‘Got it, Tripp!’
The safe door had swung open.
‘Thank heaven,’ gasped Templeton, wiping his forehead with a white silk handkerchief. ‘That gave me one of the worst five minutes I’ve ever had.’ He drew in a long breath. ‘Well, now, shall we go into the documents? I’d like to run over my notes with you. I got my secretary to type them—they’re here with the papers.’
He pulled out the top metal drawer. As he did so a cry broke from his lips, and the drawer slipped from his hands and clattered noisily to the floor.
It was empty.
The Scotland Yard man in the arm-chair took the pipe from his mouth.
‘I was afraid we were too late, Sir Richard,’ he said with a strangely quiet intonation. ‘Our friend Lord John has been here before us.’
CHAPTER VI
THE FADED PHOTOGRAPH
‘A small mail this morning, James,’ remarked Elizabeth Marlowe as the solemn-faced floor-valet who attended to Sir Richard Templeton brought in a few official-looking envelopes on a tray.
‘They were mostly personal, miss.’ James gave the door a gentle push and came a step nearer. ‘Don’t seem quite himself this morning.’ He nodded in the direction of Sir Richard’s bedroom. ‘No breakfast. Nothing but strong coffee. Been up half the night, too. Joseph—he’s on the second floor night-duty—says there was some gentleman came to see him at half-past two this morning. Scotland Yard, Joseph says, though he ain’t to be gone by. Turning night into day,’ he added with a sad shake of his head. ‘No mortal man can stand it for long, miss.’
Elizabeth was usually amused at the solemn-faced garrulity of the valet, whose attitude towards Sir Richard was one of deepest awe, but his remarks this morning left a frown on her forehead.
It took ten minutes to run through the mail and enter it up in the register, with a brief précis of the contents against each item; and as a quarter-past nine chimed she heard her employer enter the next room.
The friendly confidence of the valet had indicated that Sir Richard Templeton had not risen that morning in the best of spirits, but his secretary was not prepared for the shock she received when she went in to him with her sheaf of opened letters. He sat gloomily at his desk, and his dark brilliant eyes, which could flash like fire in the crisis of a cross-examination, were glazed and hollow.
‘Close the door,’ he requested in a dull voice. ‘I have something to say to you.’
He cleared his throat.
‘Last night I asked you to come a little earlier than usual to take some notes to Chief Inspector Tripp’s office at Scotland Yard.’
‘Would you like me to go now, Sir Richard?’
‘No. You must remain here, Elizabeth. Inspector Tripp will be along himself at half-past nine, and he would like to have a talk with you.’
‘With me?’ she repeated.
‘There’s nothing to worry about,’ he said quickly. ‘Please don’t distress yourself. The inquiries will be purely formal—at least, so far as you’re concerned.’
‘Has anything—happened?’ She spoke with an effort, as though dreading the answer.
‘I’m afraid so. The Lord John documentary evidence that I put in this safe yesterday afternoon about a quarter to five—you remember it?’
‘Yes,’ she said breathlessly; ‘I remember.’
‘When I returned here after midnight the papers were gone—stolen.’
She stood rigid, her white lips pressed together. Then she took a step forward, and gazed eagerly across the desk at her employer. ‘But what does Inspector Tripp want with me?’
‘I’ve already explained, Elizabeth. His inquiries will be purely formal. Obviously, the police must leave no stone unturned. The smallest detail may be of importance.’
‘But I know of nobody who—— I’ve seen nothing, Sir Richard——’
‘I’m afraid Inspector Tripp will want you all the same. My note-book with the combination of the safe was stolen. That’s the situation. Tripp thinks my pocket was picked some time in the evening. I’ve given him an account of my movements and he’s trying to trace the matter up.’
Elizabeth Marlowe hesitated before she spoke. ‘Did you—did you tell him you came to mother’s——’
‘Don’t let that worry you. I told him I called at a friend’s house near St. Pancras last night, but I didn’t give your mother’s name. It’s out of the question that I lost the note-book there. Besides, my relations with your mother are a private matter; I detest the idea of them being sifted out by the police—or anybody else.’
‘And the police won’t go there——’
‘Of course not.’
He saw the sudden relief in her eyes.
‘I’m so glad. Mother dreads the police for some reason—always has, ever since I was a child.’
‘She need have no anxiety.’ The barrister began to pace the floor. ‘The mystery is how Lord John got to know that these documents were here—or how he came to know of their existence at all. Well, he’s made a clean sweep! But there’s one item he didn’t take. I only discovered it after Tripp and his finger-print men had gone. It’ll be good news for him. I hadn’t put it with the papers—it was in my desk.’
He opened a drawer and tossed down on the blotting-pad a small cracked and faded photograph. It was so old that the name of the photographer had been long ago obliterated from the frayed cardboard.
‘The police believe this to be Lord John—or one of his principal associates. I think you saw it on my desk yesterday?’
‘Yes, I’ve seen it.’
The electric bell in the passage had rung. ‘If that’s Inspector Tripp,’ said Templeton, ‘show him in here.’
CHAPTER VII
INVESTIGATIONS
‘So there’s something saved after all, Sir Richard?’ said Chief Inspector James Tripp, taking the photograph which Templeton held out to him, and looking at the blurred and faded features of the face in the picture. ‘Not much to go on, perhaps; yet it might be infinitely valuable. He put the photograph carefully into an envelope and laid it on the desk beside him. ‘Will you do me a favour, Sir Richard? Can you arrange for me to call on your friend Mrs. Prideaux of Carbery Square this forenoon?’
‘I think I can fix it for you—unless she’s gone out of town.’
‘In that case I must call on her in the country. I would like her to give me a complete list of her guests last night.’
‘You think it possible, then,’ said Templeton, ‘that the note-book may have been stolen from me there?’
‘It’s a possibility we can’t overlook. Did you notice how crowded her house was last night? A clever West End pickpocket could have done anything he liked there. Please say I’m from Scotland Yard; it’s better to be frank.’
‘I’ll ring her up now if you like.’
‘Thanks, Sir Richard. Tell her it’s in connection with the Lord John case. But don’t on any account mention the robbery of the papers. We must keep that absolutely dark. If it gets out the Press will simply use it as cannon-fodder against the Yard—and there’s been enough of that lately, heaven knows. Besides, this is one of these cases where silence is golden.’
Templeton spoke for a few minutes over the telephone. ‘Mrs. Prideaux is just going out, but she’ll be back at eleven o’clock,’ he said, hanging up the receiver. ‘She seems rather amused at the prospect of meeting a Scotland Yard man. I think you’ll find her helpful. By the way, did your fingerprint people have any luck with the photographs they took here last night?’