A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

The Orange Yellow Diamond

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




"I know nothing of it," said Lauriston, "I saw no one."

Just then Melky came in. He glanced at the cheque and the bank-notes lying
on the table, and nodded to Lauriston as if he understood their presence.
Then he turned to Ayscough, almost anxiously.

"I say, Mr. Ayscough!" he said, deprecatingly. "You ain't going to be so
unkind as to mix up this here young fellow in what's happened. S'elp me,
Mr. Ayscough, I couldn't believe anything o' that sort about him, nohow--
nor would my cousin, Zillah, what you know well enough, neither; he's as
quiet as a lamb, Mr. Ayscough, is Mr. Lauriston--ain't I known him,
lodging here as he does, this many a month? I'll give my word for him,
anyway, Mr. Ayscough! And you police gentlemen know me. Don't you now, Mr.
Ayscough?"

"Very well indeed, my boy!" agreed the detective, heartily. "And I'll tell
you what--I shall have to trouble Mr. Lauriston to go round with me to the
station, just to give a formal account of what happened, and a bit of
explanation, you know--I'm satisfied myself about him, and so, no doubt,
will our people be, but you come with us, Melky, and say a word or two--
say you've known him for some time, d'ye see--it'll help."

"Anything to oblige a friend, Mr. Ayscough," said Melky. He motioned to
Lauriston to put his money in his pocket. "Glad to see your letters turned
up," he whispered as they went downstairs. "I say!--a word in your ear--
don't you tell these here police chaps any more than you need--I'll stand
up for you."

The detective's report, a little questioning of Lauriston, and Melky's
fervent protestations on Lauriston's behalf, served to satisfy the
authorities at the police-station, and Lauriston was allowed to go--
admonished by the inspector that he'd be wanted at the inquest, as the
most important witness. He went out into the street with Melky.

"Come and have a bit o' supper at Mrs. Goldmark's," suggested Melky. "I
shall have my hands full tonight at the poor old man's, but I ain't had
nothing since dinner."

Lauriston, however, excused himself. He wanted to go home and write
letters--at once. But he promised to look round at the pawnshop later in
the evening, to see if he could be of any use, and to give Melky a full
account of his finding of the old pawnbroker.

"Ah!" remarked Melky, as they pushed at the door of the eating-house. "And
ain't it going to be a nice job to find the man that scragged him?--I
don't think! But I'm going to take a hand at that game, mister!--let alone
the police."

Mrs. Goldmark was out. She had heard the news, said the waitress who was
left in charge, and had gone round to do what she could for Miss Zillah.
So Melky, deprived of the immediate opportunity of talk with Mrs.
Goldmark, ordered his supper, and while he ate and drank, cogitated and
reflected. And his thoughts ran chiefly on the platinum solitaire stud
which he had carefully bestowed in his vest pocket.

It was Melky's firm belief--already--that the stud had been dropped in
Daniel Multenius's back parlour by some person who had no business there--
in other words by the old man's assailant. And ever since he had found
the stud, Melky had been wondering and speculating on his chances of
finding its owner. Of one thing he was already certain: that the owner,
whoever he was, was no ordinary person. Ordinary, everyday persons do not
wear studs or tie-pins on chains made of platinum--the most valuable of
all the metals. How came a solitaire stud, made of a metal far more
valuable than gold, and designed and ornamented in a peculiar fashion, to
be lying on the hearthrug of old Daniel Multenius's room? It was not to be
believed that the old man had dropped it there--no, affirmed Melky to
himself, with conviction, that bit of personal property had been dropped
there, out of a loose shirt-cuff by some man who had called on Daniel not
long before Andie Lauriston had gone in, and who for some mysterious
reason had scragged the old fellow. And now the question was--who was that
man?

"Got to find that out, somehow!" mused Melky. "Else that poor chap'll be
in a nice fix--s'elp me, he will! And that 'ud never do!"

Melky, in spite of his keenness as a business man, and the fact that from
boyhood he had had to fight the world by himself, had a peculiarly soft
heart--he tended altogether to verge on the sentimental. He had watched
Lauriston narrowly, and had developed a decided feeling for him--moreover,
he now knew that his cousin Zillah, hitherto adamant to many admirers, had
fallen in love with Lauriston: clearly, Lauriston must be saved. Melky
knew police ways and methods, and he felt sure that whatever Ayscough, a
good-natured man, might think, the superior authorities would view
Lauriston's presence in the pawnshop with strong suspicion. Therefore--the
real culprit must be found. And he, Melky Rubinstein--he must have a go at
that game.

He finished his supper, thinking hard all the time he ate and drank;
finally he approached the desk to pay his bill. The young woman whom Mrs.
Goldmark had left in charge lifted the lid of the desk to get some change
--and Melky's astonished eyes immediately fell on an object which lay on
top of a little pile of papers. That object was the duplicate of the
platinum solitaire which Melky had in his pocket. Without ceremony--being
well known there--he at once picked it up.

"What's this bit of jewellery?" he demanded.

"That?" said the waitress, indifferently. "Oh, one of the girls picked it
up the other day off a table where a stranger had been sitting--we think
he'd dropped it. Mrs. Goldmark says it's valuable, so she put it away, in
case he comes again. But we haven't seen him since."

Melky took a good look at the second stud. Then he put it back in the
desk, picked up his change, and went away--in significant silence.



CHAPTER SIX


THE SPANISH MANUSCRIPT

Lauriston, walking back to his room after leaving Melky at the door of the
eating-house, faced the situation in which an unfortunate combination of
circumstances had placed him. Ayscough had been placable enough; the
authorities at the police-station had heard his own version of things with
attention--but he was still conscious that he was under a certain amount
of suspicion. More than that, he felt convinced that the police would keep
an eye on him that night. Ayscough, indeed, had more than hinted that that
would probably be done. For anything he knew, some plain-clothes man might
be shadowing him even then--anyway, there had been no mistaking the almost
peremptory request of the inspector that he should report himself at the
police station in the morning. It was no use denying the fact--he was
suspected, in some degree.

He knew where the grounds of suspicion lay--in his possession of two
rings, which were undoubtedly very similar to the rings which lay in the
tray that he and the detective had found on the table in the back-parlour
of the pawnshop. It needed no effort on the part of one who had already
had considerable experience in the construction of plots for stories, to
see how the police would build up a theory of their own. Here, they would
say, is a young fellow, who on his own confession, is so hard up, so
penniless, indeed, that he has had to pawn his watch. He has got to know
something of this particular pawnshop, and of its keepers--he watches the
girl leave; he ascertains that the old man is alone; he enters, probably
he sees that tray of rings lying about; he grabs a couple of the rings;
the old man interrupts him in the act; he seizes the old man, to silence
his outcries; the old man, feeble enough at any time, dies under the
shock. A clear, an unmistakable case!

What was he, Lauriston, to urge against the acceptance of such a theory?
He thought over everything that could be said on his behalf. The
friendliness of Zillah and her cousin Melky towards him could be
dismissed--that, when it came to it, would weigh little against the cold
marshalling of facts which a keen legal mind would put into the opposite
scale. His own contention that it was scarcely probable that he should
have gone to the pawnshop except to pledge something, and that that
something was the rings, would also be swept aside, easily enough: his
real object, the other side would say, had been robbery when the old man
was alone: what evidence had he that the two rings which he had in his
hand when Ayscough found him hurrying out of the shop were really his?

Here, Lauriston knew he was in a difficulty. He had kept these two rings
safely hidden in his old-fashioned trunk ever since coming to London, and
had never shown them to a single person--he had, indeed, never seen them
himself for a long time until he took them out that afternoon. But where
was his proof of that! He had no relations to whom he could appeal. His
mother had possessed an annuity; just sufficient to maintain her and her
son, and to give Lauriston a good education: it had died with her, and all
that she had left him, to start life on, was about two hundred pounds and
some small personal belongings, of which the rings and his father's watch
and chain were a part. And he remembered now that his mother had kept
those rings as securely put away as he had kept them since her death--
until they came into his hands at her death he had only once seen them;
she had shown them to him when he was a boy and had said they were very
valuable. Was it possible that there was any one, far away in Scotland,
who had known his mother and who would come forward--if need arose--and
prove that those rings had been her property? But when he had put this
question to himself, he had to answer it with a direct negative--he knew
of no one.

There was one gleam of hope in this critical situation. John Purdie was
coming to London. Lauriston had always felt that he could rely on John
Purdie, and he had just received proof of the value of his faith in his
old schoolmate. John Purdie would tell him what to do: he might even
suggest the names of some of Mrs. Lauriston's old friends. And perhaps the
need might not arise--there must surely be some clue to the old
pawnbroker's assailant; surely the police would go deeper into the matter.
He cheered up at these thoughts, and having written replies to the two
welcome letters and asked John Purdie to see him immediately on his
arrival in town, he went out again to the post-office and to fulfil his
promise to Melky to call at the pawnshop.

Lauriston was naturally of quick observation. He noticed now, as he
stepped out into the ill-lighted, gloomy street that a man was pacing up
and down in front of the house. This man took no notice of him as he
passed, but before he had reached Praed Street, he glanced around, and saw
that he was following him. He followed him to Spring Street post-office;
he was in his rear when Lauriston reached the pawnshop. Idly and
perfunctorily as the man seemed to be strolling about, Lauriston was sure
that he was shadowing him--and he told Melky of the fact when Melky
admitted him to the shop by the private door.

"Likely enough, mister," remarked Melky. "But I shouldn't bother myself
about it if I were you. There'll be more known about this affair before
long. Now, look here," he continued, leading the way into the little back-
parlour where Lauriston had found Daniel Multenius lying dead, "here's you
and me alone--Zillah, she's upstairs, and Mrs. Goldmark is with her. Just
you tell me what you saw when you came in here, d'you see, Mr. Lauriston--
never mind the police--just give me the facts. I ain't no fool, you know,
and I'm going to work this thing out."

Lauriston gave Melky a complete account of his connection with the matter:
Melky checked off all the points on his long fingers. At the end he turned
to the table and indicated the finely-bound book which Lauriston had
noticed when he and the detective had first looked round.

"The police," said Melky, "made Zillah lock up that tray o' rings that was
there in a drawer what she had to clear out for 'em, and they've put a
seal on it till tomorrow. They've got those rings of yours, too, mister,
haven't they?"

"They said it would be best for me to leave them with them," answered
Lauriston. "Ayscough advised it. They gave me a receipt for them, you
know."

"All right," remarked Melky. "But there's something they ain't had the
sense to see the importance of--that fine book there. Mister!--that there
book wasn't in this parlour, nor in this shop, nor in this house, at a
quarter to five o'clock this afternoon, when my cousin Zillah went out,
leaving the poor old man alone. She'll swear to that. Now then, who
brought it here--who left it here? Between the time Zillah went out,
mister, and the time you come in, and found what you did find, somebody--
somebody!--had been in here and left that book behind him! And--mark you!
--it wasn't pawned, neither. That's a fact! And--it's no common book,
that. Look at it, Mr. Lauriston--you'd ought to know something about
books. Look at it!--s'elp me if I don't feel there's a clue in that there
volume, whoever it belongs to!"

Lauriston took the book in his hands. He had only glanced at it casually
before; now he examined it carefully, while Melky stood at his elbow,
watching. The mysterious volume was certainly worthy of close inspection--
a small quarto, wonderfully bound in old dark crimson morocco leather, and
ornamented on sides and back with curious gold arabesque work: a heavy
clasp, also intricately wrought, held the boards together. Lauriston,
something of a book lover, whose natural inclination was to spend his last
shilling on a book rather than on beef and bread, looked admiringly at
this fine specimen of the binder's art as he turned it over.

"That's solid gold, isn't it?" he asked as he unfastened the clasp. "You
know."

"Solid gold it is, mister--and no error," assented Melky. "Now, what's
inside? It ain't no blooming account-book, I'll bet!"

Lauriston opened the volume, to reveal leaves of old vellum, covered with
beautiful fine writing. He had sufficient knowledge of foreign languages
to know what he was looking at.

"That's Spanish!" he said. "An old Spanish manuscript--and I should say
it's worth a rare lot of money. How could it have come here?"

Melky took the old volume out of Lauriston's hands, and put it away in a
corner cupboard.

"Ah, just so, mister!" he said. "But we'll keep that question to
ourselves--for awhile. Don't you say nothing to the police about that
there old book--I'll give Zillah the tip. More hangs round that than we
know of yet. Now look here!--there'll be the opening of the inquest
tomorrow. You be careful! Take my tip and don't let 'em get more out of
you than's necessary. I'll go along with you. I'm going to stop here
tonight--watch-dog, you know. Mrs. Goldmark and another friend's going to
be here as well, so Zillah'll have company. And I say, Zillah wants a word
with you--stop here, and I'll send her down."

Lauriston presently found himself alone with Zillah in the little parlour.
She looked at him silently, with eyes full of anxiety: he suddenly
realized that the anxiety was for himself.

"Don't!" he said, moving close to her and laying his hand on her arm. "I'm
not afraid!"

Zillah lifted her large dark eyes to his.

"Those rings?" she said. "You'll be able to account for them? The police,
oh, I'm so anxious about you!"

"The rings are mine!" he exclaimed. "It doesn't matter what the police say
or think, or do, either--at least, it shan't matter. And--you're not to be
anxious I've got a good friend coming from Scotland--Melky told you I'd
had two lots of good news tonight, didn't he?"

A moment later Lauriston was in the street--conscious that, without a word
spoken between them, he and Zillah had kissed each other. He went away
with a feeling of exaltation--and he only laughed when he saw a man detach
himself from a group on the opposite side of the street and saunter slowly
after him. Let the police shadow him--watch his lodgings all night, if
they pleased--he had something else to think of. And presently, not even
troubling to look out of his window to see if there was a watcher there,
he went to bed, to dream of Zillah's dark eyes.

But when morning came, and Lauriston realized that a fateful day was
before him, his thoughts were not quite so rosy. He drew up his blind--
there, certainly was a man pacing the opposite sidewalk. Evidently, he was
not to escape surveillance; the official eye was on him! Supposing, before
the day was out, the official hand was on him, too?

He turned from the window as he heard his newspaper thrust under his door.
He had only one luxury--a copy of the _Times_ every morning. It was a
three-penny _Times_ in those days, but he had always managed to find
his weekly eighteen pence for it. He picked it up now, and carelessly
glanced at its front page as he was about to lay it aside. The next moment
he was eagerly reading a prominent advertisement:

"Lost in a Holborn to Chapel Street Omnibus, about 4 o'clock yesterday
afternoon, a Spanish manuscript, bound in old crimson morocco. Whoever has
found the same will be most handsomely rewarded on bringing it to Spencer
Levendale, Esq., M.P., 591, Sussex Square, W."

Lauriston read this twice over--and putting the paper in his pocket,
finished his dressing and went straight to the police-station.



CHAPTER SEVEN


THE MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT

Melky Rubinstein came out of the side-passage by Multenius's shop as
Lauriston neared it; he, too, had a newspaper bulging from his coat
pocket, and at sight of Lauriston he pulled it out and waved it excitedly.

"What'd I tell you, mister?" exclaimed Melky, as Lauriston joined him, the
shadowing plain-clothes man in his rear. "D'ye see this?" He pointed to an
advertisement in his own paper, which he had marked with blue pencil.
"There y'are, Mr. Lauriston!--that identical old book what's inside the
parlour--advertised for--handsome reward, too, in the _Daily
Telegraph_! Didn't I say we'd hear more of it?"

Lauriston pulled out the _Times_ and indicated the Personal Column.

"It's there, too," he said. "This man, Mr. Levendale, is evidently very
anxious to recover his book. And he's lost no time in advertising for it,
either! But--however did it get to Multenius's?

"Mister!" said Melky, solemnly. "We'll have to speak to the police--now.
There's going to be a fine clue in that there book. I didn't mean to say
nothing to the police about it, just yet, but after this here
advertisement, t'ain't no use keeping the thing to ourselves. Come on
round to the police-station."

"That's just where I was going," replied Lauriston. "Let's get hold of
Ayscough."

Ayscough was standing just inside the police-station when they went up the
steps; he, too, had a newspaper in his hands, and at sight of them he
beckoned them to follow him into an office in which two or three other
police officials were talking. He led Lauriston and Melky aside.

"I say!" he said. "Here's a curious thing! That book we noticed on the
table in Multenius's back room last night--that finely bound book--it's
advertised for in the _Daily Mail_--handsome reward offered."

"Yes, and in the _Times_, too--and in the _Daily Telegraph_,"
said Lauriston. "Here you are--just the same advertisement. It's very
evident the owner's pretty keen about getting it back."

Ayscough glanced at the two newspapers, and then beckoned to a constable
who was standing near the door.

"Jim!" he said, as the man came up. "Just slip across to the newsagent's
over there and get me the _News_, the _Chronicle_, the _Standard_,
the _Morning Post_. If the owner's as keen as all that," he added,
turning back to Lauriston, "he'll have put that advertisement in all
the morning papers, and I'd like to make sure. What's known about
that book at the shop?" he asked, glancing at Melky. "Does your
cousin know anything?"

Melky's face assumed its most solemn expression.

"Mister!" he said earnestly. "There ain't nothing known at the shop about
that there book, except this here. It wasn't there when my cousin Zillah
left the old man alone at a quarter to five yesterday afternoon. It was
there when this here gentleman found the old man. But it hadn't been
pledged, nor yet sold, Mr. Ayscough--There'd ha' been an entry in the
books if it had been taken in pawn, or bought across the counter--and
there's no entry. Now then--who'd left it there?"

Another official had come up to the group--one of the men who had
questioned Lauriston the night before. He turned to Lauriston as Melky
finished.

"You don't know anything about this book?" he asked.

"Nothing--except that Mr. Ayscough and I saw it lying on the table in the
back room, close by that tray of rings," replied Lauriston. "I was
attracted by the binding, of course."

"Where's the book, now?" asked the official.

"Put safe away, mister," replied Melky. "It's all right. But this here
gentleman what's advertising for it--"

Just then the constable returned with several newspapers and handed them
over to Ayscough, who immediately laid them on a desk and turned to the
advertisements, while the others crowded round him.

"In every one of 'em," exclaimed Ayscough, a moment later. "Word for word,
in every morning newspaper in London! He must have sent that advertisement
round to all the offices last night. And you'll notice," he added, turning
to the other official, "that this Mr. Levendale only lost this book about
four o'clock yesterday afternoon: therefore, it must have been taken to
Multenius's shop between then and when we saw it there."

"The old man may have found it in the 'bus," suggested a third police
officer who had come up. "Looks as if he had."

"No, mister," said Melky firmly. "Mr. Multenius wasn't out of the shop at
all yesterday afternoon--I've made sure o' that fact from my cousin. He
didn't find no book, gentlemen. It was brought there."

Ayscough picked up one of the papers and turned to Melky and Lauriston.

"Here!" he said. "We'll soon get some light on this. You two come with me
--we'll step round to Mr. Levendale."

Ten minutes later, the three found themselves at the door of one of the
biggest houses in Sussex Square; a moment more and they were being ushered
within by a footman who looked at them with stolid curiosity. Lauriston
gained a general impression of great wealth and luxury, soft carpets, fine
pictures, all the belongings of a very rich man's house--then he and his
companions were ushered into a large room, half study, half library,
wherein, at a massive, handsomely carved desk, littered with books and
papers, sat a middle-aged, keen-eyed man, who looked quietly up from his
writing-pad at his visitors.

"S'elp me!--one of ourselves!" whispered Melky Rubinstein at Lauriston's
elbow. "Twig him!"

Lauriston was quick enough of comprehension and observation to know what
Melky meant. Mr. Spencer Levendale was certainly a Jew. His dark hair and
beard, his large dark eyes, the olive tint of his complexion, the lines of
his nose and lips all betrayed his Semitic origin. He was evidently a man
of position and of character; a quiet-mannered, self-possessed man of
business, not given to wasting words. He glanced at the card which
Ayscough had sent in, and turned to him with one word.

"Well?"

Ayscough went straight to the point.

"I called, Mr. Levendale, about that advertisement of yours which appears
in all this morning's newspapers," he said. "I may as well tell you that
that book of yours was found yesterday afternoon, under strange
circumstances. Mr. Daniel Multenius, the jeweller and pawnbroker, of Praed
Street--perhaps you know him, sir?"

"Not at all!" answered Levendale. "Never heard of him."

"He was well known in this part of the town," remarked Ayscough, quietly.
"Well, sir--Mr. Multenius was found dead in his back-parlour yesterday
afternoon, about five-thirty, by this young man, Mr. Lauriston, who
happened to look in there, and I myself was on the spot a few minutes
later. Your book--for it's certainly the same--was lying on the table in
the parlour. Now, this other young man, Mr. Rubinstein, is a relation of
Mr. Multenius's--from enquiries he's made, Mr. Levendale, it's a fact that
the book was neither pawned nor sold at Multenius's, though it must
certainly have been brought there between the time you lost it and the
time we found the old gentleman lying dead. Now, we--the police--want to
know how it came there. And so--I've come round to you. What can you tell
me, sir?"

Levendale, who had listened to Ayscough with great--and, as it seemed to
Lauriston, with very watchful--attention, pushed aside a letter he was
writing, and looked from one to the other of his callers.

"Where is my book?" he asked.

"It's all right--all safe, mister," said Melky. "It's locked up in a
cupboard, in the parlour where it was found, and the key's in my pocket."

Levendale turned to the detective, glancing again at Ayscough's card.

"All I can tell you, sergeant," he said, "is--practically--what I've told
the public in my advertisement. Of course, I can supplement it a bit. The
book is a very valuable one--you see," he went on, with a careless wave of
his hand towards his book-shelves. "I'm something of a collector of rare
books. I bought this particular book yesterday afternoon, at a well-known
dealer's in High Holborn. Soon after buying it, I got into a Cricklewood
omnibus, which I left at Chapel Street--at the corner of Praed Street, as
a matter of fact: I wished to make a call at the Great Western Hotel. It
was not till I made that call that I found I'd left the book in the 'bus--
I was thinking hard about a business matter--I'd placed the book in a
corner behind me--and, of course, I'd forgotten it, valuable though it is.
And so, later on, after telephoning to the omnibus people, who'd heard
nothing, I sent that advertisement round to all the morning papers. I'm
very glad to hear of it--and I shall be pleased to reward you," he
concluded, turning to Melky. "Handsomely!--as I promised."

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