David Brawn – The Crime Club (страница 11)

The spade work of detection is a laborious business, but very necessary to every detective outside the story-books. Juries do not convict on theories, however brilliant and plausible. They want facts—facts that can be sworn to. And so far Heldway had no facts—only a statement by Fleeting.

For half an hour or more Heldway laboured diligently. The Criminal Record Office put him in possession of facts relating to every one of the adventurers of this type known to be in England. Big Grant, the head of the department, who knew the science and practice of identification backwards, assisted in a close comparison of the portraits available with the amateur photograph of Vernet in the midst of a group which Fleeting had supplied. But they drew blank.

The finger-prints of Vernet might have simplified the search to a matter of minutes. As they were not available, the Record Office staff was set to work to trace through the old system of indexes, a tedious, lengthy job, by the light of the description Vernet had offered. They looked not under the letter ‘V’, but in that section of the records devoted to men of five feet nine in height with brown hair and hazel eyes.

This phase of the search Heldway left to the department, though at times he brought in a colleague to examine the photograph on the chance that Vernet might be recognised. At intervals he despatched cryptic cables to Paris and New York. Possibly Roger Vernet would have been flattered had he known how many people were being stirred to an interest in his career.

A neat little motor-car was waiting for Heldway at Haslemere station, and a run of a couple of miles brought him to a pine-shaded villa in which Fleeting had his country retreat. The detective nodded approval at the trim gables, the rose-bordered lawn, and the well-rolled gravel paths.

Fleeting, a little nervous and ill at ease, welcomed him with effusion, and with a wave of his hand introduced the couple who were standing in the shade of the veranda.

‘Mr Heldway—my daughter. Vernet, a friend of mine—Mr Heldway.’

The detective found himself gripping a slender, almost effeminate hand, and Vernet’s eyes did not drop under his scrutiny. Indeed, they were scrutinising him with a languorous ease that was almost insolent. The maker of diamonds had no appearance of the scientific student. He had been dressed by an artist in tailoring. His boots, his meticulously creased trousers, the sloping waist of his jacket, were all beyond criticism. He had a little toothbrush moustache, which he stroked from time to time with a delicate forefinger. His handkerchief was tinged with scent. Heldway, who was not self-conscious, felt uncouth in his presence.

‘Delighted to know you,’ said the young man, but his face had the abstract look of one wrestling with an abstruse mental problem. Heldway wondered if he had any suspicion of his identity. He murmured some commonplace, and his gaze wandered momentarily to the girl—a picture in grey and white. Erect and slender, with sparkling blue eyes and cheeks tanned to a wholesome clearness by fresh air and exercise, she did not conform at all to his mental impression of her. This was not the sort of woman to become infatuated with an adventurer. And yet—

They went in to lunch. Heldway was a good talker when he was in the vein, and conversation moved swiftly. He set himself to draw Vernet out, and the other was nothing loath. He had apparently been everywhere and seen everything.

‘If this man’s playing with a cold deck, he’s got a nerve,’ meditated the detective.

Once, during a lull in the conversation, he again surprised the bland hazel eyes surveying him with abstract calculation. Vernet pulled himself together.

‘Come, Mr Heldway, a man of your profession is always running against experiences. I appeal to Miss Fleeting. Here’s a real live detective, and he hasn’t told us one of his adventures.’

The shot was sudden, and for the moment Heldway was thrown off his balance. A flicker of astonishment passed across his features. Then he smiled. Vernet was evidently determined to drag him boldly into the open.

‘Are you a detective?’ inquired the girl. ‘How exciting! Dad only told us you were a friend of his.’

Heldway went imperturbably on with his sweet. ‘Yes, I am a detective, Miss Fleeting. I’m afraid it is not so exciting as the novelists would have you believe. How did you know?’ He addressed Vernet.

The other shrugged his shoulders. ‘I didn’t recall your face till this moment,’ he answered indifferently. ‘I saw you give evidence at the Old Bailey in a murder case last year. Are you down here on business?’

It was difficult for Heldway to repress a laugh. Whether Vernet was a rogue or not, he was not so simple as not to put a construction on the circumstances. ‘An official of police is always more or less on business,’ he parried. ‘But I’m here, through Mr Fleeting’s kindness, only for fresh air.’

‘So you haven’t brought your handcuffs?’ Vernet was smiling inwardly. The official wondered if he meant a challenge.

‘I don’t anticipate any occasion to use them down here,’ he laughed.

Fleeting, who had been fidgeting uneasily in his chair, broke in: ‘Here’s coffee. Have a cigar, Heldway. My daughter doesn’t mind. I never ask Vernet. He’s got his own particular brand of poisonous cigarettes. I believe he smokes them in his sleep.’

‘It’s a bad habit,’ said Vernet. ‘If I had any strength of will I should give them up. But I’m lost without a cigarette.’ He extracted a fat one from a gold case, and lighting it, blew a circle of smoke into the air. ‘If I were a criminal, now, there would be a clue for you, Mr Heldway. You’d only have to look for an insatiable consumer of cigarettes, like Raffles, eh?’

He held the white tube up to the light. ‘I have them specially made, with my initials on the paper.’

‘The perfect criminal—and thank Heaven there is none—would have no fixed habits,’ commented Heldway.

It was late in the evening before he got the chance of a word alone with his host. Miss Fleeting had accepted the diamond-maker’s challenge to billiards, and the two elder men were contemplating the moonlight from the veranda. Fleeting was anxious to make it clear that he had given no hint of the detective’s identity. Heldway brushed away his explanation.

‘Never mind about that. You haven’t shown me over the house yet. Suppose we take the opportunity now.’

‘I didn’t suppose you’d be interested. It’s entirely modern. However, come along.’

So it was that, when he retired, the detective had in his mind a very complete plan of the sleeping apartments of the house, especially the relation of his own bedroom to that occupied by Vernet. Beyond taking off his boots and collar, he had made no attempt to undress, He stretched himself out in an arm-chair with a novel, and composed himself to read until such a time as the household should be asleep. At two o’clock he laid aside his book and rummaged in his kit bag. A small electric torch about the size of an ordinary match-box, a dozen master-keys, and a red silk handkerchief with a couple of holes cut in it rewarded his search. The handkerchief he adjusted on his face, the holes serving as eye-slits. The keys and the torch he carried in his hands.

There are moments when a police officer steps out of the limits of strict legality. He knows how great a risk he runs, for if he fails of his purpose he can expect no countenance from his superiors. There was no possible excuse for Heldway in what was, in effect, an act of burglary. He had deliberately refrained from saying anything to Fleeting of his intention, partly, it must be admitted, because he was afraid that the jeweller might exercise a veto.

Softly he stepped into the corridor, his stockinged feet making no sound on the soft carpet. A thin thread of light cut through the darkness, affording just enough light to prevent his blundering into any furniture. More than once he switched off the light and stood stock still as his ear caught those indefinite sounds that are always audible in a sleeping household.

He reached Vernet’s door and softly turned the handle. As he expected, it was locked.

Very stealthily he tried his keys one after the other.

His muscles contracted involuntarily as a slight click told that the bolt had shot back. He stood stiffly, listening intently.

Five minutes elapsed before he ventured to thrust open the door and cautiously edge his way inside. He waited for a matter of seconds till the deep regular breathing from the bed reassured him. Then he flashed the bead of light on the wardrobe, and all his movements quickened. Whatever he sought he had guessed the diamond-maker would carry on him during the day—otherwise Heldway would not have waited till now to ransack the room.

Presently he gave an almost unconscious ejaculation of triumph, as he dragged out of a pocket a little wash-leather bag. With hasty fingers he opened it and directed the rays of his lamp on twenty or thirty uncut diamonds. And then, even while he chuckled to himself, the room was suddenly flooded with light. He wheeled abruptly. Vernet was sitting up in bed, one hand on the electric light switch, the other holding a revolver, its muzzle steadily directed towards Heldway.