Boldly he pushed past the London man and went to the room of the instrument.
Through the machine spoke one Bayliss, teniente de Melchardo—chief of THOSE in Millsborough, having charge of the tooth-drawing—el negocio dental, that was a cloak to cover great traffic in cocaine, opium and hashish. And Pépe knew this Bayliss for a man, if less subtle, even more prompt and terrible in action than Melchardo himself. But when Pépe answered with a password of Melchard's, Bayliss replied with questions in a stream—what of the venture of yesterday? Had they found the new drug? Were they safe from pursuit?
And it was well for Pépe that this questioning was broken by the hand that tore the instrument from his fingers and pushed him aside. It was Melchardo, the man of sweet odours, weak upon his feet, but strong in his mind.
When Pépe would have sidled away, Melchardo bade him keep close. Driven desperate by his enemies, he must trust what friend was at hand. "Stand by lest I need thee," he had said. "For very soon there will be hell to pay, if I act not now and with vigour."
So Pépe el Lagarto sunned himself in the window, and listened. And he heard Melchardo put the whole cuadrilla de morfinistas under orders to draw a net around the man who had fled with the precious powder of the new drug and the girl who knew too much.
"For I tell you, Señor Dicco," he said, "that it is the web of a spider. He is the great Araña that sits in the midst, to run out and to seize and to devour. It began in the Millsborough and Lowport sleeping-houses of the slant-eyed men of the sea, and spreads every day wider and wider its meshes and stays. Some day the web will cover the great towns and countries of the world, unless——"
"Unless a great Ticodromo come, Pépe. Tell thy tale quickly," said Dick.
Five parties had Melchard sent out from Millsborough; two cars, as if going to the fair and cricket match at Ecclesthorpe, or the races at Timsdale-Horton, each with four men; and three motor-cycles with sidecars, two men apiece. And their five bases, as Pépe showed upon the table with bread-crumbs, were set at Gallowstree Dip, in the hollow half-way between "The Goat in Boots" and Ecclesthorpe; again, hard by the railway-junction of Harthborough; thirdly, at the joining of the Ecclesthorpe parish-road with the highway to London; fourthly, between this and Millsborough, at "The Coach and Horses" Inn; and fifth, by Margetstowe village, where the woodland track from Monkswood Cottage runs into the seaward road over against "The Goat in Boots."
"And so, you are caught," said Pépe, "in a cage, with horse road and rail road beyond the bars."
"And you heard all this, in the talk which Melchard made with his teniente through the telephone?" asked Dick.