Elk 01 The Fellowship of the Frog (8 page)

Like many other important duties, this proved to be wholly unexciting. The Messenger was picked up on the quay at Dover, shepherded into a Pullman coupe which had been reserved for him, and the passage-way outside the coupe was patrolled by two men from Scotland Yard. At Victoria a car, driven by a chauffeur-policeman and guarded by armed men, picked up the Messenger and Dick, and drove them to Calden Gardens. In his library the Foreign Secretary examined the seals carefully, and then, in the presence of Dick and the Detective-Inspector who had commanded the escort, placed the envelope in the safe.

“I don’t suppose for one moment,” said the Foreign Minister with a smile, after all the visitors but Dick had departed, “that our friends the Frogs are greatly interested. Yet, curiously enough, I had them in my mind, and this was responsible for the extraordinary precautions we have taken. There is, I suppose, no further clue in the Genter murder?”

“None, sir—so far as I know. Domestic crime isn’t really in my department. And any kind of crime does not come to the Public Prosecutor until the case against an accused person is ready to be presented.”

“It is a pity,” said Lord Farmley. “I could wish that the matter of the Frogs was not entirely in the hands of Scotland Yard. It is so out of the ordinary, and such a menace to society, that I should feel more happy if some extra department were controlling the investigations.”

Dick Gordon might have said that he was itching to assume that control, but he refrained. His lordship fingered his shaven chin thoughtfully. He was an austere man of sixty, delicately featured, as delicately wrinkled, the product of that subtle school of diplomacy which is at once urbane and ruthless, which slays with a bow, and is never quite so dangerous as when it is most polite.

“I will speak to the Prime Minister,” he said. “Will you dine with me, Captain Gordon?”

Early in the next afternoon, Dick Gordon was summoned to Downing Street, and was informed that a special department had been created to deal exclusively with this social menace.

“You have carte blanche, Captain Gordon. I may be criticized for giving you this appointment, but I am perfectly satisfied that I have the right man,” said the Prime Minister; “and you may employ any officer from Scotland Yard you wish.”

“I’ll take Sergeant Elk,” said Dick promptly, and the Prime Minister looked dubious.

“That is not a very high rank,” he demurred.

“He is a man with thirty years’ service,” said Dick; “and I believe that only his failure in the educational test has stopped his further promotion. Let me have him, sir, and give him the temporary rank of Inspector.”

The older man laughed.

“Have it your own way,” he said.

Sergeant Elk, lounging in to report progress that afternoon, was greeted by a new title. For a while he was dazed, and then a slow smile dawned on his homely face.

“I’ll bet I’m the only inspector in England who doesn’t know where Queen Elizabeth is buried!” he said, not without pride.

It was perfectly absurd, Dick told himself a dozen times during the days which followed, that a grown man of his experience should punctiliously and solemnly strike from the calendar, one by one, the days which separated him from Sunday. A schoolboy might so behave, but it would have to be a very callow schoolboy. And a schoolboy might sit at his desk and dream away the time that might have been, devoted to official correspondence.

A pretty face…? Dick had admired many. A graciousness of carriage, an inspiring refinement of manner…? He gave up the attempt to analyse the attraction which Ella Bennett held. All that he knew was, that he was waiting impatiently for Sunday.

When Dick opened the garden gate, he saw the plump figure of philosophical Johnson ensconced cosily in a garden chair. The secretary rose with a beaming smile and held out his hand. Dick liked the man. He stood for that patient class which, struggling under the stifling handicap of its own mediocrity, has its superlative virtue in loyalty and unremitting application to the task it finds at hand.

“Ray told me you were coming, Mr. Gordon—he is with Miss Bennett in the orchard, and from a casual view of him just now, he is hearing a few home truths. What do you make of it?”

“Has he given up coming to the office?” asked Dick, as he stripped his dust-coat.

“I am afraid he is out for good.” Johnson’s face was sad. “I had to tell him to go. The old man found out that he’d been staying away, and by some uncanny and underground system of intelligence he has learnt that Ray was going the pace. He had an accountant in to see the books, but thank heaven they were O.K. I was very nearly fired myself.”

This was an opportunity not to be missed.

“Do you know where Maitland lives—in what state? Has he a town house?”

Johnson smiled.

“Oh yes, he has a town house all right,” he said sarcastically. “I only discovered where it was a year ago, and I’ve never told a single soul until now. And even now I won’t give details. But old Maitland is living in some place that is nearly a slum—living meanly and horribly like an unemployed labourer! And he is worth millions! He has a cheap house in one of the suburbs, a place I wouldn’t use to stable a cow! He and his sister live there; she looks after the place and does the housekeeping. I guess she has a soft job. I’ve never known Maitland to spend a penny on himself. I’m sure that he is wearing the suit he wore when I first came to him. He has a penny glass of milk and a penny roll for lunch, and tries to swindle me into paying for that, some days!”

“Tell me, Mr. Johnson, why does the old man wear gloves in the office?”

Johnson shook his head.

“I don’t know. I used to think it was to hide the scar on the back of his hand, but he’s not the kind of man to wear gloves for that. He is tattooed with crowns and anchors and dolphins all up his arms…”

“And frogs?” asked Dick quietly, and the question seemed to surprise the other.

“No, I’ve never seen a frog. There’s a bunch of snakes on one wrist—I’ve seen that. Why, old man Maitland wouldn’t be a Frog, would he?” he asked, and Dick smiled at the anxiety in his tone.

“I wondered,” he said.

Johnson’s usually cheerful countenance was glum.

“I reckon he is mean enough to be a Frog or ‘most anything,” he said, and at that minute Ray and his sister came into view. On Ray’s forehead sat a thundercloud, which deepened at the sight of Dick Gordon. The girl was flushed and obviously on the verge of tears.

“Hello, Gordon!” the boy began without preliminary. “I fancy you’re the fellow that has been carrying yarns to my sister. You set Elk to spy on me—I know, because I found Elk in the act.”

“Ray, you’re not to speak like that to Mr. Gordon,” interrupted the girl hotly. “He has never told me anything to your discredit. All I know I have seen. You seem to forget that Mr. Gordon is father’s guest.”

“Everybody is fussing over me,” Ray grumbled. “Even old Johnson!” He grinned sheepishly at the bald man, but Johnson did not return the smile.

“Somebody has got to worry about you, boy,” he said. The strained situation was only relieved when John Bennett, camera on back, came up the red path to greet his visitors.

“Why, Mr. Johnson, I owe you many apologies for putting you off, but I’m glad to see you here at last. How is Ray doing at the office?”

Johnson shot a helpless and pathetic glance at Dick. “Er—fine, Mr. Bennett,” he blurted.

So John Bennett was not to be told that his son had launched forth on a new career? The fact that he was fathering this deception made Dick Gordon a little uncomfortable. Apparently it reduced Mr. Johnson to despair, for when a somewhat tense luncheon had ended and they were alone again in the garden, that worthy man unburdened himself of his trouble.

“I feel that I’m playing it low on old Bennett,” he said. “Ray should have told him.”

Dick could only agree. He was in no mood to discuss Ray at the moment. The boy’s annoyance and self-assurance irritated him, and it did not help matters to recognize the sudden and frank hostility which the brother of Ella Bennett was showing toward him. That was disconcerting, and emphasized his anomalous position in relation to the Bennetts. He was discovering what many young men in love have to discover: that the glamour which surrounds their dears does not extend to the relations and friends of their dears. He made yet another discovery. The plump Mr. Johnson was in love with the girl. He was nervous and incoherent in her presence; miserable when she went away. More miserable still when Dick boldly took her arm and led her into the rose-garden behind the house.

“I don’t know why that fellow comes here,” said Ray savagely as the two disappeared. “He isn’t a man of our class, and he loathes me.”

“I don’t know that he loathes you, Ray,” said Johnson, waking from the unhappy daydream into which he seemed to have fallen. “He’s an extremely nice man—”

“Fiddlesticks!” said the other scornfully. “He’s a snob! Anyway, he’s a policeman, and I hate cops! If you imagine that he doesn’t look down on you and me, you’re wrong. I’m as good as he is, and I bet I’ll make more money before I’m finished!”

“Money isn’t everything,” said Johnson tritely. “What work are you doing, Ray?”

It required a great effort on his part to bring his mind back to his friend’s affairs.

“I can’t tell you. It’s very confidential,” said Ray mysteriously. “I couldn’t even tell Ella, though she’s been jawing at me for hours. There are some jobs that a man can’t speak about without betraying secrets that aren’t his to tell. This is one of them.”

Mr. Johnson said nothing. He was thinking of Ella and wondering how long it would be before her good-looking companion brought her back.

Good-looking and young. Mr. Johnson was not good-looking, and only just on the right side of fifty. And he was bald. But, worst of all, in her presence he was tongue-tied. He was rather amazed with himself.

In the seclusion of the rose-garden another member of the Bennett family was relating her fears to a more sympathetic audience.

“I feel that father guesses,” she said. “He was out most of last night. I was awake when he came in, and he looked terrible. He said he had been walking about half the night, and by the mud on his boots I think he must have been.”

Dick did not agree.

“Knowing very little about Mr. Bennett, I should hardly think he is the kind of man to suffer in silence where your brother is concerned,” he said. “I could better imagine a most unholy row. Why has your brother become so unpleasant to me?”

She shook her head.

“I don’t know. Ray has changed suddenly. This morning when he kissed me, his breath smelt of whisky—he never used to drink. This new life is ruining him—why should he take a false name if…if the work he is doing is quite straight?”

She had ceased addressing him as “Mr. Gordon.” The compromise of calling him by no name at all was very pleasant to Dick Gordon, because he recognized that it was a compromise. The day was hot and the sky cloudless. Ella had made arrangements to serve tea on the lawn, and she found two eager helpers in Dick and Johnson, galvanized to radiant activity by the opportunity of assisting. The boy’s attitude remained antagonistic, and after a few futile attempts to overcome this, Dick gave it up.

Even the presence of his father, who had kept aloof from the party al! afternoon, brought no change for the better.

“The worst of being a policeman is that you’re always on duty,” he said during the meal. “I suppose you’re storing every scrap of talk in your mind, in ease you have to use it.”

Dick folded a thin slice of bread and butter very deliberately before he replied.

“I have certainly a good memory,” he said. “It helps me to forget. It also helps me keep silent in circumstances which are very difficult and trying.”

Suddenly Ray spun round in his chair.

“I told you he was on duty!” he cried triumphantly. “Look! There’s the chief of the spy corps! The faithful Elk!”

Dick looked in astonishment. He had left Elk on the point of going north to follow up a new Frog clue that had come to light. And there he was, his hands resting on the gate, his chin on his chest, gazing mournfully over his glasses at the group.

“Can I come in, Mr. Bennett?”

John Bennett, alert and watchful, beckoned.

“Happened to be round about here, so I thought I’d call. Good afternoon, miss—good afternoon, Mr. Johnson.”

“Give Sergeant Elk your chair,” growled John Bennett, and his son rose with a scowl.

“Inspector,” said Elk. “No, I’d rather stand, mister. Stand and grow good, eh? Yes, I’m Inspector. I don’t realize it myself sometimes, especially when the men salute me—forget to salute ‘em back. Now, in America I believe patrol men salute sergeants. That’s as it should be.”

His sad eyes moved from one to the other.

“I suppose your promotion has made a lot of crooks very scared, Elk?” sneered Ray.

“Why, yes. I believe it has. Especially the amatchoors,” said Elk. “The crooks that are only fly-nuts. The fancy crooks, who think they know it all, and will go on thinking so till one day somebody says, ‘Get your hat—the chief wants you!’ Otherwise,” confessed Elk modestly, “the news has created no sensation, and London is just as full as ever of tale-pitchers who’ll let you distribute their money amongst the poor if you’ll only loan ‘em a hundred to prove your confidence. And,” Elk continued after a moment’s cogitation, “there’s nearly as many dud prize-fighters living on blackmail an’ robbery, an’ almost as many beautiful young ladies running faro parlours and dance emporiums.”

Ray’s face went a dull red, and if looks could blast, Inspector Elk’s friends would have been speaking of him in hushed tones.

Only then did he turn his attention to Dick Gordon.

“I was wondering, Captain, if I could have a day off next week—I’ve a little family trouble.”