WHEN Dick Staines left the University of Cambridge, he was confronted
with several alternatives, all more or less unalluring. On the strength
of his Honours degree in science he might have taken a mastership at a
preparatory school; alternatively, he could have gone into a great motor
works for three years at a salary of thirty shillings a week, with no
sure prospect at the end of his apprenticeship; or he could have been
appointed to a commission in His Majesty’s army, where he would have
received sufficient pay and allowances to discharge his monthly mess
bill; or, had he had influence, he might have entered that branch of the
Civil Service whence one starts forth on a diplomatic career.
He had no influence, he had no money, except the rags of a
thousand-pound legacy which had taken him through Cambridge.
He returned one night to the furnished room in Gower Street which he had
taken on his arrival in London and set out before him the four definite
offers he had received. He had discovered that even a mastership at a
preparatory school was not a post easy to secure. The final offer of a
motor car company he tore up and threw into the fire. From his pocket he
took a printed blank, and this he filled up with some care and posted.
Three days later he was invited to make a call at Scotland Yard, and
within six months Mr. Richard Staines, Bachelor of Arts (Camb.) was
patrolling the Finchley Road in the uniform of the Metropolitan
Constabulary.
Many things had contributed to his rapid promotion. A bit of luck, as he
confessed, the left hook to the jaw which sent Peter Lanbradi sprawling
to the floor just as his finger was pressing the trigger of a pistol
malignantly directed toward an under secretary of state; his skill as a
runner, and, last and most important, his command of Continental
languages. He spoke four perfectly, two well, and three others well
enough. Four years after he had joined the force, he was a sergeant in
the C. I. D., earmarked for further promotion.
That promotion came. He was Detective Inspector Staines when he went to
Brighton with Lord Weald, whom he and most people addressed familiarly
as “Tommy.” They had been together at Cambridge, were members of the
same college, had been arrested together in the same rag.
“It’s the queerest thing in the world, old thing,” bleated Tommy, as he
sent his swift Rolls dodging between two farm carts. “Only yesterday it
seems you and I were being dragged down Petty Cury by a Robert—and now
_you’re_ a Robert!”
He chuckled joyously at the thought.
He was a round-faced man who looked much younger than his years, and
though he was by no means a pigmy he was half a foot shorter than the
bareheaded, brown-faced man who sat by his side. Good looks were an
asset to Dick Staines, though he found no profit in them. He had the
build and eager face of an athlete; the gray, smiling eyes of one who
found life rather amusing. Tommy and he had not seen each other for
years. Lord Weald had just returned from a trip to South Africa, and
they had met accidentally in town—somewhat inconveniently for Dick
Staines, who was going to Scotland for a fortnight’s fishing, the guest
of a plutocratic assistant commissioner. Since his finances were by no
means assured, he had let his pretty little Chelsea flat for a month—an
arrangement which looked like being very inconvenient, as he explained
to his companion.
“Why I’m sky-hooting down to Brighton for two days, heaven knows!”
“You’re sky-hooting to Brighton, old boy,” said Tommy, “because it would
have been deuced uncivil if you hadn’t accepted an old pal’s urgent
invitation. You told me yourself that your commissioner, or whatever he
calls himself, will not be in Scotland till the end of the week.
Besides, I’ve got a lot to tell you. I’ve had tremendous
adventures—lion chasing, everything!”
“Who did the chasing—you or the lions?”
“We took it in turns,” said Tommy calmly. “Sometimes I was in front and
sometimes they were. And besides, Brighton’s good for the liver—and
there’s somebody in Brighton, the prettiest thing you ever met. Never
seen anything like her, old boy.”
“A lioness?”
Lord Weald turned pained eyes upon him.
“She’s a nurse, old boy. A stunner.”
“If you imagine,” said Dick Staines sternly, “that I’m coming to
Brighton to further your low amours you’ve got another guess coming,
Tommy.”
By the time Tommy Weald had recovered from his indignation and
incoherence they had reached the hotel. They were going up the steps of
the broad entrance when a man came out—a man with a large red face and
a short, bristling black moustache. He stared at Tommy and waved a
cheery hand.
“Dashed amusin’ feller,” said Tommy. “Know him?”
Dick shook his head.
“Walter Derrick,” explained his lordship. “Lives next door to me in
Lowndes Square. Big house, pots of money, but dashed amusin’. My poor,
dear old governor used to say that his father was the most dashed
unpleasant man he’d ever met, but this feller is—is——”
“Dashed amusin’?” suggested Dick.
Going up in the elevator, Tommy, whose mind could never hold two ideas
at once, expatiated upon the dashed amusingness of his neighbour. So far
as Dick Staines could gather Mr. Derrick’s chief claim to the title of
good fellow was that he laughed at all Tommy’s jokes.
Dick knew the gentleman very well by name; indeed, he had recognized his
big yellow Rolls standing outside the hotel. The only thing he had heard
in his disfavour was that on one occasion, when a poor cousin, his sole
relative, had called at the house to secure his help in a time of
domestic trouble, Mr. Derrick had sent for the police and had the
importunate relative removed. Which was curiously unlike the big genial
soul. His father had been the most notorious miser in London. He had
carried his meanness to such lengths that, according to legend, he had
quarrelled with Walter Derrick over the purchase of a bicycle, and for
years the pair had been estranged, Walter Derrick working abroad as a
common labourer.
Nothing of those seven or eight years’ exile had soured the man. From
the shy, furtive lad that very few people had seen and nobody had known
intimately, he returned a year before the old man died, one who saw all
the humour there was in life.
“He’s dashed glad to be alive—he told me so,” said Tommy.
This little extra holiday was a pleasant break to Dick Staines. After
dinner, the evening being warm and the light still holding, the two men
strolled along the front, and Tommy, who had hardly stopped speaking
since he reached England, related with great force and vigour and with a
wealth of illustrative gesture the adventures (tame enough they sounded,
even embellished as they were) that had come his way.
They had reached a less populated part of the parade when Dick felt his
arm clutched.
“There she is!”
Dick Staines turned his head. A girl in severe nurse’s costume was
walking slowly toward them. Until they were nearly abreast he could not
see her face.
There is a beauty which instantly appeals; more critical examination
brings disappointment. There is another type which impresses more slowly
and more lastingly, and a third, and the rarest of all, an instant
discovery of loveliness which brings with it the illusion of
familiarity.
Seeing her for the first time, Dick Staines was certain that a long
acquaintance must have built up his knowledge and appreciation of her
beauty. In less than a second he had seen and she had passed.
“Well, what do you think, old boy?” Tommy was anxiously awaiting his
verdict.
“She’s very pretty,” said the cautious Dick Staines, and felt a brute at
his churlish lack of enthusiasm.
“She’s a nurse, old boy,” said Tommy unnecessarily. “Pushes a dithering
old johnny all over the place in a perambulator—well, she doesn’t
exactly push him, but she’s on the spot. Ain’t she a stunner?”
“She’s certainly a stunner,” admitted Dick. “What is her name?”
“Mary Dane. You wouldn’t guess that I’d find that out,” said Tommy
triumphantly, “but I have! Mary Dane—sounds like something off the
screen, doesn’t it?”
“How do you know her name is Mary Dane?”
“Because I asked at the boarding house,” said the shameless Tommy.
“That’s an idea that wouldn’t have occurred to you—some of us fellers
have got more initiative than Roberts. And I’ll tell you something else:
the old gentleman she pulls about is a man named Cornfort. They dodge up
and down the coast, looking for the right kind of air. I spoke to her
once—said ‘Good-morning.’”
“What did she say?” asked Dick, amused at this sudden romance.
“She said ‘Good-morning’ too,” said Tommy. “But she so took me back
answering me at all that I couldn’t think of anything more to say! She’s
a lady, old boy—got a voice like custard—you know, kind of soft and
creamy . . .” He floundered, seeking an illustration.
They walked back, hoping to see her again, but were disappointed. That
night, as they sat in the smoke room, discussing a final whisky and
soda, Mr. Walter Derrick strolled in. He was in evening dress, a fine,
happy-looking figure of a man. He glanced round the room and presently
his eyes rested on Lord Weald, and he walked slowly across to where they
were sitting.
“Hullo, Weald! Siamese twins, you and I, eh? They lived next door in
London and in Brighton they were not divided!” He chuckled at this as he
sat down.
He smiled at Dick, his eyes gleaming good-humouredly behind his
horn-rimmed glasses.
“And what terrible crime brings you to Brighton, Mr. Inspector?” he
said, to Dick’s surprise. “Oh, yes, I know you—saw you giving evidence
in court—criminal cases are a hobby of mine. I’ve got the best library
in London.”
“Dick’s a friend of mine.” Tommy hastened to explain his guest’s
position. “We were at Varsity together—then he became a Robert, and
there you are!”
Evidently Mr. Derrick had no great interest in Dick’s social position.
“It’s queer I should have met you. I was only talking with somebody the
other night, and your name cropped up. We were discussing the Slough
shooting case. You remember, the cashier of some company—I don’t
remember what it was—was shot dead and the pay roll taken. I was in
Africa at the time, and my impression was that they’d caught the man,
but my friend tells me that he was never captured. That’s probably
before you went into the force.”
“On the very day I entered the force,” said Dick quietly. “No, he was
never captured. We have, of course, a clue.”
Mr. Derrick nodded.
“A fingerprint found on the barrel of the automatic. Yes, I know that
part of it. The only thing I didn’t know was whether this fellow was
ever caught. If you’re living about a thousand miles from everywhere and
your weekly newspapers have a trick of going astray—I lost six mails
through flooded rivers—you miss the end of these stories.”
“The end is not written yet,” smiled Dick.
Mr. Derrick pursed his lips thoughtfully.
“Then I’ve lost,” he said. “I could have sworn that the man was arrested
and tried. I must have confused him with somebody else.”
He was one of the loquacious kind that gives little opportunity for
conversation.
“I had a sort of personal interest in the matter—my father, who had, I
am sorry to confess, very few endearing qualities, made a collection of
fingerprints. The poor old chap all his life was keen on proving that
everybody else was wrong but he!” He made a little grimace. “I suffered
from that little hobby, but I’m not complaining. And he was perfectly
convinced that the police theory that a man’s fingerprints have no exact
duplicate in the world was wrong, and he made an extraordinary
collection—used to give prizes—though the Lord knows he hated spending
money—to schools and factories for fingerprint collections.”
“He must have been disappointed,” smiled Dick.
The big man shook his head.
“I don’t know. I’m not so sure that there wasn’t something in his
theory. After all, how many fingerprints have you got at Scotland Yard?
Suppose you’ve got a quarter of a million: that represents an
infinitesimally small fractional part of the population. The only people
you examine are members of the criminal classes, and it is the same in
France and America and wherever the fingerprint system is in force. It
doesn’t prove, because there are no two criminals alike, that there are
no two honest men alike!”
“Are you continuing the good work?” asked Dick.
Mr. Derrick shook his head.
“Rather not,” he said. “The first thing I did after my father’s death
was to go around and, collecting these beastly things, put them in the
fire.”
Then abruptly he turned to Tommy, asked him how he had enjoyed his
shooting trip, whom he had met, where he had been. Evidently part of the
country that Tommy had crossed was familiar to Mr. Derrick. His exile
had been spent a few miles south of the southern arm of Tanganyika.
“Early to bed and early to rise,” he yawned as he rose. “That is what
makes millionaires!” He laughed at the joke, turned to go, and came back
solemnly to tap Dick’s shoulder. “A better way is to have a frugal
father who makes it for you,” he said.
“Cheerful bird,” said Tommy when the jovial man had gone, “and such a
sense of humour! The other day I told him a yarn about——”
“I’m going to bed,” said Dick. “If it is the story about what you said
to the railway guard on the Beira railway I don’t think I could stand it
again.”
He was up early the next morning and had a bit of luck. He saw the nurse
in some difficulties with her Bath chair: they were hauling it up a
steep incline, and Dick brought his weight to the back of the vehicle.
This little exertion resulted in a loss—Tommy had given him a gold
pencil with a large red lacquer top. After the Bath chair had gone he
missed this and went down the slope to the beach. But his search was
vain. He may have dropped it from his waistcoat pocket as he was bending
over the chair.
When he saw the nurse again it was in such dramatic circumstances that
he forgot to ask.
It was ten minutes to one; he was sitting on a rail, watching the
ceaseless weaving of cars, when he saw something in the middle of the
road that brought his heart to his mouth. . . .
If Mr. Derrick’s big Rolls had collided with the yellow Bath chair, this
story would not have been written. He came flying round along the parade
at a speed beyond legal limits, saw the Bath chair, the nurse, and the
bowed chairman only just in time to apply his brakes, and the car
skidded awkwardly to the left, until its wheels bumped against the curb,
bounded back again, and half turned in its own length.
In an instant Dick was in the roadway, tugging the chair to safety.
“My friend,” said Dick solemnly, “you have had a very lucky escape—by
rights you ought to be in heaven!”
He addressed the nurse.
She really was beautiful and owed nothing to her picturesque attire—if
a woman cannot look pretty in a nurse’s uniform she is plain beyond
rescue.
She looked at him quickly, recognized the man who had earlier in the
morning helped push the Bath chair, and smiled. The grizzled chairman
stood apathetically by; the invalid dozed in his voluminous wrappings,
unconcerned.
“It was funny, wasn’t it?” she said.
She had the voice of a lady, soft yet distinct; for the moment it was
rich with the quality of laughter.
“It didn’t amuse me terribly,” he said truthfully. “I congratulate you
on your sense of humour. The only satisfaction you could have got out of
the tragedy would have been the knowledge that you had been killed—and
of course you wouldn’t have known that—by a very rich and jovial man.”
The nurse looked across the road. Mr. Derrick was talking to a
policeman. The policeman looked rather stern and had a notebook in his
hand.
“Mr. Derrick, isn’t it? He is staying at the Metropole—I’ve often seen
his car. He was travelling at an awful rate.”
“And awfully is he being rated by that guardian of the law,” said Dick.
She laughed at this.
The apathetic Bath chairman did not move; the invalid still slumbered.
“You are at the Metropole too,” she nodded.
“The merest guest of a guest,” said Dick. “My purse does not run to
Metropoles.”
He felt greatly complimented. This was no fly-by-night young lady to
whom the formalities of an introduction were unnecessary. She offered as
much as she demanded. He knew that if he asked her to dine with him that
night she would be shockingly surprised. She knew (he was aware of this)
that he was incapable of any such invitation. It was just one of those
curious understandings which occur between two people who have a similar
code of behaviour.
“Then you’re seeing life,” she smiled, and signalled the chairman.
Dick watched the little party regretfully as they moved along the front.
She was lovely; those eyes of her, as clear and gray as a spring sky,
haunted him.
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