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The Yellow Streak

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He roused up with a start. There was the click of a key in the lock of
his front door. Bruce Wright burst into the room.

The boy shut the door quickly and locked it. He was rather pale and
seemed perturbed. On seeing Robin he jerked his head in the direction of
the courtyard.

"I suppose you know they're still outside?" he said.

Robin nodded nonchalantly.

"There are three of them now," the boy went on. "Robin, I don't like it.
Something's going to happen. You'll want to mind yourself ... if it's
not too late already!"

He stepped across to the window and bending down, peered cautiously
round the curtain.

Robin Greve laughed.

"Bah!" he said, "they can't touch me!"

"You're wrong," Bruce retorted without changing his position. "They can
and they will. Don't think Manderton is a fool, Robin. He means
mischief ..."

Robin raised his eyebrows.

"Does he?" he said. "Now I wonder who told you that ..."

"Friends of yours at Harkings asked me to warn you ..." began Bruce
awkwardly.

"My friends are scarcely in the majority there," retorted Robin. "Whom
do you mean exactly?"

But the boy ignored the question.

"Three men watching the house!" he exclaimed; "don't you think that
_this_ looks as though Manderton meant business?"

He returned to his post of observation at the curtain.

Robin laughed cynically.

"Manderton doesn't worry me any," he said cheerfully. "The man's the
victim of an _idée fixe_. He believes Parrish killed himself just as
firmly as he believes that I frightened or bullied Parrish into doing
it ..."

"Don't be too sure about that, Robin," said the boy, dropping the
curtain and coming back to Robin's chair. "He may want you to think
that. But how can we tell how much he knows?"

Robin flicked the ash off his cigarette disdainfully.

"These promoted policemen make me tired," he said.

Bruce Wright shook his head quickly with a little gesture of
exasperation.

"You don't understand," he said. "There's fresh evidence ..."

Robin Greve looked up with real interest in his eyes. His bantering
manner had vanished.

"You've got that letter?" he asked eagerly.

Bruce shook his head.

"No, not that," he said. Then leaning forward he added in a low voice:

"Have you ever heard of the Maxim silencer?"

"I believe I have, vaguely," replied Robin. "Isn't it something to do
with a motor engine?"

"No," said Bruce. "It's an extraordinary invention which absolutely
suppresses the noise of the discharge of a gun."

Robin shot a quick glance at the speaker.

"Go on," he said.

"It's a marvelous thing, really," the boy continued, warming to his
theme. "A man at Havre had one when I was at the base there, during the
war. It's a little cup-shaped steel fitting that goes over the barrel.
You can fire a rifle fitted with one of these silencers in a small room
and it makes no more noise than a fairly loud sneeze ..."

"Ah!"

Robin was listening intently now.

"Parrish had a Maxim silencer," Bruce went on impressively.

"_Parrish_ had?"

"It was fitted on his automatic pistol, the one he had in his hand when
they found him ..."

"There was no attachment of any kind on the gun Parrish was holding when
he was discovered yesterday afternoon," declared Robin positively; "I
can vouch for that. I was there almost immediately after they found him.
And if there had been anything of the kind Horace Trevert would
certainly have mentioned it ..."

"I know. Jay, who came in soon after you, was surprised to see that the
silencer was not on the pistol. And he made a point of looking for it ..."

"But how do you know that Parrish had it on the pistol?..."

"Well, we don't know for certain. But we do know that it was permanently
fitted to his automatic. Jay has often seen it. And if Parrish did
remove it, he didn't leave it lying around any where. Jay has looked
all through his things without finding it ..."

"When did Jay see it last?"

"On Thursday!"

"But are you sure that this is the same pistol as the one which Jay has
been in the habit of seeing?"

"Jay is absolutely sure. He says that Parrish only had the one automatic
which he always kept in the same drawer in his dressing-room ..."

Robin was silent for a moment. Very deliberately he filled his pipe, lit
it, and drew until it burned comfortably. Then he said slowly:

"This means that Hartley Parrish was murdered, Bruce, old man. All
through I have been puzzling my mind to reconcile the unquestionable
circumstance that two bullets were fired--I told you of the bullet mark
I found on the upright in the rosery--with the undoubted fact that only
one report was heard. We can therefore presume, either that Hartley
Parrish first fired one shot from his pistol with the silencer fitted
and then removed the silencer and fired another shot without it, thereby
killing himself, or that the second shot was fired by the person whose
interest it was to get rid of the silencer. There is no possible or
plausible reason why Parrish should have fired first one shot with the
silencer and then one without. Therefore, I find myself irresistibly
compelled to the conclusion that the shot heard by Mary Trevert was
fired by the person who killed Parrish. Do I make myself clear?"

"Perfectly," answered Bruce.

"Now, then," the barrister proceeded, thoughtfully puffing at his pipe,
"one weak point about my deductions is that they all hang on the
question as to whether, at the time of the tragedy, Parrish actually had
the silencer on his pistol or not. That is really the acid test of
Manderton's suicide theory. You said, I think, that a rifle fired with
the silencer attachment makes no more noise than the sound of a loud
sneeze!"

"That's right," agreed Bruce; "a sort of harsh, spluttering noise. Not
so loud either, Robin. Ph ... t-t-t! Like that!"

"Loud enough to be heard through a door, would you say?"

"Oh, I think so!"

Robin thought intently for a moment.

"Then Mary is the only one who can put us right on that point. Assuming
that two shots were fired--and that bullet mark in the rosery is, I
think, conclusive on that head--and knowing that she heard the loud
report of the one, presumably, if Parrish had the silencer on his
automatic, Mary must have heard the _muffled_ report of the other. What
it comes to is this, Mary heard the shot fired that killed Parrish. Did
she hear the shot he fired at his murderer?"

"By Gad!" exclaimed Bruce Wright impressively, "I believe you've got it,
Robin! Parrish fired at somebody at the window--a silent shot--and the
other fellow fired back the shot that Mary Trevert heard, the shot that
killed Parrish. Isn't that the way you figure it out?"

"Not so fast, young man," remarked Robin. "Let's first find out whether
Mary actually heard the muffled shot and, if so, _when ... before_ or
_after_ the loud report."

He glanced across at the window and then at Bruce,

"I suppose this discovery about the silencer is responsible for the
deputation waiting in the courtyard," he said drily.

"The police don't know about it yet," replied Bruce; "at least they
didn't when I left."

Robin shook his head dubiously.

"If the servants know it, Manderton will worm it out of them. Hasn't he
cross-examined Jay?"

"Yes," said Bruce. "But he got nothing out of him about this. Manderton
seems to have put everybody's back up. He gets nothing out of the
servants ..."

"If Parrish had had this silencer for some time, you may be sure that
other people know about it. These silencers must be pretty rare in
England. You see, an average person like myself didn't know what it was.
By the way, another point which we haven't yet cleared up is this:
supposing we are right in believing Parrish to have been murdered, how
do you explain the fact that the bullet removed from his body fitted his
pistol?"

"That's a puzzler, I must say!" said Bruce.

"There's only one possible explanation, I think," Robin went on, "and
that is that Parrish was shot by a pistol of exactly the same calibre as
his own. For the murderer to have killed Parrish with his own weapon
would have been difficult without a struggle. But Miss Trevert heard no
struggle. For murderer and his victim to have pistols of the same
calibre argues a rather remarkable coincidence, I grant you. But then
life is full of coincidences! We meet them every day in the law. Though,
I admit, this is a coincidence which requires some explaining ..."

He fell into a brown study which Bruce interrupted by suddenly
remembering that he had had no lunch.

For answer Robin pointed at the sideboard.

"There's a cloth in there," he said, "also the whisky, if my laundress
has left any, and a siphon and there should be some claret--Mrs. Bragg
doesn't care about red wine. Set the table, and I'll take a root round
in the kitchen and dig up some tinned stuff."

They supped off a tinned tongue and some _pâté de foie gras_. Over their
meal Bruce told Robin of his adventure in the library at Harkings.

"Jeekes must have collected that letter," Bruce said. "Before I came to
you, I went to Lincoln's Inn Fields to see if he was still at Bardy's--
Parrish's solicitor, you know. But the office was closed, and the place
in darkness. I went on to the Junior Pantheon, that's Jeekes's club, but
he wasn't in. He hadn't been there all day, the porter told me. So I
left a note asking him to ring you up here ..."

"The case reeks of blackmail," said Robin thoughtfully, "but I am
wondering how much we shall glean from this precious letter when we do
see it. I am glad you asked Jeekes to ring me up, though. He should be
able to tell us something about these mysterious letters on the blue
paper that used to put Parrish in such a stew ... Hullo, who can that
be?"

An electric bell trilled through the flat. It rang once ... twice ...
and then a third time, a long, insistent peal.

"See who's there, will you, Bruce?" said Robin.

"Suppose it's the police ..." began the boy.

Robin shrugged his shoulders.

"You can say I'm at home and ask them in," he said.

He heard the heavy oaken door swing open, a murmur of voices in the
hall. The next moment Detective-Inspector Manderton entered the
sitting-room,




CHAPTER XIX


MR. MANDERTON LAYS HIS CARDS ON THE TABLE

The detective's manner had undergone some subtle change which Robin,
watching him closely as he came into the room, was quick to note. Mr.
Manderton made an effort to retain his old air of rather patronizing
swagger; but he seemed less sure of himself than was his wont. In fact,
he appeared to be a little anxious.

He walked briskly into the sitting-room and looked quickly from Bruce to
Robin.

"Mr. Greve," he said, "you can help me if you will by answering a few
questions ..."

With another glance at Bruce Wright he added:

"... in private."

Bruce, obedient to a sign from Robin, said he would ring up in the
morning and prepared to take his leave. Robin turned to the detective.

"There are some of your men, I believe," he said coldly, "watching this
house. Would it be asking too much to request that my friend here might
be permitted to return home unescorted?"

"He needn't worry," replied Manderton with a significant smile.
"There's no one outside now!..."

They watched Bruce Wright pass into the hall and collect his hat and
coat. As the front door slammed behind him, the detective added:

"I took 'em off myself soon after seven o'clock!"

"Why?" asked Robin bluntly.

Mr. Manderton dropped his heavy form into a chair.

"I'm a plain man, Mr. Greve," he said, "and I'm not above owning to it,
I hope, when I'm wrong. For some little time now it has struck me that
our lines of investigation run parallel ..."

"Instead of crossing!"

"Instead of crossing--exactly!"

"It's a pity you did not grasp that very obvious fact earlier," observed
Robin pointedly.

Mr. Manderton crossed one leg over the other and, his finger-tips
pressed together, looked at Robin.

"Will you help me?" he asked simply.

"Do you want my help?"

Mr. Manderton nodded.

"Allies, then?"

"Allies it is!"

Robin pointed to the table.

"It's dry work talking," he said. "Won't you take a drink?"

"Thanks, I don't drink. But I'll have a cigar if I may. Thank you!"

The detective helped himself to a cheroot from a box on the table and
lit up. Then, affecting to scan the end of his cigar with great
attention, he asked abruptly:

"What do you know of the woman calling herself Madame de Malpas?"

Robin pursed up his lips rather disdainfully.

"One of the late Mr. Parrish's lady friends," he replied. "I expect you
know that!"

"Do you know where she lives?" pursued the detective, ignoring the
implied question.

"She's dead."

A flicker of interest appeared for an instant in Mr. Manderton's keen
eyes.

"You're sure of that?"

"Certainly," answered Robin.

"Who told you?"

"Le Hagen--the solicitor, you know. He acted for this Malpas woman on
one or two occasions."

"When did she die?"

"Six or seven months ago ..."

"Did Jeekes know about it?"

"Jeekes? Do you mean Parrish's secretary?

"It's funny your asking that. As a matter of fact, it was through Jeekes
that I heard the lady was dead. I was in Le Hagen's office one day when
Jeekes came in, and Le Hagen told me Jeekes had come to pay in a cheque
for the cost of the funeral and the transport of the body to France."

"This was six or seven months ago, you say? I take it, then, that any
allowance that Parrish was in the habit of making to this woman has
ceased?"

"I tell you the lady is dead!"

"Then what would you say if I informed you that Mr. Jeekes had declared
that these payments were still going on ..."

Robin shrugged his shoulders.

"I should say he was lying ..."

"I agree. But why?"

"Whom did he tell this to?"

"Miss Trevert!"

"Miss Trevert?"

Robin repeated the name in amazement.

"I don't understand," he said. "Why on earth should Jeekes blacken his
employer's character to Miss Trevert? What conceivable motive could he
have had? Did she tell you this?"

"No," said Manderton; "I heard him tell her myself."

"Do you mean to tell me," protested Robin, growing more and more
puzzled, "that Jeekes told Miss Trevert this offensive and deliberate
lie in your presence!"

"Well," remarked Mr. Manderton slowly, "I don't know about his saying
this in my presence exactly. But I heard him tell her for all that.
Walls have ears, you know--particularly if the door is ajar!"

He looked shrewdly at Robin, then dropped his eyes to the floor.

"He also told her that Le Hagen and you were in business relations ..."

Robin sat up at this.

"Ah!" he said shortly. "I see what you're getting at now. Our friend has
been trying to set Miss Trevert against me, eh? But why? I don't even
know this man Jeekes except to have nodded 'Good-morning' to him a few
times. Why on earth should he of all men go out of his way to slander me
to Miss Trevert, to throw suspicion ..."

He broke off short and looked at the detective.

Mr. Manderton caressed his big black moustache.

"Yes," he repeated suavely, "you were saying 'to cast suspicion' ..."

The eyes of the two men met. Then the detective leaned back in his
chair and, blowing a cloud of smoke from his lips, said:

"Mr. Greve, you've been thinking ahead of me on this case. What you've
told me so far I've checked. And you're right. Dead right. And since
you're, in a manner of speaking, one of the parties interested in
getting things cleared up, I'd like you to tell me just simply what idea
you've formed about it ..."

"Gladly," answered the barrister. "And to start with let me tell you
that the case stinks of blackmail ..."

"Steady on," interposed the detective. "I thought so, too, at first.
I've been into all that. Mr. Parrish made a clean break with the last of
his lady friends about two months since; and, as far as our
investigations go, there has been no blackmail in connection with any of
his women pals. Vine Street knows all about Master Parrish. There were
complaints about some of his little parties up in town. But I don't
believe there's a woman in this case ..."

"I didn't say there was," retorted Robin. "The blackmail is probably
being levied from Holland. A threat of violence was finally carried into
effect on Saturday evening between 5 and 5.15 P.M. by some one
conversant with the lie of the land at Harkings. This individual, armed
with an automatic Browning of the same calibre as Mr. Parrish's, shot
at Parrish through the open window of the library and killed
him--probably in self-defence, after Parrish had had a shot at him ..."

"Steady there, whoa!" said Mr. Manderton in a jocular way clearly
expressive of his incredulity; "there was only one shot ..."

"There were _two_," was Robin's dispassionate reply. "Though maybe only
one was heard. Parrish had a Maxim silencer on his gun ..."

Mr. Manderton was now thoroughly alert.

"How did you find that out?" he asked.

"Jay, Parrish's man, came forward and volunteered this evidence ..."

"He said nothing about it when I questioned him," grumbled the
detective.

Robin laughed.

"You're a terror to the confirmed criminal, they tell me, Manderton," he
said, "but you obviously don't understand that complicated mechanism
known as the domestic servant. No servant at Harkings will voluntarily
tell _you_ anything ..."

Mr. Manderton, who had stood up, shook his big frame impatiently.

"Explain the rest of your theories," he said harshly. "What's all this
about blackmail being levied from Holland?"

Then Robin Greve told him of the letters written on the slatey-blue
paper and of their effect upon Parrish, and of the letter headed, "Elias
van der Spyck & Co., General Importers, Rotterdam," which had lain on
the desk in the library when Parrish's dead body had been found.

Manderton nodded gloomily.

"It was there right enough," he remarked. "I saw it. A letter about
steel shipments and the dockers' strike, wasn't it? As there seemed
nothing to it, I left it with the other papers for Jeekes, the secretary
chap. But what evidence is there that this was blackmail?"

"This," said Robin, and showed the detective the sheet of blue paper
with its series of slits. "Manderton," he said, "these letters written
on this blue paper were in code, I feel sure. Why should not this be the
key? You see it bears a date--'Nov. 25.' May it not refer to that
letter? I found it by Parrish's body on the carpet in the library. I
would have given it to you at Harkings, but I shoved it in my pocket and
forgot all about it until I was in the train coming up to town this
morning."

Mr. Manderton took the sheet of paper, turned it over, and held it up to
the light. Then, without comment, he put it away in the pocket of his
jacket.

"If Parrish killed himself," Robin went on earnestly, "that letter drove
him to it. If, on the other hand, he was murdered, may not that letter
have contained a warning?"

"I should prefer to suspend judgment until we've seen the letter, Mr.
Greve," said the detective bluntly. "We must get it from Jeekes. In the
meantime, what makes you think that the murderer (to follow up your
theory) was conversant with the lay of the land at Harkings?"

"Because," answered Robin, "the murderer left no tracks on the grass or
flower-beds. He stuck to the hard gravel path throughout. That path,
which runs from the drive through the rosery to the gravel path round
the house just under the library window, is precious hard to find in the
dark, especially where it leaves the drive, as at the outset it is a
mere thread between the rhododendron bushes. And, as I know from
experience, unless you are acquainted with the turns in the path, it is
very easy to get off it in the dark, especially in the rosery, and go
blundering on to the flower-beds. And I'll tell you something else about
the murderer. He--or she--was of small stature--not much above five
foot six in height. The upward diagonal course of the bullet through
Parrish's heart shows that ..."

Mr. Manderton shook his head dubiously.

"Very ingenious," he commented. "But you go rather fast, Mr. Greve. We
must test your theory link by link. There may be an explanation for
Jeekes's apparently inexplicable lie to the young lady. Let's see him
and hear what he says. The grounds at Harkings must be searched for this
second bullet, if second bullet there is, the mark on the tree examined
by an expert. And since two bullets argue two pistols in this case, let
us see what result we get from our enquiries as to where Mr. Parrish
bought his pistol. He may have had two pistols ..."

"If Parrish used a silencer," remarked Robin, quite undisconcerted by
the other's lack of enthusiasm, "and my theory that two shots were fired
is correct, there must have been two reports, a loud one and a muffled
one. Miss Trevert heard one report, as we know. Did she hear a second?"

"She said nothing about it," remarked the detective.

"She was probably asked nothing about it. But we can get this point
cleared up at once. There's the telephone. Ring up Harkings and ask her
now."

"Why not?" said Mr. Manderton and moved to the telephone.

There is little delay on the long-distance lines on a Sunday evening,
and the call to Harkins came through almost at once. Bude answered the
telephone at Harkings. Manderton asked for Miss Trevert. The butler
replied that Miss Trevert was no longer at Harkings. She had gone to the
Continent for a few days.

This plain statement, retailed in the fortissimo voice which Bude
reserved for use on the telephone, produced a remarkable effect on the
detective. He grew red in the face.

"What's that?" he cried assertively. "Gone to the Continent? I should
have been told about this. Why wasn't I informed? What part of the
Continent has she gone to?"

Mr. Manderton's questions, rapped out with a rasping vigour that
recalled a machine-gun firing, brought Robin to his feet in an instant.
He crossed over to the desk on which the telephone stood.

Manderton placed one big palm over the transmitter and turned to Robin.

"She's gone to the Continent and left no address," he said quickly.

"Ask him if Lady Margaret is there," suggested Robin.

Mr. Manderton spoke into the telephone again. Lady Margaret had gone to
bed, Bude answered, and her ladyship was much put out by Miss Trevert
gallivanting off like that by herself with only a scribbled note left to
say that she had gone.

Had Bude got the note?

No, Mr. Manderton, sir, he had not. But Lady Margaret had shown it to
him. It had simply stated that Miss Trevert had gone off to the
Continent and would be back in a few days.

Again the detective turned to Robin at his elbow.

"These country bumpkins!" he said savagely. "I must go to the Yard and
get Humphries on the 'phone. He may have telegraphed me about it. You
stay here and I'll ring you later if there's any news. What do you make
of it, Mr. Greve?"

"It beats me," was Robin's rueful comment. "And what about the inquest?
It's for Tuesday, isn't it? Miss Trevert will have to give evidence, I
take it?..."

"Oh," said Mr. Manderton, picking up his hat and speaking in an offhand
way, "I'm getting _that_ adjourned for a week!"

"The inquest adjourned! Why?"

There was a twinkle in the detective's eye as he replied.

"I thought, maybe, I might get further evidence ..."

Robin caught the expression and smiled.

"And when did you come to this decision, may I ask?"

"After our little experiment in the garden this morning," was the
detective's prompt reply.

Robin looked at him fixedly.

"But, see here," he said, "apparently it was to the deductions you
formed from the result of that experiment that I owe the attentions of
your colleagues who have been hanging round the house all day. And yet
you now come to me and invite my assistance. Mr. Manderton, I don't get
it at all!"

"Mr. Greve," replied the detective, "Miss Trevert tried to shield you.
That made me suspicious. You tried to force my investigations into an
entirely new path. That deepened my suspicions. I believed it to be my
duty to ascertain your movements after leaving Harkings. But then I
heard Jeekes make an apparently gratuitously false statement to Miss
Trevert with an implication against you. That, to some extent, cleared
you in my eyes. I say 'to some extent' because I will not deny that I
thought I might be taking a risk in coming to you like this. You see I
am frank!..."

The smile had left Greve's face and he looked rather grim.

"You're pretty deep, aren't you?" was his brief comment.




CHAPTER XX


THE CODE KING

Major Euan MacTavish was packing. A heavy and well-worn leather
portmanteau, much adorned with foreign luggage labels, stood in the
centre of the floor. From a litter of objects piled up on a side table
the Major was transferring to it various brown-paper packages which he
checked by a list in his hand.

The Major always packed for himself. He packed with the neatness and
rapidity derived from long experience of travel. As a matter of fact, he
could not afford a manservant any more than he could allow himself
quarters more luxurious than the rather grimy bedroom in Bury Street
which housed him during his transient appearances in town. The
remuneration doled out by the Foreign Office to the quiet and
unobtrusive gentlemen known as King's messengers is, in point of fact,
out of all proportion to the prestige and glamour surrounding the silver
greyhound badge, an example of which was tucked away in a pocket of the
Major's blue serge jacket hanging over the back of a chair.

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