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The Orange Yellow Diamond

J >> J. S. Fletcher >> The Orange Yellow Diamond




"Why, of course!" the attendant answered surlily. "He'd Mr. Ayscough's
card, and--"

Mirandolet dropped the man's arm and threw up his own long white hands.

"Merciful Powers!" he vociferated. "He has stolen the diamond!"



CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE


THE MIRANDOLET THEORY

The silence that followed on this extraordinary exclamation was suddenly
broken: the mortuary keeper, who had been advancing towards a door at the
side of the room, dropped a bunch of keys. The strange metallic sound of
their falling roused Ayscough, who had started aside, and was staring,
open-mouthed, at Mirandolet's waving hands. He caught the doctor by the
arm.

"What on earth do you mean?" he growled. "Speak man--what is it?"

Mirandolet suddenly laughed.

"What is it?" he exclaimed. "Precisely what I said, in plain language!
That fellow has, of course, gone off with the diamond--worth eighty
thousand pounds! Your card!--Oh, man, man, whatever have you been doing?
Be quick!--who is this Japanese?--how came he by your card? Quick, I say!
--if you want to be after him!"

"Hanged if I know what this means!" muttered Ayscough. "As to who he is--
if he's the fellow I gave a card to, he's a young Japanese medical
student, one Yada, that was a friend of those Chinese--I called on him
tonight, with Rubinstein, to see if we could pick up a bit of information.
Of course, I sent in my professional card to him. But--we saw him set off
to the East End!"

"Bah!" laughed Mirandolet. "He has--what you call done you brown, my
friend! He came--here! And he has got away--got a good start--with that
diamond in his pocket!"

"What the devil do you mean by that?" said Ayscough, hotly. "Diamond!
Diamond! Where should he find the diamond--here? In a deadhouse? What are
you talking about?"

Mirandolet laughed again, and giving the detective a look that was very
like one of pitying contempt, turned to the amazed mortuary keeper.

"Show us that dead man!" he said.

The mortuary keeper, who had allowed his keys to lie on the floor during
this strange scene, picked them up, and selecting one, opened, and threw
back the door by which he was standing. He turned on the light in the
mortuary chamber, and Mirandolet strode in, with Ayscough, sullen and
wondering, at his heels.

Chen Li lay where the detective had last seen him, still and rigid, the
sheet drawn carefully over his yellow face. Without a word Mirandolet drew
that sheet aside, and motioning his companion to draw nearer, pointed to a
skull-cap of thin blue silk which fitted over the Chinaman's head.

"You see that!" he whispered. "You know what's beneath it!--something that
no true Chinaman ever parts with, even if he does come to Europe, and does
wear English dress and English headgear--his pigtail! Look here!"

He quietly moved the skull-cap, and showed the two astonished men a
carefully-coiled mass of black hair, wound round and round the back of the
head. And into it he slipped his own long, thin fingers--to draw them out
again with an exclamation which indicated satisfaction with his own
convictions.

"Just as I said," he remarked. "Gone! Mr. Detective--that's where Chen Li
hid the diamond--and that Japanese man has got it. And now--you'd better
be after him--half-an-hour's start to him is as good as a week's would be
to you."

He drew the sheet over the dead face and strode out, and Ayscough
followed, angry, mystified, and by no means convinced.

"Look here!" he said, as they reached the ante-room; "that's all very
well, Dr. Mirandolet, but it's only supposition on your part!"

"Supposition that you'll find to be absolute truth, my good friend!"
retorted Mirandolet, calmly. "I know the Chinese--better than you think.
As soon as I heard of this affair tonight, I came to you to put you up to
the Chinese trick of secreting things of value in their pigtails--it did
not occur to me that the diamond might be there in this case, but I
thought you would probably find something. But when we reached this
mortuary, and I heard that a Japanese had been here, presenting your card
when he had no business to present it, I guessed immediately what had
happened--and now that you tell me that you told him all about this
affair, well--I am certain of my assertion. Mr. Detective--go after the
diamond!"

He turned as if to leave the place, and Ayscough followed.

"He mayn't been after the diamond at all!" he said, still resentful and
incredulous. "Is it very likely he'd think it to be in that dead chap's
pigtail when the other man's missing? It's Chang that's got that diamond--
not Chen."

"All right, my friend!" replied Mirandolet. "Your wisdom is superior to
mine, no doubt. So--I wish you good-night!"

He strode out of the place and turned sharply up the street, and Ayscough,
after a growl or two, went back to the mortuary keeper.

"How long was that Jap in there?" he asked, nodding at the death chamber.

"Not a minute, Mr. Ayscough!" replied the man. "In and out again, as you
might say."

"Did he say anything when he came out?" enquired the detective.

"He did--two words," answered the keeper. "He said, 'That's he!' and
walked straight out, and into his car."

"And when he came he told you I'd sent him?" demanded Ayscough.

"Just that--and showed me your card," assented the man. "Of course, I'd no
reason to doubt his word."

"Look here, George!" said Ayscough, "you keep this to yourself! Don't say
anything to any of our folks if they come in. I don't half believe what
that doctor said just now--but I'll make an enquiry or two. Mum's the
word, meanwhile. You understand, George?"

George answered that he understood very well, and Ayscough presently left
him. Outside, in the light of the lamp set over the entrance to the
mortuary, he pulled out his watch. Twelve o'clock--midnight. And
somewhere, that cursed young Jap was fleeing away through the London
streets--having cheated him, Ayscough, at his own game!

He had already reckoned things up in connection with Yada. Yada had been
having him--even as Melky Rubinstein had suspected and suggested--all
through that conversation at Gower Street. Probably, Yada, from his window
in the drawing-room floor of his lodging-house, had watched him and Melky
slip across the street and hide behind the hoarding opposite. And then
Yada had gone out, knowing he was to be followed, and had tricked them
beautifully, getting into an underground train going east, and, in all
certainty, getting out again at the next station, chartering a cab, and
returning west--with Ayscough's card in his pocket.

But Ayscough knew one useful thing--he had memorized the letters and
numbers of the taxi-cab in which Yada had sped by him and Mirandolet, L.C.
2571--he had kept repeating that over and over. Now he took out his note-
book and jotted it down--and that done he set off to the police-station,
intent first of all on getting in touch with New Scotland Yard by means of
the telephone.

Ayscough, like most men of his calling in London, had a considerable
amount of general knowledge of things and affairs, and he summoned it to
his aid in this instance. He knew that if the Japanese really had become
possessed of the orange and yellow diamond (of which supposition, in spite
of Mirandolet's positive convictions, he was very sceptical) he would most
certainly make for escape. He would be off to the Continent, hot foot.
Now, Ayscough had a good acquaintance with the Continental train services
--some hours must elapse before Yada could possibly get a train for Dover,
or Folkstone, or Newhaven, or the shortest way across, or to any other
ports such as Harwich or Southampton, by a longer route. Obviously, the
first thing to do was to have the stations at Victoria, and Charing Cross,
and Holborn Viaduct, and London Bridge carefully watched for Yada. And for
two weary hours in the middle of the night he was continuously at work on
the telephone, giving instructions and descriptions, and making
arrangements to spread a net out of which the supposed fugitive could not
escape.

And when all that was at last satisfactorily arranged, Ayscough was
conscious that it might be for nothing. He might be on a wrong track
altogether--due to the suspicions and assertions of that queer man,
Mirandolet. There might be some mystery--in Ayscough's opinion there
always was mystery wherever Chinese or Japanese or Hindus were concerned.
Yada might have some good reason for wishing to see Chen Li's dead body,
and have taken advantage of the detective's card to visit it. This
extraordinary conduct might be explained. But meanwhile Ayscough could not
afford to neglect a chance, and tired as he was, he set out to find the
driver of the taxicab whose number he had carefully set down in his
notebook.

There was little difficulty in this stage of the proceedings; it was
merely a question of time, of visiting a central office and finding the
man's name and address. By six o'clock in the morning Ayscough was at a
small house in a shabby street in Kentish Town, interviewing a woman who
had just risen to light her fire, and was surlily averse to calling up a
husband, who, she said, had not been in bed until nearly four. She was not
any more pleased when Ayscough informed her of his professional status--
but the man was fetched down.

"You drove a foreigner--a Japanese--to the mortuary in Paddington last
night?" said Ayscough, plunging straight into business, after telling the
man who he was. "I saw him--just a glimpse of him--in your cab, and I took
your number. Now, where did you first pick him up?"

"Outside the Underground, at King's Cross," replied the driver promptly.

This was precisely what Ayscough had expected; so far, so good; his own
prescience was proving sure.

"Anything wrong, mister?" asked the driver.

"There may be," said Ayscough. "Well--you picked him up there, and drove
him straight to the mortuary?"

"No--I didn't," said the man. "We made a call first. Euston. He went in
there, and, I should say, went to the left luggage office, 'cause he came
back again with a small suit-case--just a little 'un. Then we went on to
that mortuary."

Euston! A small suit-case! More facts--Ayscough made notes of them.

"Well," he said, "and when you drove away from the mortuary, where did you
go then?"

"Oxford Circus," answered the driver, "set him down--his orders--right
opposite the Tube Station--t'other side of the street."

"Did you see which way he went--then?" enquired Ayscough.

"I did. Straight along Oxford Street--Tottenham Court Road way," said the
driver, "carrying his suitcase--which it was, as I say, on'y a little 'un
--and walking very fast. Last I see of him was that, guv'nor."

Ayscough went away and got back to more pretentious regions. He was dead
tired and weary with his night's work, and glad to drop in at an early-
opened coffee-shop and get some breakfast. While he ate and drank a boy
came in with the first editions of the newspapers. Ayscough picked one up
--and immediately saw staring headlines:--

THE PADDINGTON MYSTERIES.
NEW AND STARTLING FEATURES.
DIAMOND WORTH £80,000 BEING LOOKED FOR
MURDER IN MAIDA VALE

Ayscough laid down the paper and smiled. Levendale--if not dead--could
scarcely fail to see that!



CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO


ONE O'CLOCK MIDNIGHT

Five minutes after Ayscough had gone away with Dr. Mirandolet the hotel
servant who had summoned him from Purdie's sitting-room knocked at the
door for the second time and put a somewhat mystified face inside.

"Beg pardon, sir," he said, glancing at Purdie, who was questioning Melky
Rubinstein as to the events of the evening in their relation to the house
in Maida Vale. "Two ladies outside, sir--waiting to see you. But they
don't want to come in, sir, unless they know who's here--don't want to
meet no strangers, sir."

Purdie jumped to his feet, and putting the man aside looked into the
dimly-lighted corridor. There, a few paces away, stood Zillah--and, half
hidden by her, Mrs. Goldmark.

"Come in--come in!" he exclaimed. "Nobody here but Andie Lauriston and
Melky Rubinstein. You've something to tell--something's happened?"

He ushered them into the room, sent the hotel servant, obviously in a
state of high curiosity about these happenings, away, and closed the door.

"S'elp me!" exclaimed Melky, "there ain't no other surprises, Zillah? You
ain't come round at this time o' night for nothing! What you got to tell,
Zillah?--another development?"

"Mrs. Goldmark has something to tell," answered Zillah. "We didn't know
what to do, and you didn't come, Melky--nobody come--and so we locked the
house and thought of Mr. Purdie. Mrs. Goldmark has seen somebody!"

"Who?" demanded Melky. "Somebody, now? What somebody?"

"The man that came to her restaurant," replied Zillah. "The man who lost
the platinum solitaire!"

Mrs. Goldmark who had dropped into the chair which Purdie had drawn to the
side of the table for her, wagged her head thoughtfully.

"This way it was, then," she said, with a dramatic suggestion of personal
enjoyment in revealing a new feature of the mystery, "I have a friend who
lives in Stanhope Street--Mrs. Isenberg. She sends to me at half-past-ten
to tell me she is sick. I go to see her--immediate. I find her very
poorly--so! I stop with her till past eleven, doing what I can. Then her
sister, she comes--I can do no more--I come away. And I walk through
Sussex Square, as my road back to Praed Street and Zillah. But before I am
much across Sussex Square, I stop--sudden, like that! For what? Because--I
see a man! That man! Him what drops his cuff-link on my table. Oh, yes!"

"You're sure it was that man, Mrs. Goldmark?" enquired Melky, anxiously.
"You don't make no mistakes, so?"

"Do I mistake myself if I say I see you, Mr. Rubinstein?" exclaimed Mrs.
Goldmark, solemnly and with emphasis. "No, I don't make no mistakes at
all. Is there not gas lamps?--am I not blessed with good eyes? I see him--
like as I see you there young gentleman and Zillah. Plain!"

"Well--and what was he doing?" asked Purdie, desirous of getting at facts.
"Did he come out of a house, or go into one, or--what?"

"I tell you," replied Mrs. Goldmark, "everything I tell you--all in good
time. It is like this. A taxicab comes up--approaching me. It stops--by
the pavement. Two men--they get out. Him first. Then another. They pay the
driver--then they walk on a little--just a few steps. They go into a
house. The other man--he lets them into that house. With a latch-key. The
door opens--shuts. They are inside. Then I go to Zillah and tell her what
I see. So!"

The three young men exchanged glances, and Purdie turned to the informant.

"Mrs. Goldmark," he said, "did you know the man who opened the door?"

"Not from another!" replied Mrs. Goldmark. "A stranger to me!"

"Do you know Mr. Levendale--by sight?" asked Purdie.

"Often, since all this begins, I ask myself that question," said Mrs.
Goldmark, "him being, so to speak, a neighbour. No, that I do not, not
being able to say he was ever pointed out to me."

"Well, you can describe the man who pulled out his latch-key and opened
the door, anyhow," remarked Purdie. "You took a good look at him, I
suppose!"

"And a good one," answered Mrs. Goldmark. "He was one of our people--I saw
his nose and his eyes. And I was astonished to see so poor-looking a man
have a latch-key to so grand a mansion as that!--he was dressed in poor
clothes, and looked dirty and mean."

"A bearded dark man?" suggested Purdie.

"Not at all," said Mrs. Goldmark. "A clean-shaved man--though dark he
might be."

Purdie looked at Melky and shook his head.

"That's not Levendale!" he said, "Clean-shaven! Levendale's bearded and
mustached--and I should say a bit vain of his beard. Um! you're dead
certain, Mrs. Goldmark, about the other man?"

"As that I tell you this," insisted Mrs. Goldmark. "I see him as plain as
what I see him when he calls at my establishment and leaves his jewellery
on my table. Oh, yes--I don't make no mistake, Mr. Purdie."

Purdie looked again at Melky--this time with an enquiry in his glance.

"Don't ask me, Mr. Purdie!" said Melky. "I don't know what to say. Sounds
like as if these two went into Levendale's house. But what man would have
a latch-key to that but Levendale himself? More mystery!--ain't I full of
it already? Now if Mr. Ayscough hadn't gone away--"

"Look here!" said Purdie, coming to a sudden decision, "I'm going round
there. I want to know what this means--I'm going to know. You ladies had
better go home. If you others like to come as far as the corner of Sussex
Square, come. But I'm going to Levendale's house alone. I'll find
something out."

He said no more until, Zillah and Mrs. Goldmark having gone homeward, and
he and his two companions having reached a side street leading into Sussex
Square, he suddenly paused and demanded their attention!

"I've particular reasons for wanting to go into that house alone," he
said. "There's no danger--trust me. But--if I'm not out again in a quarter
of an hour or so, you can come there and ask for me. My own impression is
that I shall find Levendale there. And--as you're aware, Andie--I know
Levendale." He left them standing in the shadow of a projecting portico
and going up to Levendale's front door, rang the bell. There was no light
in any of the windows; all appeared to be in dead stillness in the house;
somewhere, far off in the interior, he heard the bell tinkle. And
suddenly, as he stood waiting and listening, he heard a voice that sounded
close by him and became aware that there was a small trap or grille in the
door, behind which he made out a face.

"Who is that?" whispered the voice.

"John Purdie--wanting to see Mr. Levendale," he answered promptly.

The door was just as promptly opened, and as Purdie stepped within was as
quickly closed behind him. At the same instant the click of a switch
heralded a flood of electric light, and he started to see a man standing
at his side--a man who gave him a queer, deprecating smile, a man who was
not and yet who was Levendale.

"Gracious me!" exclaimed Purdie, "it isn't--"

"Yes!" said Levendale, quietly. "But it is, though! All right, Purdie--
come this way."

Purdie followed Levendale into a small room on the right of the hall--a
room in which the remains of a cold, evidently impromptu supper lay on a
table lighted by a shaded lamp. Two men had been partaking of that supper,
but Levendale was alone. He gave his visitor another queer smile, and
pointed, first to a chair and then to a decanter.

"Sit down--take a drink," he said. "This is a queer meeting! We haven't
seen each other since--"

"Good God, man!" broke in Purdie, staring at his host. "What's it all
mean? Are you--disguised?"

Levendale laughed--ruefully--and glanced at the mean garments which Mrs.
Goldmark had spoken of.

"Necessity!" he said. "Had to! Ah!--I've been through some queer times--
and in queer places. Look here--what do you know?"

"Know!" cried Purdie. "You want me to tell you all I know--in a sentence?
Man!--it would take a month! What do you know? That's more like it!"

Levendale passed a hand across his forehead--there was a weariness in his
gesture which showed his visitor that he was dead beat.

"Aye, just so!" he said. "But--tell me! has John Purvis come looking for
his brother?"

"He has!" answered Purdie. "He's in London just now."

"Has he told about that diamond?--told the police?" demanded Levendale.

"He has!" repeated Purdie. "That's all known. Stephen Purvis--where is
he?"

"Upstairs--asleep--dead tired out," said Levendale. "We both are! Night
and day--day and night--I could fall on this floor and sleep--"

"You've been after that diamond?" suggested Purdie.

"That--and something else," said Levendale.

"Something else?" asked Purdie. "What then?"

"Eighty thousand pounds," answered Levendale. "Just that!"

Purdie stood staring at him. Then he suddenly put a question.

"Do you know who murdered that old man in Praed Street?" he demanded.
"That's what I'm after."

"No!" said Levendale, promptly. "I don't even know that he was murdered!"
He, too, stared at his visitor for a moment; then "But I know more than a
little about his being robbed," he added significantly.

Purdie shook his head. He was puzzled and mystified beyond measure.

"This is getting too deep for me!" he said. "You're the biggest mystery of
all, Levendale. Look here!" he went on. "What are you going to do? This
queer disappearance of yours--this being away--coming back without your
beard and dressed like that!--aren't you going to explain? The police--"

"Yes!" said Levendale. "Ten o'clock this morning--the police-station. Be
there--all of you--anybody--anybody who likes--I'm going to tell the
police all I know. Purvis and I, we can't do any more--baffled, you
understand! But now--go away, Purdie, and let me sleep--I'm dead done
for!"

Within ten minutes of leaving them, Purdie was back with Lauriston and
Melky Rubinstein, and motioning them away from Sussex Square.

"That's more extraordinary than the rest!" he said, as they all moved off.
"Levendale's there, in his own house, right enough! And he's shaved off
his beard and mustache, and he's wearing tramp's clothes and he and
Stephen Purvis have been looking night and day, for that confounded
diamond, and for eighty thousand pounds! And--what's more, Levendale does
not know who killed Daniel Multenius or that he was murdered! But, by
George, sirs!" he added, as high above their heads the clock of St.
James's Church struck one, "he knows something big!--and we've got to wait
nine hours to hear it!"



CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE


SECRET WORK

The inner room of the police-station, at ten o'clock that morning, was
full of men. Purdie, coming there with Lauriston at five minutes before
the hour, found Melky Rubinstein hanging about the outer door, and had
only just time to warn his companion to keep silence as to their midnight
discovery before Guyler and John Purvis drove up in one cab and Mr.
Killick in another. Inside, Ayscough, refreshed by his breakfast and an
hour's rest, was talking to the inspector and the man from New Scotland
Yard--all these looked enquiringly at the group which presently crowded in
on them.

"Any of you gentlemen got any fresh news?" demanded the inspector, as he
ran his eye over the expectant faces "No?--well, I suppose you're all
wanting to know if we have?" He glanced at Ayscough, who was pointing out
certain paragraphs in one of the morning newspapers to the Scotland Yard
man. "The fact is," he continued, "there have been queer developments
since last night--and I don't exactly know where we are! My own opinion is
that we'd better wait a few hours before saying anything more definite--to
my mind, these newspapers are getting hold of too much news--giving
information to the enemy, as it were. I think you'd all better leave
things to us, gentlemen--for a while." There was rather more than a polite
intimation in this that the presence of so many visitors was not wanted--
but John Purvis at once assumed a determined attitude.

"I want to know exactly what's being done, and what's going to be done,
about my brother!" he said. "I'm entitled to that! That's the job I came
about--myself--as for the rest--"

"Your brother's here!" said Purdie, who was standing by the window and
keeping an eye on the street outside. "And Mr. Levendale with him--hadn't
you better have them straight in?" he went on, turning to the inspector.
"They both look as if they'd things to tell."

But Ayscough had already made for the door and within a moment was
ushering in the new arrivals. And Purdie was quick to note that the
Levendale who entered, a sheaf of morning papers in his hand, was a vastly
different Levendale to the man he had seen nine hours before, dirty,
unkempt, and worn out with weariness. The trim beard and mustache were
hopelessly lost, and there were lines on Levendale's face which they
concealed, but Levendale himself was now smartly groomed and carefully
dressed, and business-like, and it was with the air of a man who means
business that he strode into the room and threw a calm nod to the
officials.

"Now, Inspector," he said, going straight to the desk, while Stephen
Purvis turned to his brother. "I see from the papers that you've all been
much exercised about Mr. Purvis and myself--it just shows how a couple of
men can disappear and give some trouble before they're found. But here we
are!--and why we're here is because we're beaten--we took our own course
in trying to find our own property--and we're done! We can do no more--and
so we come to you."

"You should have come here at first, Mr. Levendale," said the Inspector, a
little sourly. "You'd have saved a lot of trouble--to yourselves as well
as to us. But that's neither here nor there--I suppose you've something to
tell us, sir?"

"Before I tell you anything," replied Levendale, "I want to know
something." He pointed to the morning papers which he had brought in.
"These people," he said, "seem to have got hold of a lot of information--
all got from you, of course. Now, we know what we're after--let's put it
in a nutshell. A diamond--an orange-yellow diamond--worth eighty thousand
pounds, the property of Mr. Stephen Purvis there. That's item one! But
there's another. Eighty thousand pounds in bank-notes!--my property. Now--
have any of you the least idea who's got the diamond and my money? Come!"

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