The Clue of the New Pin · Chapter 19 (1/2)

XIX

Mr. Wellington Brown woke one morning feeling extraordinarily refreshed. Usually he woke with a clouded brain and a parched mouth, with no other desire than to satisfy that craving for opium which all his life had kept him poor and eventually had ruined him physically and morally. But on this occasion he opened his eyes, made a quick stock of his surroundings, and uttered a “faugh!” of disgust. He knew himself so well, and was so well acquainted with his idiosyncrasies and the character of these fits which came upon him, that he saw that the end of a bout had come. Some day he would not wake up feeling refreshed, or wake up at all.

He sat up in bed, fingering his beard, and sucked in the breeze that came through the open window. Rising to his feet, he found his knees a little unstable, and laughed foolishly. It was Yo Len Fo himself who came in bearing a tray with a glass of water, a bottle half-full of whiskey and the inevitable pipe.

Without a word, Wellington poured himself out a stiff dose of the spirit and gulped it down.

“You may take that pipe to the devil,” he said. His voice was quavery but determined.

“ ‘A pipe in the morning makes the sun shine,’ ” quoted Yo Len Fo.

“ ‘A pipe in the morning does not go out with the stars,’ ” replied Wellington Brown, giving proverb for proverb.

“If the Illustrious will stay I will have breakfast sent to him,” said the Chinaman urgently.

“I have stayed too long,” said Wellington Brown. “What is the day of the month by the foreign reckoning?”

“I do not know the foreign ways,” said Yo Len Fo, “but if your Excellency will deign to stay a few hours in this hovel⁠—”

“My Excellency will not deign to stay in any hovel or palace,” said Wellington. “Where is Yeh Ling?”

“I will send for him at once,” said the old man eagerly.

“Leave him,” replied Mr. Brown with a fine gesture and began to search his pockets. To his surprise, all his money, which was not much, was intact.

“How much do I owe you?” he asked.

Yo Len Fo nodded, thereby meaning “nothing.”

“Running a philanthropic hop joint?” asked the other sarcastically.

“It has all been paid by the excellent Yeh Ling,” answered the man.

Brown grunted.

“I suppose that old devil Trasmere is behind this,” he said in English, and seeing that the man did not comprehend him, he pushed his way past Yo Len Fo and went down the uncarpeted stairs into the street. He felt terribly weak, but his heart was light. Hesitating at the end of a narrow passage, he turned to the left, otherwise he could not have failed to have run into the arms of Inspector Carver who had made a call that morning upon the proprietor of the Golden Roof.

Mr. Brown’s day was spent simply. He found his way to the park and, sitting down on a bench, dozed and mused the hours away, basking in the glorious June sunlight and seemingly obvious to its heat.

Late in the afternoon he felt hungry and went to a refreshment kiosk in the park. Finishing his meal he found the nearest bench and continued his pleasant occupation of doing nothing. Mr. Wellington Brown was a born loafer; it is a knack which would prolong many lives in this strenuous age, if it could be acquired.

The stars were coming out in a velvet blue sky when, with a shiver, he aroused himself and made instinctively for the lights. As he slouched along one of the big main paths that cross the park, he overtook a man who was walking slowly in his direction. The man shot a quick glance at him and then turned suddenly away.

“Here,” said Mr. Brown truculently, “I know you. Why in hell are you running away from me? Think I’m a leper or something?”

The man stopped, glanced uneasily left and right.

“I don’t know you,” he said coldly.

“That’s a damned lie,” snarled Brown. The reaction of his bout was upon him. He would have quarrelled with anything or anybody. “I know you and I’ve met you.” He groped in his hazy mind for some string that would lead him to the identity of the stranger. “In China, wasn’t it? My name’s Brown⁠—Wellington Brown.”

“Yes, perhaps it was in China,” said the other and of a sudden became friendly, gripped Wellington Brown’s arm and leaving the path, led him across the green spaces of the park.

A courting couple sitting under one of the trees saw them pass and heard Wellington Brown say:

“Don’t say that I was his storekeeper, because I wasn’t, or his servant! I was his equal, by gad. A partner in the firm, the blamed old swindler⁠—”

So they passed, the Man in Black and the besotted pensioner from China.

At this hour another person deeply interested in Jesse Trasmere’s fate was making his final preparations for departure.

He had ventured forth in broad daylight, braved the glances of the purser of the Arak and had signed on as steward of the second saloon on a voyage to South Africa. The end of the long nightmare had come. Walters had to join his ship overnight, an excellent arrangement from his point of view, since it reduced the danger of detection to a minimum.

He carried with him to the big roomy docks, a respectable sum of money, the proceeds of his pilfering at Mayfield and his opportunities had been many, remembering Mr. Trasmere’s parsimony.

He had sent his bag off to the ship in the afternoon and he had only to convey himself to the docks. He went on foot, keeping to the less frequented streets, and although this entailed a longer journey he was taking no risks. A month ago he would have trembled at every shadow, and the sight of a policeman would have paralysed his activities, but now the case had been forgotten; one never read a line about it in even the more sensational newspapers, and it was with some confidence that he traversed the wharf and mounted the gangway leading to the ill-lighted decks of the liner.

“Report to the chief steward,” said the custodian on duty at the ship end of the plank and Walters enquired his way forward, went down the broad companion to the broader deck where the chief steward’s office is situated, and joined a dozen other men who were lined up in queues waiting to report.

Walters would not have worried if the waiting had occupied the rest of the evening, but in a remarkably short space of time he stepped into the chief steward’s cabin, knuckled his forehead and said:

“Reporting for duty, sir. John Williams, steward⁠—” and then he stopped.

On the further side of the steward’s table was Inspector Carver.

Walters turned in a flash but the doorway was blocked by a detective.

“All right,” he said despondently as they snapped the steel handcuffs on his wrists, “but I didn’t do it, Mr. Carver. I know nothing about the murder. I am as innocent as a babe unborn.”

“What I like about you,” said Carver unpleasantly, “is your originality.”

He followed behind the two men who held the arms of their manacled prisoner and Tab joined him. As they came off the ship, Tab asked:

“Well, do you honestly think you have him, Carver?”

“Who⁠—Walters? That’s the man all right, I know him very well indeed.”

“I mean the murderer,” said Tab.

“Oh, the murderer. No, I don’t think that this is the gentleman, but he will have some difficulty in proving he isn’t. You can say that he’s arrested, Tab, but I would rather you didn’t say that I charged him with the murder, because I shan’t, until I have much more information in my possession than I have at present. Perhaps if you come round to the station after you have been to the office, I will be able to tell you a little more, especially if Walters makes a statement, as I think he will.”

In this the detective was right, for Mr. Walters lost no time in putting his defence on record.