"That's great," said Mike. "If that's the way you feel, we can get down to cases."
In Augustus Robb's demeanour, as he listened to the story of the stamp, there exhibited itself at first only a growing horror. Three times in the course of the narrative he said "Coo!" and each time, as the inkiness of the butler's soul became more and more plain to him, with a greater intensity of repulsion. There seemed no question that Mike was holding his audience, and had its sympathy.
But when, passing from his preamble, he went on to outline what it was that Augustus Robb was expected to do, the other's aspect changed. It was still instinct with horror, but a horror directed now not at Mervyn Spink but at one whom it was evident that he had mentally labelled as The Tempter. He rose, swelling formidably.
"What! You're asking me to bust a pete?"
"A safe," corrected Lord Shortlands deferentially.
"Well, a pete is a safe, ain't it?"
"Is it?"
"Of course it is," said Mike. "Safes are always called petes in the best circles. Yes, that's the scheme, Augustus. How about it?"
"No!"
Mike blinked. The monosyllable, spoken at the fullest extent of a good man's lungs, had seemed to strike him like a projectile.
"Did you say No?"
"Yus, no."
"But it'll only take a few minutes of your time."
"No, I tell you. A thousand times no."
"Not even to oblige an earl?"
"Not even to oblige a dozen ruddy earls."
Mike blinked again. He glanced round at his colleagues, and drew little comfort from their deportment. Lord Shortlands was looking crushed and desolate. Terry's eyes were round with dismay. Stanwood Cobbold seemed to be grinding his teeth, which of course is never much use in a crisis of this sort.
"I had not expected this, Augustus," said Mike reproachfully.
"You knew I was saved, didn't you?"
"Yes, but can't you understand that this is a far, far better thing that we are asking you to do than you have ever done? Consider the righteousness of our cause."
"Busting a pete is busting a pete, and you can't get away from it."
"You aren't forgetting that Lord Shortlands' ancestors came over with the Conqueror?"
For an instant Augustus Robb seemed to waver.
"This won't please the Foster-Frenches."
The weakness passed. Augustus Robb was himself again.
"That's enough of that. Stop tempting me. Get thou behind me, Satan, and look slippy about it. Why don't you get behind me?" asked Augustus Robb peevishly.
"And how about the Byng-Brown-Byngs?" said Mike.
Stanwood exploded like a bomb. For some moments he had been muttering to himself, and it had been plain that he was not in sympathy with the conscientious objector.
"What's the good of talking to the fellow? Kick him!"
Mike started. It was a thought.
"Egad, Stanwood, I believe you've got something there."
"Grab him by the scruff of the neck and bend him over and leave the rest to me."
"Wait," said Mike. "Not in thin evening shoes. Go and put on your thick boots. And you, Terry, had better be leaving us. The situation is one which strong men must thresh out face to face. Or, perhaps, not face to face exactly—"
Augustus Robb had paled. He was essentially a man of peace.
"If there's going to be verlence—"
"There is."
It was Stanwood who had spoken. In his manner there was no trace now of his former meek obsequiousness. It had all the poised authority which had been wont to mark it in the days when, crouched and menacing, he had waited to plunge against the opposing line.
"You belcher there's going to be verlance. I'll give you two seconds to change your mind."
Augustus Robb changed it in one.
"Well, right ho," he said hastily. "If you put it that way, chum, I suppose I've no option."
"That's the way to talk."
"Well spoken, Augustus."
"But you're overlooking something. It's years since I bust a pete."
"No doubt the old skill still lingers."
"As to that, I wouldn't say it didn't. But what you've omitted to take into account, cockles," said Augustus Robb with gloomy triumph, "is me nervous system. I'm not the man I was. I wouldn't 'ave the nerve to do a job nowadays without I took a gargle first. And I can't take a gargle, because gargling's sinful. So there you are. It's an am-parce."
Terry smiled that winning smile of hers.
"You wouldn't mind taking a tiny little gargle to oblige me, Mr. Robb?"
"Yus, I would. And it wouldn't be tiny, either. I'd need a bucketful."
"Then take a bucketful," said Lord Shortlands.
It was a good, practical suggestion, but Augustus Robb shook his head.
"Those boots, Stanwood," said Mike. "Be as quick as you can."
Augustus Robb capitulated. He had never actually seen Stanwood on the football field, but his imagination was good and he could picture him punting.
"Well, all right. 'Ave it your own way, chums. But no good's going to come of this."
"Splendid, Augustus," said Mike. "We knew you wouldn't fail us. How about tools?"
"I'll have to go to London and fetch 'em, I suppose."
"You still have the dear old things, then?"
"Yus. I 'adn't the 'eart to get rid of 'em. They're with a gentleman friend of mine that lives in Seven Dials. I'll go and get 'em. More trouble," said Augustus Robb, and, moving broodingly to the door, was gone.
"Stanwood!" cried Terry. "You're marvellous! How did you think of it?"
"Oh, it just came to me," said Stanwood modestly.
"In these delicate negotiations," explained Mike, "it often happens that where skilled masters of the spoken word fail to bring home the bacon, success is achieved by some plain, blunt, practical man who ignores the niceties of diplomacy and goes straight to the root of the matter. The question now arises, How do we procure the needful? We can't very well raid the cellar. It seems to me that the best plan will be for me to run up to London tomorrow with Augustus and lay in supplies."
"Get plenty," advised Stanwood.
"I will."
"And of all varieties," added Lord Shortlands, who in matters like this was a farseeing man. "There's no telling what the chap will prefer. Many people, for instance, dislike the taste of whiskey. I have never been able to see eye to eye with them, but it is an undoubted fact. Get a good representative mixed assortment, my boy, and put it in my room. He will need a quiet place in which to prepare himself. And anything that's left over," said Lord Short-lands, a sudden brightness coming into his eyes, "I can use myself."
15
In every human enterprise, if success is to be achieved, there must always be behind the operations the directing brain. In the matter of breaking open the library safe at Beevor Castle and abstracting the Spanish 1851 dos reales stamp, blue unused, it was Mike who had framed the plan of campaign and issued the divisional orders.
These were as follows:
1. Zero hour to be 1.30 a.m.
Start the attack earlier, Mike had pointed out, and it might find members of the household awake. Start it later, and it cut into one's night too much. He wanted his sleep, he said, and Lord Shortlands said he wanted his, too.
2. All units to assemble in the study at one-fifteen.
Because they had to assemble somewhere, and it would be wisest if
Augustus Robb, before repairing to the library, were to remove a pane of glass from the study window and make a few chisel marks on the woodwork, thus conveying the suggestion that the job had been an outside one. This ruse was strongly approved of by Lord Shortlands, who did not conceal his opinion that the more outside the job could be made to look, the better.