The Complete Works of H. C. McNeile "Sapper". Sapper
hat, girl," cried the German, waving his arms at her. She went to get it, and from behind her back came the noise of a key turning. "Ach! my friend—no one will disturb you," rumbled the German. "No need to your door lock."
Mechanically he took the hat the parlourmaid was holding out, while he still continued muttering to himself. "What is the good? one mistake, and you will experiment no more. You and your house will go sky-high."
Still waving his arms, he shambled off down the street, and the girl stood watching him. And it was just after he had turned the corner and she was expressing her opinion of his appearance to the cook, who was taking a breather in the area below, that she was hurled forward flat on her face. A terrific explosion shook the house; windows broke; plaster and pictures came crashing down.
And if it was bad in the front, it was immeasurably worse at the back. A huge hole had been blown in the outside wall of what had once been the Professor's laboratory; the three inside walls had collapsed, and the ceiling had descended, bringing with it a bed, two wardrobes, and a washing-stand complete.
In fact there was every justification for the remark of the parlourmaid as she picked herself up.
"Lumme! what's the old fool done now? I suppose he'll ring the bell in a minute and ask me to sweep up the mess."
An hour later Edward Blackton was seated at his desk in the house in the quiet square. Up to date his scheme had gone even more smoothly than he had expected, though there were still one or two small points to be attended to before he could retire from observation and devote himself to the Professor. There was bound to be an inquest, for instance, and he was far too big a man not to realise that it might be fatal for him not to attend it. Moreover, there was the little matter of that extra quarter of a million from the Metropolitan Syndicate.
But just at the moment Lewisham was occupying his mind. A note in cipher on the table in front of him from Freyder informed him that Henry Lewisham was a married man, and that he lived in South Kensington. And since the appearance of the late Mr Lewisham betokened his immense respectability, there was but little doubt that Mrs Lewisham would become seriously alarmed if her spouse absented himself for the night from the conjugal roof without any word to her.
Blackton pressed a bell on his desk twice, and a moment or two later the man who had been staring into the shop-window, and to whom he had spoken as he left the Metropolitan Syndicate earlier in the day, entered.
"That man you followed this morning—Lewisham: did he go home to lunch?"
"No, Chief. He had a chop in a restaurant in the city."
"Did he use the telephone as far as you know?"
"I know he didn't use it. He was never out of my sight from the time he came into the street till he went into Goodman's house."
Blackton nodded as if satisfied.
"Go to Euston, and send a wire to this address. 'Called North on urgent business, Henry.' Then go to the Plough Inn in Liverpool, and wait there for further orders. Draw fifty pounds for expenses"—he scribbled his signature on a slip of paper—"and it is possible you will have to start for South America at a moment's notice. If you do, it will be necessary for you to make yourself up to an approximate resemblance of Henry Lewisham, and your berth will be taken in his name."
"I didn't have a chance of studying his face very closely, Chief," said the man doubtfully.
Blackton waved his hand in dismissal.
"Approximate resemblance, I said," he remarked curtly. "You will receive full instructions later. Go."
He lay back in his chair as the door closed behind the man, and pulled thoughtfully at his cigar. A merciful fact, he reflected, that it is not a police offence for a man to run away from his wife. In fact if Mrs Lewisham was anything like Mr Lewisham, it could hardly be regarded as an offence at all by any disinterested person, but rather as an example of praiseworthy discretion. A letter in due course from Liverpool stating his intention; a resemblance sufficient to cope with a wireless description in case the lady should think of such a thing—and finally complete disappearance in South America. An easy place to disappear in—South America, reflected Mr Blackton; a fact he had made use of on several occasions, when the circumstances had been similar. And it was better for sorrowing relatives to picture their dear one alive and wandering through primeval forests in Brazil, or dallying with nitrates in Chile, than for them to realise that the dear one was very, very dead. It was also better for Mr Blackton.
He dismissed the unfortunate Lewisham from his mind, and produced from his pocket the papers he had taken from Professor Goodman before removing his clothes. The first thing he saw, to his intense satisfaction, was the warning typewritten letter, and holding a match under one corner of it he reduced it to ashes and finally to powder. Two or three private letters he treated similarly, and then he came to a dozen loose sheets of paper covered with incomprehensible scrawling hieroglyphics. These he carefully pinned together and put in his pocket, reflecting yet again on the extreme goodness of fate. And then for the second time he took from the drawer where he had placed it for safety the metal retort which apparently played such an important part in the process. He had found it standing on the electric furnace in the Professor's laboratory, and now he examined it curiously. It was about double the size of an ordinary tumbler, and was made of some dull opaque substance which resembled dirty pewter. And as Blackton looked at it and realised the incredible fortune that was soon to come to him out of that uninteresting—looking pot, his hand shook uncontrollably.
He replaced it in the drawer, as someone knocked on the door. It was the man who had spoken to him outside the Professor's house.
"They're all humming like a hive of bees, Chief," he remarked. "The police are in, and they've cleared away the debris. I managed to get in and have a look—and it's all right."
"You're certain of that," said Blackton quietly.
"There's nothing left of him, Chief, except a boot in one corner."
Blackton rubbed his hands together. "Excellent—excellent! You've done very well: cash this downstairs."
Again he scribbled his initials on a slip of paper, and pushing it across the table dismissed the man. Assuredly luck was in, though as a general rule Blackton refused to allow the existence of such a thing. The big man, according to him, made allowance for every possible contingency; only the fool ever trusted to luck if anything of importance was at stake. And in this case he only regarded his luck as being in because he would be able, as far as he could see, to carry on with the simplest of the three schemes which he had worked out to meet different emergencies should they arise. And though he had employed enough explosive to shatter ten men, no man knew better than he did how capricious it was in its action.
Now he was only waiting for one thing more—a telephone call from Freyder. He glanced at his watch: hardly time as yet, perhaps, for him to have reached his destination and to get through to London. In fact it was twenty minutes before the bell rang at his side.—"Everything gone without a hitch."
Freyder was speaking, and with a gentle sigh of pure joy for work well and truly done Mr Blackton laid down the receiver.
Half an hour later he was strolling along Pall Mall towards his club. A newsboy passed him shouting. "'Orrible explosion in 'Ampstead," and he paused to buy a copy. It had occurred to him that it is always a good thing to have something to read in the cooler rooms of a Turkish bath. And he never went into the hotter ones; there were peculiarities about Mr Edward Blackton's face which rendered great heat a trifle ill-advised.
IV. — IN WHICH MR WILLIAM ROBINSON
ARRIVES AT HIS COUNTRY SEAT
The report made to Mr Blackton on the condition of the Professor's house was certainly justified. It looked just as if a heavy aeroplane bomb had registered a direct hit on the back of the premises. And the damage was continually increasing. The whole fabric of the