Wallace Edgar
The Green Rust
"One moment," he begged. "I have a cab here. Won't you come and have tea somewhere?"
"Where is somewhere?" she asked.
"The Grand Alliance?" he suggested.
She nodded slowly.
CHAPTER VIII
THE CRIME OF THE GRAND ALLIANCE
The hotel and the café of the Grand Alliance was London's newest rendezvous. Its great palm-court was crowded at the tea-hour and if, as the mysterious Mr. Beale had hinted, any danger was to be apprehended from Dr. van Heerden, it could not come to her in that most open of public places.
She had no fear, but that eighth sense of armed caution, which is the possession of every girl who has to work for her living and is conscious of the perils which await her on every side, reviewed with lightning speed all the possibilities and gave her the passport of approval.
It was later than she had thought. Only a few tables were occupied, but he had evidently reserved one, for immediately on his appearance the waiter with a smirk led him to one of the alcoves and pulled back a chair for the girl. She looked round as she stripped her gloves. The place was not unfamiliar to her. It was here she came at rare intervals, when her finances admitted of such an hilarious recreation, to find comfort for jangled nerves, to sit and sip her tea to the sound of violins and watch the happy crowd at her leisure, absorbing something of the happiness they diffused.
The palm-court was a spacious marble hall, a big circle of polished pillars supporting the dome, through the tinted glass of which the light was filtered in soft hues upon the marble floor below.
"Doctor," she said, suddenly remembering, "I have been reading quite a lot about you to-day."
He raised his eyebrows.
"About me?"
She nodded, smiling mischievously.
"I didn't know that you were such a famous person—I have been reading about the Millinborn murder."
"You have been reading about the Millinborn murder?" he said steadily, looking into her eyes. "An unpleasant case and one I should like to forget."
"I thought it was awfully thrilling," she said. "It read like a detective story without a satisfactory end."
He laughed.
"What a perfectly gruesome subject for tea-table talk," he said lightly, and beckoned the head-waiter. "You are keeping us waiting, Jaques."
"Doctor, it will be but a few minutes," pleaded the waiter, and then in a low voice, which was not so low that it did not reach the girl. "We have had some trouble this afternoon, doctor, with your friend."
"My friend?"
The doctor looked up sharply.
"Whom do you mean?"
"With Mr. Jackson."
"Jackson," said the doctor, startled. "I thought he had left."
"He was to leave this morning by the ten o'clock train, but he had a fainting-fit. We recovered him with brandy and he was too well, for this afternoon he faint again."
"Where is he now?" asked van Heerden, after a pause.
"In his room, monsieur. To-night he leave for Ireland—this he tell me—to catch the mail steamer at Queenstown."
"Don't let him know I am here," said the doctor.
He turned to the girl with a shrug.
"A dissolute friend of mine whom I am sending out to the colonies," he said.
"Won't you go and see him?" she asked. "He must be very ill if he faints."
"I think not," said Dr. van Heerden quietly, "these little attacks are not serious—he had one in my room the other night. It is a result of over-indulgence, and six months in Canada will make a man of him."
She did not reply. With difficulty she restrained an exclamation. So that was the man who had been in the doctor's room and who was going to Red Horse Valley! She would have dearly loved to supplement her information about Mr. Scobbs, proprietor of many hotels, and to have mystified him with her knowledge of Western Canada, but she refrained.
Instead, she took up the conversation where he had tried to break it off.
"Do you know Mr. Kitson?"
"Kitson? Oh yes, you mean the lawyer man," he replied reluctantly. "I know him, but I am afraid I don't know much that is good about him. Now, I'm going to tell you, Miss Cresswell"—he leant across the table and spoke in a lower tone—"something that I have never told to a human being. You raised the question of the Millinborn murder. My view is that Kitson, the lawyer, knew much more about that murder than any man in this world. If there is anybody who knows more it is Beale."
"Mr. Beale?" she said incredulously.
"Mr. Beale," he repeated. "You know the story of the murder: you say you have read it. Millinborn was dying and I had left the room with Kitson when somebody entered the window and stabbed John Millinborn to the heart. I have every reason to believe that that murder was witnessed by this very man I am sending to Canada. He persists in denying that he saw anything, but later he may change his tune."
A light dawned upon her.
"Then Jackson is the man who was seen by Mr. Kitson in the plantation?"
"Exactly," said the doctor.
"But I don't understand," she said, perplexed. "Aren't the police searching for Jackson?"
"I do not think that it is in the interests of justice that they should find him," he said gravely. "I place the utmost reliance on him. I am sending Mr. Jackson to a farm in Ontario kept by a medical friend of mine who has made a hobby of dealing with dipsomaniacs."
He met her eyes unfalteringly.
"Dr. van Heerden," she said slowly, "you are sending Mr. Jackson to Red Horse Valley."
He started back as if he had been struck in the face, and for a moment was inarticulate.
"What—what do you know?" he asked incoherently.
His face had grown white, his eyes tragic with fear. She was alarmed at the effect of her words and hastened to remove the impression she had created.
"I only know that I heard Mr. Jackson through the ventilator of my flat, saying good-bye to you the other night. He mentioned Red Horse Valley–"
He drew a deep breath and was master of himself again, but his face was still pale.
"Oh, that," he said, "that is a polite fiction. Jackson knows of this inebriates' home in Ontario and I had to provide him with a destination. He will go no farther than–"
"Why, curse my life, if it isn't the doctor!"
At the sound of the raucous voice both looked up. The man called Jackson had hailed them from the centre of the hall. He was well dressed, but no tailor could compensate for the repulsiveness of that puckered and swollen face, those malignant eyes which peered out into the world through two slits. He was wearing his loud-check suit, his new hat was in his hand and the conical-shaped dome of his head glistened baldly.
"I'm cursed if this isn't amiable of you, doctor!"
He did not look at the girl, but grinned complacently upon her angry companion.
"Here I am "—he threw out his arms with an extravagant gesture—"leaving the country of my adoption, if not birth, without one solitary soul to see me off or take farewell of me. I, who have been—well, you know, what I've been, van Heerden. The world has treated me very badly. By heaven! I'd like to come back a billionaire and ruin all of 'em. I'd like to cut their throats and amputate 'em limb from limb, I would like–"
"Be silent!" said van Heerden angrily. "Have you no decency? Do you not realize I am with a lady?"
"Pardon." The man called Jackson leapt up from the chair into which he had fallen and bowed extravagantly in the direction of the girl. "I cannot see your face because of your hat, my dear lady," he said gallantly, "but I am sure my friend van Heerden, whose taste–"
"Will you be quiet?" said van Heerden. "Go to your room and I will come up to you."
"Go to my room!" scoffed the other. "By Jove! I like that! That any whipper-snapper of a sawbones should tell me to go to my room. After what I have been, after the position I have held in society. I have had ambassadors' carriages at my door, my dear fellow, princes of the royal blood, and to be told to go to my room like a naughty little boy! It's too much!"
"Then behave yourself," said van Heerden, "and at least wait until I am free before you approach me again."
But the man showed no inclination to move; rather did this rebuff stimulate his power of reminiscence.
"Ignore me, miss—I have not your name, but I am sure it is a noble one," he said. "You see before you one who in his time has been a squire of dames, by Jove! I can't remember 'em. They must number thousands and only one of them was worth two sous. Yes," he shook his head in melancholy, "only one of 'em. By Jove! The rest were"—he snapped his fingers—"that for 'em!"
The girl listened against her will.
"Jackson!"—and van Heerden's voice trembled with passion—"will you go or must I force you to go?"
Jackson rose with a loud laugh.
"Evidently I am de trop," he said with heavy sarcasm.
He held out a swollen hand which van Heerden ignored.
"Farewell, mademoiselle." He thrust the hand forward, so that she could not miss it.
She took it, a cold flabby thing which sent a shudder of loathing through her frame, and raised her face to his for the first time.
He let the hand drop. He was staring at her with open mouth and features distorted with horror.
"You!" he croaked.
She shrunk back against the wall of the alcove, but he made no movement. She sensed the terror and agony in his voice.
"You!" he gasped. "Mary!"
"Hang you! Go!" roared van Heerden, and thrust him back.
But though he staggered back a pace under the weight of the other's arm, his eyes did not leave the girl's face, and she, fascinated by the appeal in the face of the wreck, could not turn hers away.
"Mary!" he whispered, "what is your other name?"
With an effort the girl recovered herself.
"My name is not Mary," she said quietly. "My name is Oliva Cresswell."
"Oliva Cresswell," he repeated. "Oliva Cresswell!"
He made a movement toward her but van Heerden barred his way. She heard Jackson say something in a strangled voice and heard van Heerden's sharp "What!" and there was a fierce exchange of words.
The attention of the few people in the palm-court had been attracted to the unusual spectacle of two men engaged in what appeared to be a struggle.
"Sit down, sit down, you fool! Sit over there. I will come to you in a minute. Can you swear what you say is true?"
Jackson nodded. He was shaking from head to foot.
"My name is Prédeaux," he said; "that is my daughter—I married in the name of Cresswell. My daughter," he repeated. "How wonderful!"
"What are you going to do?" asked van Heerden.
He had half-led, half-pushed the other to a chair near one of the pillars of the rotunda.
"I am going to tell her," said the wreck. "What are you doing with her?" he demanded fiercely.
"That is no business of yours," replied van Heerden sharply.
"No business of mine, eh! I'll show you it's some business of mine. I am going to tell her all I know about you. I have been a rotter and worse than a rotter." The old flippancy had gone and the harsh voice was vibrant with purpose. "My path has been littered with the wrecks of human lives," he said bitterly, "and they are mostly women. I broke the heart of the best woman in the world, and I am going to see that you don't break the heart of her daughter."
"Will you be quiet?" hissed van Heerden. "I will go and get her away and then I will come back to you."
Jackson did not reply. He sat huddled up in his chair, muttering to himself, and van Heerden walked quickly back to the girl.
"I am afraid I shall have to let you go back by yourself. He is having one of his fits. I think it is delirium tremens."
"Don't you think you had better send for–" she began. She was going to say "send for a doctor," and the absurdity of the request struck her.
"I think you had better go," he said hastily, with a glance at the man who was struggling to his feet. "I can't tell you how sorry I am that we've had this scene."
"Stop!"—it was Jackson's voice.
He stood swaying half-way between the chair he had left and the alcove, and his trembling finger was pointing at them.
"Stop!" he said in a commanding voice. "Stop! I've got something to say to you. I know … he's making you pay for the Green Rust...."
So far he got when he reeled and collapsed in a heap on the floor. The doctor sprang forward, lifted him and carried him to the chair by the pillar. He picked up the overcoat that the man had been wearing and spread it over him.
"It's a fainting-fit, nothing to be alarmed about," he said to the little knot of people from the tables who had gathered about the limp figure. "Jaques"—he called the head-waiter—"get some brandy, he must be kept warm."
"Shall I ring for an ambulance, m'sieur?"
"It is not necessary," said van Heerden. "He will recover in a few moments. Just leave him," and he walked back to the alcove.
"Who is he?" asked the girl, and her voice was shaking in spite of herself.
"He is a man I knew in his better days," said van Heerden, "and now I think you must go."
"I would rather wait to see if he recovers," she said with some obstinacy.
"I want you to go," he said earnestly; "you would please me very much if you would do as I ask."
"There's the waiter!" she interrupted, "he has the brandy. Won't you give it to him?"
It was the doctor who in the presence of the assembled visitors dissolved a white pellet in the brandy before he forced the clenched teeth apart and poured the liquor to the last drop down the man's throat.
Jackson or Prédeaux, to give him his real name, shuddered as he drank, shuddered again a few seconds later and then went suddenly limp.
The doctor bent down and lifted his eyelid.
"I am afraid—he is dead," he said in a low voice.
"Dead!" the girl stared at him. "Oh no! Not dead!"
Van Heerden nodded.
"Heart failure," he said.
"The same kind of heart failure that killed John Millinborn," said a voice behind him. "The cost of the Green Rust is totalling up, doctor."
The girl swung round. Mr. Beale was standing at her elbow, but his steady eyes were fixed upon van Heerden.
CHAPTER IX
A CRIME AGAINST THE WORLD
"What do you mean?" asked Dr. van Heerden.
"I merely repeat the words of the dead man," answered Beale, "heart failure!"
He picked up from the table the leather case which the doctor had taken from his pocket. There were four little phials and one of these was uncorked.
"Digitalis!" he read. "That shouldn't kill him, doctor."
He looked at van Heerden thoughtfully, then picked up the phial again. It bore the label of a well-known firm of wholesale chemists, and the seal had apparently been broken for the first time when van Heerden opened the tiny bottle.
"You have sent for the police?" Beale asked the agitated manager.
"Oui, m'sieur—directly. They come now, I think."
He walked to the vestibule to meet three men in plain clothes who had just come through the swing-doors. There was something about van Heerden's attitude which struck Beale as strange. He was standing in the exact spot he had stood when the detective had addressed him. It seemed as if something rooted him to the spot. He did not move even when the ambulance men were lifting the body nor when the police were taking particulars of the circumstances of the death. And Beale, escorting the shaken girl up the broad staircase to a room where she could rest and recover, looked back over his shoulder and saw him still standing, his head bent, his fingers smoothing his beard.
"It was dreadful, dreadful," said the girl with a shiver. "I have never seen anybody—die. It was awful."
Beale nodded. His thoughts were set on the doctor. Why had he stood so motionless? He was not the kind of man to be shocked by so normal a phenomenon as death. He was a doctor and such sights were common to him. What was the reason for this strange paralysis which kept him chained to the spot even after the body had been removed?
The girl was talking, but he did not hear her. He knew instinctively that in van Heerden's curious attitude was a solution of Prédeaux's death.
"Excuse me a moment," he said.
He passed with rapid strides from the room, down the broad stairway and into the palm-court.
Van Heerden had gone.
The explanation flashed upon him and he hurried to the spot where the doctor had stood.
On the tessellated floor was a little patch no bigger than a saucer which had been recently washed.
He beckoned the manager.
"Who has been cleaning this tile?" he asked.
The manager shrugged his shoulders.
"It was the doctor, sare—so eccentric! He call for a glass of water and he dip his handkerchief in and then lift up his foot and with rapidity incredible he wash the floor with his handkerchief!"
"Fool!" snapped Beale. "Oh, hopeless fool!"
"Sare!" said the startled manager.
"It's all right, M'sieur Barri," smiled Beale ruefully. "I was addressing myself—oh, what a fool I've been!"
He went down on his knees and examined the floor.
"I want this tile, don't let anybody touch it," he said.
Of course, van Heerden had stood because under his foot he had crushed the digitalis tablet he had taken from the phial, and for which he had substituted something more deadly. Had he moved, the powdered tablet would have been seen. It was simple—horribly simple.
He walked slowly back to where he had left Oliva.
What followed seemed ever after like a bad dream to the girl. She was stunned by the tragedy which had happened under her eyes and could offer no evidence which in any way assisted the police in their subsequent investigation, the sum of which was ably set forth in the columns of the Post Record.
"The tragedy which occurred in the Palm-Court of the Grand Alliance Hotel yesterday must be added to the already long list of London's unravelled mysteries. The deceased, a man named Jackson, has been staying at the hotel for a week and was on the point of departure for Canada. At the last moment Dr. van Heerden, who was assisting the unfortunate man, discovered that Jackson was no other than the wanted man in the Millinborn murder, a crime which most of our readers will recall.
"Dr. van Heerden stated to our representative that the man had represented that he was a friend of the late John Millinborn, but was anxious to get to Canada. He had produced excellent credentials, and Dr. van Heerden, in a spirit of generosity, offered to assist him. At the eleventh hour, however, he was struck with the likeness the man bore to the published description of the missing man in the Millinborn case, and was on the point of telegraphing to the authorities at Liverpool, when he discovered that Jackson had missed the train.
"The present tragedy points to suicide. The man, it will be remembered, collapsed, and Dr. van Heerden rendered first aid, administering to the man a perfectly harmless drug. The post-mortem examination reveals the presence in the body of a considerable quantity of cyanide of potassium, and the police theory is that this was self-administered before the collapse. In the man's pocket was discovered a number of cyanide tablets.
"'I am satisfied,' said Dr. van Heerden, 'that the man already contemplated the deed, and when I voiced my suspicions in the palm-court he decided upon the action. The presence in his pocket of cyanide—one of the deadliest and quickest of poisons—suggests that he had the project in his mind. I did not see his action or, of course, I should have stopped him!'"
Oliva Cresswell read this account in her room two nights following the tragedy and was struck by certain curious inaccuracies, if all that the doctor had told her was true.
Mr. Beale read the account, smiled across the table grimly to the bearded superintendent of the Criminal Investigation Department.
"How does that strike you for ingenuity?" he said, pushing the paper over the table.
"I have read it," said the other laconically, "I think we have sufficient evidence to arrest van Heerden. The tile from the Grand Alliance shows traces of digitalis."
Beale shook his head.
"The case would fall," he said. "What evidence have you? We did not confiscate his medicine-case. He might have dropped a tablet of digitalis by accident. The only evidence you could convict van Heerden on is proof that he brought with him cyanide tablets which he slipped into Prédeaux's pocket. No, we can prove nothing."
"What is your theory in connection with the crime?"
"I have many theories," said Mr. Beale, rising and pacing the room, "and one certainty. I am satisfied that Millinborn was killed by Doctor van Heerden. He was killed because, during the absence of Mr. Kitson in the village, the doctor forced from the dying man a secret which up till then he had jealously preserved. When Kitson returned he found his friend, as he thought, in extremis, and van Heerden also thought that John Millinborn would not speak again. To his surprise Millinborn did speak and van Heerden, fearful of having his villainy exposed, stabbed him to the heart under the pretext of assisting him to lie down.
"Something different occurred at the Grand Alliance Hotel. A man swoons, immediately he is picked up by the doctor, who gives him a harmless drug—that is to say, harmless in small quantities. In five seconds the man is dead. At the inquest we find he has been poisoned—cyanide is found in his pocket. And who is this man? Obviously the identical person who witnessed the murder of John Millinborn and whom we have been trying to find ever since that crime."
"Van Heerden won't escape the third time. His presence will be a little more than a coincidence," said the superintendent.
Beale laughed.
"There will be no third time," he said shortly, "van Heerden is not a fool."
"Have you any idea what the secret was that he wanted to get from old Millinborn?" asked the detective.
Beale nodded.
"Yes, I know pretty well," he said, "and in course of time you will know, too."
The detective was glancing over the newspaper account.
"I see the jury returned a verdict of 'Suicide whilst of unsound mind!'" he said. "This case ought to injure van Heerden, anyway."
"That is where you are wrong," said Beale, stopping in his stride, "van Heerden has so manœuvred the Pressmen that he comes out with an enhanced reputation. You will probably find articles in the weekly papers written and signed by him, giving his views on the indiscriminate sale of poisons. He will move in a glamour of romance, and his consulting-rooms will be thronged by new admirers."
"It's a rum case," said the superintendent, rising, "and if you don't mind my saying so, Mr. Beale, you're one of the rummiest men that figure in it. I can't quite make you out. You are not a policeman and yet we have orders from the Foreign Office to give you every assistance. What's the game?"
"The biggest game in the world," said Beale promptly, "a game which, if it succeeds, will bring misery and suffering to thousands, and will bring great businesses tumbling, and set you and your children and your children's children working for hundreds of years to pay off a new national debt."
"Man alive!" said the other, "are you serious?"
Beale nodded.
"I was never more serious in my life," he said, "that is why I don't want the police to be too inquisitive in regard to this murder of Jackson, whose real name, as I say, is Prédeaux. I can tell you this, chief, that you are seeing the development of the most damnable plot that has ever been hatched in the brain of the worst miscreant that history knows. Sit down again. Do you know what happened last year?" he asked.
"Last year?" said the superintendent. "Why, the war ended last year."
"The war ended, Germany was beaten, and had to accept terms humiliating for a proud nation, but fortunately for her Prussia was not proud, she was merely arrogant. Her worst blow was the impoverishing conditions which the Entente Powers imposed. That is to say, they demanded certain concessions of territory and money which, added to the enormous interest of war stock which the Germans had to pay, promised to cripple Prussia for a hundred years."
"Well?" said the detective, when the other had stopped.
"Well?" repeated Beale, with a hard little smile. "Germany is going to get that money back."
"War?"
Beale laughed.
"No, nothing so foolish as war. Germany has had all the war she wants. Oh no, there'll be no war. Do you imagine that we should go to war because I came to the Foreign Office with a crazy story. I can tell you this, that officially the German Government have no knowledge of this plot and are quite willing to repudiate those people who are engaged in it. Indeed, if the truth be told, the Government has not contributed a single mark to bring the scheme to fruition, but when it is working all the money required will be instantly found. At present the inventor of this delightful little scheme finds himself with insufficient capital to go ahead. It is his intention to secure that capital. There are many ways by which this can be done. He has already borrowed £40,000 from White, of Punsonby's."
Superintendent McNorton whistled.
"There are other ways," Beale went on, "and he is at liberty to try them all except one. The day he secures control of that fortune, that day I shoot him."
"The deuce you will?" said the startled Mr. McNorton.
"The deuce I will," repeated Beale.
There was a tap at the door and McNorton rose.
"Don't go," said Beale, "I would like to introduce you to this gentleman."
He opened the door and a grey-haired man with a lean, ascetic face came in.
Beale closed the door behind him and led the way to the dining-room.
"Mr. Kitson, I should like you to know Superintendent McNorton."
The two men shook hands.
"Well?" said Kitson, "our medical friend seems to have got away with it." He sat at the table, nervously drumming with his fingers. "Does the superintendent know everything?"
"Nearly everything," replied Beale.
"Nearly everything," repeated the superintendent with a smile, "except this great Green Rust business. There I admit I am puzzled."
"Even I know nothing about that," said Kitson, looking curiously at Beale. "I suppose one of these days you will tell us all about it. It is a discovery Mr. Beale happed upon whilst he was engaged in protecting Miss–" He looked at Beale and Beale nodded—"Miss Cresswell," said Kitson.
"The lady who was present at the murder of Jackson?"
"There is no reason why we should not take you into our confidence, the more so since the necessity for secrecy is rapidly passing. Miss Oliva Cresswell is the niece of John Millinborn. Her mother married a scamp who called himself Cresswell but whose real name was Prédeaux. He first spent every penny she had and then left her and her infant child."
"Prédeaux!" cried the detective. "Why you told me that was Jackson's real name."
"Jackson, or Prédeaux, was her father," said Kitson, "it was believed that he was dead; but after John Millinborn's death I set inquiries on foot and discovered that he had been serving a life sentence in Cayenne and had been released when the French President proclaimed a general amnesty at the close of the war. He was evidently on his way to see John Millinborn the day my unhappy friend was murdered, and it was the recognition of his daughter in the palm-court of the Grand Alliance which produced a fainting-fit to which he was subject."
"But how could he recognize the daughter? Had he seen her before?"
For answer Kitson took from his pocket a leather folder and opened it. There were two photographs. One of a beautiful woman in the fashion of 25 years before; and one a snapshot of a girl in a modern costume, whom McNorton had no difficulty in recognizing as Oliva Cresswell.
"Yes," he said, "they might be the same person."
"That's the mother on the left," explained Kitson, "the resemblance is remarkable. When Jackson saw the girl he called her Mary—that was his wife's name. Millinborn left the whole of his fortune to Miss Cresswell, but he placed upon me a solemn charge that she was not to benefit or to know of her inheritance until she was married. He had a horror of fortune-hunters. This was the secret which van Heerden surprised—I fear with violence—from poor John as he lay dying. Since then he has been plotting to marry the girl. To do him justice, I believe that the cold-blooded hound has no other wish than to secure her money. His acquaintance with White, who is on the verge of ruin, enabled him to get to know the girl. He persuaded her to come here and a flat was found for her. Partly," said the lawyer dryly, "because this block of flats happens to be her own property and the lady who is supposed to be the landlady is a nominee of mine."
"And I suppose that explains Mr. Beale," smiled the inspector.
"That explains Mr. Beale," said Kitson, "whom I brought from New York especially to shadow van Heerden and to protect the girl. In the course of investigations Mr. Beale has made another discovery, the particulars of which I do not know."
There was a little pause.
"Why not tell the girl?" said the superintendent.
Kitson shook his head.
"I have thought it out, and to tell the girl would be tantamount to breaking my faith with John Millinborn. No, I must simply shepherd her. The first step we must take"—he turned to Beale—"is to get her away from this place. Can't you shift your offices to—say New York?"
Beale shook his head.
"I can and I can't," he said. "If you will forgive my saying so, the matter of the Green Rust is of infinitely greater importance than Miss Cresswell's safety."
James Kitson frowned.
"I don't like to hear you say that, Beale."
"I don't like hearing myself say it," confessed the other, "but let me put it this way. I believe by staying here I can afford her greater protection and at the same time put a spoke in the wheel of Mr. van Heerden's larger scheme."
Kitson pinched his lips thoughtfully.
"Perhaps you are right," he said. "Now I want to see this young lady, that is why I have come. I suppose there will be no difficulty?"
"None at all, I think," said Beale. "I will tell her that you are interested in the work she is doing. I might introduce you as Mr. Scobbs," he smiled.
"Who is Scobbs?"
"He is a proprietor of a series of hotels in Western Canada, and is, I should imagine, a most praiseworthy and inoffensive captain of minor industry, but Miss Cresswell is rather interested in him," he laughed. "She found the name occurring in Canadian guide-books and was struck by its quaintness."
