The Sacred Secret.
Had I ever been tempted, indeed, to think that the mission which Don José Casteno had confided to me was some small matter of a collector’s gain, I should not have done so after the part I played as sole witness of this wordless drama. The very atmosphere of the room was pregnant with mysterious suggestion of the tremendous issues that were hanging then in the balance. I knew at last, with as much certainty as though I had read the documents themselves, that these manuscripts that had dropped so carelessly from the hands of a dead monk into all the hurly-burly of a commonplace auction room were precious records that affected the lives, the happiness, the fortunes of thousands.
Again the problem stated itself: Who would triumph? And again I had to wait, for neither Peter Zouche nor John Cooper-Nassington would make any sign.
Suddenly, though, the dwarf stood up and fixed his eager, burning, avaricious eyes on me. “You, Mr Glynn,” he snapped, “are a man who knows as much about old manuscripts as most folks. I have seen your collection, and, for one who has had no means to speak of, you have done exceedingly well. Why don’t you tell this big, bullying, aggressive friend of ours what those three deeds contained? You were employed by some peculiar people to get possession of them, no matter what the cost might be. You received very explicit instructions about them. You made a clever fight for them.”
“And,” I broke in sternly, “you, sir, filled the room with a ‘knock out’ of dirty, hungry aliens from Whitechapel; and, when I grew dangerous, you and your friends did not scruple to hound me down and kidnap me. That was the way you put me out of competition and snatched your beggarly triumph, but you know as well as I do that I am ignorant of the precise contents or qualities of the documents which I was employed to make such a strenuous battle for.”
“But, sir,” he sneered, rolling back his lips and showing his toothless gums, “think of that beautiful sign outside your office: ‘Mr Hugh Glynn, Secret Investigator!’ why, nothing should be hidden from you!” And he threw out his hands with a gesture of infinite comprehensiveness and burst into a loud and offensive mocking laugh.
“Nor will this thing be a mystery to me long,” I retorted boldly, rising and striking the top of the table with my clenched fist. “You, Peter Zouche, understand that! At present I am merely a private soldier obeying the orders of a superior officer, but, by heaven! if it were not so, and I were free to handle this affair in the manner that suited me best, do you fancy you would be able to play with me like you did at the auction mart in Covent Garden, that I would walk meekly out of your shop after I had been kicked and buffeted and imprisoned, and that I would come here almost immediately afterwards and let you do your level best to jeer at me and sneer at me and treat me as a dolt or a child? No!” I thundered, “ten thousand thousand times no!
“Luckily,” I went on in a more subdued voice, “fate has given me a share in this mystery, and as soon as I am free of all the honourable obligations which I have undertaken you may be sure I shall be here to be reckoned with. Sooner or later I will make you bitterly regret this cheap scoffing of yours at my qualifications as a professional detective. I know that wonderful secrets about buried treasures and compacts between states and churches and individuals, lie hidden in those old manuscript deeds that are often left kicking about as so much idle lumber in garret and cellar and office. Nobody in London, indeed, knows better; and I will track this precious secret of yours down—”
“Enough,” struck in Cooper-Nassington in his most terrible tones. “You, Glynn, have now justified yourself. It’s the hunchback’s turn. Once again I demand of him: What has he deciphered from those three queer-looking manuscripts which he purchased this afternoon?”
Peter Zouche faltered; to my astonishment I saw that he had been conquered.