In spite of the hour, the nucleus of a crowd had already gathered outside, with that peculiar instinct for the morbid which is the gift of crowds; and Storm had to fight his way to a taxi through the first batch of eager reporters.
He found the vanguard of another contingent sitting patiently on his doorstep when he got back to the Albany, and was instantly deluged with questions.
"I can give you no information at present," he repeated for the umteenth time. "Also, I want to get a couple of hours' rest before breakfast. Try your luck later."
Fifteen minutes afterwards he rolled into bed and fell at once into a calm, untroubled sleep.
He breakfasted at seven-thirty in his dressing-gown, already bathed and shaved, and he was looking as cool and fresh as if he had had nine hours' healthy slumber instead of two. The table was littered with newspapers, and folded sheets were propped up against every available support in front of him. He read while he ate. In spite of his own reticence, someone at the Yard had evidently talked unguardedly, for the stop-press columns were full of sensational hints in small closely set type.
"This will be all over the world in three hours," he said resignedly, and Inspector Teal, who had dropped in for a cup of coffee, nodded.
"I don't know that it matters much. The real point of advertising a crime is to call up the noses, and I doubt if there'll be much nosing the Triangle. Do you know, when they searched Lew he had five hundred pounds on him? You can't nose a gang who can pay that well."
Storm drove down to the hospital after breakfast to see the injured gunman, and found him confidently defiant.
"Ef yew think yew're gonna git a squeak outer me, yew sure gotten another guess comin', Cap."
Storm sat down by the side of the bed and lighted a cigarette. He had already surmised that it would be difficult to make Lew Mecklen talk, and he had the disadvantage of being on the right side of the law, which put the more obvious methods of securing information out of the question.
"I don't know what the law is in the States," he said, "and I don't know if you know what it is over here. Anyway, in England we have a thing called King's Evidence, and it's saved one or two people's necks before now."
Lew shook his head.
"Quit kiddin', son," he advised. "Yew cain't hang me fer doin' a bit of fancy shootin' around yore haid. Yew weren't injured any. All yew bulls c'n do is ter lock me up fer a time--an' then I've gotten yew all skinned a mile!"
The thought seemed to amuse him, for his big chest heaved with silent guffaws.
"You can get your sentence reduced by helping us to round up the rest of the gang," Storm pointed out. "And I can get you a longer stretch if you're obstinate."
"Yew c'n go ter hell any time," said Mecklen, and chuckled again. "Aw--mother! Take 'im outside an' tie a halo round 'is baby braow. Tell me good-bye, buddy, an' go home, or yew'll make me die laughin'! Put ole Lew in jail?" he scoffed. "I'm an Amurrican cidizen, bo, an' don't yew fergit it."
"Since when has America been using the slums of Leipzig as a breeding-ground?" inquired Storm mildly. "Mecklen, you synthetic Americans make me tired! In case you're interested, I'll say you're nothing more than a fourth-rate Hun thug, and your pal Morini's about as American as you are--which means he's a plain ornery Dago!"
He held a consultation with the house-surgeon, and was unaccountably annoyed at the report he received.
"Of course, if you insist, Captain Arden, I can do nothing; but I strongly advise against moving him."
"How long is it likely to be before we can take him away?" Storm asked, and the doctor spread out his hands.
"It may be any time," was his unsatisfactory answer. "I'll do my best to get him patched up as soon as possible--you can be sure of that. But if you move him now, you may be sued for damages later, and that wouldn't do you any good."
As Storm drove back along Piccadilly he saw that nearly every poster advertising the early editions of the evening papers bore an enlarged reproduction of the Alpha Triangle. He bought a copy of the Evening Record and found the latest Fleet Street conjectures stunted across four columns and crowned with bloodcurdling headlines.
He rang up Susan from Scotland Yard, and had the disappointment of hearing that she was already engaged for lunch.
"Lord Hannassay leaves for a holiday the day after to-morrow," she added. "He's going down through Spain, then to Teneriffe, and finishing up with a tour down the West African coast."
This was news to Storm, and, incidentally, an unexpected blessing for with Lord Hannassay out of the way a responsibility would be off his hands.
"Who are you lunching with?" he demanded jealously.
"Uncle Joe."
"Damn Uncle Joe!" snarled Storm, and her soft, amused laughter reached his ears before he hung up the receiver.
Joe Blaythwayt had come into his own. Few of the callers he interviewed that morning failed to make some remarks about the Triangle, and Joe made the best of the secondhand scraps of out-of-the-way knowledge he had acquired from Inspector Teal.
"I know criminals," he would say to the scoffers, with morbid satisfaction.
Nevertheless, the Joe Blaythwayt who discussed evil-doers and evil deeds with a Central Detective-Inspector in his leisure moments was a very different man from the Joe Blaythwayt who conducted the business of the Lombard Street branch of the City and Continental Bank. Still alert, eyes still ready to twinkle, frequent of laughter--yes. But eminently practical and business-like.
He was business-like when he held his usual weekly interview with Raegenssen in the snug little office to which the roar of traffic came but faintly.
It was a highly business-like occasion--one of those colossal moments during which the most unassuming man is justified in donning horn-rimmed spectacles and a cigar, sticking his thumbs in the armholes of his waistcoat, and generally adopting the accent and demeanour of the Man of Big Business. For Raegenssen was augmenting his account by a sum which exceeded even his ordinary weekly contributions--and they would have represented Blaythwayt's income for a year.
He dropped a wad of hundred-pound notes on the table as carelessly as a merely rich man might have paid in a handful of fivers. The manager counted them with a similar dispassionate air, and passed them over to the cashier as if they were so much waste paper; for Joe Blaythwayt was a stickler for the etiquette of his profession.
But, business over, he degenerated into a human being.
"Of course, you've seen the papers," he remarked.
The Swede nodded.
"It is ter pig bluff," he said.
He glared at the inoffensive Joe as though he suspected him of being in league with the gang.
"Plackmail!" he declared violently. "Ant I shall nod bay!"
Blaythwayt watched the departure of the huge Viking figure in its ill-fitting clothes thoughtfully.
Oscar Raegenssen drove back to Cockspur Street, where he occupied a palatial suite of offices in Scandinavia House. He sat over his desk for a long time, his big, capable hands toying with a ridiculously small pencil. Crag-like jaw outthrust, he stared truculently into space. His leonine head was set at an arrogant angle--he looked by no means an easy man to intimidate.
Presently he pressed the bell at his side, and there was a knock on the door.
"Gom!" he commanded curtly, and Mattock entered.
Raegenssen took the little bundle of pink slips from his clerk's hand and spread them out on the blotting-paper in front of him. With ponderous deliberation he scrawled his thick untidy signature in the bottom right-hand corner of each; and when he had finished he gathered them up, counted them, and studied every one minutely.
"Two are missing!"
"I have them here," Mattock said. "I've written nothing on them--they're for large sums."
"Why?"
Mattock showed his teeth.
"You forget my reputation, sir," he said gently.
Raegenssen regarded his clerk inscrutably. Mattock met the stare boldly--almost insolently. Then, without a word, Raegenssen wrote out the cheques, blotted them, and handed them back.
Although Raegenssen's were vaguely described in the directory as "Agents," the City knew them very little. It was rumoured that the Swede was a gigantic speculator in foreign exchanges, and certainly large sums of exotic currencies passed through the Scandinavia House offices and between London and the firm's correspondents in Marseilles, Lisbon, Amsterdam and Genoa.
"Next week ter will pe ingoming monies. You will nodify Amstertam as usual. That iss all. Go!"
"There was something I wanted to mention, sir, if you'll excuse me," Mattock said.
"Gondinue--yess?"
"The safe you have in the office is of an old pattern. It would be child's play to an expert safe-breaker."
"Gondinue--yess?"
"Mightn't it be wiser, sir, to get a new safe--or, better still, keep the papers at the bank? If anything should happen, the police would be after me at once. Once a man's made a break, they never let him go."
"Gondinue--yess?"
"They are rather private papers, sir?"
Cold blue eyes bored mercilessly into insolent brown ones.
"Hof you seen ter babers?"
"No, sir, but--"
"What mages you tink we hof anydings to gonceal?"
"Nothing, sir, but the private correspondence of any business--"
"Gondinue--yess?"
"That's all, sir," Mattock concluded lamely.
"Thang you. Go!"
Towards three o'clock Raegenssen rose, tidied his desk, picked up his battered felt hat.
The safe to which Mattock had taken exception stood in one corner of the room--a great massive affair that seemed to occupy half the office. It was eight feet high by three feet wide by three feet deep, and it was Oscar Raegenssen's especial joy. There was a glitter of amusement in his eyes as he comprehended its imposing bulk.
He locked the door of his sanctum and passed through the outer office where his two clerks and Mattock worked. Only Mattock was left, and he was at that moment drawing on his waterproof preparatory to departure, for Raegenssen's closed early.
"It's come on to rain, sir," he remarked. "Have you your car outside, or shall I fetch a taxi?"
"Ter gar is in St. James's Square. You will blease summon it."
Storm, endeavouring to appear interested in Inspector Teal's lengthy monologue on the psychology of the criminal, had been suddenly seized with what struck him as being an exceptionally brilliant idea. He took up the telephone and gave a number in the City.
"I want to speak to Mr. Blaythwayt, please.... Captain Arden of the Criminal Investigation Department."
He was unpleasantly conscious of Mr. Teal's curious gaze, and fervently wished that he had delayed putting his idea into practice until that portly sleuth had taken his leave.
"Hullo ... yes.... Can you see me almost immediately, Mr. Blaythwayt? This Triangle affair--it's an awful nuisance, I know; but it can't be helped.... You're just going out to lunch? ... No, I'm afraid I can't--I've got a lot of other things to attend to this afternoon. Look here, if I shan't intrude, will you lunch with me? ... Susan Hawthorne? Je-ru-salem, that's funny! ... Yes--known her for years! I remember now; you're her uncle, aren't you? ... No, I'm sure she won't mind. I'd tell you over the 'phone, but I hate invisible backchatters! ... I'll pick you up at the Record office in under ten minutes. So long!"
"She's a nice kid, that Miss Hawthorne," observed the somniloquent Mr. Teal, as Storm put down the instrument.
Storm was not inclined to be conversational on the subject.
"M'm. You know, sir, I always say a young man ought to get married. It kind of puts a kick into his work. And if there's kids, it gives him something to work for. Now, I was married when I was a youngster of twenty-two, walking my beat like any cub copper. Well, believe me, sir, it made a new man of me, and when we had our First--that was four months after----"
"Teal," said Storm awfully, "you're shocking me. Go away and blow froth."
He collected Blaythwayt at the bank, and they parked the car in Salisbury Square and proceeded on foot to the Fleet Street restaurant where Joe had arranged to meet his niece. She was surprised to see Storm, and, in his state of exaggerated self-consciousness, he thought she was a trifle displeased. Thinking things over, he realised the painful transparency of his ruse.
"I'm sorry to butt in on you like this," he said. "Fact is, it's important for me to see your uncle, and I shan't have ten consecutive free seconds this afternoon."
Joe Blaythwayt tucked his napkin into his waistcoat and beamed at them both impartially.
"Anything I can do for you, Captain Arden----"
This placed Storm in a quandary, for he hadn't the foggiest notion of an excuse for his presence. The timely arrival of an overworked waiter gave him a few minutes' respite, during which time his brain seethed frantically, and at the end of it he was prepared to be fluently plausible.
"Teal is always talking about you, Mr. Blaythwayt. He says you're a great criminologist."
"Well, I've read a bit about it," admitted Joe modestly. "It's difficult, of course, to do much as an amateur. Now, this Triangle, Captain Arden, is the very first time I've ever been mixed up in anything of the sort personally. I shall put it in my book--I'm writing a book, you know. Did Teal tell you that?"
Storm nodded. He glanced at Susan and then exerted himself not to meet her eye, for her initial annoyance had given place to quiet amusement. He felt her eyes upon him, and went hot and cold.
"And you absolutely can't remember a thing about Harchester that you could associate with the Triangle?" he asked.
"Not a thing," said Blaythwayt with a vigorous shake of his head. "Of course, some people must have been jealous--I was jolly good at Rugger in my time, and Harchester thinks more of brawn than of brains, so I became captain of the school rather out of my turn. But that's all so long ago I can't remember details. Certainly nobody disliked me to my face, whatever they may have thought."
"Who was the bird you cut out?"
Blaythwayt wrinkled his brow.
"I can remember him a bit. A big fellow, no good at games--he was so gawky everyone used to rag him about it. Bull-something ... Bull ... Bulsaid--that's it! He was brilliantly clever, I remember that. I often wonder what happened to him. He ought to have become a great scientist. But, bless you, Bulsaid never kicked. He was too quiet. One of the most easy-going fellows I've ever met."
Susan turned to Storm with a smile.
"Is Uncle's school life so terrifically important?" she asked sweetly.
"Fearfully," Storm assured her gravely.
She shook her head, and all mischief was in her eyes.
"You're forgiven," she said, and the simple Joe blinked uncomprehendingly at the laughter that followed.
The rest of the meal was delightful, and Storm listened soberly to the account of Blaythwayt's literary aspirations, interspersing the recital at intervals with the most innocent expressions of admiration.
"About this Triangle, though--seriously!" he said later. "There's going to be trouble, and it's going to be tough! You've heard what they've done already--tried to poison me, shot me up, and sent the gentle Gat gunning for Susan. And that's before they've committed a single crime against the men they've threatened. I say 'threatened,' although no threats have been put on paper in so many words. But I guess if I got one of those little valentines I'd look under my bed before I got into it, whether they said, 'This is where you get yours,' or not! What do you make of it?"
"Crime on a big scale," said Blaythwayt impressively. "It's a solid possibility, as a commercial investment, to a man with capital and genius."
Joe's simplicity was his great charm.
"As I see it, Captain Arden, criminals would never be caught if they didn't leave Clues. Consequently, in order to be a successful criminal, all you have to do is to master the art of not leaving Clues. And, as a detective, you will only run the Triangle to earth by looking for and following up Clues. The ordinary police methods of searching for Clues are inadequate. There are too many hindrances--you should be able to enter houses without search warrants, take people into custody and interrogate them on the slightest provocation, and adopt any means you choose in order to accumulate evidence. The Detective should be above the Law."
Storm shook his head.
"I'm not a pukka detective," he said, "and Teal owes me ten bob."
"Are you being funny," demanded Susan, "or is there likely to be more trouble?"
He looked at her steadily, eyes half closed, his cigarette between his lips.
"You're scared!" he said.
"Well, I'm not absolutely praying to be killed."
There was a short silence, for he had no wish to alarm her unduly. And yet, to minimise the danger would not be the thought of anyone but a born fool. He turned his eyes on Blaythwayt.
"Are you scared?"
"I can't say I've thought about it seriously," confessed Joe. "I really don't see that I have much to fear--far less, anyway, than I have to fear from bank robbers and kiters--that's an American word for bank swindlers," he explained unnecessarily. "Inspector Teal, my very good friend, always says that violent crime is foreign to this country. A few attempts by dagoes and suchlike, perhaps, but they can easily be rounded up. It's just a coincidence that a threat should have come to me. One can understand them being sent to the others. Public men are bound to receive threatening letters, but they very rarely come to anything."
Storm would have liked to point out the minor coincidences of alcohol diluted with aconite, and firework displays in Albany Court Yard and Hamilton Place, but refrained.
"What's your honest opinion, Kit?" Susan persisted.
"Oh, well, Mecklen's in hospital, and we've got Morini's description. There may be a bit of fun before he's found," he conceded easily, "but I don't think you need be afraid. I'd like you to stay with some friends of mine, though, while Hannassay's away. You don't want to be alone in that huge house--besides, it's so dull. You'll like 'em--Terry Mannering's a great lad. But don't go liking him too much, because he's already married!"
"You needn't be afraid of that," she told him coldly, and did not realise for five minutes why he smiled.
Blaythwayt pulled out his watch.
"I'm afraid I really must be off, Captain Arden. It's nearly a quarter to three--please don't think I'm rude, my dear fellow, but Business..."
When Joe Blaythwayt spoke of weighty matters he always gave the impression that he talked in capital letters.
In Salisbury Square he inspected every inch of the silver Hirondel with an almost childish awe.
"I wish I could afford a car like this," he said wistfully. "Can she Go?"
"Go?" scoffed Storm. "She's the fastest thing on wheels that you can use on the road! I've tried her up to a hundred and fifteen at Brooklands." He had an inspiration. "Get in and let's have a run--I'll be taking Susan home, anyway."
"Can we really?" said Joe, and Storm had shepherded him into the back seat before he had quite decided whether to accept the invitation.
He had, apparently, forgotten the calls of Business.
They whirled round Trafalgar Square, and Storm hesitated momentarily between Cockspur Street and the Mall. He decided on Cockspur Street, and to this day the thought of the far-reaching effects of that casual decision makes him gasp.
Oscar Raegenssen, waiting for the arrival of his luxurious Navarre cabriolet, saw a man whom he particularly wished to avoid sauntering down from Pall Mall. He looked up and down the street, but there was no sign of his car. With a slight gesture of annoyance he started to cross the road.
He stepped directly in front of the bonnet of Storm's car. The fine drizzle that was falling lay on the road like thin oil, and Storm knew at once that it would be impossible to pull up in time on the treacherous surface, for he was doing over thirty miles an hour. He wrenched the wheel over to the right as he braked, and one wing just caught Raegenssen as the Hirondel skidded round. Luckily the street was almost deserted, and the silver car turned completely round in a space of feet and fetched up against the kerb, facing back towards Trafalgar Square.
It was a magnificent piece of driving, but the most masterly driver in the world could not have saved Raegenssen from that blow.
Storm jumped from his seat and ran towards the stunned man, an excited Joe hard on his heels. He picked the Swede up in his arms and carried him to the pavement. He was loosening the clothes about Raegenssen's throat, with Blaythwayt trying ineffectually to assist, when a tall, oldish man elbowed his way through the crowd and knelt down beside him.
"Your boss, Mattock," remarked Storm briefly.
Raegenssen was not badly hurt. He was even then recovering consciousness. His eyelids flickered dazedly, and his lips framed an almost inaudible word.
"Sylvia ... Sylvia..."
"He's coming round," said Storm to the constable who had joined the group. "He stepped out right in front of me without looking where he was going, but I only grazed him."
"This gentleman is Captain Arden of the Special Branch," announced Blaythwayt pompously.
Storm was searching in his pockets for a card, and Susan saw that his jaw was tightened up so that the muscles stood out in faintly serrated knots, and his eyes were abnormally level.
Wondering, she looked at the others. Joe Blaythwayt was standing by importantly with a broad smile on his face, and yet he was trembling with excitement. Mattock had looked up from applying first aid to his employer, and was staring at one of the other two--she could not be sure which. His features were contorted, his mouth working, and there was a blaze in his eyes that set her heart pounding against her ribs like a trip-hammer.
