And evidently he had; for five minutes later he walked into the office of the hotel, and said to the clerk, “Make out my bill, please—I shall be leaving England at once,” and immediately thereafter walked into a telephone booth, consulted his notebook, and rang up 253480 Soho, and, on getting it, began to talk rapidly and softly to some one who understood French.
Meantime Mr. Narkom, unaware of the little powder train he had unconsciously lighted, had gone on up the stairs with his two companions—purposely avoiding the lift that he might explain matters as they went—piloted them safely to the suite occupied by “Captain Maltravers,” and at the precise moment when “Baron Rodolf de Montravanne” walked into the telephone booth, Cleek was meeting Miss Larue for the first time since those distressing days of eleven months ago, and meeting Mr. Harrison Trent for the first time ever.
Chapter XXXV
Cleek found young Trent an extremely handsome man of about three-and-thirty; of a highly strung, nervous temperament, and with an irritating habit of running his fingers through his hair when excited. Also, it seemed impossible for him to sit still for half a minute at a stretch; he must be constantly hopping up only to sit down again, and moving restlessly about as if he were doing his best to retain his composure and found it difficult with Cleek’s calm eyes fixed constantly upon him.
“I want to tell you something about that bloodstained sponge business, Mr. Cleek,” he said in his abrupt, jerky, uneasy manner. “I never heard a word about it until last night, when Miss Larue confessed her former suspicions of my dear old dad, and gave me all the details of the matter. That sponge had nothing to do with the affair at all. It was I that tucked it under the staircase where it was found, and I did so on the day before James Colliver’s disappearance. The blood that had been on it was mine, not his.”
“I see,” said Cleek, serenely. “The explanation, of course, is the good, old tried-and-true refuge of the story-writers—namely, a case of nose-bleeding, is it not?”
“Yes,” admitted Trent. “But with this difference: mine wasn’t an accidental affair at all—it was the result of getting a jolly good hiding; and I made an excuse to get away and hop out of town, so that the dad wouldn’t know about it nor see how I’d been battered. The fact is, I met one of our carmen in the upper hall. He was as drunk as a lord, and when I took him to task about it and threatened him with discharge, he said something to me that I thought needed a jolly sight more than words by way of chastisement, so I nipped off my coat and sailed into him. It turned out that he was the better man, and gave me all that I’d asked for in less than a minute’s time; so I shook hands with him, told him to bundle off home and sleep himself sober, and that if he wouldn’t say anything about the matter I wouldn’t either, and he could turn up for work in the morning as usual. Then I washed up, shoved the sponge under the staircase, and nipped off out of town; because, you know, it would make a deuced bad impression if any of the other workmen should find out that a member of the firm had been thrashed by one of the employees—and Draycott had done me up so beautifully that I was a sight for the gods.”
The thing had been so frankly confessed that, in spite of the fact of having in the beginning been rather repelled by him, Cleek could not but experience a feeling of liking for the man. “So that’s how it happened, is it?” he said, with a laugh. “It is a brave man, Mr. Trent, that will resist the opportunity to make himself a hero in the presence of the lady he loves; and I hope I may be permitted to congratulate Miss Larue on the wisdom of her choice. But now, if you please, let us get down at once to the details of the melancholy business we have in hand. Mr. Narkom has been telling me the amazing story of the boy’s visit to the building and of his strange disappearance therein, but I should like to have a few further facts, if you will be so kind. What took the boy to the building, in the first place? I am told he went there upon your invitation, but I confess that that seems rather odd to me. Why should a man of business want a boy to visit him during business hours?”
“Good Lord, man! I couldn’t have let him see what he wanted to see if he didn’t come during business hours, could I? But that’s rather ambiguous, so I’ll make haste to put it plainer. Young Stan—his Christian name is Stanley, as I suppose you know—young Stan is mad to learn the business of theatrical property making, and particularly that of the manufacture of those wax effigies, et cetera, which we supply for the use of drapers in their show windows; and as he is now sixteen and of an age to begin thinking of some trade or profession for the future, I thought it would save Miss Larue putting up a jolly big premium to have him taught outside if we took him into our business free, so I invited him to come and look round and see if he thought he’d like it when he came to look into the messy details.