The Bulldog Drummond MEGAPACK ®. Sapper
but the man showed no signs of availing himself of the doctor’s suggestion. He turned and walked rapidly away, and a few moments later—in an exclusive West End club—a trunk call was put through to Godalming—a call which caused the recipient to nod his head in satisfaction and order the Rolls-Royce.
Meanwhile, unconscious of this sudden solicitude for his health, Hugh Drummond was once more occupied with the piece of paper he had been studying on the doctor’s entrance. Every now and then he ran his fingers through his crisp brown hair and shook his head in perplexity. Beyond establishing the fact that the man in the peculiar condition was Hiram C. Potts, the American multimillionaire, he could make nothing out of it.
“If only I’d managed to get the whole of it,” he muttered to himself for the twentieth time. “That darn’ fellah Peterson was too quick.” The scrap he had torn off was typewritten, save for the American’s scrawled signature, and Hugh knew the words by heart.
plete paralysis
ade of Britain
months I do
the holder of
of five million
do desire and
earl necklace and the
are at present
chess of Lamp-
k no questions
btained.
AM C. Purrs.
At length he replaced the scrap in his pocket-book and rang the bell.
“James,” he remarked as his servant came in, “will you whisper ‘very little meat and no alcohol’ in your wife’s ear, so far as the bird next door is concerned? Fancy paying a doctor to come round and tell one that!”
“Did he say anything more, sir?”
“Oh! A lot. But that was the only thing of the slightest practical use, and I knew that already.” He stared thoughtfully out of the window. “You’d better know,” he continued at length, “that as far as I can see we’re up against a remarkably tough proposition.”
“Indeed, sir,” murmured his servant. “Then perhaps I had better stop any further insertion of that advertisement. It works out at six shillings a time.”
Drummond burst out laughing. “What would I do without you, oh! my James,” he cried. “But you may as well stop it. Our hands will be quite full for some time to come, and I hate disappointing hopeful applicants for my services.”
“The gentleman is asking for you, sir.” Mrs. Denny’s voice from the door made them look round, and Hugh rose.
“Is he talking sensibly, Mrs. Denny?” he asked eagerly, but she shook her head.
“Just the same, sir,” she announced. “Looking round the room all dazed like. And he keeps on saying ‘Danger.’”
Hugh walked quickly along the passage to the room where the millionaire lay in bed.
“How are you feeling?” said Drummond cheerfully.
The man stared at him uncomprehendingly, and shook his head. “Do you remember last night?” Hugh continued, speaking very slowly and distinctly. Then a sudden idea struck him and he pulled the scrap of paper out of his case. “Do you remember signing that?” he asked, holding it out to him.
For a while the man looked at it; then with a sudden cry of fear he shrank away. “No, no,” he muttered, “not again.”
Hugh hurriedly replaced the paper. “Bad break on my part, old bean; you evidently remember rather too well. It’s quite all right,” he continued reassuringly; “no one will hurt you.” Then after a pause: “Is your name Hiram C. Potts?”
The man nodded his head doubtfully and muttered “Hiram Potts” once or twice, as if the words sounded familiar.
“Do you remember driving in a motor-car last night?” persisted Hugh.
But what little flash of remembrance had pierced the drug-clouded brain seemed to have passed; the man only stared dazedly at the speaker. Drummond tried him with a few more questions, but it was no use, and after a while he got up and moved towards the door.
“Don’t you worry, old son,” he said with a smile. “We’ll have you jumping about like a two-year-old in a couple of days.” Then he paused: the man was evidently trying to say something. “What is it you want?” Hugh leant over the bed.
“Danger, danger.” Faintly the words came, and then, with a sigh, he lay back exhausted.
With a grim smile Drummond watched the motionless figure. “I’m afraid,” he said half aloud, “that you’re rather like your medical attendant. Your only contribution to the sphere of pure knowledge is something I know already.”
He went out and quietly closed the door. And as he re-entered his sitting-room he found his servant standing motionless behind one of the curtains watching the street below.
“There’s a man, sir,” he remarked without turning round, “watching the house.”
For a moment Hugh stood still, frowning. Then he gave a short laugh. “The devil there is!” he remarked. “The game has begun in earnest, my worthy warrior, with the first nine points to us. For possession, even of a semi-dazed lunatic, is nine points of the law, is it not, James?”
His servant retreated cautiously from the curtain, and came back into the room. “Of the law—yes, sir,” he repeated enigmatically. “It is time, sir, for your morning glass of beer.”
II
At twelve o’clock precisely the bell rang, announcing a visitor, and Drummond looked up from the columns of the Sportsman as his servant came into the room.
“Yes, James,” he remarked. “I think we are at home. I want you to remain within call, and under no circumstances let our sick visitor out of your sight for more than a minute. In fact, I think you’d better sit in his room.”
He resumed his study of the paper, and James, with a curt “Very good, sir,” left the room. Almost at once he returned, and flinging open the door announced Mr. Peterson.
Drummond looked up quickly and rose with a smile.
“Good morning,” he cried. “This is a very pleasant surprise, Mr. Peterson.” He waved his visitor to a chair. “Hope you’ve had no more trouble with your car.”
Mr. Peterson drew off his gloves, smiling amiably. “None at all, thank you, Captain Drummond. The chauffeur appears to have mastered the defect.”
“It was your eye on him that did it. Wonderful thing—the human optic, as I said to your friend, Mr.—Mr. Laking. I hope that he’s quite well and taking nourishment.”
“Soft food only,” said the other genially. “Mr. Lakington had a most unpleasant accident last night—most unpleasant.”
Hugh’s face expressed his sympathy. “How very unfortunate!” he murmured. “I trust nothing serious.”
“I fear his lower jaw was fractured in two places.” Peterson helped himself to a cigarette from the box beside him. “The man who hit him must have been a boxer.”
“Mixed up in a brawl, was he?” said Drummond, shaking his head. “I should never have thought, from what little I’ve seen of Mr. Lakington, that he went in for painting the town red. I’d have put him down as a most abstemious man—but one never can tell, can one? I once knew a fellah who used to get fighting drunk on three whiskies, and to look at him you’d have put him down as a Methodist parson. Wonderful the amount of cheap fun that chap got out of life.”
Peterson flicked the ash from his cigarette into the grate. “Shall we come to the point, Captain Drummond?” he remarked affably.
Hugh looked bewildered.