The Five Knots

"Oh, but you must not lose your way again," he said. "Come with me and I will see that you take the right path. I suppose you are a stranger."

"I have never been here before," the fat man said with unnecessary energy. "This part of the country is unknown to me. So that is Maldon Grange? I recognize the dormer window which – "

The stranger paused and muttered something in confusion. Then he immediately proceeded to descant on the beauty of the landscape. There was nothing about the man to suggest criminal intent, but Wilfrid disliked him more and more. Beyond all doubt he was no stranger in this quarter. As Wilfrid turned down one field-path to another, the man turned with him without hesitation and by the time they had emerged into the fields in front of Maldon Grange, Mercer was satisfied that the stranger knew his way about better than he did himself.

"I am going to stop here," he said. "If you will follow that laurel track you will come to a gate leading to the road, and a few hundred yards farther down is the farm you speak of."

The stranger was profuse in his thanks. Once more he raised his hat with a flourish and went rapidly down the laurel path. After a moment's hesitation Wilfrid turned on his heel and followed. He knew the path twisted and wound along the edge of the plantation. He had only to make a detour and then, by looking through the bushes, he could see what the stranger was after. Cautiously making his way along, by and by he peeped through the bushes and saw the stranger nearly opposite him with a broad smile on his face and a look of amusement in his eyes. Face to face with the intruder was Cotter. The latter's features had acquired a dull green hue and his jaw dropped. He was a picture of abject terror.

"Ah, so you had not expected me," the stranger said. "You thought you were done with me. That was a mistake. When Dr. Jansen makes up his mind to a thing he is not easily discouraged. I have been waiting years for the right time and it has come at last. But you need not be afraid. Come, what have you to fear? Believe me, yonder ship is sinking. Oh, it is a magnificent vessel, and the owner is a fortunate man, but she will founder all the same. It may go down this very night. Come, friend Cotter, am I not speaking the truth?"

The last few words came with a muttered ferocity which contrasted grimly with Jansen's previously jocular humour. Cotter made no reply. He stood rubbing his hands together as if the palms were wet and he could find no way to dry them.

"It may be now," Jansen went on. "It may have happened for all you know to the contrary since you left the house. A clever man like you makes few blunders. The only mistake you have ever made was to think you could escape the vengeance and had seen the last of me. And what have I come for, friend Cotter? I have come to see the end and you know it as well as I do."

"What are you talking about?" Cotter stammered.

"Oh, you know – perfectly well," Jansen sneered. "Take my advice. Leave the sinking ship and throw in your lot with me. But make no error; keep nothing from me, for I know everything. Strange that with your knowledge of the world you should cling to Samuel Flower when his life is not worth an hour's purchase. Think it over, my good Cotter. I am not coming to Maldon Grange but I will not be far away. I find the country good for my health and have rooms at that farmhouse down the road. It may be that I shall do nothing for a fortnight. It may be that I shall strike at once. It is for you to say whether you will be on the winning side or not. But I waste my time with you. Why should I worry over a creature like you? You are not worth it."

Jansen turned away with a contemptuous gesture and picked up his portmanteau. Without another word he trudged sturdily along the path until he was lost to sight. Cotter watched him till the stout figure disappeared. Then he took his handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face.

"Good Lord!" he muttered. "Fancy seeing him again! And I thought – goodness knows what I thought. This is no place for me. I'll get away while I can."

Wilfrid stole back to the path and walked towards the house. He had plenty of food for thought and the more he gave his mind to the strange affair the more bewildered he became. One thing was clear. He could not see this plot through to a finish single-handed. He must get into touch with Uzali and Russell. He must induce them to come down and investigate matters on the spot. For the present, however, he would keep his discovery to himself. He would not alarm Beatrice.

The house was perfectly peaceful. There was silence in the sick-room. The nurse was of opinion that his patient was progressing favourably. Dr. Shelton had called in Wilfrid's absence and had left, not displeased with the case. Wilfrid could but wait and hope for the best. It was a consolation to know that Beatrice was there and that no one could come between them and their friendship. Beatrice listened gravely to the result of Wilfrid's interview with Vardon.

"Do you think you have acted for the best?" she said. "I am sorry I misjudged you, Wilfrid. I might have known you would do the right thing in any case."

CHAPTER XXXIX

THE VAULTS BENEATH

Wilfrid had walked into Oldborough with Beatrice and returned to Maldon Grange. The night promised to be long and dull; but there was always the feeling of restlessness and uncertainty as to what might happen before morning. Wilfrid sat in the dining-room smoking cigarettes and trying to interest himself in a book until the hour for bed came. About eleven o'clock the nurse came into the dining-room with an expression of annoyance on his face.

"Is anything wrong, Mason?" Wilfrid asked.

"Well, yes, sir," Mason said in an aggrieved tone. "I ordered certain things from Castlebridge and the people have forgotten to send them. Mr. Cotter said he was going to town about seven o'clock this evening and would bring the things back with him. Now he wires that he is summoned to London on important business, and that if I want the goods I shall have to send for them. It is most annoying. There is a certain food Dr. Shelton said the patient must have. I don't know what to do."

"There is no one we can send," Wilfrid said. "You must bike into Castlebridge, late as it is. I will look after your patient."

"I know you can do that," Mason replied. "And, really, there doesn't seem to be any other way."

Wilfrid hesitated and then made some excuse to leave the room. Recalling the conversation he had overheard between Cotter and the man who called himself Jansen, a sudden idea crossed his mind. He went straight to Cotter's room and opened the door without ceremony. It was very much as he had expected. The wardrobe was open and most of the drawers had been pulled out and lay upon the floor. Not so much as a pocket-handkerchief remained in any of them. There was no sign of a portmanteau or dressing-basket, either. Wilfrid smiled cynically as he looked round the dismantled room. The first of the rats had left the sinking ship. Beyond question, Cotter had stolen away, and Maldon Grange would see him no more. The telegram he had sent from Castlebridge was probably the last communication that Maldon would ever receive again from Samuel Flower's confidant and factotum.

No doubt he had feathered his nest. Possibly he had laid his hands upon everything available. He had fled from the terror to come before it was too late. He had been wise in his choice of time.

"I think you had better go!" Wilfrid said when he had returned to the dining-room. "Everybody has gone to bed and your patient will be safe in my hands. You ought not to be more than an hour away. The road is a good one and you can't go wrong."

A few minutes later and Mason was speeding off to Castlebridge on his bicycle. Wilfrid laid his book aside and pitched his cigarette into the grate. He must sit in the sick-room and watch till Mason returned. Flower lay quiet and still as death. He hardly seemed to breathe. There was a good fire in the room and the atmosphere inclined Wilfrid to drowsiness, and presently he shut his eyes.

He was aroused a little later by the sounds of muttering from the bed. Flower's eyes were closed and seemed to be dreaming about something in which the name of Cotter was mixed up.

"Why doesn't he come back?" he was saying. "What a time he is! He promised me to see the matter through this afternoon. I was a fool to trust him. I am a fool to trust anybody but myself, and some day he will desert me and I shall have to bear it all myself. But he doesn't know everything; nobody knows the secret that lies hidden in Maldon Grange."

The speaker broke off into a feeble chuckle. There was something sinister in this senile mirth, something that caused Wilfrid to turn away in disgust. The voice ceased a moment later and all was still.

Surely Mason was a long time. More than an hour had passed and there was no sign of the nurse's return. Wilfrid closed his eyes just for a moment, or so it seemed to him, and when he looked again he saw the clock was pointing to half-past two.

He jumped to his feet with a start. For nearly two hours he had utterly forgotten his duty to the patient! He turned to the bed to see if Flower required anything, then a startled cry came from his lips. The bed was empty!

Wilfrid gazed at the sheets and pillows with a feeling of stupefaction. At first he thought some one must have stolen into the bedroom and kidnapped his patient. But the idea was abandoned as absurd. Wilfrid knew himself to be a light sleeper, and it would have been impossible for two men or more to enter the bedroom and carry off a heavy man like Flower. Besides, he would have offered some sort of resistance. He must face the matter calmly and find out without delay what had become of the patient. Most of his clothes no longer hung over the chair by the bedside where they had been thrown and even the slippers were gone.

Wilfrid dashed from the room and made a tour throughout the house. He had taken the precaution before the nurse left to see that every door and window was rigidly fastened, but though he ranged from the top to the bottom of the mansion there was not a bolt out of place or a single catch neglected.

Obviously, Flower must be somewhere on the premises. Quickly and quietly Wilfrid went from room to room starting with the top floor and working down to the basement. He came at length to the cellars and there he hesitated. It seemed almost a waste of time to scour those dingy chambers, but Flower was nowhere to be found upstairs, and if the man were roaming about in a state of delirium there was no telling where he might wander. From the kitchen Wilfrid procured a candle and set out on his errand. It was cold and damp down here, for the cellars were all beneath the house. White fungus grew on the walls and clammy moisture oozed from the ceilings. There were certain cell-like structures closely barred and locked, and these, Wilfrid concluded, contained wine. He emerged presently into a wider, drier space, at the end of which were three small, insignificant-looking doors approached by a short flight of steps. Wilfrid paused and held the candle above his head, for he could see a figure crouching on the top of one of the flights of stairs. He fancied he could hear the click of a key in the door.

Somebody was there, beyond all doubt. Wilfrid advanced cautiously until he ascertained that somebody was really there. Whoever it was took no heed of the approaching light. Wilfrid called out to Flower by name. He had found the missing man.

"Come away," he said. "What madness is this! You will catch your death of cold. What are you doing here?"

Flower turned a blank face on the questioner. He was only dressed in his trousers and shirt. His face was begrimed with dirt and cobwebs, and his white linen had assumed a dingy hue.

"Go away," he said sullenly. "What are you doing here? It is no business of yours. Now that Cotter is gone none shall share the secret. But I forgot – not even Cotter knows of this. I had sense enough to keep this to myself. Come and open the door for me. It will be worth your while."

Flower's manner had changed all at once to a fawning civility. His truculent manner had vanished. He was like one in deadly fear who welcomes a friend.

"I can't get the key in the lock," he whined. "Perhaps you can do it. The door hasn't been opened for eleven years, and the key has got rusty. You try it."

"We must oil it first," Wilfrid said. "Come upstairs and get some oil. You can't expect to use a key after all that time. Then we will return and you shall show me your treasures."

Flower obeyed instantly. His limbs staggered under him. It was as much as Wilfrid could do to get him upstairs and into the bed-room again. For a moment Flower clung tenaciously to his keys, but they dropped unheeded on the floor and his eyes closed again, as if his exertions had overpowered him. When he was between the sheets, the strange look of coma came over him again. How quiet the house seemed! Then, as he was feeling the tense stillness of it all, his ear caught the sound of a footstep on the gravel and a moment later there was a tinkle of pebbles on the window.

CHAPTER XL

TOWARDS THE LIGHT

Russell stood by the side of Uzali waiting for developments. They were still in the shade of the portico outside the music-hall, and it was Uzali's part to play the next card. But he remained perfectly motionless, though Russell could see his eyes gleaming and that he was moved by some strong feeling. At the same time, Russell had no fear and no anxiety. He felt the thing was in capable hands and that Uzali would not spoil the situation by undue haste.

"What are you going to do?" he whispered.

"For the moment, nothing," Uzali said grimly. "We are going to pursue what one of your greatest statesmen used to call a policy of masterly inactivity. In other words, we will follow Mr. Jansen and my countryman and ascertain what deep scheme they have on hand. Unless I am mistaken Jansen is as much in my debt as Samuel Flower. But we can go into that later. Just now we have to keep those fellows in view and watch them all night if necessary."

Russell had no objection. He felt that action was blessed and that his dogged patience and perseverance were about to be rewarded. Few words were spoken as he and his companion turned and followed Jansen at a respectful distance until Gray's Inn Road was reached. Here Jansen paused and appeared to take a latch-key from his pocket. A door was quietly opened and shut and then the watchers had the street to themselves. Uzali turned eagerly to Russell.

"You marked the right house?" he asked.

"Oh, I think I know the house," Russell replied. "I have had a very good description of it and here comes Goatley to see that we are on the right track. Well, what is it, Goatley?"

"I ventured to follow you, gentlemen," Goatley said, "in fact, I have been following you all the evening. I was afraid you might make some mistake. Some description of the house where Jansen is lodging will be of assistance to you."

"You know all about it?" Uzali said.

"Well, yes, sir," Goatley proceeded to explain. "It is a shop where a man named Giles deals in birds and animals. He is a queer, solitary old man and does for himself in a small room behind the shop. He has a horror of women, and I don't suppose one has been in the place for years. You can understand how lodgings like that would suit Jansen. He has the two upstairs rooms where he cooks for himself, so that there is no one to spy upon his movements. He might commit half a dozen murders and no one be the wiser."

"Is there any way into the house?" Uzali asked.

"Certainly, sir," Goatley went on. "Behind the shops is a kind of Tom Tiddler's Ground where children come and play. It is easy to get over the fence and into the back yard on to which Giles' room looks. Above this room is a dilapidated glass house where a former tenant tried to grow flowers. By way of this little glass house one could readily get into the premises. I am sure of my ground because I have been over it before. I will show you the way so that there can be no mistake."

Goatley had spoken the truth when he had said that it would be easy to burgle the premises by way of the little glass house. Russell surveyed the whole carefully and nodded his head approvingly.

"The thing can be managed," he said. "And now, what I want you to do, Goatley, is to hang about the front and see if anybody leaves the house. If Jansen himself leaves come round at once and whistle softly."

There were no further instructions for Goatley, so they disappeared to the side street. Russell turned to his companion somewhat eagerly.

"I think I had better understand what you want," he said. "Your idea is to get into the house. What do you expect to see?"

"Well, I expect to see Jansen and one of my fellow-countrymen to begin with," Uzali said grimly. "And if I am not mistaken I shall find the other conspirator there, too. I don't think you appreciate how clever Jansen is. To begin with, he is an exceedingly skilful chemist and can produce the most extraordinary results from apparently innocent experiments. I have never met the man, but I know that he was in my country years ago, and at one time managed to exert a deal of influence over certain people there. It was much the same as in the early days when white settlers first appeared. The natives used to take them for gods and all that kind of thing, and that is what has happened with those two fellow-countrymen of mine who have done their best to put an end to Samuel Flower. I expect to find them under the thumb of Jansen."

"Well, that can be easily ascertained," Russell cried. "The question is, who is going first? As you are the lightest, perhaps you had better get on my shoulders and try to wriggle yourself through that broken framework into the glass house. I can pull myself up afterwards. Are you ready?"

Uzali climbed up Russell like a cat and wormed his way through the broken woodwork until he stood upright in the place where plants had once grown. Russell followed a little more slowly, but just as surely, until he stood by the side of his more agile companion.

"So far, so good," he said. "Now, what next? I don't suppose there are more than two rooms over a small shop like this, so that we must be careful how we move. It won't be safe to light a match."

Uzali agreed and there was nothing for it but to feel their way along the passage until they came to the top of the stairs. It was so dark that a slit of light shining under a closed door stood out like an edge of flame. Voices could be heard on the other side of the door, voices in earnest confabulation, though it was almost impossible to hear what was said. Uzali chuckled.

"What did I tell you?" he whispered. "There are three people there – Jansen and two others. You wouldn't notice it, but knowing the language I can discriminate between those other two voices."

They could only wait until Jansen chose to open the door. A quarter of an hour passed and gradually the voices died away to a murmur and then ceased altogether. After that there was the sound of a heavy footstep on the floor and the door was flung open. Jansen stood on the threshold, glancing back with an evil grin upon his face. It was so dark on the landing that it was impossible for him to detect the figures standing so close beside him. The Dutchman seemed to be on exceedingly good terms with himself, for he kissed his hand gaily.

"That is well," he said. "That is exceedingly well. I do not think, my friends, that you are likely to trouble me for many hours to come, so I will go about my business. There is no chance of anybody coming in, no chance of anybody discovering what has happened. Strange that men, in some ways so clever, should be so innocent in matters outside their understanding."

Jansen uttered the last words in a tone of regret. He went quietly down the stairs as if fearful of arousing his landlord. The door closed softly behind him and he was gone. Uzali strode into the stuffy little sitting-room and applied his foot vigorously to two little yellow men lying like logs on the carpet. In spite of the rough punishment nothing came from either except a suppressed grunt or two.

"What did I tell you?" Uzali said in disgust. "Did I not say that I should find my other fellow-countrymen here. They have become tools of Jansen. You can see for yourself what has happened to them."

"They have smoked themselves into a state of torpor," Russell said.

"Yes, and been drugged into the bargain. You heard what Jansen said before he went out. They will lie here like logs, perhaps for the next twenty-four hours, until Jansen has accomplished his deep scheme. But I am going to frustrate all that. Let us get out of here at once."

"I am ready," Russell said. "Where do you want to go?"

"Maldon Grange," Uzali replied. "We are going there at once. You can ask questions on the way."

CHAPTER XLI

VANISHED!

It was as easy to leave the house as it had been to enter it. No sooner were Uzali and his companion off the premises than Goatley appeared all excitement.

"I could not make you hear," he said. "I whistled till I was afraid to whistle any longer. Jansen has gone away. He went up the street in a tremendous hurry as if he had some most important business on hand."

"Oh, we know about that," Russell explained. "You have done a very good evening's work and we shall not want you any more."

Russell hastened to overtake his companion who was striding down the street as if he wished to overtake Jansen. His manner was abrupt and irritable. He had little to say as Russell rejoined him.

"Has anything gone wrong?" the latter asked.

"Well, things are not as I expected," Uzali admitted. "And the worst of it is we are bound to lose time in picking up information. We shall have to go to my rooms to get Bradshaw. My dear friend, don't ask any unnecessary questions. The loss of every moment annoys me. What an extraordinary thing it is that you never see a cab in the street when you want one."

At length they reached the flat where Uzali immediately consulted his Bradshaw. When he came to what he wanted, something like an execration broke from his lips as he glanced at the clock on the mantel-piece.

"We have missed the down express by ten minutes," he exclaimed. "If we had been a quarter of an hour earlier we might have had the pleasure of travelling in the same train as Mr. Jansen. But it can't be helped. Now here is the position of things. It is half past one. London is fast asleep, and we are thirty miles from Maldon Grange. What I want you to tell me is this. How are we to get there in an hour and a half?"

Russell shook his head. He was bound to confess that the problem was beyond him. The feat could not be accomplished. Uzali glanced at him with something like contempt in his narrow dark eyes.

"I thought it was always your boast," he said, "that day or night this London of yours could produce anything you required. Don't you know any place that you could ring up on the telephone and get a motor-car? Mind, I don't care what I pay for it. The only stipulation is this – it must be here in a quarter of an hour and I must drive it myself. We cannot afford to have any curious outsiders in this business. Can you manage that? I have plenty of ready cash and am prepared to put it down if you find the owners of the machine at all suspicious."

Russell thought for a moment. Surely the thing ought not to be impossible. He might learn what he wanted at the nearest police or fire station. He strode out of the house and accosted the first policeman he met. A judicious half-crown produced the desired information.

"Oh, that is an easy enough matter, sir," the officer said. "There are one or two livery-stable-keepers hereabouts who have been investing in motors lately, and no doubt you could hire one, providing your references are right. Come with me, sir, and I'll see what I can do."

The thing was not so easily achieved as the policeman had prophesied. The livery-stable-keeper listened suspiciously, but was won over by the sight of a five-pound note and an offer to pay for the hire before it left the yard. At the end of half an hour Russell was back at Uzali's flat with a smart-looking car, which was handed over on receipt of twenty pounds in hard cash. All Uzali's irritation seemed to disappear. He threw himself heart and soul into the management of the car which, before long, was speeding Citywards.