Mr. Fortune's Practice. H. C. Bailey
surprised, he was bewildered. “Say it again slowly and distinctly,” he entreated, and when that was done he was as one who tries not to laugh. “And very nice too. My dear fellow, what more do you want? There’s a story for you.”
“Well, it’s never been officially denied,” said the young man.
“Fancy that!” Reggie chuckled.
“But between ourselves, Mr. Fortune——”
“It’s a great story,” Reggie chuckled. “But really—Well, I ask you!” and he slid away.
In the hotel lounge he found Bell and Lomas and cocktails. “Pleasure before business, as ever,” he reproached them, and ordered one for himself.
“And what have you been doing, then?” Lomas asked.
“I have been consoling the Fourth Estate. That great institution the Press, Mr. Lomas, sir. Through one of Gilligan’s young lions. Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings——”
“I wish you wouldn’t talk to reporters,” Lomas complained.
“You’re so haughty. By the way, what was Ludlow Blenkinhorn doing here?” He referred to a solicitor of more ability than standing. “Osbert was here and his solicitor, the young Deans and their solicitor. Who was old Blenkinhorn representing?”
Bell and Lomas looked at each other. “Didn’t see the fellow,” said Lomas.
“Mr. Fortune’s quite right, sir. Blenkinhorn was standing with the public. And that’s odd, too.”
“Highly odd. Lomas, my dear old thing, I wish you’d watch Blenkinhorn’s office and Osbert’s flat for any chaps who look a bit exotic, a bit foreign—and follow him up if you find one.”
Lomas groaned. “Surely we’ve done with the case.”
“Ye-es. But there’s some fellow who hasn’t. And he has a pretty taste in poisons. And he’s still wanting papers.”
“We’ve nothing to act on, you know,” Lomas protested.
“Oh, not a thing, not a thing. But he might have.” Lomas nodded and Superintendent Bell went to the telephone.
When Mr. Fortune read “The Daily Post” in the morning he smiled upon his devilled kidneys. Its report of the inquest was begun with a little pompous descriptive work. “The mystery of the Ascot Tragedy was solved yesterday. In the cold sanity of the coroner’s court the excitement of the last few days received its quietus. Two minutes of scientific evidence from Mr. Fortune—” and so on until young omniscience worked up to its private little scoop. “The melodramatic rumours of sensational developments in the case have thus only availed to expose the fatuity of their inventors.” (This was meant for some rival papers.) “It may now be stated bluntly that nothing in the case ever gave rise to speculation among well-informed people, and that the stories of impounding documents and so forth have no foundation in fact.”
But about lunch time Mr. Fortune received a curt summons from the Hon. Sidney Lomas and instantly obeyed it. “Well, you know, I thought I should be hearing from you,” he smiled. “I felt, as it were, you couldn’t live without me long.”
“Did you, by Jove!” said Lomas bitterly. “I’ve been wishing all the morning you had been dead some time. Look at that!” He tossed across the table a marked copy of “The Daily Post.”
“Yes, I was enjoying that at breakfast. A noble institution, the British Press, Lomas. A great power. If you know how to use it.”
“I wish to God you wouldn’t spoof reporters. It’s a low taste. And it’s a damned nuisance. I can’t contradict the rag and——”
“No, you can’t contradict it. I banked on that,” Reggie chuckled.
“Did you indeed? And pray what the devil are you at? I have had Osbert here raving mad——”
“Yes, I thought it would stir up Osbert. What’s his line?”
“Wants the papers, of course. And as you very well know, confound you, they’re all at the Foreign Office, the cream of them, and likely to be. He says we’ve no right to keep them after this. Nonsense, of course, but devilish inconvenient to answer. And at last the old man was quite pathetic, says it isn’t fair to him to give out we haven’t touched the papers. No more it is. He was begging me to contradict it officially. I could hardly get rid of him.”
“Busy times for Lomas.”
“Damme, I have been at it all the morning. Old Ludlow Blenkinhorn turned up, too.”
“I have clicked, haven’t I?” Reggie chuckled.
“Confound you. He says he has a client with claims on the estate and is informed by the executor that all papers have been taken by us. Now he has read your damned article and he wants to know if the executor is lying.”
“That is a conundrum, isn’t it? And who is Mr. Ludlow Blenkinhorn’s client?”
“He didn’t say, of course.”
“What a surprise. And your fellows watching his office, do they say?”
Lomas took up a scrap of paper. “They have sent us something. A man of foreign or mulatto appearance called on him first thing this morning. Was followed to a Bayswater lodging-house. Is known there as Sherif. Mr. A. Sherif. Thought to be an Egyptian.”
“The negro or Hamitic heel!” Reggie murmured. “Do you remember, Lomas old thing?”
“Good Gad!” Lomas dropped his eyeglass. “But what the devil can we do?”
“Watch and pray,” said Reggie. “Your fellows watch Sherif and Blenkinhorn and Osbert and you pray. Do you pray much, Lomas?”
They went in fact to lunch. They were not long back when a detective speaking over the telephone reported that a man of mulatto appearance had called on Colonel Osbert. Reggie sprang up. “Come on, Lomas. We’ll have them in the act and bluff the whole thing out of them.”
“What act?”
“Collusion. This Egyptian-Syrian-negroid-Young Turk and the respectable executor. Come on, man.”
In five minutes they were mounting to Colonel Osbert’s flat. His servant could not say whether Colonel Osbert was at home. Lomas produced his card. “Colonel Osbert will see me,” he announced, and fixed the man with a glassy stare.
“Well, sir, I beg pardon, sir. There’s a gentleman with him.”
“At once,” said Lomas and walked into the hall.
The man still hesitated. From one of the rooms could be heard voices in some excitement. Lomas and Reggie made for that door. But as they approached there was a cry, a horrible shrill cry, and the sound of a scuffle. Reggie sprang forward. Some one rushed out of the room and Reggie, the smaller man, went down before him. Lomas clutched at him and was kicked in the stomach. The fellow was off. Reggie picked himself out of the hatstand and ran after him. Lomas, in a heap, gasping and hiccoughing, fumbled in his pocket. “B-b-blow,” he stammered to the stupefied servant, and held out a whistle. “Like hell. Blow!”
A long peal sounded through the block of flats.
Down below a solid man strolled out of the porter’s lodge just as a gentleman of dark complexion and large feet was hurrying through the door. The solid man put out a leg. Another solid man outside received the gentleman on his bosom. They had then some strenuous moments. By the time Reggie reached them three hats were on the ground, but a pair of handcuffs clasped the coffee-coloured wrists.
“His pockets,” Reggie panted, “his waistcoat pockets.”
The captive said something which no one understood, and struggled. One of the detectives held out a small white-metal case. Reggie