“After that, M. Lowenthal, you will see for yourself that you cannot plead ignorance of the affair. Let me advise you for your own sake to be open with me.”
The man pulled himself together. He wiped his brow as he replied earnestly, but in somewhat shaky accents:
“That I haf met Blessington, Sime, and Dangle I do not deny, though they were Merkel’s friends—not mine. But I do not know that they are criminal. Dangle, he called here and asked Merkel to take him on the next”—he hesitated for a word—“next work, next sail of the sheep. Merkel said that Dangle iss a writer—he writes books. He weeshed to see the sail to Casablanca to deescribe it in hiss book. Merkel said he would haf to pay fare, the firm could not afford it unless. Dangle agreed. Merkel was going himself, and Dangle suggested Sime and Blessington go also to make party—to play cards. Of a second Dangle I know nothing. They went secretly—I admit it—because the law forbids to take passengers for sail without a certificate. That is all of the affair.”
Not a single word of this statement did French believe, but he saw that unless he could get some further information, or surprise this Lowenthal into some more damaging admission, he could not have him arrested. After all, the story hung together. Merkel might conceivably be playing his own game, and have pitched the yarn of the author out for copy to his partner. The contravention of the shipping laws would undoubtedly account for the secrecy with which the start was made. Certainly there was no evidence to bring before a jury.
French proceeded to question the junior partner with considerable thoroughness, but he could not shake his statement. The only additional facts he learned were that the L’Escaut was going to Casablanca on the order of the Moroccan Government to load up a cargo of agricultural samples for the Italian market, and that M. Merkel was accompanying it simply as a holiday trip.
With this French had to be content, and he went to the post office, and got through on the long distance telephone to his chief at the Yard. To him he repeated the essentials of the tale, asking him to inquire from the Moroccan authorities as to the truth of their portion of it, as well as to endeavor to trace the L’Escaut.
On leaving the post office, it occurred to him that communication with the L’Escaut should be possible by wireless, and he returned to the Rue des Tanneurs to ascertain this point. There he was told that just after he had left M. Lowenthal had received a telephone call, requiring his immediate presence in Holland, and he had with a great rush caught the afternoon express for the Dutch capital.
“Skedaddled, by Jove!” said French to himself. “Guess that lets in the Belgian police.”
He called at headquarters, and saw the officer in charge, and before he left to catch the connection for London, it had been arranged that the movements of the junior partner should be gone into, and a watch kept for the return of that enterprising weaver of fairy tales.