to be at your party.”

“I cannot understand!” she declared. “I do not want to understand! You are foolish, Roddy. I have no liking for Mr Rutherford. None whatever!”