The power-house

A

THE POWER-HOUSE

JOHN B U C H A N

BOOKS BY JOHN BUCHAN

Novels

The House of the Four Winds
The Free Fishers
Greenmantle

HuNTINGTOWER

John Burnet of Barns

The Three Hostages

John Macnab

Midwinter

The Dancing Floor

Witch Wood

Mr. Standfast

The Thirty-Nine Steps

The Half-Hearted

The Runagates Club

The Courts of the Morning

Salute to Adventurers

Castle Gay

The Path of the King

The Blanket of the Dark

The Gap in the Curtain

A Prince of the Captivity

The Man From the Norlands

Adventures of Richard Hannay

(Omnibus)
Mountain Meadow
The Power-House

Biography, History, and Essays

The People's King

A History of the Great War

A Book of Escapes and Hurried

Journeys
The Last Secrets
History of the Royal Scots

Fusiliers
Lord Minto
The Nations of Today (Editor)

Two Ordeals of Democracy

Homilies and Recreations

The Northern Muse (Editor)

Montrose

Oliver Cromwell

Augustus

Pilgrim's Way

Books Especially for Young People

Prester John

The Magic Walkiwg Stick
Lake of Gold

By JOHN BUCHAN

The

POWER-HOUSE

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY • BOSTON
tTfje XUbenftoe $ress Cambridge

COPYRIGHT, 191 6, BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO REPRODUCE
THIS BOOK OR PARTS THEREOF IN ANY FORM

PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

TO
MAJOR-GENERAL

Sir FRANCIS LLOYD, K.C.B.

MY DEAR GENERAL:

A recent tale of mine has, I am told, found favour in
the dug-outs and billets of the British front, as being
sufficiently short and sufficiently exciting for men who
have little leisure to read. My friends in that uneasy
region have asked for more. So I have printed this story,
written in the smooth days before the war, in the hope
that it may enable an honest man here and there to forget
for an hour the too urgent realities. I have put your
name on it, because among the many tastes which we
share one is a liking for precipitous yarns.

J.B.

M735588

CONTENTS

PAGE

Preface by the Editor ix

CHAPTER

I. Beginning of the Wild-Goose Chase 13

II. I First Hear of Mr. Andrew Lumley 31

III. Tells of a Midsummer Night ... 53

IV. I Follow the Trail of the Super-

Butler 87

V. I Take a Partner 113

VI. The Restaurant in Antioch Street . 135

VII. I Find Sanctuary 163

VIII. The Power-House 189

IX. Return of the Wild Geese .... 209

PREFACE BY THE EDITOR

We were at Glenaicill — six of us — for the duck-
shooting, when Leithen told us this story. Since
five in the morning we had been out on the sker-
ries, and had been blown home by a wind which
threatened to root the house and its wind-blown
woods from their precarious lodgment on the hill.
A vast nondescript meal, luncheon and dinner in
one, had occupied us till the last daylight departed,
and we settled ourselves in the smoking-room for
a sleepy evening of talk and tobacco.

Conversation, I remember, turned on some of
Jim's trophies which grinned at us from the firelit
walls, and we began to spin hunting yarns. Then
Hoppy Bynge, who was killed next year on the
Bramaputra, told us some queer things about his
doings in New Guinea, where he tried to climb
Carstensz, and lived for six months in mud. Jim
said he couldn't abide mud — anything was better
than a country where your boots rotted. (He was
to get enough of it last winter in the Ypres Sa-
lient.) You know how one tale begets another,
and soon the whole place hummed with odd recol-

ix

PREFACE BY THE EDITOR

lections, for five of us had been a good deal about
the world.

All except Leithen, the man who was afterwards
Solicitor-General, and, they say, will get to the
Woolsack in time. I don't suppose he had ever
been farther from home than Monte Carlo, but
he liked hearing about the ends of the earth.

Jim had just finished a fairly steep yarn about
his experiences on a Boundary Commission near
Lake Chad, and Leithen got up to find a drink.

"Lucky devils,,, he said. "You've had all the
fun out of life. I've had my nose to the grind-
stone ever since I left school."

I said something about his having all the honour
and glory.

"All the same," he went on, "I once played the
chief part in a rather exciting business without
ever once budging from London. And the joke
of it was that the man who went out to look for
adventure only saw a bit of the game, and I who
sat in my chambers saw it all and pulled the
strings. 'They also serve who only stand and
wait,' you know."

Then he told us this story. The version I give
is one he afterwards wrote down when he had
looked up his diary for some of the details.

CHAPTER I

BEGINNING OF THE WILD-GOOSE
CHASE

CHAPTER I

BEGINNING OF THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

T T all started one afternoon, early in May,
* when I came out of the House of Com-
mons with Tommy Deloraine. I had got in
by an accident at a by-election, when I was
supposed to be fighting a forlorn hope, and as
I was just beginning to be busy at the Bar I
found my hands pretty full. It was before
Tommy succeeded, in the days when he sat
for the family seat in Yorkshire, and that aft-
ernoon he was in a powerful bad temper. Out
of doors it was jolly spring weather, there was
greenery in Parliament Square and bits of
gay colour, and a light wind was blowing up
from the river. Inside a dull debate was
winding on, and an advertising member had
been trying to get up a row with the Speaker.
The contrast between the frowsy place and
the cheerful world outside would have im-

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pressed even the soul of a Government Whip.

Tommy sniffed the spring breeze like a su-
percilious stag.

"This about finishes me," he groaned.
"What a juggins I am to be mouldering here!
Joggleberry is the celestial limit, what they
call in happier lands the pink penultimate.
And the frowst on those back benches! Was
there ever such a moth-eaten old museum?"

"It is the Mother of Parliaments," I ob-
served.

"Damned monkey-house," said Tommy. "I
must get off for a bit, or I'll bonnet Joggle-
berry or get up and propose a national monu-
ment to Guy Fawkes, or something silly."

I did not see him for a day or two, and
then one morning he rang me up and peremp-
torily summoned me to dine with him. I
went, knowing very well what I should find.
Tommy was off next day to shoot lions on the
Equator, or something equally unconscien-
tious. He was a bad acquaintance for a placid
sedentary soul like me, for though he could
work like a Trojan when the fit took him, he

14

THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

was never at the same job very long. In the
same week he would harass an Under Secre-
tary about horses for the Army, write volumi-
nously to the press about a gun he had in-
vented for potting aeroplanes, give a fancy-
dress ball which he forgot to attend, and get
into the semi-final of the racquets champion-
ship. I waited daily to see him start a new
religion.

That night, I recollect, he had an odd as-
sortment of guests. A Cabinet Minister was
there, a gentle being for whom Tommy pro-
fessed public scorn and private affection; a
sailor; an Indian cavalry fellow; Chapman,
the Labour member, whom Tommy called
Chipmunk; myself, and old Milson of the
Treasury. Our host was in tremendous form,
chaffing everybody, and sending Chipmunk
into great rolling gusts of merriment. The
two lived adjacent in Yorkshire, and on plat-
forms abused each other like pickpockets.

Tommy enlarged on the misfits of civilised
life. He maintained that none of us, except
perhaps the sailor and the cavalryman, were

IS

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at our proper job. He would have had Wy-
tham — that was the Minister — a cardinal of
the Roman Church, and he said that Milson
should have been the Warden of a college full
of port and prejudice. Me he was kind enough
to allocate to some reconstructed Imperial
General Staff, merely because I had a craze
for military history. Tommy's perception did
not go very deep. He told Chapman he should
have been a lumberman in California. "You'd
have made an uncommon good logger, Chip-
munk, and you know you're a dashed bad poli-
tician."

When questioned about himself he became
reticent, as the newspapers say. "I doubt if
I'm much good at any job," he confessed, "ex-
cept to ginger up my friends. Anyhow, I'm
getting out of this hole. Paired for the rest
of the session with a chap who has lockjaw.
I'm off to stretch my legs and get back my
sense of proportion."

Some one asked him where he was going,
and was told "Venezuela, to buy Government
bonds and look for birds' nests."

16

THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

Nobody took Tommy seriously, so his guests
did not trouble to bid him the kind of fare-
well a prolonged journey would demand. But
when the others had gone, and we were sitting
in the little back smoking-room on the first
floor, he became solemn. Portentously sol-
emn, for he wrinkled up his brows and
dropped his jaw in the way he had when he
fancied he was in earnest.

"I've taken on a queer job, Leithen," he
said, "and I want you to hear about it. None
of my family know, and I would like to leave
some one behind me who could get on to my
tracks if things got troublesome."

I braced myself for some preposterous con-
fidence, for I was experienced in Tommy's va-
garies. But I own to being surprised when he
asked me if I remembered Pitt-Heron.

I remembered Pitt-Heron very well. He
had been at Oxford with me, but he was no
great friend of mine, though for about two
years Tommy and he had been inseparable.
He had had a prodigious reputation for clev-
erness with everybody but the college authori-

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ties, and used to spend his vacations doing mad
things in the Alps and the Balkans and writ-
ing about them in the half-penny press. He
was enormously rich — cotton mills and Liver-
pool ground rents — and, being without a fa-
ther, did pretty much what his fantastic taste
dictated. He was rather a hero for a bit after
he came down, for he had made some wild
journey in the neighbourhood of Afghanistan
and written an exciting book about it.

Then he married a pretty cousin of Tom-
my's, who happened to be the only person that
ever captured my stony heart, and settled
down in London. I did not go to their house,
and soon I found that very few of his friends
saw much of him, either. His travels and
magazine articles suddenly stopped, and I put
it down to the common course of successful
domesticity. Apparently I was wrong.

"Charles Pitt-Heron," said Tommy, "is
blowing up for a most thundering mess."

I asked what kind of mess, and Tommy said
he didn't know. "That's the mischief of it.
You remember the wild beggar he used to be,

18

THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

always off on the spree to the Mountains of
the Moon, or somewhere. Well, he has been
damping down his fires lately and trying to
behave like a respectable citizen, but God
knows what he has been thinking! I go a good
deal to Portman Square, and all last year he
has been getting queerer."

Questions as to the nature of the queerness
only elicited the fact that Pitt-Heron had
taken to science with some enthusiasm.

"He has got a laboratory at the back of the
house — used to be the billiard-room — where
he works away half the night. And Lord!
The crew you meet there! Every kind of
heathen — Chinese and Turks, and long-haired
chaps from Russia, and fat Germans. I've
several times blundered into the push.
They've all got an odd secretive air about
them, and Charlie is becoming like them. He
won't answer a plain question or look you
straight in the face. Ethel sees it, too, and
she has often talked to me about it."

I said I saw no harm in such a hobby.
19

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"I do," said Tommy grimly. "Anyhow, the
fellow has bolted."

"What on earth " I began, but was cut

short.

"Bolted without a word to a mortal soul.
He told Ethel he would be home for luncheon
yesterday, and never came. His man knew
nothing about him, hadn't packed for him, or
anything; but he found he had stuffed some
things into a kit-bag and gone out by the back
through the mews. Ethel was in terrible
straits, and sent for me, and I ranged all yes-
terday afternoon like a wolf on the scent. I
found he had drawn a biggish sum in gold
from the bank, but I couldn't find any trace of
where he had gone.

"I was just setting out for Scotland Yard
this morning, when Tomlin, the valet, rang
me up and said he had found a card in the
waistcoat of the dress clothes that Charles had
worn the night before he left. It had a name
on it like Konalevsky, and it struck me that
they might know something about the business
at the Russian Embassy. Well, I went round

20

THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

there, and the long and short of it was that I
found there was a fellow of that name among
the clerks. I saw him, and he said he had
gone to see Mr. Pitt-Heron two days before
with a letter from some Embassy chap. Un-
fortunately, the man in question had gone off
to New York next day, but Konalevsky told
me one thing which helped to clear up mat-
ters. It seemed that the letter had been one
of those passports that Embassies give to their
friends — a higher-powered sort than the ordi-
nary make — and Konalevsky gathered from
something he had heard that Charles was aim-
ing for Moscow."

Tommy paused to let his news sink in.

"Well, that was good enough for me. I'm
off to-morrow to run him to ground."

"But why shouldn't a man go to Moscow
if he wants?" I said feebly.

"You don't understand," said the sage Tom-
my. "You don't know old Charles as I know
him. He's got into a queer set, and there's
no knowing what mischief he's up to. He's
perfectly capable of starting a revolution in

21

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Armenia or somewhere merely to see how it
feels like to be a revolutionary. That's the
damned thing about the artistic temperament.
Anyhow, he's got to chuck it. I won't have
Ethel scared to death by his whims. I am
going to hale him back from Moscow, even
if I have to pretend he's an escaped lunatic.
He's probably like enough one by this time if
he has taken no clothes."

I have forgotten what I said, but it was
some plea for caution. I could not see the
reason for these heroics. Pitt-Heron did not
interest me greatly, and the notion of Tommy
as a defender of the hearth amused me. I
thought that he was working on very slight
evidence and would probably make a fool of
himself.

"It's only another of the man's fads," I
said. "He never could do things like an or-
dinary mortal. What possible trouble could
there be? Money?"

"Rich as Croesus," said Tommy.

"A woman?"

"Blind as a bat to female beauty."
22

THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

"The wrong side of the law?"

"Don't think so. He could settle any ordi-
nary scrape with a cheque."

"Then I give it up. Whatever it is it looks
as if Pitt-Heron would have a companion
in misfortune before you are done with the
business. I'm all for your taking a holiday,
for at present you are a nuisance to your
friends and a disgrace to your country's legis-
lature. But for goodness' sake curb your pas-
sion for romance. They don't like it in
Russia."

Next morning Tommy turned up to see me
in Chambers. The prospect of travel always
went to his head like wine. He was in wild
spirits, and had forgotten his anger at the
defaulting Pitt-Heron in gratitude for his pro-
vision of an occupation. He talked of carry-
ing him off to the Caucasus when he had
found him, to investigate the habits of the
Caucasian stag.

I remember the scene as if it were yester-
day. It was a hot May morning, and the sun
which came through the dusty window in

23

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Fountain Court lit up the dust and squalor of
my working chambers. I was pretty busy at
the time, and my table was well-nourished
with briefs. Tommy picked up one and be-
gan to read it. It was about a new drainage
scheme in West Ham. He tossed it down and
looked at me pityingly.

"Poor old beggar!" he said. "To spend
your days on such work when the world is
chockful of amusing things. Life goes roar-
ing by and you only hear the echo in your
stuffy rooms. You can hardly see the sun for
the cobwebs on these windows of yours.
Charles is a fool, but I'm blessed if he isn't
wiser than you. Don't you wish you were
coming with me?"

The queer thing was that I did. I remem-
ber the occasion, as I have said, for it was
one of the few on which I have had a pang
of dissatisfaction with the calling I had
chosen. As Tommy's footsteps grew faint on
the stairs I suddenly felt as if I were missing
something, as if somehow I were out of it It

24

THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

is an unpleasant feeling, even when you know
that the thing you are out of is foolishness.

Tommy went off at n from Victoria, and
my work was pretty well ruined for the day.
I felt oddly restless, and the cause was not
merely Tommy's departure. My thoughts
kept turning to the Pitt-Herons — chiefly to
Ethel, that adorable child unequally yoked
to a perverse egoist, but a good deal to the
egoist himself. I have never suffered much
from whimsies, but I suddenly began to feel
a curious interest in the business, an unwill-
ing interest, for I found it in my heart to re-
gret my robust scepticism of the night before.
And it was more than interest. I had a sort
of presentiment that I was going to be mixed
up in the affair more than I wanted. I told
myself angrily that the life of an industrious
common-law barrister could have little to do
with the wanderings of two maniacs in Mus-
covy. But, try as I might, I could not get rid
of the obsession. That night it followed me
into my dreams, and I saw myself with a
knout coercing Tommy and Pitt-Heron in a

25

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Russian fortress which faded away into the
Carlton Hotel.

Next afternoon I found my steps wending
in the direction of Portman Square. I lived
at the time in Down Street, and I told myself
I would be none the worse of a walk in the
Park before dinner. I had a fancy to see Mrs.
Pitt-Heron, for, though I had only met her
twice since her marriage, there had been a
day when we were the closest of friends.

I found her alone, a perplexed and sad-
dened lady with imploring eyes. Those eyes
questioned me as to how much I knew. I
told her presently that I had seen Tommy
and was aware of his errand. I was moved
to add that she might count on me if there
were anything she wished done on this side of
the Channel.

She was very little changed. There was
still the old exquisite slimness, the old shy
courtesy. But she told me nothing. Charles
was full of business and becoming very for-
getful. She was sure the Russian journey was
all a stupid mistake. He probably thought he

26

THE WILD-GOOSE CHASE

had told her of his departure. He would
write; she expected a letter by every post.

But her haggard eyes belied her optimism.
I could see that there had been odd happen-
ings of late in the Pitt-Heron household. She
either knew or feared something — the latter,
I thought, for her air was more of apprehen-
sion than of painful enlightenment.

I did not stay long, and, as I walked home,
I had an awkward feeling that I had intruded.
Also I was increasingly certain that there was
trouble brewing, and that Tommy had more
warrant for his journey than I had given him
credit for. I cast my mind back to gather
recollections of Pitt-Heron, but all I could
find was an impression of a brilliant uncom-
fortable being, who had been too fond of the
byways of life for my sober tastes. There was
nothing crooked in him in the wrong sense,
but there might be a good deal that was per-
verse. I remember consoling myself with the
thought that, though he might shatter his
wife's nerves by his vagaries, he would scarce-
ly break her heart.

27

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To be watchful, I decided, was my busi-
ness. And I could not get rid of the feeling
that I might soon have cause for all my
vigilance.

28

CHAPTER II

I FIRST HEAR OF MR. ANDREW
LUMLEY

CHAPTER II

I FIRST HEAR OF MR. ANDREW LUMLEY

A FORTNIGHT later— to be accurate,
on the 2 1 st of May — I did a thing I
rarely do, and went down to South London
on a County Court case. It was an ordinary
taxi-cab accident, and, as the solicitors for
the company were good clients of mine, and
the regular county-court junior was ill in bed,
I took the case to oblige them. There was
the usual dull conflict of evidence. An empty
taxi-cab, proceeding slowly on the right side
of the road and hooting decorously at the cor-
ners, had been run into by a private motor-
car, which had darted down a side street. The
taxi had been swung round and its bonnet con-
siderably damaged, while its driver had suf-
fered a dislocated shoulder. The bad feature
in the case was that the motor-car had not
halted to investigate the damage, but had pro-

31

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ceeded unconscientiously on its way, and the
assistance of the London police had been
called in to trace it. It turned out to be the
property of a Mr. Julius Pavia, a retired East
India merchant, who lived in a large villa in
the neighbourhood of Blackheath, and at the
time of the accident it had been occupied by
his butler. The company brought an action
for damages against its owner.

The butler, Tuke, by name, was the only
witness for the defence. He was a tall man,
with a very long, thin face, and a jaw the two
parts of which seemed scarcely to fit. He was
profuse in his apologies on behalf of his mas-
ter, who was abroad. It seemed that on the
morning in question — it was the 8th of May —
he had received instructions from Mr. Pavia
to convey a message to a passenger by the Con-
tinental express from Victoria, and had been
hot on this errand when he met the taxi. He
was not aware that there had been any dam-
age, thought it only a slight grazing of the
two cars, and on his master's behalf consented
to the judgment of the court.

32

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

It was a commonplace business, but Tuke
was by no means a commonplace witness. He
was very unlike the conventional butler, much
liker one of those successful financiers whose
portraits you see in the picture papers. His
little eyes were quick with intelligence, and
there were lines of ruthlessness around his
mouth, like those of a man often called to de-
cisive action. His story was simplicity itself,
and he answered my questions with an air of
serious candour. The train he had to meet
was the n a. m. from Victoria, the train by
which Tommy had travelled. The passenger
he had to see was an American gentleman,
Mr. Wright Davies. His master, Mr. Pavia,
was in Italy, but would shortly be home again.

The case was over in twenty minutes, but
it was something unique in my professional ex-
perience. For I took a most intense and un-
reasoning dislike to that bland butler. I
cross-examined with some rudeness, was an-
swered with steady courtesy, and hopelessly
snubbed. The upshot was that I lost my tem-
per, to the surprise of the County Court

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judge. All the way back I was both angry
and ashamed of myself. Half way home I
realised that the accident had happened on
the very day that Tommy left London. The
coincidence merely flickered across my mind,
for there could be no earthly connection be-
tween the two events.

That afternoon I wasted some time in look-
ing up Pavia in the directory. He was there
sure enough, as the occupier of a suburban
mansion called the White Lodge. He had no
city address, so it was clear that he was out of
business. My irritation with the man had
made me inquisitive about the master. It was
a curious name he bore, possibly Italian, pos-
sibly Goanese. I wondered how he got on
with his highly competent butler. If Tuke
had been my servant I would have wrung his
neck or bolted before a week was out.

Have you ever noticed that, when you hear
a name that strikes you, you seem to be con-
stantly hearing it for a bit. Once I had a
case in which one of the parties was called
Jubber, a name I had never met before, but

34

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

I ran across two other Jubbers before the case
was over. Anyhow, the day after the Black-
heath visit I was briefed in a big Stock Ex-
change case, which turned on the true owner-
ship of certain bearer bonds. It was a com-
plicated business which I need not trouble you
with, and it involved a number of consulta-
tions with my lay clients, a famous firm of
brokers. They produced their books and my
chambers were filled with glossy gentlemen
talking a strange jargon.

I had to examine my clients closely on their
practice in treating a certain class of bearer
security, and they were very frank in ex-
pounding their business. I was not surprised
to hear that Pitt-Heron was one of the most
valued names on their lists. With his wealth
he was bound to be a good deal in the city.
Now I had no desire to pry into Pitt-Heron's
private affairs, especially his financial ar-
rangements, but his name was in my thoughts
at the time, and I could not help looking
curiously at what was put before me. He
seemed to have been buying these bonds on a

35

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big scale. I had the indiscretion to ask if Mr.
Pitt-Heron had long followed this course, and
was told that he had begun to purchase some
six months before.

"Mr. Pitt-Heron," volunteered the stock-
broker, "is very closely connected in his finan-
cial operations with another esteemed client
of ours, Mr. Julius Pavia. They are both at-
tracted by this class of security."

At the moment I scarcely noted the name,
but after dinner that night I began to specu-
late about the connection. I had found out
the name of one of Charles's mysterious new
friends.

It was not a very promising discovery. A
retired East India merchant did not suggest
anything wildly speculative, but I began to
wonder if Charles's preoccupation, to which
Tommy had been witness, might not be con-
nected with financial worries. I could not
believe that the huge Pitt-Heron fortune had
been seriously affected, or that his flight was
that of a defaulter, but he might have got en-
tangled in some shady city business which

36

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

preyed on his sensitive soul. Somehow or
other I could not believe that Mr. Pavia was
a wholly innocent old gentleman; his butler
looked too formidable. It was possible that
he was blackmailing Pitt-Heron, and that
the latter had departed to get out of his
clutches.

But on what ground? I had no notion as
to the blackmailable thing that might lurk in
Charles's past, and the guesses which flitted
through my brain were too fantastic to con-
sider seriously. After all, I had only the flim-
siest basis for conjecture. Pavia and Pitt-
Heron were friends; Tommy had gone off in
quest of Pitt-Heron; Pavia's butler had
broken the law of the land in order, for some
reason or other, to see the departure of the
train by which Tommy had travelled. I re-
member laughing at myself for my suspicions,
and reflecting that, if Tommy could see into
my head, he would turn a deaf ear in the
future to my complaints of his lack of balance.

But the thing stuck in my mind, and I
called again that week on Mrs. Pitt-Heron.

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She had had no word from her husband, and
only a bare line from Tommy, giving his
Moscow address. Poor child, it was a
wretched business for her. She had to keep
a smiling face to the world, invent credible
tales to account for her husband's absence,
and all the while anxiety and dread were
gnawing at her heart. I asked her if she had
ever met a Mr. Pavia, but the name was un-
known to her. She knew nothing of Charles's
business dealings, but at my request she inter-
viewed his bankers, and I heard from her next
day that his affairs were in perfect order. It
was no financial crisis which had precipitated
him abroad.

A few days later I stumbled by the merest
accident upon what sailors call a "cross-bear-
ing." At the time I used to "devil" a little
for the Solicitor-General, and "note" cases
sent to him from the different Government
offices. It was thankless work, but it was sup-
posed to be good for an ambitious lawyer. By

38

1 FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

this prosaic channel I received the first hint
of another of Charles's friends.

I had sent me one day the papers dealing
with the arrest of a German spy at Plymouth,
for at the time there was a sort of epidemic
of roving Teutons who got themselves into
compromising situations, and gravely trou-
bled the souls of the Admiralty and the War-
Office. This case was distinguished from the
common ruck by the higher social standing
of the accused. Generally the spy is a pho-
tographer or bagman who attempts to win the
bibulous confidence of minor officials. But
this specimen was no less than a professor of a
famous German University, a man of excel-
lent manners, wide culture, and attractive
presence, who had dined with Port officers
and danced with Admirals' daughters.

I have forgotten the evidence or what was
the legal point submitted for the Law Offi-
cers' opinion ; in any case it matters little, for
he was acquitted. What interested me at the
time was the testimonials as to character
which he carried with him. He had many

39

THE POWER-HOUSE

letters of introduction. One was from Pitt-
Heron to his wife's sailor uncle; and when he
was arrested one Englishman went so far as
to wire that he took upon himself the whole
costs of the defence. This gentleman was a
Mr. Andrew Lumley, stated in the papers sent
me to be a rich bachelor, a member of the
Athenaeum and Carlton Clubs, and a dweller
in the Albany.

Remember, that till a few weeks before I
had known nothing of Pitt-Heron's circle,
and here were three bits of information drop-
ping in on me unsolicited, just when my inter-
est had been awakened. I began to get really
keen, for every man at the bottom of his heart
believes that he is a born detective. I was on
the look-out for Charles's infrequent friends,
and I argued that if he knew the spy and the
spy knew Mr. Lumley, the odds were that
Pitt-Heron and Lumley were acquaintances.
I hunted up the latter in the Red Book. Sure
enough, he lived in the Albany, belonged to
half a dozen clubs, and had a country house
in Hampshire.

40

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

I tucked the name away in a pigeon-hole
of my memory, and for some days asked
every one I met if he knew the philanthropist
of the Albany. I had no luck till the Satur-
day, when, lunching at the club, I ran against
Jenkinson, the art critic.

I forget if you know that I have always
been a bit of a connoisseur in a mild way. I
used to dabble in prints and miniatures, but
at that time my interest lay chiefly in Old
Wedgwood, of which I had collected some
good pieces. Old Wedgwood is a thing which
few people collect seriously, but the few who
do are apt to be monomaniacs. Whenever a
big collection comes into the market it fetches
high prices, but it generally finds its way into
not more than half a dozen hands. Wedg-
woodites all know each other, and they are
less cut-throat in their methods than most col-
lectors. Of all I have ever met Jenkinson
was the keenest, and he would discourse for
hours on the "feel" of good jasper and the
respective merits of blue and sage-green
grounds.

4i

THE POWER-HOUSE

That day he was full of excitement. He
babbled through luncheon about the Went-
worth sale, which he had attended the week
before. There had been a pair of magnifi-
cent plaques, with a unique Flaxman design,
which had roused his enthusiasm. Urns and
medallions and what not had gone to this or
that connoisseur, and Jenkinson could quote
their prices, but the plaques dominated his
fancy, and he was furious that the nation had
not acquired them. It seemed that he had
been to South Kensington and the British
Museum and all sorts of dignitaries, and he
thought he might yet persuade the authorities
to offer for them if the purchaser would re-
sell. They had been bought by Lutrin for a
well-known private collector, by name An-
drew Lumley.

I pricked up my ears and asked about Mr.
Lumley.

Jenkinson said he was a rich old buffer who
locked up his things in cupboards and never
let the public get a look at them. He sus-
pected that a lot of the best things at recent

42

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

sales had found their way to him, and that
meant that they were put in cold storage for
good.

I asked if he knew him.

No, he told me, but he had once or twice
been allowed to look at his things for books
he had been writing. He had never seen the
man, for he always bought through agents,
but he had heard of people who knew him.
"It is the old silly game," he said. "He will
fill half a dozen houses with priceless treas-
ures, and then die, and the whole show will
be sold at auction and the best things carried
off to America. It's enough to make a patriot
swear."

There was balm in Gilead, however. Mr.
Lumley apparently might be willing to re-
sell the Wedgwood plaques if he got a fair
offer. So Jenkinson had been informed by
Lutrin, and that very afternoon he was going
to look at them. He asked me to come with
him, and, having nothing to do, I accepted.

Jenkinson's car was waiting for us at the
club door. It was closed, for the afternoon

43

THE POWER-HOUSE

was wet. I did not hear his directions to the
chauffeur, and we had been on the road ten
minutes or so before I discovered that we had
crossed the river and were traversing South
London. I had expected to find the things
in Lutrin's shop, but to my delight I was told
that Lumley had taken delivery of them at
once.

"He keeps very few of his things in the
Albany except his books," I was told. "But
he has a house at Blackheath which is stuffed
from cellar to garret."

"What is the name of it?" I asked with a
sudden suspicion.

"The White Lodge," said Jenkinson.

"But that belongs to a man called Pavia,"
I said.

"I can't help that. The things in it be-
long to old Lumley, all right. I know, for
I've been three times there with his per-
mission."

Jenkinson got little out of me for the rest
of the ride. Here was excellent corrobora-
tive evidence of what I had allowed myself

44

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

to suspect. Pavia was a friend of Pitt-Heron,
Lumley was a friend of Pitt-Heron ; Lumley
was obviously a friend of Pavia, and he might
be Pavia himself, for the retired East India
merchant, as I figured him, would not be
above an innocent impersonation. Anyhow,
if I could find one or the other, I might learn
something about Charles's recent doings. I
sincerely hoped that the owner might be at
home that afternoon when we inspected his
treasures, for so far I had found no one who
could procure me an introduction to that mys-
terious old bachelor of artistic and philo-
Teutonic tastes.

We reached the White Lodge about half-
past three. It was one of those small, square,
late-Georgian mansions which you see all
around London — once a country-house among
fields, now only a villa in a pretentious gar-
den. I looked to see my super-butler Tuke,
but the door was opened by a female servant,
who inspected Jenkinson's card of admission,
and somewhat unwillingly allowed us to
enter.

45

THE POWER-HOUSE

My companion had not exaggerated when
he described the place as full of treasures. It
was far more like the shop of a Bond Street
art-dealer than a civilised dwelling. The hall
was crowded with Japanese armour and lac-
quer cabinets. One room was lined from floor
to ceiling with good pictures, mostly seven-
teenth-century Dutch, and had enough Chip-
pendale chairs to accommodate a public meet-
ing. Jenkinson would fain have prowled
around, but we were moved on by the inexor-
able servant to the little back room where
lay the objects of our visit. The plaques had
been only half-unpacked, and in a moment
Jenkinson was busy on them with a magnify-
ing glass, purring to himself like a contented
cat.

The housekeeper stood on guard by the
door, Jenkinson was absorbed, and after the
first inspection of the treasures I had leisure
to look about me. It was an untidy little
room, full of fine Chinese porcelain in dusty
glass cabinets, and in a corner stood piles of
old Persian rugs.

46

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

Pavia, I reflected, must be an easy-going
soul, entirely oblivious of comfort, if he al-
lowed his friend to turn his dwelling into such
a pantechnicon. Less and less did I believe
in the existence of the retired East Indian
merchant. The house was Lumley's, who
chose to pass under another name during his
occasional visits. His motive might be inno-
cent enough, but somehow I did not think so.
His butler had looked too infernally intelli-
gent.

With my foot I turned over the lid of one
of the packing-cases that had held the Wedg-
woods. It was covered with a litter of cotton-
wool and shavings, and below it lay a crum-
pled piece of paper. I looked again, and
saw that it was a telegraph form. Clearly
somebody, with the telegram in his hand, had
opened the cases, and had left it on the top
of one, whence it had dropped to the floor
and been covered by the lid when it was flung
off.

I hope and believe that I am as scrupulous
as other people, but then and there came on

47

THE POWER-HOUSE

me the conviction that I must read that tele-
gram. I felt the gimlet eye of the housekeeper
on me, so I had recourse to craft. I took out
my cigarette case as if to smoke, and clumsily
upset its contents amongst the shavings. Then
on my knees I began to pick them up, turn-
ing over the litter till the telegram was ex-
posed.

It was in French and I read it quite clearly.
It had been sent from Vienna, but the address
was in some code. "Suivez a Bokhare Saro-
nov" — these were the words. I finished my
collection of the cigarettes, and turned the lid
over again on the telegram, so that its owner,
if he chose to look for it diligently, migKi
find it.

When we sat in the car going home, Jen-
kinson absorbed in meditation on the plaques,
I was coming to something like a decision. A
curious feeling of inevitability possessed me.
I had collected by accident a few odd dis-
jointed pieces of information, and here by the
most amazing accident of all was the con-
necting link. I knew I had no evidence to go

48

I FIRST HEAR OF ANDREW LUMLEY

upon which would have convinced the most
credulous common jury. Pavia knew Pitt-
Heron; so probably did Lumley. Lumley
knew Pavia, possibly was identical with him.
Somebody in Pavia's house got a telegram in
which a trip to Bokhara was indicated. It
didn't sound much. Yet I was absolutely
convinced, with the queer sub-conscious cer-
titude of the human brain, that Pitt-Heron
was or was about to be in Bokhara, and that
Pavia-Lumley knew of his being there and
was deeply concerned in his journey.

That night after dinner I rang up Mrs.
Pitt-Heron.

She had had a letter from Tommy, a very
dispirited letter, for he had had no luck. No-
body in Moscow had seen or heard of any
wandering Englishman remotely like Charles,
and Tommy, after playing the private de-
tective for three weeks, was nearly at the end
of his tether and spoke of returning home.

I told her to send him the following wire in
her own name. "Go on to Bokhara. Have in-
formation you will meet him there/'

49

THE POWER-HOUSE

She promised to send the message next day
and asked no further questions. She was a
pearl among women.

SO

CHAPTER in
TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

CHAPTER III

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

HITHERTO I had been the looker-on;
now I was to become a person of the
drama. That telegram was the beginning of
my active part in this curious affair. They
say that everybody turns up in time at the
corner of Piccadilly Circus if you wait long
enough. I was to find myself like a citizen
of Bagdad in the days of the great Caliph,
and yet never stir from my routine of flat,
chambers, club, and flat.

I am wrong; there was one episode out of
London, and that perhaps was the true be-
ginning of my story.

Whitsuntide that year came very late, and
I was glad of the fortnight's rest, for Parlia-
ment and the Law Courts had given me a
busy time. I had recently acquired a car and
a chauffeur called Stagg, and I looked for-

53

THE POWER-HOUSE

ward to trying it in a tour in the West coun-
try. But before I left London I went again
to Portman Square.

I found Ethel Pitt-Heron in grave distress.
You must remember that Tommy and I had
always gone on the hypothesis that Charles's
departure had been in pursuance of some mad
scheme of his own which might get him into
trouble. We thought that he had become
mixed up with highly undesirable friends,
and was probably embarking in some venture
which might not be criminal but was certain
to be foolish. I had long rejected the idea of
blackmail, and convinced myself that Lum-
ley and Pavia were his colleagues. The same
general notion, I fancy, had been in his wife's
mind. But now she had found something
which altered the case.

She had ransacked his papers in the hope
of finding a clue to the affair which had taken
him abroad, but there was nothing but busi-
ness letters, notes of investments, and such
like. He seemed to have burned most of his
papers in the queer laboratory at the back of

54

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

the house. But, stuffed into the pocket of a
blotter on a bureau in the drawing-room
where he scarcely ever wrote, she had found
a document. It seemed to be the rough draft
of a letter, and it was addressed to her. I
give it as it was written ; the blank spaces were
left blank in the manuscript.

"You must have thought me mad, or worse,
to treat you as I have done. But there was a
terrible reason, which some day I hope to tell
you all about. I want you as soon as you get
this to make ready to come out to me at . . .
You will travel by . . . and arrive at . . .
/ enclose a letter which I want you to hand
in deepest confidence to Knowles, the solicitor.
He will make all arrangements about your
journey and about sending me the supplies of
money I want. Darling, you must leave as
secretly as I did, and tell nobody anything,
not even that I am alive — that least of all. I
would not frighten you for worlds, but I am
on the edge of a horrible danger, which I hope
with God's help and yours to escape . . ."

That was all — obviously the draft of a let-
55

THE POWER-HOUSE

ter which he intended to post to her from some
foreign place. But can you conceive a mis-
sive more calculated to shatter a woman's
nerves? It filled me, I am bound to say, with
heavy disquiet. Pitt-Heron was no coward,
and he was not the man to make too much of
a risk. Yet it was clear that he had fled that
day in May under the pressure of some mortal
fear.

The affair in my eyes began to look very
bad. Ethel wanted me to go to Scotland
Yard, but I dissuaded her. I have the utmost
esteem for Scotland Yard, but I shrank from
publicity at this stage. There might be some-
thing in the case too delicate for the police to
handle, and I thought it better to wait.

I reflected a great deal about the Pitt-
Heron business the first day or two of my
trip, but the air and the swift motion helped
me to forget it. We had a fortnight of su-
perb weather, and sailed all day through a
glistening green country under the hazy blue
heavens of June. Soon I fell into the blissful

56

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

state of physical and mental ease which such
a life induces. Hard toil, such as deer-stalk-
ing, keeps the nerves on the alert and the mind
active, but swimming all day in a smooth car
through a heavenly landscape mesmerises
brain and body.

We ran up the Thames valley, explored the
Cotswolds, and turned south through Somer-
set till we reached the fringes of Exmoor. I
stayed a day or two at a little inn high up in
the moor, and spent the time tramping the
endless ridges of hill or scrambling in the
arbutus thickets where the moor falls in
steeps to the sea. We returned by Dartmoor
and the south coast, meeting with our first
rain in Dorset, and sweeping into sunlight
again on Salisbury Plain. The time came
when only two days remained to me. The
car had behaved beyond all my hopes, and
Stagg, a sombre and silent man, was lyrical in
his praises.

I wanted to be in London by the Monday
afternoon, and to insure this I made a long
day of it on the Sunday. It was the long day

57

THE POWER-HOUSE

which brought our pride to a fall. The car
had run so well that I resolved to push on and
sleep in a friend's house near Farnham. It
was about half-past eight, and we were tra-
versing the somewhat confused and narrow
roads in the neighbourhood of Wolmer For-
est, when, as we turned a sharp corner, we
ran full into the tail of a heavy carrier's cart.
Stagg clapped on the brakes, but the collision,
though it did no harm to the cart, was suffi-
cient to send the butt-end of something
through our glass screen, damage the tyre of
the near front-wheel, and derange the steer-
ing-gear. Neither of us suffered much hurt,
but Stagg got a long scratch on his cheek from
broken glass, and I had a bruised shoulder.

The carrier was friendly but useless, and
there was nothing for it but to arrange for
horses to take the car to Farnham. This*
meant a job of some hours, and I found on
inquiry at a neighbouring cottage that there
was no inn where I could stay within eight
miles. Stagg borrowed a bicycle somehow
and went off to collect horses, while I mo-

58

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

rosely reviewed the alternatives before me.

I did not like the prospect of spending the
June night beside my derelict car, and the
thought of my friend's house near Farnham
beckoned me seductively. I might have
walked there, but I did not know the road,
and I found that my shoulder was paining
me, so I resolved to try to find some gentle-
man's house in the neighbourhood where I
could borrow a conveyance. The south of
England is now so densely peopled by Lon-
doners that even in a wild district where there
are no inns and few farms there are certain
to be several week-end cottages.

I walked along the white ribbon of road in
the scented June dusk. At first it was bound-
ed by high gorse, then came patches of
open heath, and then woods. Beyond the
woods I found a park-railing, and presently
an entrance-gate with a lodge. It seemed to
be the place I was looking for, and I woke the
lodge-keeper, who thus early had retired to
bed. I asked the name of the owner, but was
told the name of the place instead — it was

59

THE POWER-HOUSE

High Ashes. I asked if the owner was at
home, and got a sleepy nod for answer.

The house, as seen in the half-light, was a
long white-washed cottage, rising to two
storeys in the centre. It was plentifully cov-
ered with creepers and roses, and the odour of
flowers was mingled with the faintest savour
of wood-smoke, pleasant to a hungry traveller
in the late hours. I pulled an old-fashioned
bell, and the door was opened by a stolid
young parlour-maid.

I explained my errand, and offered my
card. I was, I said, a Member of Parlia-
ment and of the Bar, who had suffered a mo-
tor accident. Would it be possible for the
master of the house to assist me to get to my
destination near Farnham? I was bidden en-
ter, and wearily seated myself on a settle in
the hall.

In a few minutes an ancient housekeeper
appeared, a grim dame whom at other times I
should have shunned. She bore, however, a
hospitable message. There was no convey-
ance in the place, as the car had gone that day

60

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

to London for repairs. But if I cared to
avail myself of the accommodation of the
house for the night it was at my service.
Meantime my servant could be looking after
the car, and a message would go to him to
pick me up in the morning.

I gratefully accepted, for my shoulder was
growing troublesome, and was conducted up
a shallow oak staircase to a very pleasant
bedroom with a bathroom adjoining. I had
a bath, and afterwards found a variety of
comforts put at my service, from slippers to
razors. There was also some Elliman for my
wounded shoulder. Clean and refreshed, I
made my way downstairs and entered a room
from which I caught a glow of light.

It was a library, the most attractive I think
I have ever seen. The room was long, as
libraries should be, and entirely lined with
books, save over the fireplace, where hung a
fine picture, which I took to be a Raeburn.
The books were in glass cases, which showed
the beautiful shallow mouldings of a more ar-
tistic age. A table was laid for dinner in a

61

THE POWER-HOUSE

corner, for the room was immense, and the
shaded candlesticks on it, along with the late
June dusk, gave such light as there was. At
first I thought the place was empty, but as I
crossed the floor a figure rose from a deep
chair by the hearth.

"Good evening, Mr. Leithen," a voice said.
"It is a kindly mischance which gives a lonely
old man the pleasure of your company."

He switched on an electric lamp, and I saw
before me — what I had not guessed from the
voice — an old man. I was thirty-four at the
time, and counted anything over fifty old, but
I judged my host to be well on in the sixties.
He was about my own size, but a good deal
bent in the shoulders as if from study. His
face was clean-shaven and extraordinarily.fine,
with every feature delicately chiselled. He
had a sort of Hapsburg mouth and chin, very
long and pointed, but modelled with a grace
which made the full lower lip seem entirely
right. His hair was silver, brushed so low
on the forehead as to give him a slightly for-

62

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

eign air, and he wore tinted glasses, as if for
reading.

Altogether it was a very dignified and
agreeable figure who greeted me in a voice so
full and soft that it belied his obvious age.

Dinner was a light meal, but perfect in its
way. There were soles, I remember, an ex-
ceedingly well-cooked chicken, fresh straw-
berries and a savoury. We drank a '95 Per-
rier-Jouet and some excellent Madeira. The
stolid parlour-maid waited on us, and, as we
talked of the weather and the Hampshire
roads, I kept trying to guess my host's pro-
fession. He was not a lawyer, for he had not
the inevitable lines on the cheek. I thought
that he might be a retired Oxford don, or one
of the higher civil servants, or perhaps some
official of the British Museum. His library
proclaimed him a scholar, and his voice a
gentleman.

Afterwards we settled ourselves in arm-
chairs and he gave me a good cigar. We
talked about many things — books, the right
furnishing of a library, a little politics in def-

63

THE POWER-HOUSE

erence to my M.P.-ship. My host was apa-
thetic about party questions, but curious about
defence matters and in his way an amateur
strategist. I could fancy him inditing letters
to The Times on national service.

Then we wandered into foreign affairs,
where I found his interest acute, and his
knowledge immense. Indeed he was so well
informed that I began to suspect that my
guesses had been wrong, and that he was a re-
tired diplomat. At that time there was some
difficulty between France and Italy over cus-
toms duties, and he sketched for me with re-
markable clearness the weak points in the
French tariff administration. I had been re-
cently engaged in a big South American rail-
way case, and I asked him a question about
the property of my clients. He gave me a
much better account than I had ever got from
the solicitors who briefed me.

The fire had been lit before we finished
dinner, and presently it began to burn up
and light the figure of my host, who sat in a
deep arm-chair. He had taken off his tinted

64

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

glasses, and as I rose to get a match I saw
his eyes looking abstractedly before him.

Somehow they reminded me of Pitt-Heron.
Charles had always a sort of dancing light in
his, a restless intelligence which was at once
attractive and disquieting. My host had this
and more. His eyes were paler than I had
ever seen in a human head — pale, bright, and
curiously wild. But, whereas Pitt-Heron's
had only given the impression of reckless
youth, this man's spoke of wisdom and power
as well as of endless vitality.

All my theories vanished, for I could not
believe that my host had ever followed any
profession. If he had, he would have been at
the head of it, and the world would have been
familiar with his features. I began to won-
der if my recollection was not playing me
false, and I was in the presence of some great
man whom I ought to recognise.

As I dived into the recesses of my memory
I heard his voice asking if I were not a lawyer.

I told him, Yes. A barrister with a fair

65

THE POWER-HOUSE

common-law practice and some work in Privy-
Council appeals.

He asked me why I chose the profession.

"It came handiest," I said. "I am a dry
creature, who loves facts and logic. I am not
a flier, I have no new ideas, I don't want to
lead men and I like work. I am the ordinary
educated Englishman, and my sort gravitates
to the Bar. We like feeling that, if we are
not the builders, at any rate we are the cement
of civilisation."

He repeated the words "cement of civilisa-
tion" in his soft voice.

"In a sense you are right. But civilisation
needs more than the law to hold it together.
You see all mankind are not equally willing
to accept as divine justice what is called hu-
man law."

"Of course there are further sanctions," I
said. "Police and armies and the good-will
of civilisation."

He caught me up quickly. "The last is
your true cement. Did you ever reflect, Mr.

66

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

Leithen, how precarious is the tenure of the
civilisation we boast about?"

"I should have thought it fairly substan-
tial," I said, "and the foundations grow daily
firmer."

He laughed. "That is the lawyer's view,
but believe me you are wrong. Reflect, and
you will find that the foundations are sand.
You think that a wall as solid as the earth
separates civilisation from barbarism. I tell
you the division is a thread, a sheet of glass.
A touch here, a push there, and you bring
back the reign of Saturn."

It was the kind of paradoxical, undergrad-
uate speculation which grown men indulge
in sometimes after dinner. I looked at my
host to discover his mood, and at the moment
a log flared up again.

His face was perfectly serious. His light
wild eyes were intently watching me.

"Take one little instance," he said. "We
are a commercial world, and have built up a
great system of credit. Without our cheques
and bills of exchange and currency the whole

67

THE POWER-HOUSE

of our life would stop. But credit only exists
because behind it we have a standard of value.
My Bank of England notes are worthless pa-
per unless I can get sovereigns for them if I
choose. Forgive this elementary disquisition,
but the point is important. We have fixed a
gold standard, because gold is sufficiently
rare, and because it allows itself to be coined
into a portable form. I am aware that there
are economists who say that the world could
be run on a pure credit basis, with no metal
currency at the back of it; but, however
sound their argument may be in the abstract,
the thing is practically impossible. You
would have to convert the whole of the
world's stupidity to their economic faith be-
fore it would work.

"Now, suppose something happened to
make our standard of value useless. Suppose
the dream of the alchemists came true, and all
metals were readily transmutable. We have
got very near it in recent years, as you will
know if you interest yourself in chemical sci-
ence. Once gold and silver lost their intrinsic

68

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

value, the whole edifice of our commerce
would collapse. Credit would become mean-
ingless, because it would be untranslatable.
We should be back at a bound in the age of
barter, for it is hard to see what other stand-
ard of value could take the place of the
precious metals. All our civilisation, with its
industries and commerce, would come top-
pling down. Once more, like primitive man,
I would plant cabbages for a living and ex-
change them for services in kind from the
cobbler and the butcher. We should have
the simple life with a vengeance — not the self-
conscious simplicity of the civilised man, but
the compulsory simplicity of the savage."

I was not greatly impressed by the illus-
tration. "Of course, there are many key-
points in civilisation," I said, "and the loss of
them would bring ruin. But these keys are
strongly held."

"Not so strongly as you think. Consider
how delicate the machine is growing. As life
grows more complex, the machinery grows
more intricate and therefore more vulnerable.

69

THE POWER-HOUSE

Your so-called sanctions become so infinitely
numerous that each in itself is frail. In the
Dark Ages you had one great power — the ter-
ror of God and His Church. Now you have
a multiplicity of small things, all delicate and
fragile, and strong only by our tacit agree-
ment not to question them."

"You forget one thing," I said — "the fact
that men really are agreed to keep the ma-
chine going. That is what I called the 'good-
will of civilisation.' "

He got up from his chair and walked up
and down the floor, a curious dusky figure lit
by the rare spurts of flame from the hearth.

"You have put your finger on the one thing
that matters. Civilisation is a conspiracy.
What value would your police be if every
criminal could find a sanctuary across the
Channel, or your law courts if no other tri-
bunal recognised their decisions? Modern
life is the silent compact of comfortable folk
to keep up pretences. And it will succeed
till the day comes when there is another com-
pact to strip them bare."

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TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

I do not think that I have ever listened to a
stranger conversation. It was not so much
what he said — you will hear the same thing
from any group of half-baked young men — as
the air with which he said it. The room was
almost dark, but the man's personality seemed
to take shape and bulk in the gloom. Though
I could scarcely see him, I knew that those
pale strange eyes were looking at me. I
wanted more light, but did not know where to
look for a switch. It was all so eery and odd
that I began to wonder if my host were not a
little mad. In any case, I was tired of his
speculations.

"We won't dispute on the indisputable," I
said. "But I should have thought that it was
the interest of all the best brains of the world
to keep up what you call the conspiracy."

He dropped into his chair again.

"I wonder," he said slowly. "Do we really
get the best brains working on the side of the
compact? Take the business of Government.
When all is said, we are ruled by the amateurs
and the second-rate. The methods of our de-

7*

THE POWER-HOUSE

partments would bring any private firm to
bankruptcy. The methods of Parliament —
pardon me — would disgrace any board of di-
rectors. Our rulers pretend to buy expert
knowledge, but they never pay the price for it
that a business man would pay, and if they get
it they have not the courage to use it. Where
is the inducement for a man of genius to sell
his brains to our insipid governors?

"And yet knowledge is the only power —
now as ever. A little mechanical device will
wreck your navies. A new chemical combina-
tion will upset every rule of war. It is the
same with our commerce. One or two minute
changes might sink Britain to the level of
Ecuador or give China the key of the world's
wealth. And yet we never dream that these
things are possible. We think our castles of
sand are the ramparts of the universe."

I have never had the gift of the gab, but I
admire it in others. There is a morbid charm
in such talk, a kind of exhilaration of which
one is half ashamed. I found myself inter-
ested and more than a little impressed.

72

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

"But surely," I said, "the first thing a dis-
coverer does is to make his discovery public.
He wants the honour and glory, and he wants
money for it. It becomes part of the world's
knowledge, and everything is readjusted to
meet it. That was what happened with elec-
tricity. You call our civilisation a machine,
but it is something far more flexible. It has
the power of adaptation of a living organism."

"That might be true if the new knowledge
really became the world's property. But does
it? I read now and then in the papers that
some eminent scientist has made a great dis-
covery. He reads a paper before some Acad-
emy of Science, and there are leading articles
on it, and his photograph adorns the maga-
zines. That kind of man is not the danger.
He is a bit of the machine, a party to the com-
pact. It is the men who stand outside it that
are to be reckoned with, the artists in discov-
ery who will never use their knowledge till
they can use it with full effect. Believe me,
the biggest brains are without the ring which
we call civilisation."

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THE POWER-HOUSE

Then his voice seemed to hesitate. "You
may hear people say that submarines have
done away with the battleship, and that air-
craft have annulled the mastery of the sea.
That is what our pessimists say. But do you
imagine that the clumsy submarine or the fra-
gile aeroplane is really the last word of sci-
ence ?"

"No doubt they will develop," I said,
"but by that time the power of the defence
will have advanced also."

He shook his head. "It is not so. Even
now the knowledge which makes possible
great engines of destruction is far beyond the
capacity of any defence. You see only the
productions of second-rate folk who are in a
hurry to get wealth and fame. The true
knowledge, the deadly knowledge, is still kept
secret. But, believe me, my friend, it is
there."

He paused for a second, and I saw the faint
outline of the smoke from his cigar against
the background of the dark. Then he quoted

74

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

me one or two cases, slowly, as if in some
doubt about the wisdom of his words.

It was these cases which startled me. They
were of different kinds — a great calamity, a
sudden breach between two nations, a blight
on a vital crop, a war, a pestilence. I will not
repeat them. I do not think I believed in
them then, and now I believe less. But they
were horribly impressive, as told in that quiet
voice in that sombre room on that dark June
night. If he was right, these things had not
been the work of Nature or accident, but of a
devilish art. The nameless brains that he
spoke of, working silently in the background,
now and then showed their power by some
cataclysmic revelation. I did not believe him,
but, as he put the case, showing with strange
clearness the steps in the game, I had no
words to protest.

At last I found my voice.

"What you describe is super-anarchy, and
yet it makes no headway. What is the motive
of those diabolical brains?"

He laughed. "How should I be able to tell

75

THE POWER-HOUSE

you? I am a humble inquirer, and in my re-
searches I come on curious bits of fact. But
I cannot pry into motives. I only know of the
existence of great extra-social intelligences.
Let us say that they distrust the machine.
They may be idealists and desire to make a
new world, or they may simply be artists, lov-
ing for its own sake the pursuit of truth. If
I were to hazard a guess, I should say that it
took both types to bring about results, for the
second find the knowledge and the first the
will to use it."

A recollection came back to me. It was of
a hot upland meadow in Tyrol, where among
acres of flowers and beside a leaping stream
I was breakfasting after a morning spent in
climbing the white crags. I had picked up a
German on the way, a small man of the Pro-
fessor class, who did me the honour to share
my sandwiches. He conversed fluently, but
quaintly in English, and he was, I remember,
a Nietzschean, and a hot rebel against the
established order. "The pity," he cried, "is
that the reformers do not know, and those who

76

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

know are too idle to reform. Some day there
will come the marriage of knowledge and
will, and then the world will march."

"You draw an awful picture," I said. "But
if those extra-social brains are so potent, why
after all do they effect so little? A dull po-
lice-officer, with the machine behind him, can
afford to laugh at most experiments in anar-
chy."

"True," he said, "and civilisation will win
until its enemies learn from it the importance
of the machine. The compact must endure
until there is a counter-compact. Consider
the ways of that form of foolishness which to-
day we call nihilism or anarchy. A few illit-
erate bandits in a Paris slum defy the world,
and in a week they are in jail. Half a dozen
crazy Russian intellectuels in Geneva con-
spire to upset the Romanoffs and are hunted
down by the police of Europe. All the Gov-
ernments and their not very intelligent police
forces join hands, and hey, presto! there is an
end of the conspirators. For civilisation
knows how to use such powers as it has, while

77

THE POWER-HOUSE

the immense potentiality of the unlicensed is
dissipated in vapour. Civilisation wins be-
cause it is a world-wide league; its enemies
fail because they are parochial. But sup-
posing "

Again he stopped and rose from his chair.
He found a switch and flooded the room with
light. I glanced up blinking to see my host
smiling down on me, a most benevolent and
courteous old gentleman. He had resumed
his tinted glasses.

"Forgive me," he said, "for leaving you in
darkness while I bored you with my gloomy
prognostications. A recluse is apt to forget
what is due to a guest."

He handed the cigar-box to me, and pointed
to a table where whisky and mineral waters
had been set out.

"I want to hear the end of your prophe-
cies," I said. "You were saying ?"

"I said — supposing anarchy learned from
civilisation and became international. Oh, I
don't mean the bands of advertising donkeys
who call themselves International Unions of

78

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

Workers and such-like rubbish. I mean if the
real brain-stuff of the world were internation-
alised. Suppose that the links in the cordon
of civilisation were neutralised by other links
in a far more potent chain. The earth is
seething with incoherent power and unorgan-
ised intelligence. Have you ever reflected on
the case of China? There you have millions
of quick brains stifled in trumpery crafts.
They have no direction, no driving power, so
the sum of their efforts is futile, and the world
laughs at China. Europe throws her a mil-
lion or two on loan now and then, and she
cynically responds by begging the prayers of
Christendom. And yet, I say, suppos-
ing "

"It's a horrible idea," I said, "and, thank
God, I don't believe it possible. Mere de-
struction is too barren a creed to inspire a new
Napoleon, and you can do with nothing short
of one."

"It would scarcely be destruction," he re-
plied gently. "Let us call it iconoclasm, the
swallowing of formulas, which has always had

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THE POWER-HOUSE

its full retinue of idealists. And you do not
want a Napoleon. All that is needed is direc-
tion, which could be given by men of far
lower gifts than a Bonaparte. In a word, you
want a Power-House, and then the age of
miracles will begin."

I got up, for the hour was late, and I had
had enough of this viewy talk. My host was
smiling, and I think that smile was the thing
I really disliked about him. It was too —
what shall I say? — superior and Olympian.

As he led me into the hall he apologised for
indulging his whims. "But you, as a lawyer,
should welcome the idea. If there is an atom
of truth in my fancies, your task is far bigger
than you thought. You are not defending
an easy case, but fighting in a contest where
the issues are still doubtful. That should en-
courage your professional pride . . ."

By all the rules I should have been sleepy,
for it was past midnight, and I had had a long
day in the open air. But that wretched talk
had unsettled me, and I could not get my

80

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

mind off it. I have reproduced very crudely
the substance of my host's conversation, but
no words of mine could do justice to his eery
persuasiveness. There was a kind of mag-
netism in the man, a sense of vast powers and
banked-up fires, which would have given
weight to the tritest platitudes. I had a hor-
rible feeling that he was trying to convince
me, to fascinate me, to prepare the ground for
some proposal. Again and again I told my-
self it was crazy nonsense, the heated dream of
a visionary, but again and again I came back
to some details which had a horrid air of real-
ity. If the man was a romancer he had an
uncommon gift of realism.

I flung open my bedroom window and let
in the soft air of the June night and the scents
from leagues of clover and pines and sweet
grasses. It momentarily refreshed me, for I
could not believe that this homely and gra-
cious world held such dire portents.

But always that phrase of his, the "Power-
House," kept recurring. You know how
twisted your thoughts get during a wakeful

81

THE POWER-HOUSE

night, and long before I fell asleep towards
morning I had worked myself up into a very
complete dislike of that bland and smiling
gentleman, my host. Suddenly it occurred to
me that I did not know his name, and that
set me off on another train of reflection.

I did not wait to be called, but rose about
seven, dressed, and went downstairs. I heard
the sound of a car on the gravel of the drive,
and to my delight saw that Stagg had arrived.
I wanted to get away from the house as soon
as possible, and I had no desire to meet its
master again in this world.

The grim housekeeper, who answered my
summons, received my explanation in silence.
Breakfast would be ready in twenty minutes;
eight was Mr. Lumley's hour for it.

"Mr. Andrew Lumley?" I asked with a
start.

"Mr. Andrew Lumley," she said.

So that was my host's name. I sat down at
a bureau in the hall and did a wildly foolish
thing.

I wrote a letter, beginning "Dear Mr. Lum-
82

TELLS OF A MIDSUMMER NIGHT

ley," thanking him for his kindness and ex-
plaining the reason of my early departure.
It was imperative, I said, that I should be
in London by midday. Then I added: "I
wish I had known who you were last night,
for I think you know an old friend of mine,
Charles Pitt-Heron."

Breakfastless I joined Stagg in the car, and
soon we were swinging down from the uplands
to the shallow vale of the Wey. My thoughts
were very little on my new toy or on the mid-
summer beauties of Surrey. The friend of
Pitt-Heron, who knew about his going to
Bokhara, was the maniac who dreamed of the
"Power-House." There were going to be
dark scenes in the drama before it was played
out.

83

CHAPTER IV

I FOLLOW THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-
BUTLER

CHAPTER IV

I FOLLOW THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

MY first thought, as I journeyed towards
London, was that I was horribly alone
in this business. Whatever was to be done I
must do it myself, for the truth was I had no
evidence which any authority would recog-
nise. Pitt-Heron was the friend of a strange
being who collected objects of art, probably
passed under an alias in South London, and
had absurd visions of the end of civilisation.
That, in cold black and white, was all my
story came to. If I went to the police they
would laugh at me, and they would be right.
Now I am a sober and practical person,
but, slender though my evidence was, it
brought to my mind the most absolute con-
viction. I seemed to know Pitt-Heron's story
as if I had heard it from his own lips — his
first meeting with Lumley and their growing

87 '

THE POWER-HOUSE

friendship; his initiation into secret and for-
bidden things; the revolt of the decent man,
appalled that his freakishness had led him so
far; the realisation that he could not break so
easily with his past, and that Lumley held
him in his power; and last, the mad flight
under the pressure of overwhelming terror.

I could read, too, the purpose of that flight.
He knew the Indian frontier as few men know
it, and in the wild tangle of the Pamirs he
hoped to baffle his enemy. Then from some
far refuge he would send for his wife and
spend the rest of his days in exile. It must
have been an omnipotent terror to drive such
a man, young, brilliant, rich, successful, to
the fate of an absconding felon.

But Lumley was on his trail. So I read the
telegram I had picked up on the floor of the
Blackheath house, and my business was to
frustrate the pursuit. Some one must have
gone to Bokhara, some creature of Lumley's,
perhaps the super-butler I had met in the
County Court. The telegram, for I had noted
the date, had been received on the 27th day

88

THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

of May. It was now the 15th of June, so if
some one had started immediately on its re-
ceipt, in all probability he would by now be
in Bokhara.

I must find out who had gone and endeav-
our to warn Tommy. I calculated that it
would have taken him seven or eight days to
get from Moscow by the Transcaspian; prob-
ably he would find Pitt-Heron gone, but in-
quiries would set him on the track. I might
be able to get in touch with him through the
Russian officials. In any case, if Lumley were
stalking Pitt-Heron, I, unknown and unsus-
pected, would be stalking Lumley.

And then in a flash I realised my folly.

The wretched letter I had written that
morning had given the whole show away.
Lumley knew that I was a friend of Pitt-
Heron, and that I knew that he was a friend
of Pitt-Heron. If my guess was right, friend-
ship with Lumley was not a thing Charles was
likely to confess to, and he would argue that
my knowledge of it meant that I was in
Charles's confidence. I would therefore know

89

THE POWER-HOUSE

of his disappearance and its cause, and alone
in London would connect it with the decorous
bachelor of the Albany. My letter was a
warning to him that he could not play the
game unobserved, and I, too, would be sus-
pect in his eyes.

It was no good crying over spilt milk, and
Lumley's suspicions must be accepted. But I
confess that the thought gave me the shivers.
The man had a curious terror for me, a terror
I cannot hope to analyse and reproduce for
you. My bald words can give no idea of the
magnetic force of his talk, the sense of brood-
ing and unholy craft. I was proposing to
match my wits against a master's, one, too,
who must have at his command an organisa-
tion far beyond my puny efforts. I have said
that my first feeling was that of loneliness and
isolation; my second was one of hopeless in-
significance. It was a boy's mechanical toy
arrayed against a Power-House with its shin-
ing wheels and monstrous dynamos.

My first business was to get into touch with
Tommy.

90

THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

At that time I had a friend in one of the
Embassies, whose acquaintance I had made on
a dry-fly stream in Hampshire. I will not tell
you his name, for he has since become a great
figure in the world's diplomacy, and I am by
no means certain that the part he played in this
tale was strictly in accordance with official
etiquette. I had assisted him on the legal
side in some of the international worries that
beset all Embassies, and we had reached the
point of intimacy which is marked by the use
of Christian names and by dining frequently
together. Let us call him Monsieur Felix.
He was a grave young man, slightly my senior,
learned, discreet, and ambitious, but with an
engaging boyishness cropping up now and
then under the official gold lace. It occurred
to me that in him I might find an ally.

I reached London about eleven in the morn-
ing, and went straight to Belgrave Square.
Felix I found in the little library off the big
secretaries' room, a sunburnt sportsman fresh
from a Norwegian salmon river. I asked him

9i

THE POWER-HOUSE

if he had half an hour to spare, and was told
that the day was at my service.

"You know Tommy Deloraine?" I asked.

He nodded.

"And Charles Pitt-Heron?"

"I have heard of him."

"Well, here is my trouble. I have reason
to believe that Tommy has joined Pitt-Heron
in Bokhara. If he has, my mind will be
greatly relieved, for, though I can't tell you
the story, I can tell you that Pitt Heron is in
very considerable danger. Can you help
me?"

Felix reflected. "That should be simple
enough. I can wire in cypher to the Military
Governor. The police there are pretty effi-
cient, as you may imagine, and travellers don't
come and go without being remarked. I
should be able to give you an answer within
twenty-four hours. But I must describe Tom-
my. How does one do that in telegraphese?"

"I want you to tell me another thing," I
said. "You remember that Pitt-Heron has
some reputation as a Central Asian traveller.

92

THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

Tommy, as you know, is as mad as a hatter.
Suppose these two fellows at Bokhara, want-
ing to make a long trek into wild country —
how would they go? You've been there, and
know the lie of the land."

Felix got down a big German atlas, and for
half an hour we pored over it. From Bok-
hara, he said, the only routes for madmen ran
to the south. East and north you got into
Siberia; west lay the Transcaspian desert; but
southward you might go through the Hissar
range by Pamirski Post to Gilgit and Kash-
mir, or you might follow up the Oxus and
enter the north of Afghanistan, or you might
go by Merv into north-eastern Persia. The
first he thought the likeliest route, if a man
wanted to travel fast.

I asked him to put in his cable a sugges-
tion about watching the Indian roads, and left
him with a promise of early enlightenment.

Then I went down to the Temple, fixed
some consultations, and spent a quiet evening
in my rooms. I had a heavy sense of impend-
ing disaster, not unnatural in the circum-

93

THE POWER-HOUSE

stances. I really cannot think what it was that
held me to the job, for I don't mind admitting
that I felt pretty queasy about it. Partly, no
doubt, liking for Tommy and Ethel, partly
regret for that unfortunate fellow Pitt-Heron,*
most of all, I think, dislike of Lumley. That
bland super-man had fairly stirred my prosaic
antipathies.

That night I went carefully over every item
in the evidence to try and decide on my next
step. I had got to find out more about my
enemies* Lumley I was pretty certain would
baffle me, but I thought I might have a better
chance with the super-butler. As it turned
out I hit his trail almost at once.

Next day I was in a case at the Old Bailey.
It was an important prosecution for fraud,
and I appeared, with two leaders, for the Bank
concerned. The amazing and almost incredi-
ble thing about this story of mine is the way
clues kept rolling in unsolicited, and I was to
get another from this dull prosecution. I
suppose that the explanation is that the world

94

THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

is full of clues to everything, and that, if a
man's mind is sharp-set on any quest, he hap-
pens *tb notice and take advantage of what
otherwise he would miss. «

My leaders were both absent the first day,
and I had to examine our witnesses alone.
Towards the close of the afternoon I put a
fellow in the box, an oldish, drink-sodden
clerk from a Cannon Street bucket-shop. His
evidence was valuable for our case, but I was
very doubtful how he would stand a cross-ex-
amination as to credit. His name was Routh,
and he spoke with a strong North-country ac-
cent. But what caught my attention was his
face. His jaw looked as if it had been made
in two pieces which did not fit, and he had
little, bright protuberant eyes. At my first
glance I was conscious of a recollection.

He was still in the box when the Court
rose, and I informed the solicitors that before
going further I wanted a conference with the
witness. I mentioned also that I should like
to see him alone. A few minutes later he was
brought to my chambers, and I put one or two

95

THE POWER-HOUSE

obvious questions on the case, till the man-
aging clerk who accompanied him announced
with many excuses that he must hurry away.
Then I shut the door, gave Mr. Routh a cigar,
and proceeded to conduct a private inquiry.

He was a pathetic being, only too ready to
talk. I learned the squalid details of his con-
tinuous misfortunes. He had been the son of
a dissenting minister in Northumberland, and
had drifted through half a dozen occupations
till he found his present unsavoury billet.
Truth was written large on his statement, he
had nothing to conceal, for his foible was
folly, not crime, and he had not a rag of pride
to give him reticence. He boasted that he was
a gentleman and well-educated, too, but he
had never had a chance. His brother had ad-
vised him badly; his brother was too clever
for a prosaic world; always through his remi-
niscences came this echo of fraternal admira-
tion and complaint.

It was about the brother I wanted to know,
and Mr. Routh was very willing to speak. In-
deed, it was hard to disentangle facts from his

96

THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

copious outpourings. The brother had been
an engineer and a highly successful one ; had
dallied with politics, too, and had been a great
inventor. He had put Mr. Routh on to a
South American speculation, where he had
made a little money but speedily lost it again.
Oh, he had been a good brother in his way,
and had often helped him, but he was a busy
man, and his help never went quite far
enough. Besides, he did not like to apply to
him too often. I gathered that the brother
was not a person to take liberties with.

I asked him what he was doing now.

"Ah," said Mr. Routh, "that is what I wish
I could tell you. I will not conceal from you
that for the moment I am in considerable
financial straits, and this case, though my
hands are clean enough, God knows, will not
make life easier for me. My brother is a mys-
terious man, whose business often takes him
abroad. I have never known even his ad-
dress, for I write always to a London office
from which my communications are forward-
ed. I only know that he is in some big elec-

97

THE POWER-HOUSE

trical business, for I remember that he once
let drop the remark that he was in charge of
some power station. No, I do not think it is
in London, probably somewhere abroad. I
heard from him a fortnight ago, and he told
me he was just leaving England for a couple
of months. It is very annoying, for I want
badly to get into touch with him."

"Do you know, Mr. Routh," I said, "I be-
lieve I have met your brother. Is he like you
in any way?"

"We have a strong family resemblance, but
he is taller and slimmer. He has been more
prosperous, and has lived a healthier life, you
see."

"Do you happen to know," I asked, "if he
ever uses another name? I don't think that
the man I knew was called Routh."

The clerk flushed. "I think it highly un-
likely that my brother would use an alias.
He has done nothing to disgrace a name of
which we are proud."

I told him that my memory had played me
false, and we parted on very good terms. He

98

THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

was an innocent soul, one of those people that
clever rascals get to do their dirty work for
them. But there was no mistaking the resem-
blance. There, without the brains and force
and virility, went my super-butler of Black-
heath, who passed under the name of Tuke.

The clerk had given me the name of the
office to whose address he had written to his
brother. I was not surprised to find that it
was that of the firm of stockbrokers for whom
I was still acting in the bearer-bonds case
where I had heard Pavia's name.

I rang up the partner whom I knew and
told him a very plausible story of having a
message for one of Mr. Pavia's servants, and
asked him if he were in touch with them and
could forward letters. He made me hold the
line, and then came back and told me that he
had forwarded letters for Tuke, the butler,
and one Routh who was a groom or footman.
Tuke had gone abroad to join his master and
he did not know his address. But he advised
me to write to the White Lodge.

I thanked him and rang off. That was set-

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tied anyhow. Tuke's real name was Routh,
and it was Tuke who had gone to Bokhara.

My next step was to ring up Macgillivray
at Scotland Yard and get an appointment in
half an hour's time. Macgillivray had been
at the Bar — I had read in his chambers — and
was now one of the heads of the Criminal In-
vestigation Department. I was about to ask
him for information which he was in no way
bound to give me, but I presumed on our old
acquaintance.

I asked him first whether he had ever heard
of a secret organisation which went under the
name of the Power-House. He laughed out
loud at my question.

"I should think we have several hundreds
of such pet names on our records," he said.
"Everything from the Lodge of the Baldfaced
Ravens to Solomon's Seal No. X. Fancy no-
menclature is the relaxation of the tired an-
archist, and matters very little. The danger-
ous fellows have no names, no numbers even,
which we can get hold of. But I'll get a man

ioo

THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

to look up our records. There may be some-
thing filed about your Power-House."

My second question he answered differ-
ently. "Routh! Routh! Why, yes, there was
a Routh we had dealings with a dozen years
ago, when I used to go the North-Eastern
circuit. He was a trade-union official who
bagged the funds, and they couldn't bring him
to justice because of the ridiculous extra-legal
status they possess. He knew it, and played
their own privileges against them. Oh, yes,
he was a very complete rogue. I once saw
him at ■ meeting in Sunderland, and I re-
member his face — sneering eyes, diabolically
clever mouth, and with it all as smug as a
family butler. He has disappeared from Eng-
land— at least we haven't heard of him for
some years, but I can show you his photo-
graph."

Macgillivray took from a lettered cabinet a
bundle of cards, selected one and tossed it
towards me. It was that of a man of thirty
or so, with short side-whiskers and a drooping
moustache. The eyes, the ill-fitting jaw, and

IOI

THE POWER-HOUSE

the brow were those of my friend, Mr. Tuke,
brother and patron of the sorrowful Mr.
Routh, who had already that afternoon occu-
pied my attention.

Macgillivray promised to make certain in-
quiries, and I walked home in a state of ela-
tion. Now I knew for certain who had gone
to Bokhara, and I knew something, too, of
the traveller's past. A discredited genius was
the very man for Lumley's schemes — one who
asked for nothing better than to use his brains
outside the ring-fence of convention. Some-
where in the wastes of Turkestan the ex-trade-
union official was in search of Pitt-Heron. I
did not fancy that Mr. Tuke would be very
squeamish.

I dined at the club and left early. Going
home, I had an impression that I was being
shadowed.

You know the feeling that some one is
watching you, a sort of sensation which the
mind receives without actual evidence. If the
watcher is behind where you can't see him you
have a cold feeling between your shoulders.

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THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

I daresay it is a legacy from the days when the
cave-man had to look pretty sharp to keep
from getting his enemy's knife between the
ribs.

It was a bright summer evening, and Pic-
cadilly had its usual crowd of motor-cars and
busses and foot passengers. I halted twice,
once in St. James's Street and once at the cor-
ner of Stratton Street, and retraced my steps
for a bit, and each time I had the impression
that some one a hundred yards or so off had
done the same. My instinct was to turn round
and face him, whoever he was, but I saw that
that was foolishness. Obviously in such a
crowd I could get no certainty in the matter,
so I put it out of my mind.

I spent the rest of the evening in my rooms,
reading cases and trying to keep my thoughts
off Central Asia. About ten I was rung up
on the telephone by Felix. He had had his
answer from Bokhara. Pitt-Heron had left
with a small caravan on June 2d by the main
road through the Hissar range. Tommy had
arrived on June 10th and on the 12th had set

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off with two servants on the same trail. Trav-
elling the lighter of the two, he should have
overtaken Pitt-Heron by the 15th at latest.

That was yesterday, and my mind was im-
mensely relieved. Tommy in such a situation
was a tower of strength, for, whatever his fail-
ings in politics, I knew no one I would rather
have with me to go tiger-shooting.

Next day the sense of espionage increased.
I was in the habit of walking down to the
Temple by way of Pall Mall and the Em-
bankment, but, as I did not happen to be in
Court that morning, I resolved to make a
detour and test my suspicions. There seemed
to be nobody in Down Street as I emerged
from my flat, but I had not walked five yards
before, turning back, I saw a man enter from
the Piccadilly end, while another moved
across the Hertford Street opening. It may
have been only my imagination, but I was con-
vinced that these were my watchers.

I walked up Park Lane, for it seemed to me
that by taking the Tube at the Marble Arch
Station I could bring matters to the proof. I

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THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

have a knack of observing small irrelevant
details, and I happened to have noticed that
a certain carriage in the train which left Mar-
ble Arch about 9.30 stopped exactly opposite
the exit at the Chancery Lane Station, and by
hurrying up the passage one could just catch
the lift which served an earlier train and so
reach the street before any of the other trav-
ellers.

I performed this manoeuvre with success,
caught the early lift, reached the street and
took cover behind a pillar-box from which
I could watch the exit of passengers from the
stairs. I judged that my tracker, if he missed
me below, would run up the stairs rather than
wait for the lift. Sure enough, a breathless
gentleman appeared, who scanned the street
eagerly, and then turned to the lift to watch
the emerging passengers. It was clear that
the espionage was no figment of my brain.

I walked slowly to my chambers and got
through the day's work as best I could, for my
mind was preoccupied with the unpleasant
business in which I found myself entangled.

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THE POWER-HOUSE

I would have given a year's income to be hon-
estly quit of it, but there seemed to be no way
of escape. The maddening thing was that I
could do so little. There was no chance of
forgetting anxiety in strenuous work. I could
only wait with the patience at my command,
and hope for the one chance in a thousand
which I might seize. I felt miserably that it
was no game for me. I had never been
brought up to harry wild beasts and risk my
neck twice a day at polo like Tommy Delo-
raine. I was a peaceful, sedentary man, a
lover of a quiet life, with no appetite for
perils and commotions. But I was beginning
to realize that I was very obstinate.

At four o'clock I left the Temple and
walked to the Embassy. I had resolved to
banish the espionage from my mind, for that
was the least of my difficulties.

Felix gave me an hour of his valuable time.
It was something that Tommy had joined
Pitt-Heron, but there were other matters to
be arranged in that far country. The time

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THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

had come, in my opinion, to tell him the
whole story.

The telling was a huge relief to my mind.
He did not laugh at me as I had half feared,
but took the whole thing as gravely as possi-
ble. In his profession, I fancy, he had found
too many certainties behind suspicions to treat
anything as trivial. The next step, he said,
was to warn the Russian police of the presence
of the man called Saronov and the super-but-
ler. Happily we had materials for the de-
scription of Tuke or Routh, and I could not
believe that such a figure would be hard to
trace. Felix cabled again in cypher, asking
that the two should be watched, more espe-
cially if there was reason to believe that they
had followed Tommy's route. Once more we
got out the big map and discussed the possible
ways. It seemed to me a land created by
Providence for surprises, for the roads fol-
lowed the valleys, and to the man who trav-
elled light there must be many short cuts
through the hills.

I left the Embassy before six o'clock and,
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crossing the Square engrossed with my own
thoughts, ran full into Lumley.

I hope I played my part well, though I
could not repress a start of surprise. He wore
a grey morning-coat and a white top-hat and
looked the image of benevolent respectability.

"Ah, Mr. Leithen," he said, "we meet
again."

I murmured something about my regrets
at my early departure three days ago, and
added the feeble joke that I wished he would
hurry on his Twilight of Civilisation, for the
burden of it was becoming too much for me.

He looked me in the eyes with all the
friendliness in the world. "So you have not
forgotten our evening's talk? You owe me
something, my friend, for giving you a new
interest in your profession."

"I owe you much," I said, "for your hospi-
tality, your advice, and your warnings."

He was wearing his tinted glasses and
peered quizzically into my face.

"I am going to make a call in Grosvenor
Place," he said, "and shall beg in return the

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THE TRAIL OF THE SUPER-BUTLER

pleasure of your company. So you know my
young friend, Pitt-Heron?"

With an ingenuous countenance I explained
that he had been at Oxford with me and that
we had common friends.

"A brilliant young man," said Lumley.
"Like you, he has occasionally cheered an old
man's solitude. And he has spoken of me to
you?"

"Yes," I said, lying stoutly. "He used to
tell me about your collections." (If Lumley
knew Charles well he would find me out, for
the latter would not have crossed the road
for all the treasures of the Louvre.)

"Ah, yes, I have picked up a few things.
If ever you should care to see them I should
be honoured. You are a connoisseur? Of a
sort? You interest me for I should have
thought your taste lay in other directions
than the dead things of art. Pitt-Heron is no
collector. He loves life better than art, as a
young man should. A great traveller our
friend — the Laurence Oliphant or Richard
Burton of our day."

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We stopped at a house in Grosvenor Place,
and he relinquished my arm. "Mr. Leithen,"
he said, "a word from one who wishes you no
ill. You are a friend of Pitt-Heron, but
where he goes you cannot follow. Take my
advice and keep out of his affairs. You will
do no good to him, and you may bring your-
self into serious danger. You are a man of
sense, a practical man, so I speak to you
frankly. But, remember, I do not warn
twice."

He took off his glasses, and his light, wild
eyes looked me straight in the face. All be-
nevolence had gone, and something implaca-
ble and deadly burned in them. Before I
could say a word in reply he shuffled up the
steps of the house and was gone. . . .

no

CHAPTER V
I TAKE A PARTNER

CHAPTER V

I TAKE A PARTNER

THAT meeting with Lumley scared me
badly, but it also clinched my resolu-
tion. The most pacific fellow on earth can
be gingered into pugnacity. I had now more
than my friendship for Tommy and my sym-
pathy with Pitt-Heron to urge me on. A
man had tried to bully me, and that roused
all the worst stubbornness of my soul. I was
determined to see the game through at any
cost.

But I must have an ally if my nerves were
to hold out, and my mind turned at once to
Tommy's friend Chapman. I thought with
comfort of the bluff independence of the La-
bour member. So that night at the House I
hunted him out in the smoking-room.

He had been having a row with the young
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THE POWER-HOUSE

bloods of my party that afternoon and re-
ceived me ungraciously.

"I'm about sick of you fellows," he
growled. (I shall not attempt to reproduce
Chapman's accent. He spoke rich Yorkshire
with a touch of the drawl of the western
dales.) "They went and spoiled the best
speech, though I say it as shouldn't, which
this old place has heard for a twelvemonth.
I've been workin' for days at it in the Library.
I was tellin' them how much more bread cost
under Protection, and the Jew Hilderstein
started a laugh because I said kilometres for
kilogrammes. It was just a slip o' the tongue,
for I had it right in my notes, and besides
there furrin' words don't matter a curse.
Then that young lord as sits for East Clay-
gate gets up and goes out as I was gettin' into
my peroration, and he drops his topper and
knocks off old Higgins's spectacles, and all
the idiots laughed. After that I gave it them
hot and strong, and got called to order. And
then Wattles, him as used to be as good a so-
cialist as me, replied for the Government and

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I TAKE A PARTNER

his blamed Board and said that the Board
thought this and the Board thought that, and
was damned if the Board would stir its
stumps. Well I mind the day when I was
hanging on to the Board's coat-tails in Hyde
Park to keep it from talking treason."

It took me a long time to get Chapman set-
tled down and anchored to a drink.

"I want you," I said, "to tell me about
Routh — you know the fellow I mean — the ex-
Union-Leader."

At that he fairly blazed up.

"There you are, you Tories," he shouted,
causing a pale Liberal member on the next
sofa to make a hurried exit. "You can't fight
fair. You hate the Unions, and you rake up
any rotten old prejudice to discredit them.
You can find out about Routh for yourself, for
I'm damned if I help you."

I saw I could do nothing with Chapman
unless I made a clean breast of it, so for the
second time that day I told the whole story.

I couldn't have wished for a better audi-
ence. He got wildly excited before I was half

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through with it. No doubt of the correctness
of my evidence ever entered his head, for,
like most of his party, he hated anarchism
worse than capitalism, and the notion of a
highly capitalised, highly scientific, highly
undemocratic anarchism fairly revolted his
soul. Besides, he adored Tommy Deloraine.
Routh, he told me, had been a young en-
gineer of a superior type, with a job in a big
shop at Sheffield. He had professed advanced
political views, and, although he had strictly
no business to be there, had taken a large part
in Trade Union work, and was treasurer of
one big branch. Chapman had met him often
at conferences and on platforms, and had been
impressed by the fertility and ingenuity of
his mind and the boldness of his purpose. He
was the leader of the left wing of the move-
ment, and had that gift of half-scientific, half-
philosophic jargon which is dear at all times
to the hearts of the half-baked. A seat in
Parliament had been repeatedly offered him,
but he had always declined ; wisely, Chapman

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thought, for he judged him the type which is
more effective behind the scenes.

But with all his ability he had not been
popular. "He was a cold-blooded, sneering
devil," as Chapman put it, "a sort of Parnell.
He tyrannised over his followers, and he was
the rudest brute I ever met."

Then followed the catastrophe, in which it
became apparent that he had speculated with
the funds of his Union and had lost a large
sum. Chapman, however, was suspicious of
these losses, and was inclined to suspect that
he had the money all the time in a safe place.
A year or two earlier the Unions, greatly to
the disgust of old-fashioned folk, had been
given certain extra-legal privileges, and this
man Routh had been one of the chief advo-
cates of the Unions' claims. Now he had the
cool effrontery to turn the tables on them and
use those very privileges to justify his action
and escape prosecution.

There was nothing to be done. Some of the
fellows, said Chapman, swore to wring his
neck, but he did not give them the chance.

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THE POWER-HOUSE

He had disappeared from England, and was
generally believed to be living in some for-
eign capital.

"What I would give to be even with the
swine!" cried my friend, clenching and un-
clenching his big fist. "But we're up against
no small thing in Josiah Routh. There isn't
a crime on earth he'd stick at, and he's as
clever as the old Devil, his master."

"If that's how you feel, I can trust you to
back me up," I said. "And the first thing I
want you to do is to come and stay at my flat.
God knows what may happen next, and two
men are better than one. I tell you frankly,
I'm nervous, and I would like to have you
with me."

Chapman had no objection. I accompa-
nied him to his Bloomsbury lodgings, where
he packed a bag, and we returned to the Down
Street flat. The sight of his burly figure and
sagacious face was a relief to me in the mys-
terious darkness where I now found myself

walking.

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Thus begun my housekeeping with Chap-
man— one of the queerest episodes in my life.
He was the best fellow in the world, but I
found that I had misjudged his character. To
see him in the House, you would have thought
him a piece of granite, with his Yorkshire
bluntness and hard, downright, north-country
sense. He had all that somewhere inside him,
but he was also as romantic as a boy. The
new situation delighted him. He was quite
clear that it was another case of the strife be-
tween Capital and Labour — Tommy and I
standing for Labour, though he used to refer
to Tommy in public as a "gilded popinjay,"
and only a month before had described me in
the House as a "viperous lackey of Capital-
ism." It was the best kind of strife, in which
you had not to meet your adversary with long-
winded speeches but might any moment get
a chance to pummel him with your fists.

He made me ache with laughter. The spy-
ing business used to rouse him to fury. I don't
think he was tracked as I was, but he chose
to fancy he was, and was guilty of assault and

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THE POWER-HOUSE

battery on one butcher's boy, two cabbies, and
a gentleman who turned out to be a bookmak-
er's assistant. This side of him got to be an
infernal nuisance, and I had many rows with
him. Among other things, he chose to sus-
pect my man Waters of treachery — Waters,
who was the son of a gardener at home, and
hadn't wits enough to put up an umbrella
when it rained.

"You're not taking this business rightly,"
he maintained one night. "What's the good
of waiting for these devils to down you? Let's
go out and down them." And he announced
his intention, from which no words of mine
could dissuade him, of keeping watch on Mr.
Andrew Lumley at the Albany.

His resolution led to a complete disregard
of his Parliamentary duties. Deputations of
constituents waited for him in vain. Of
course he never got a sight of Lumley. All
that happened was that he was very nearly
given in charge more than once for molesting
peaceable citizens in the neighbourhood of
Piccadilly and Regent Street.

1 20

I TAKE A PARTNER

One night, on my way home from the Tem-
ple, I saw in the bills of the evening papers
the announcement of the arrest of a Labour
Member. It was Chapman, sure enough. At
first, I feared that he had got himself into
serious trouble, and was much relieved to find
him in the flat in a state of blazing anger. It
seemed that he had found somebody whom
he thought was Lumley, for he only knew him
from my descriptions. The man was in a
shop in Jermyn Street, with a car waiting out-
side, and Chapman had — politely, as he swore
-—asked the chauffeur his master's name. The
chauffeur had replied abusively, upon which
Chapman had haled him from the driver's
seat and shaken him till his teeth rattled. The
owner came out, and Chapman was arrested
and taken off to the nearest police-court. He
had been compelled to apologise and had been
fined five pounds and costs.

By the mercy of Heaven, the chauffeur's
master was a money-lender of evil repute, so
the affair did Chapman no harm. But I was
forced to talk to him seriously. I knew it was

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THE POWER-HOUSE

no use explaining that for him to spy on the
Power-House was like an elephant stalking
a gazelle. The only way was to appeal to his
incurable romanticism.

"Don't you see," I told him, "that you are
playing Lumley's game? He will trap you
sooner or later into some escapade which will
land you in jail, and where will I be then?
That is what he and his friends are out for.
We have got to meet cunning with cunning,
and lie low till we get our chance."

He allowed himself to be convinced, and
handed over to me the pistol he had bought,
which had been the terror of my life.

"All right," he said, "I'll keep quiet. But
you promise to let me into the big scrap when
it comes off."

I promised. Chapman's notion of the grand
finale was a Homeric combat in which he
would get his fill of fisticuffs.

He was an anxiety, but all the same he was
an enormous comfort. His imperturbable
cheerfulness and his racy talk were the tonics
I wanted. He had plenty of wisdom, too. My

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nerves were getting bad those days, and,
whereas I had rarely touched the things be-
fore, I now found myself smoking cigarettes
from morning till night. I am pretty abste-
mious, as you know, but I discovered, to my
horror, that I was drinking far too many whis-
keys-and-sodas. Chapman knocked me off all
that and got me back to a pipe and a modest
nightcap.

He did more, for he undertook to put me
in training. His notion was that we should
win in the end by superior muscles. He was
a square, thick-set fellow, who had been a
good middle-weight boxer. I could box a bit
myself, but I improved mightily under his
tuition. We got some gloves, and used to
hammer each other for half an hour every
morning. Then might have been seen the
shameful spectacle of a rising barrister with
a swollen lip and a black eye arguing in court,
and proceeding of an evening to his country's
legislature, where he was confronted from the
opposite benches by the sight of a Leader of
the People in the same vulgar condition.

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THE POWER-HOUSE

In those days I wanted all the relief I could
get, for it was a beastly time. I knew I was
in grave danger, so I made my will and went
through the other doleful performances con-
sequent on the expectation of a speedy decease.
You see, I had nothing to grip on, no clear
job to tackle, only to wait on the off-chance,
with an atmosphere of suspicion thickening
around me. The spying went on — there was
no mistake about that — but I soon ceased to
mind it, though I did my best to give my
watchers little satisfaction. There was a hint
of bullying about the spying. It is discon-
certing at night to have a man bump against
you and look you greedily in the face.

I did not go again to Scotland Yard, but
one night I ran across Macgillivray in the
club.

He had something of profound interest to
tell me. I had asked about the phrase, the
"Power-House." Well, he had come across
it in the letter of a German friend, a private
letter, in which the writer gave the results of

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his inquiries into a curious affair which a year
before had excited Europe.

I have forgotten the details, but it had some-
thing to do with the Slav States of Austria
and an Italian Students' Union, and it threat-
ened at one time to be dangerous. Macgilli-
vray's correspondent said that in some docu-
ments which were seized he found constant
allusion to a thing called the Krafthaus, evi-
dently the headquarters-staff of the plot. And
this same word, Krafthaus, had appeared else-
where— in a sonnet of a poet-anarchist who
shot himself in the slums of Antwerp, in the
last ravings of more than one criminal, in the

extraordinary testament of Professor M ,

of Jena, who, at the age of thirty-seven, took
his life after writing a strange, mystical mes-
sage to his fellow citizens.

Macgillivray's correspondent concluded by
saying that, in his opinion, if this Krafthaus
could be found, the key would be discovered
to the most dangerous secret organisation in
the world. He added that he had some rea-

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THE POWER-HOUSE

son to believe that the motive power of the
concern was English.

"Macgillivray," I said, "you have known
me for some time, and I fancy you think me
a sober and discreet person. Well, I believe
I am on the edge of discovering the secret of
your Krafthaus. I want you to promise me
that if in the next week I send you an urgent
message you will act on it, however fantastic
it seems. I can't tell you more. I ask you
to take me on trust, and believe that for any-
thing I do I have tremendous reasons."

He knit his shaggy grey eyebrows and
looked curiously at me. "Yes, I'll go bail for
your sanity. It's a good deal to promise, but
if you make an appeal to me I will see that
it is met."

Next day I had news from Felix. Tuke
and the man called Saronov had been identi-
fied. If you are making inquiries about any-
body it is fairly easy to find those who are
seeking for the same person, and the Russian
police, in tracking Tommy and Pitt-Heron,
had easily come on the two gentlemen who

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were following the same trail. The two had
gone by Samarkand, evidently intending to
strike into the hills by a shorter route than
the main road from Bokhara. The frontier
posts had been warned, and the stalkers had
become the stalked.

That was one solid achievement, at any rate.
I had saved Pitt-Heron from the worst dan-
ger, for first I had sent him Tommy, and now
I had put the police on guard against his
enemies. I had not the slightest doubt that
enemies they were. Charles knew too much,
and Tuke was the man appointed to reason
with him, to bring him back, if possible; or,
if not As Chapman had said, the ex-
Union leader was not the man to stick at
trifles.

It was a broiling June, the London season
was at its height, and I had never been so
busy in the Courts before. But that crowded
and garish world was little more than a dream
to me. I went through my daily tasks, dined
out, went to the play, had consultations, talked
to my fellows, but all the while I had the

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THE POWER-HOUSE

feeling that I was watching somebody else
perform the same functions. I believe I did
my work well, and I know I was twice com-
plimented by the Court of Appeal.

But my real interests were far away. Al-
ways I saw two men in the hot glens of the
Oxus, with the fine dust of the loess rising
in yellow clouds behind them. One of these
men had a drawn and anxious face, and both
rode hard. They passed by the closes of apri-
cot and cherry and the green, watered gardens,
and soon the Oxus ceased to flow wide among
rushes and water-lilies and became a turbid
hill-stream. By-and-by the roadside changed,
and the horses of the travellers trod on moun-
tain turf, crushing the irises and marigolds
and thyme. I could feel the free air blowing
from the roof of the world, and see far ahead
the snowy saddle of the pass which led to
India.

Far behind the riders I saw two others, and
they chose a different way, now over water-
less plateaux, now in rugged nullahs. They
rode the faster and their route was the shorter.

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I TAKE A PARTNER

Sooner or later they must catch up the first
riders, and I knew, though how I could not
tell, that death would attend the meeting.

I, and only I, sitting in London, four thou-
sand miles away, could prevent disaster. The
dream haunted me at night, and often, walk-
ing in the Strand or sitting at a dinner-table,
I have found my eyes fixed clearly on the shin-
ing upland with the thin white mountains at
the back of it, and the four dots, which were
men, hurrying fast on their business.

One night I met Lumley. It was at a big
political dinner given by the chief of my party
in the House of Lords — fifty or sixty guests,
and a blaze of stars and decorations. I sat
near the bottom of the table, and he was near
the top, sitting between a famous General and
an ex- Viceroy of India. I asked my right-
hand neighbour who he was, but he could not
tell me. The same question to my left-hand
neighbour brought an answer:

"It is old Lumley. Have you never met
him? He doesn't go out much, but he gives
a man's dinner now and then which are the
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THE POWER-HOUSE

best in London. No. He's not a politician,
though he favours our side, and I expect has
given a lot to our funds. I can't think why
they don't make him a Peer. He's enormously
rich and very generous, and the most learned
old fellow in Britain. My Chief" — my neigh-
bour was an Under-Secretary — "knows him,
and told me once that if you wanted any out-
of-the-way bit of knowledge you could get it
by asking Lumley. I expect he pulls the
strings more than anybody living. But he
scarcely ever goes out, and it's a feather in
our host's cap to have got him to-night. You
never see his name in the papers, either. He
probably pays the Press to keep him out, like
some of those millionaire fellows in Amer-
ica."

I watched him through dinner. He was the
centre of the talk at his end of the table. I
could see the blue ribbon bulging out on Lord
Morecambe's breast as he leaned forward to
question him. He was wearing some foreign
orders, including the Legion of Honour, and
I could hear in the pause of conversation ech-

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I TAKE A PARTNER

oes of his soft, rich voice. I could see him
beaming through his glasses on his neighbours,
and now and then he would take them off and
look mildly at a speaker. I wondered why
nobody realised, as I did, what was in his light
wild eyes.

The dinner, I believe, was excellent and the
company was good, but down at my end I
could eat little, and I did not want to talk.
Here in this pleasant room, with servants mov-
ing softly about and a mellow light on the
silver from the shaded candles, I felt the man
was buttressed and defended beyond my reach.
A kind of despairing hatred gripped me when
I looked his way. For I was always conscious
of that other picture — the Asian desert, Pitt-
Heron's hunted face, and the grim figure of
Tuke on his trail. That, and the great secret
wheels of what was too inhuman to be called
crime moving throughout the globe under this
man's hand.

There was a party afterwards, but I did
not stay. No more did Lumley, and for a

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THE POWER-HOUSE

second I brushed against him in the hall at
the foot of the big staircase.

He smiled on me affectionately.

"Have you been dining here? I did not no-
tice you."

"You had better things to think of," I said.
"By the way, you gave me good advice some
weeks ago. It may interest you to hear that
I have taken it."

"I am so glad," he said softly. "You are
a very discreet young man."

But his eyes told me that he knew I lied.

132

CHAPTER VI

THE RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH
STREET

CHAPTER VI

THE RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

I WAS working late at the Temple next
day, and it was nearly seven before I got
up to go home. Macgillivray had telephoned
to me in the afternoon saying he wanted to
see me, and suggesting dinner at the Club, and
I had told him I should come straight there
from my Chambers. But just after six he had
rung me up again and proposed another meet-
ing place.

"I've got some very important news for you,
and want to be quiet. There's a little place
where I sometimes dine — Rapaccini's, in An-
tioch Street. I'll meet you there at half-past
seven."

I agreed, and sent a message to Chapman
at the flat, telling him I would be out to din-
ner. It was a Wednesday night, so the House
rose early. He asked me where I was dining,

135

THE POWER-HOUSE

and I told him, but I did not mention with
whom. His voice sounded very cross, for he
hated a lonely meal.

It was a hot, still night, and I had had a
heavy day in Court, so heavy that my private
anxieties had almost slipped from my mind.
I walked along the Embankment, and up Re-
gent Street towards Oxford Circus. Antioch
Street, as I had learned from the Directory,
was in the area between Langham Place and
Tottenham Court Road. I wondered vaguely
why Macgillivray should have chosen such
an out-of-the-way spot, but I knew him for a
man of many whims.

The street, when I found it, turned out to
be a respectable little place, boarding-houses
and architects' offices, with a few antiquity
shops and a picture-cleaner's. The restaurant
took some finding, for it was one of those dis-
creet establishments, common enough in
France, where no edibles are displayed in the
British fashion, and muslin half-curtains deck
the windows. Only the doormat, lettered with

136

RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

the proprietor's name, remained to guide the
hungry.

I gave a waiter my hat and stick, and was
ushered into a garish dining-room, apparently
full of people. A single violinist was discours-
ing music from beside the grill. The occu-
pants were not quite the kind one expects to
find in an eating-house in a side street. The
men were all in evening dress with white
waistcoats, and the women looked either demi-
mondaines or those who follow their taste in
clothes. Various eyes looked curiously at me
as I entered. I guessed that the restaurant had,
by one of those odd freaks of Londoners, be-
come for a moment the fashion.

The proprietor met me half way up the
room. He might call himself Rapaccini, but
he was obviously a German.

"Mr. Geelvrai," he nodded. "He has en-
gaged a private room. Vill you follow, sir?"

A narrow stairway broke into the wall on
the left side of the dining-room. I followed
the manager up it and along a short corridor
to a door which filled its end. He ushered

137

THE POWER-HOUSE

me into a brightly lit little room where a table
was laid for two.

"Mr. Geelvrai comes often here," said the
manager. "He vill be late — sometimes.
Everything is ready, sir. I hope you vill be
pleased."

It looked inviting enough, but the air smelt
stuffy. Then I saw that, though the night
was warm, the window was shut and the cur-
tains drawn. I pulled back the curtains, and,
to my surprise, saw that the shutters were
closed.

"You must open these," I said, "or we'll
stifle."

The manager glanced at the window. "I
vill send a waiter," he said, and departed. The
door seemed to shut with an odd click.

I flung myself down in one of the arm-
chairs, for I was feeling pretty tired. The
little table beckoned alluringly, for I was also
hungry. I remember there was a mass of
pink roses on it. A bottle of champagne, with
the cork loose, stood in a wine-cooler on the
side-board, and there was an unopened bottle

138

RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

beside it. It seemed to me that Macgillivray,
when he dined here, did himself rather well.

The promised waiter did not arrive, and
the stuffiness was making me very thirsty. I
looked for a bell, but could not see one. My
watch told me it was now a quarter to eight,
but there was no sign of Macgillivray. I
poured myself out a glass of champagne from
the opened bottle, and was just about to drink
it when my eye caught something in a corner
of the room.

It was one of those little mid- Victorian cor-
ner tables — I believe they call them "what-
nots"— which you will find in any boarding-
house, littered up with photographs and coral
and "Presents from Brighton." On this one
stood a photograph in a shabby frame, and I
thought I recognised it.

I crossed the room and picked it up. It
showed a man of thirty, with short side-whis-
kers and ill-fitting jaw and a drooping mous-
tache. The duplicate of it was in Macgilli-
vray's cabinet. It was Mr. Routh, the ex-
Union leader.

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THE POWER-HOUSE

There was nothing very remarkable about
that, after all, but it gave me a nasty shock.
The room now seemed a sinister place, as well
as intolerably close. There was still no sign
of the waiter to open the window, so I thought
I would wait for Macgillivray downstairs.

But the door would not open. The handle
would not turn. It did not seem to be locked,
but rather to have shut with some kind of
patent spring. I noticed that the whole thing
was a powerful piece of oak, with a heavy
framework, very unlike the usual flimsy res-
taurant doors.

My first instinct was to make a deuce of a
row and attract the attention of the diners be-
low. I own I was beginning to feel badly
frightened. Clearly, I had got into some sort
of trap. Macgillivray's invitation might have
been a hoax, for it is not difficult to counter-
feit a man's voice on the telephone. With an
effort I forced myself into calmness. It was
preposterous to think that anything could hap-
pen to me in a room not thirty feet from where
a score or two of ordinary citizens were din-

140

RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

ing. I had only to raise my voice to bring
inquirers.

Yes, but above all things I did not want a
row. It would never do for a rising lawyer
and a Member of Parliament to be found
shouting for help in an upper chamber of a
Bloomsbury restaurant. The worst deduction
would be drawn from the open bottle of cham-
pagne. Besides, it might be all right after
all. The door might have got stuck. Mac-
gillivray at that very moment might be on
his way up.

So I sat down and waited. Then I remem-
bered my thirst, and stretched out my hand
to the glass of champagne.

But at that instant I looked towards the win-
dow, and set down the wine untasted.

It was a very odd window. The lower end
was about flush with the floor, and the hinges
of the shutters seemed to be only on one side.
As I stared, I began to wonder whether it
was a window at all.

Next moment my doubts were solved. The
141

THE POWER-HOUSE

window swung open like a door, and in the
dark cavity stood a man.

Strangely enough, I knew him. His figure
was not one that is readily forgotten.

"Good evening, Mr. Docker," I said. "Will
you have a glass of champagne?"

A year before, on the South Eastern Circuit,
I had appeared for the defence in a burglary
case. Criminal law was not my province, but
now and then I took a case to keep my hand in,
for it is the best training in the world for the
handling of witnesses. This case had been
peculiar. A certain Bill Docker was the ac-
cused, a gentleman who bore a bad reputa-
tion in the eyes of the police. The evidence
against him was strong, but it was more or
less tainted, being chiefly that of two former
accomplices — a proof that there is small truth
in the proverbial honour among thieves. It
was an ugly business, and my sympathies were
with the accused, for though he may very
well have been guilty, yet he had been the
victim of a shabby trick. Anyhow, I put my
back into the case, and after a hard struggle

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RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

got a verdict of "Not guilty." Mr. Docker
had been kind enough to express his apprecia-
tion of my efforts, and to ask, in a hoarse whis-
per, how I had "squared the old bird," mean-
ing the Judge. He did not understand the
subtleties of the English law of evidence.

He shambled into the room, a huge, hulk-
ing figure of a man, with the thickness of
chest which, under happier circumstances,
might have made him a terror in the prize-
ring. His features wore a heavy scowl, which
slowly cleared to a flicker of recognition.

"By God, it's the lawyer-chap," he mut-
tered.

I pointed to the glass of champagne.

"I don't mind if I do," he said. " 'Ere's
health!" He swallowed the wine at a gulp,
and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. " 'Ave a
drop yourself, guvnor," he added. "A glass
of bubbly will cheer you up."

"Well, Mr. Docker," I said, "I hope I see
you fit." I was getting wonderfully collected
now that the suspense was over.

H3

THE POWER-HOUSE

"Pretty fair, sir. Pretty fair. Able to do
my day's work like an honest man."

"And what brings you here?"

"A little job I'm on. Some friends of mine
wants you out of the road for a bit, and they've
sent me to fetch you. It's a bit of luck for
you that you've struck a pal. We needn't
'ave no unpleasantness, seein' we're both what
you might call men of the world."

"I appreciate the compliment," I said.
"But where do you propose to take me?"

"Dunno. It's some lay near the Docks. I've
got a motor-car waitin' at the back of the
'ouse."

"But supposing I don't want to go?"

"My orders hadmit no hexcuse," he said
solemnly. "You're a sensible chap, and can
see that in a scrap I could down you easy."

"Very likely," I said. "But, man, you must
be mad to talk like that. Downstairs there
is a dining-room fall of people. I have only
to lift my voice to bring the police."

"You're a kid," he said scornfully. "Them
geesers downstairs are all in the job. That

144

RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

was a flat-catching rig to get you up here so
as you wouldn't suspect nothing. If you was
to go down now — which you ain't going to be
allowed to do — you wouldn't find a blamed
soul in the place. I must say you're a bit
softer than I 'oped after the 'andsome way
you talked over the old juggins with the wig
at Maidstone."

Mr. Docker took the bottle from the wine-
cooler and filled himself another glass.

It sounded horribly convincing. If I was
to be kidnapped and smuggled away Lumley
would have scored half a success. Not the
whole, for, as I swiftly reflected, I had put
Felix on the track of Tuke, and there was
every chance that Tommy and Pitt-Heron
would be saved. But for myself it looked
pretty black. The more my scheme succeeded
the more likely the Power-House would be to
wreak its vengeance on me once I was spirited
from the open-air world into its dark laby-
rinths.

I made a great effort to keep my voice even
and calm.

145

THE POWER-HOUSE

"Mr. Docker," I said. "I once did you a
good turn. But for me you might be doing
time now instead of drinking champagne like
a gentleman. Your pals played you a pretty
low trick, and that was why I stuck out for
you. I didn't think you were the kind of man
to forget a friend."

"No more I am," said he. "The man who
says Bill Docker would go back on a pal is a
liar."

"Well, here's your chance to pay your debts.
The men who employ you are my deadly en-
emies, and want to do me in. I'm not a match
for you. You're a stronger fellow and can
drag me off and hand me over to them. But
if you do I'm done with. Make no mistake
about that. I put it to you as a decent fellow.
Are you going to go back on the man who
has been a good friend to you?"

He shifted from one foot to another with
his eyes on the ceiling. He was obviously in
difficulties. Then he tried another glass of
champagne.

"I dursn't, guv'nor. I dursn't let you go.
146

RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

Them I work for would cut my throat as soon
as look at me. Besides, it ain't no good. If
I was to go off and leave you there'd be plenty
more in this 'ouse as would do the job.
You're up against it, guv'nor. But take a
sensible view and come with me. They don't
mean you no real 'arm. I'll take my Bible
oath on it. Only to keep you quiet for a bit,
for you've run across one of their games.
They won't do you no 'urt if you speak 'em
fair. Be a sport and take it smiling-like "

"You're afraid of them," I said.

"Yuss. I'm afraid. Black afraid. So
would you be if you knew the gents. I'd
rather take on the whole Rat Lane crowd —
you know them as I mean — on a Saturday
night, when they're out for business, than go
back to my gents and say as 'ow I had shirked
the job."

He shivered. "Good Lord, they'd freeze
the 'eart out of a bull-pup."

"You're afraid," I said slowly. "So you're
going to give me up to the men you're afraid
of to do as they like with me. I never ex-

147

THE POWER-HOUSE

pected it of you, Bill. I thought you were the
kind of lad who would send any gang to the
devil before you'd go back on a pal."

"Don't say that," he said almost plaintively.
"You don't 'alf know the 'ole I'm in." His
eye seemed to be wandering, and he yawned
deeply.

Just then a great noise began below. I
heard a voice speaking, a loud peremptory
voice. Then my name was shouted: "Leithen!
Leithen! Are you there?"

There could be no mistaking that broad
Yorkshire tongue. By some miracle Chap-
man had followed me and was raising Cain
downstairs.

My heart leaped with the sudden revulsion.
"I'm here," I yelled. "Upstairs. Come up
and let me out!"

Then I turned with a smile of triumph to
Bill.

"My friends have come," I said. "You're
too late for the job. Get back and tell your
masters that."

He was swaying on his feet, and he sud-
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RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

denly lurched towards me. "You come along.
By God, you think you've done me. I'll let
you see."

His voice was growing thick and he
stopped short. "What the 'ell's wrong with
me?" he gasped. "I'm goin' all queer.
I . . ."

He was like a man far gone in liquor, but
three glasses of champagne would never have
touched a head like Bill's. I saw what was
up with him. He was not drunk, but
drugged.

"They've doped the wine," I cried. "They
put it there for me to drink it and go to
sleep."

There is always something which is the
last straw to any man. You may insult and
outrage him and he will bear it patiently, but
touch the quick in his temper and he will
turn. Apparently for Bill drugging was the
unforgivable sin. His eye lost for a moment
its confusion. He squared his shoulders and
roared like a bull.

149

THE POWER-HOUSE

"Doped, by. God," he cried. "Who done
it?"

"The men who shut me in this room.
Burst that door and you will find them."

He turned a blazing face on the locked door
and hurled his huge weight on it. It cracked
and bent but the lock and hinges held. I
could see that sleep was overwhelming him
and that his limbs were stiffening, but his
anger was still strong enough for another
effort. Again he drew himself together like
a big cat and flung himself on the woodwork.
The hinges tore from the jambs and the whole
outfit fell forward into the passage in a cloud
of splinters and dust and broken plaster.

It was Mr. Docker's final effort. He lay
on the top of the wreckage he had made, like
Samson among the ruins of Gaza, a senseless
and slumbering hulk.

I picked up the unopened bottle of cham-
pagne— it was the only weapon available —
and stepped over his body. I was beginning
to enjoy myself amazingly.

As I expected, there was a man in the cor-
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RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

ridor, a little fellow in waiter's clothes, with a
tweed jacket instead of a dress coat. If he
had a pistol I knew I was done, but I gambled
upon the disinclination of the management for
the sound of shooting.

He had a knife, but he never had a chance
to use it. My champagne bottle descended on
his head and he dropped like a log.

There were men coming upstairs — not
Chapman, for I still heard his hoarse shouts
in the dining-room. If they once got up they
could force me back through that hideous
room by the door through which Docker had
come, and in five minutes I should be in their
motor-car.

There was only one thing to do. I jumped
from the stair-head right down among them.
I think there were three, and my descent
toppled them over. We rolled in a wild,
whirling mass and cascaded into the dining-
room, where my head bumped violently on
the parquet.

I expected a bit of a grapple, but none
came. My wits were pretty woolly, but I

I5i

THE POWER-HOUSE

managed to scramble to my feet. The heels
of my enemies were disappearing up the
staircase. Chapman was pawing my ribs to
discover if there were any bones broken.
There was not another soul in the room ex-
cept two policemen who were pushing their
way in from the street.

Chapman was flushed and breathing heav-
ily: his coat had a big split down the seams
at the shoulder, but his face was happy as a
child's.

I caught his arm and spoke in his ear.
"We've got to get out of this at once. How
can we square these policemen? There must
be no inquiry and nothing in the papers. Do
you hear?"

"That's all right," said Chapman. "These
bobbies are friends of mine, two good lads
from Wensleydale. On my road here I told
them to give me a bit of law and follow me,
for I thought they might be wanted. They
didn't come too soon to spoil sport, for I've
been knocking furriners about for ten min-

152

RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

utes. You seem to have been putting up a
tidy scrap yourself."

"Let's get home first," I said, for I was be-
ginning to think of the bigger thing.

I wrote a chit for Macgillivray which I
asked one of the constables to take to Scot-
land Yard. It was to beg that nothing should
be done yet in the business of the restaurant,
and above all that nothing should get into the
papers. Then I asked the other to see us
home. It was a queer request for two able-
bodied men to make on a summer evening in
the busiest part of London, but I was taking
no chances. The Power-House had declared
war on me, and I knew it would be war with-
out quarter.

I was in a fever to get out of that place.
My momentary lust of battle had gone, and
every stone of that building seemed to me a
threat. Chapman would have liked to spend
a happy hour rummaging through the house,
but the gravity of my face persuaded him.
The truth is I was bewildered. I could not
understand the reason of this sudden attack.

153

THE POWER-HOUSE

Lumley's spies must long ago have told him
enough to connect me with the Bokhara busi-
ness. My visits to the Embassy alone were
sufficient proof. But now he must have found
out something new, something which startled
him, or else there had been wild doings in
Turkestan.

I won't forget that walk home in a hurry.
It was a fine July twilight. The streets were
full of the usual crowd, shop-girls in thin
frocks, promenading clerks, and all the flot-
sam of a London summer. You would have
said it was the safest place on earth. But I
was glad we had the policeman with us, who
at the end of one beat passed us on to his col-
league, and I was glad of Chapman. For I
am morally certain I would never have got
home alone.

The queer thing is that there was no sign
of trouble till we got into Oxford Street
Then I became aware that there were people
on those pavements who knew all about me.
I first observed it at the mouth of one of those
little dark side-alleys which run up into mews

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RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

and small dingy courts. I found myself be-
ing skilfully edged away from Chapman into
the shadow, but I noticed it in time and butted
my way back to the pavement. I couldn't
make out who the people were who hustled
me. They seemed nondescripts of all sorts,
but I fancied there were women among them.

This happened twice, and I got wary, but
I was nearly caught before we reached Ox-
ford Circus. There was a front of a big shop
rebuilding, and the usual wooden barricade
with a gate. Just as we passed it there was a
special throng on the pavement and I, being
next the wall, got pushed against the gate.
Suddenly it gave and I was pressed inward.
I was right inside before I realised my dan-
ger, and the gate was closing. There must
have been people there, but I could see noth-
ing in the gloom.

It was no time for false pride. I yelled to
Chapman and the next second his burly
shoulder was in the gap. The hustlers van-
ished and I seemed to hear a polite voice beg-
ging my pardon.

*55

THE POWER-HOUSE

After that Chapman and I linked arms and
struck across Mayfair. But I did not feel
safe till I was in the flat with the door bolted.

We had a long drink and I stretched my-
self in an armchair, for I was as tired as if I
had come out of a big game of Rugby foot-
ball.

"I owe you a good deal, old man," I said.
"I think I'll join the Labour Party. You can
tell your fellows to send me their whips.
What possessed you to come to look for me?"

The explanation was simple. I had men-
tioned the restaurant in my telephone mes-
sage, and the name had awakened a recollec-
tion in Chapman's mind. He could not fix
it at first, but by and by he remembered that
the place had cropped up in the Routh case.
Routh's London headquarters had been at the
restaurant in Antioch Street. As soon as
he remembered this he got into a taxi and
descended at the corner of the street, where
by sheer luck he fell in with his Wensleydale
friends.

He said he had marched into the restaurant

i56

RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

and found it empty, but for an ill-favoured
manager, who denied all knowledge of me.
Then fortunately he chose to make certain by
shouting my name, and heard my answer.
After that he knocked the manager down,
and was presently assaulted by several men
whom he described as "furrin' muck." They
had knives, of which he made very little, for
he seems to have swung a table as a battering
ram and left sore limbs behind him.

He was on the top of his form. "I haven't
enjoyed anything so much since I was a lad at
school," he informed me. "I was beginning
to think your Power-House was a wash-out,
but Lord! it's been busy enough to-night.
This is what I call life!"

My spirits could not keep pace with his.
The truth is that I was miserably puzzled —
not afraid so much as mystified. I couldn't
make out this sudden dead-set at me. Either
they knew more than I bargained for or I
knew far too little.

"It's all very well," I said, "but I don't see
how this is going to end. We can't keep up

157

THE POWER-HOUSE

the pace long. At this rate it will be only a
matter of hours till they get me."

We pretty well barricaded ourselves in the
flat, and, at his earnest request, I restored to
Chapman his revolver. Then I got the clue
I had been longing for.

It was about eleven o'clock, while we were
sitting smoking, when the telephone bell rang.
It was Felix who spoke.

"I have news for you," he said. "The hunt-
ers have met the hunted and one of the hunt-
ers is dead. The other is a prisoner in our
hands. He has confessed."

It had been black murder in intent. The
frontier police had shadowed the two men
into the cup of a glen where they met Tommy
and Pitt-Heron. The four had spoken to-
gether for a little, and then Tuke had fired
deliberately at Charles and had grazed his
ear. Whereupon Tommy had charged him
and knocked the pistol from his hand. The
assailant had fled, but a long shot from the
police on the hillside had toppled him over.

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RESTAURANT IN ANTIOCH STREET

Tommy had felled Saronov with his fists, and
the man had abjectly surrendered. He had
confessed, Felix said, but what the confession
was he did not know.

*S9

CHAPTER VII
I FIND SANCTUARY,

'

CHAPTER VII

I FIND SANCTUARY

TV yf"Y nervousness and indecision dropped
■*■▼-■• from me at the news. I had won the
first round, and I would win the last, for it
suddenly became clear to me that I had now
evidence which would blast Lumley. I be-
lieved that it would not be hard to prove his
identitv with Pavia and his receipt of the
telegram from Saronov; Tuke was his crea-
ture, and Tuke's murderous mission was his
doing. No doubt I knew little and could
prove nothing about the big thing, the Power-
House, but conspiracy to murder is not the
lightest of criminal charges. I was beginning
to see my way to checkmating my friend, at
least so far as Pitt-Heron was concerned.
Provided — and it was a pretty big proviso —
that he gave me the chance to use my knowl-
edge.

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THE POWER-HOUSE

That I foresaw, was going to be the diffi-
culty. What I knew now Lumley had known
hours before. The reason of the affair at
Antioch Street was now only too clear. If he
believed that I had damning evidence against
him — and there was no doubt he suspected it
— then he would do his best to stop my mouth.
I must get my statement lodged in the proper
quarter at the earliest possible moment.

The next twenty-four hours, I feared, were
going to be too sensational for comfort. And
yet I cannot say that I was afraid. I was
too full of pride to be in a funk. I had lost
my awe of Lumley through scoring a point
against him. Had I known more I should
have been less at my ease. It was this confi-
dence which prevented me doing the obvious
safe thing — ringing up Macgillivray, telling
him the gist of my story, and getting him to
put me under police protection. I thought
I was clever enough to see the thing through
myself. And it must have been the same over-
confidence which prevented Lumley getting
at me that night. An organisation like his

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I FIND SANCTUARY

could easily have got into the flat and done
for us both. I suppose the explanation is that
he did not yet know how much I knew and
was not yet ready to take the last steps in
silencing me.

I sat up till the small hours, marshalling
my evidence in a formal statement and mak-
ing two copies of it. One was destined for
Macgillivray and the other for Felix, for I
was taking no risks. I went to bed and slept
peacefully and was awakened as usual by
Waters. My man slept out, and used to turn
up in the morning about seven. It was all so
normal and homely that I could have believed
my adventures of the night before a dream.
In the summer sunlight the ways of darkness
seemed very distant. I dressed in excellent
spirits and made a hearty breakfast.

Then I gave the docile Chapman his in-
structions. He must take the document to
Scotland Yard, ask to see Macgillivray, and
put it into his hands. Then he must ring me
up at once at Down Street and tell me that he
had done this. I had already telephoned to

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THE POWER-HOUSE

my clerk that I would not be at the Temple
that day.

It seems a simple thing to travel less than
a mile in the most frequented part of London
in broad daylight, and perform an easy act
like carrying a letter; but I knew that Lum-
ley's spies would be active, and would con-
nect Chapman sufficiently with me to think
him worth following. In that case there
might be an attempt at violence. I thought
it my duty to tell him this, but he laughed me
to scorn. He proposed to walk, and he begged
to be shown the man who would meddle with
him. Chapman after last night was prepared
to take on all comers. He put my letter to
Macgillivray in his inner pocket, buttoned his
coat, crushed down his felt hat on his head,
and defiantly set forth.

I expected a message from him in half an
hour, for he was a rapid walker. But the half
hour passed, then the three-quarters, and
nothing happened. At eleven I rang up
Scotland Yard, but they had no news of him.

Then I became miserably anxious, for it
1 66

I FIND SANCTUARY

was clear that some disaster had overtaken my
messenger. My first impulse was to set out
myself to look for him, but a moment's re-
flection convinced me that that would be play-
ing into the enemy's hands. For an hour I
wrestled with my impatience, and then a few
minutes after twelve I was rung up by St.
Thomas's Hospital.

A young doctor spoke, and said that Mr.
Chapman had asked him to tell me what had
happened. He had been run down by a
motor-car at the corner of Whitehall — noth-
ing serious — only a bad shake and some scalp
wounds. In a day or so he would be able to
leave.

Then he added what drove the blood from
my heart. "Mr. Chapman personally wished
me to tell you," he said, "that the letter has
gone." I stammered some reply asking his
meaning. "He said he thinks," I was told,
"that, while he was being assisted to his feet,
his pocket was picked and a letter taken. He
said you would know what he meant."

I knew only too well what he meant. Lum-
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THE POWER-HOUSE

ley had got my statement, and realised pre-
cisely how much I knew and what was the
weight of evidence against him. Before he
had only suspected, now he knew. He must
know, too, that there would be a copy some-
where which I would try to deliver. It was
going to be harder than I had fancied to get
my news to the proper ears, and I had to an-
ticipate the extreme of violence on the part
of my opponents.

The thought of the peril restored my cool-
ness. I locked the outer door of my flat, and
telephoned to the garage where I kept my
car, bidding Stagg call for me at two o'clock
precisely. Then I lit a pipe and strove to
banish the whole business from my thoughts,
for fussing would do me no good.

Presently it occurred to me to ring up Felix
and give him some notion of the position. But
I found that my telephone was now broken
and connection was impossible. The spoken
as well as the written word was to be denied
me. That had happened in the last half hour
and I didn't believe it was by accident. Also

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I FIND SANCTUARY

my man Waters, whom I had sent out on an
errand after breakfast, had never returned.
The state of siege had begun.

It was a blazing hot midsummer day. The
water-carts were sprinkling Piccadilly, and
looking from my window I could see lei-
surely and elegant gentlemen taking their
morning stroll. A florist's cart full of roses
stood below me in the street. The summer
smell of town — a mixture of tar, flowers, dust
and patchouli — rose in gusts through the hot
air. It was the homely London I knew so
well, and I was somehow an exile from it. I
was being shepherded into a dismal isolation,
which, unless I won help, might mean death.
I was cool enough now, but I will not deny
that I was miserably anxious. I cursed my
false confidence the night before. By now I
might have had Macgillivray and his men
by my side. As it was I wondered if I should
ever see them.

I changed into a flannel suit, lunched off
sandwiches and a whisky and soda, and at two
o'clock looked for Stagg and my car. He was

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THE POWER-HOUSE

five minutes late, a thing which had never
happened before. But I never welcomed
anything so gladly as the sight of that car.
I had hardly dared to hope that it would
reach me.

My goal was the Embassy in Belgrave
Square, but I was convinced that if I ap-
proached it directly I should share the fate
of Chapman. Worse, for from me they
would not merely snatch the letter. What I
had once written I could write again, and if
they wished to ensure my silence it must be
by more drastic methods. I proposed to baffle
my pursuers by taking a wide circuit round
the western suburbs of London, returning to
the Embassy when I thought the coast clear.

It was a tremendous relief to go down the
stairs and emerge into the hot daylight. I
gave Stagg his instructions, and lay back in
the closed car with a curious fluttering sense of
anticipation. I had begun the last round in
the wild game. There was a man at the cor-
ner of Down Street who seemed to peer curi-

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I FIND SANCTUARY

ously at the car. He was doubtless one of my
watchers.

We went up Park Lane into the Edgeware
Road, my instructions to Stagg being to make
a circuit by Harrow and Brentford. Now
that I was ensconced in my car I felt a trifle
safer, and my tense nerves relaxed. I grew
drowsy and allowed myself to sink into a half
doze. The stolid back of Stagg filled my
gaze, as it had filled it a fortnight ago on
the western road, and I admired lazily the
brick-red of his neck. He had been in the
Guards, and a Boer bullet at Modder River
had left a long scar at the nape of his neck,
which gave to his hair the appearance of be-
ing badly cut. He had told me the story on
Exmoor.

Suddenly I rubbed my eyes. There was no
scar there; the hair of the chauffeur grew
regularly down to his coat-collar. The re-
semblance had been perfect, the voice was
Stagg's, but clearly it was not Stagg who now
drove my car.

I pulled the blind down over the front win-
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THE POWER-HOUSE

dow as if to shelter myself from the sun.
Looking out I saw that we were some distance
up the Edgeware Road, nearing the point
where the Marylebone Road joins it. Now
or never was my chance, for at the corner
there is always a block in the traffic.

The car slowed down in obedience to a
policeman's uplifted hand, and very gently I
opened the door on the left side. Since the
car was new it opened softly, and in two sec-
onds I had stepped out, shut it again, and
made a dive between a butcher's cart and a
motor-bus for the side-walk. I gave one
glance back and saw the unconscious chauf-
feur still rigid at the wheel.

I dodged unobtrusively through the crowd
on the pavement, with my hand on my breast-
pocket to see that my paper was still there.
There was a little picture-shop near by to
which I used to go occasionally, owned by a
man who was an adept at cleaning and restor-
ing. I had sent him customers and he was
likely to prove a friend. So I dived into his
doorway, which made a cool pit of shade after

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I FIND SANCTUARY

the glaring street, and found him, spectacles
on nose, busy examining some dusty prints.

He greeted me cordially and followed me
into the back shop.

"Mr. Levison," I said, "have you a back
door?"

He looked at me in some surprise. "Why,
yes; there is the door into the lane which runs
from Edgeley Street into Connaught Mews."

"Will you let me use it? There is a friend
outside whom I wish to avoid. Such things
happen, you know."

He smiled comprehendingly. "Certainly,
sir. Come this way," and he led me through
a dark passage hung with dingy Old Masters
to a little yard filled with the debris of pic-
ture frames. There he unlocked a door in the
wall and I found myself in a narrow alley.
As I emerged I heard the bell of the shop-
door ring. "If any one inquires, you have not
seen me here, remember," I said, and Mr.
Levison nodded. He was an artist in his
small way and liked the scent of a mystery.

I ran down the lane and by various cross

173

THE POWER-HOUSE

streets made my way into Bayswater. I be-
lieved that I had thrown my trackers for the
moment of! the scent, but I had got to get to
the Embassy, and that neighbourhood was
sure to be closely watched. I came out on the
Bayswater Road pretty far west, and resolved
to strike south-east across the Park. My rea-
son was that the neighbourhood of Hyde Park
Corner was at that time of day certain to be
pretty well crowded, and I felt more security
in a throng than in the empty streets of Ken-
sington. Now that I come to think of it, it
was a rash thing to do, for since Lumley
knew the full extent of my knowledge, he was
likely to deal more violently with me than
with Chapman, and the seclusion of the Park
offered him too good a chance.

I crossed the riding-track and struck over
the open space where the Sunday demonstra-
tions are held. There was nothing there but
nurses and perambulators, children at play,
and dogs being exercised. Presently I
reached Grosvenor Gate, where on the little
green chairs well-dressed people were taking

174

I FIND SANCTUARY

the air. I recognised several acquaintances
and stopped for a moment to talk to one of
them. Then I emerged in Park Lane and
walked down it to Hamilton Place.

So far I thought I had not been followed,
but now once more I had the indefinable but
unerring sensation of being watched. I
caught a man looking eagerly at me from the
other side of the street, and it seemed to me
that he made a sign to someone farther off.
There was now less than a quarter of a mile
between me and Belgrave Square, but I saw
that it would be a hard course to cover.

Once in Piccadilly there could be no doubt
about my watchers. Lumley was doing the
thing in style this time. Last night it had
only been a trial trip, but now the whole en-
ergies of the Power-House were on the job.
The place was filled with the usual mid-sea-
son crowd, and I had to take off my hat sev-
eral times. Up in the bow-window of the
Bachelors' Club a young friend of mine was
writing a letter and sipping a long drink with
an air of profound boredom. I would have

*7S

THE POWER-HOUSE

given much for his ennui, for my life at the
moment was painfully exciting. I was alone
in that great crowd, isolated and proscribed,
and there was no help save in my own wits.
If I spoke to a policeman he would think me
drunk or mad, and yet I was on the edge of
being made the victim of a far subtler crime
than fell within the purview of the Metro-
politan force.

Now I saw how thin is the protection of
civilisation. An accident and a bogus ambu-
lance— a false charge and a bogus arrest —
there were a dozen ways of spiriting me out
of this gay, bustling world. I foresaw that, if
I delayed, my nerve would break, so I boldly
set off across the road.

I jolly nearly shared the fate of Chapman.
A car which seemed about to draw up at a
club door suddenly swerved across the street,
and I had to dash to an island to escape it
It was no occasion to hesitate, so, dodging a
bus and missing a motor bicycle by a hair's
breadth, I rushed across the remaining dis-

176

I FIND SANCTUARY

tance and reached the railings of the Green
Park.

Here there were fewer people, and several
queer things began to happen. A little group
of workmen with their tools were standing by
the kerb, and they suddenly moved towards
me. A pavement artist, who looked like a
cripple, scrambled to his feet and moved in
the same direction. There was a policeman at
the corner, and I saw a well-dressed man go
up to him, say something and nod in my direc-
tion, and the policeman too began to move
towards me.

I did not await them. I took to my heels
and ran for my life down Grosvenor Place.

Long ago at Eton I had won the school
mile, and at Oxford I was a second string for
the quarter. But never at Eton or at Oxford
did I run as I ran then. It was blisteringly
hot, but I did not feel it, for my hands were
clammy and my heart felt like a cold stone.
I do not know how the pursuit got on, for I
did not think of it. I did not reflect what
kind of spectacle I must afford running like

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THE POWER-HOUSE

a thief in a London thoroughfare on a June
afternoon. I only knew that my enemies were
around and behind me, and that in front, a
few hundred yards away, lay safety.

But even as I ran I had the sense to think
out my movements, and to realise that the
front door of the Embassy was impossible.
For one thing it would be watched, and for
another, before the solemn footmen opened
it, my pursuers would be upon me. My only
hope was the back door.

I twisted into the mews behind the north
side of the Square, and as I turned I saw two
men run up from the Square as if to cut me
off. A whistle was blown and more men ap-
peared— one entering from the far end of the
mews, one darting from a public-house door,
and one sliding down a ladder from a stable-
loft. This last was nearest me and tried to
trip me, but I rejoice to say that a left-hander
on the chin sent him sprawling on the cob-
bles. I remembered that the Embassy was
the fifth house from the end, and feverishly
I tried to count the houses by their backs. It

i78

I FIND SANCTUARY

is not so easy as it sounds, for the modern
London householder studs his back premises
with excrescences which seem to melt into his
neighbour's. In the end I had to make a
guess at the door, which to my joy was un-
locked. I rushed in and banged it behind
me. I found myself in a stone passage, with
on one side a door opening on a garage. There
was a wooden staircase leading to an upper
floor, and a glass door in front which opened
into a large disused room full of boxes. Be-
yond were two doors, one of which was
locked. The other abutted on a steep iron
stairway which obviously led to the lower re-
gions of the house.

I ran down the stair — it was no more than
a ladder — crossed a small courtyard, traversed
a passage, and burst into the kitchen, where
I confronted an astonished white-capped chef
in the act of lifting a pot from the fire.

His face was red and wrathful, and I
thought that he was going to fling the pot at
my head. I had disturbed him in some deli-

179

THE POWER-HOUSE

cate operation, and his artist's pride was out-
raged.

"Monsieur," I stammered in French, "I
seek your pardon for my intrusion. There
were circumstances which compelled me to
enter this house by the back premises. I am
an acquaintance of His Excellency, your pa-
tron, and an old friend of Monsieur Felix.
I beg you of your kindness to direct me to
Monsieur Felix's room, or to bid some one
take me there."

My abject apologies mollified him.

"It is a grave offence, monsieur," he said,
"an unparalleled offence, to enter my kitchen
at this hour. I fear you have irremediably
spoiled the new casserole dish that I was en-
deavouring to compose."

I was ready to go on my knees to the of-
fended artist.

"It grieves me indeed to have interfered
with so rare an art, which I have often ad-
mired at His Excellency's table. But there
is danger behind me and an urgent mission in
front. Monsieur will forgive me? Neces-

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I FIND SANCTUARY

sity will, sometimes, overrule the finest sen-
sibility."

He bowed to me and I bowed to him, and
my pardon was assured.

Suddenly a door opened, another than that
by which I had entered, and a man appeared
whom I took to be a footman. He was strug-
gling into his livery coat, but at the sight of
me he dropped it. I thought I recognised
the face as that of the man who had emerged
from the public-house and tried to cut me off.

" 'Ere, Mister Alphonse," he cried, " 'elp
me to collar this man. The police are after
'im."

"You forget, my friend," I said, "that an
Embassy is privileged ground which the po-
lice can't enter. I desire to be taken before
His Excellency."

"So that's yer game," he shouted. "But
two can play at that. 'Ere, give me an 'and,
moosoo, and we'll 'ave him in the street in a
jiffy. There's two 'undred of the best in our
pockets if we 'ands 'im over to them as wants

'im."

181

THE POWER-HOUSE

The cook looked puzzled and a little
frightened.

"Will you allow them to outrage your
kitchen — an Embassy kitchen too — without
your consent?" I said.

"What have you done?" he asked in French.

"Only what your patron will approve," I
replied in the same tongue. "Messieurs les
assassins have a grudge against me."

He still hesitated, while the young footman
advanced on me. He was fingering some-
thing in his trousers pocket which I did not
like.

Now was the time when, as they say in
America, I should have got busy with my
gun; but alas! I had no gun. I feared sup-
ports for the enemy, for the footman at the
first sight of me had run back the way he had
come, and I had heard a low whistle.

What might have happened I do not know,
had not the god appeared from the machine
in the person of Hewins, the butler.

"Hewins," I said, "you know me. I have
often dined here, and you know that I am a

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I FIND SANCTUARY

friend of Monsieur Felix. I am on my way
to see him on an urgent matter, and for vari-
ous reasons I had to enter by Monsieur Al-
phonse's kitchen. Will you take me at once
to Monsieur Felix?"

Hewins bowed, and on his imperturbable
face there appeared no sign of surprise.
"This way, sir," was all he said.

As I followed him I saw the footman
plucking nervously at the something in his
trousers-pocket. Lumley's agents apparently
had not always the courage to follow his in-
structions to the letter, for I made no doubt
that the order had been to take me alive or
dead.

I found Felix alone, and flung myself into
an arm-chair. "My dear chap," I said, "take
my advice and advise His Excellency to sack
the red-haired footman."

From that moment I date that sense of
mastery over a situation which drives out
fear. I had been living for weeks under a
dark pall and suddenly the skies had light-
ened. I had found sanctuary. What-

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THE POWER-HOUSE

ever happened to me now the worst was past,
for I had done my job.

Felix was looking at me curiously, for,
jaded, scarlet, dishevelled, I was an odd figure
for a London afternoon. "Things seem to
have been marching fast with you," he said.

"They have, but I think the march is over.
I want to ask several favours. First, here is a
document which sets out certain facts. I shall
ring up Macgillivray at Scotland Yard and
ask him to come here at 9.30 this evening.
When he comes I want you to give him this
and ask him to read it at once. He will know
how to act on it."

Felix nodded. "And the next?"

"Give me a telegraph form. I want a wire
sent at once by someone who can be trusted."
He handed me a form and I wrote out a tele-
gram to Lumley at the Albany, saying that I
proposed to call upon him that evening at 8
sharp, and asking him to receive me.

"Next?" said Felix.

"Next and last, I want a room with a door
which will lock, a hot bath, and something to

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I FIND SANCTUARY

eat about seven. I might be permitted to taste
Monsieur Alphonse's new casserole dish."

I rang up Macgillivray, reminded him of
his promise, and told him what awaited him
at 9.30. Then I had a wash, and afterwards at
my leisure gave Felix a sketch of the day's
doings. I have never felt more completely at
my ease, for whatever happened I was certain
that I had spoiled Lumley's game. He would
know by now that I had reached the Embassy,
and that any further attempts on my life and
liberty were futile. My telegram would
show him that I was prepared to offer terms,
and I would certainly be permitted to reach
the Albany unmolested. To the meeting with
my adversary I looked forward without
qualms, but with the most lively interest. I
had my own theories about that distinguished
criminal, and I hoped to bring them to the
proof.

Just before seven I had a reply to my wire.
Mr. Lumley said he would be delighted to see
me. The telegram was directed to me at the
Embassy, though I had put no address on

185

THE POWER-HOUSE

the one I sent. Lumley of course knew all
my movements. I could picture him sitting
in his chair, like some Chief of Staff, receiv-
ing every few minutes the reports of his
agents. All the same Napoleon had fought
his Waterloo.

86

CHAPTER VIII
THE POWER-HOUSE

CHAPTER VIII

THE POWER-HOUSE

I LEFT Belgrave Square about a quarter
to eight and retraced my steps along the
route which for me that afternoon had been
so full of tremors. I was still being watched
— a little observation told me that — but I
would not be interfered with, provided my
way lay in a certain direction. So completely
without nervousness was I that at the top of
Constitution Hill I struck into the Green
Park and kept to the grass till I emerged into
Piccadilly, opposite Devonshire House. A
light wind had risen and the evening had
grown pleasantly cool. I met several men I
knew going out to dinner on foot and stopped
to exchange greetings. From my clothes they
thought I had just returned from a day in
the country.

I reached the Albany as the clock was strik-
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THE POWER-HOUSE

ing eight. Lumley's rooms were on the first
floor, and I was evidently expected, for the
porter himself conducted me to them and
waited by me till the door was opened by a
man-servant.

You know those rococo, late Georgian Al-
bany rooms, large, square, clumsily corniced.
Lumley's was lined with books, which I saw
at a glance were of a different type from those
in his working library at his country house.
This was the collection of a bibliophile, and
in the light of the summer evening the rows
of tall volumes in vellum and morocco lined
the walls like some rich tapestry.

The valet retired and shut the door, and
presently from a little inner chamber came his
master. He was dressed for dinner and wore
more than ever the air of the eminent diplo-
mat. Again I had the old feeling of incre-
dulity. It was the Lumley I had met two
nights before at dinner, the friend of Viceroys
and Cabinet Ministers. It was hard to con-
nect him with Antioch Street or the red-
haired footman with a pistol. Or with Tuke?

190

THE POWER-HOUSE

Yes, I decided, Tuke fitted into the frame.
Both were brains cut loose from the decencies
that make life possible.

"Good evening, Mr. Leithen," he said
pleasantly. "As you have fixed the hour of
eight, may I offer you dinner?"

"Thank you," I replied, "but I have already
dined. I have chosen an awkward time, but
my business need not take long."

"So," he said. "I am always glad to see
you at any hour."

"And I prefer to see the master rather than
the subordinates who have been infesting my
life during the past week."

We both laughed. "I am afraid you have
had some annoyance, Mr. Leithen," he said.
"But remember, I gave you fair warning."

"True. And I have come to do the same
kindness to you. That part of the game, at
any rate, is over."

"Over?" he queried, raising his eyebrows.

"Yes, over," I said, and took out my watch.
"Let us be quite frank with each other, Mr.
Lumley. There is really very little time to

191

THE POWER-HOUSE

waste. As you have doubtless read the paper
which you stole from my friend this morning
you know more or less the extent of my in-
formation."

"Let us have frankness by all means. Yes,
I have read your paper. A very creditable
piece of work, if I may say so. You will rise
in your profession, Mr. Leithen. But surely
you must realise that it carries you a very lit-
tle way."

"In a sense you are right. I am not in a
position to reveal the full extent of your mis-
deeds. Of the Power-House and its doings I
can only guess. But Pitt-Heron is on his way
home, and he will be carefully safeguarded
on that journey. Your creature, Saronov, has
confessed. We shall know more very soon,
and meantime I have clear evidence which
implicates you in a conspiracy to murder."

He did not answer, but I wished I could
see behind his tinted spectacles to the look in
his eyes. I think he had not been quite pre-
pared for the line I took.

"I need not tell you as a lawyer, Mr. Lei-
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then," he said at last, "that what seems good
evidence on paper is often feeble enough in
Court. You cannot suppose that I will tame-
ly plead guilty to your charges. On the con-
trary, I will fight them with all the force that
brains and money can give. You are an in-
genious young man, but you are not the bright-
est jewel of the English Bar."

"That also is true. I do not deny that some
of my evidence may be weakened at the trial.
It is even conceivable that you may be ac-
quitted on some technical doubt. But you
have forgotten one thing. From the day you
leave the Court you will be a suspected man.
The police of all Europe will be on your
trail. You have been highly successful in the
past, and why? Because you have been above
suspicion, an honourable and distinguished
gentleman, belonging to the best clubs, count-
ing as your acquaintances the flower of our
society. Now you will be a suspect, a man
with a past, a centre of strange stories. I put
it to you — how far are you likely to succeed
under these conditions?"

193

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He laughed.

"You have a talent for character drawing,
my friend. What makes you think that I can
work only if I live in the limelight of popu-
larity?"

"The talent you mentioned," I said. "As I
read your character — and I think I am right
— you are an artist in crime. You are not the
common cut-throat who acts out of passion or
greed. No, I think you are something subtler
than that. You love power, hidden power.
You flatter your vanity by despising mankind
and making them your tools. You scorn the
smattering of inaccuracies which passes for
human knowledge, and I will not venture to
say you are wrong. Therefore you use your
brains to frustrate it. Unhappily the life of
millions is built on that smattering, so you are
a foe to society. But there would be no fla-
vour in controlling subterranean things if you
were yourself a mole working in the dark.
To get the full flavour, the irony of it all,
you must live in the light. I can imagine you
laughing in your soul as you move about our

194

THE POWER-HOUSE

world, praising it with your lips, patting it
with your hands, and kicking its props away
with your feet. I can see the chami of it.
But it is over now."

"Over?" he asked.

"Over," I repeated. "The end has come —
the utter, final and absolute end."

He made a sudden, odd, nervous move-
ment, pushing his glasses close back upon his
eyes.

"What about yourself?" he said hoarsely.
"Do you think you can play against me with-
out suffering desperate penalties?"

He was holding a cord in his hand with a
knob on the end of it. He now touched a
button in the knob and there came the faint
sound of a bell.

The door was behind me and he was look-
ing beyond me towards it. I was entirely at
his mercy, but I never budged an inch. I do
not know how I managed to keep calm, but I
did it, and without much effort. I went on
speaking, conscious that the door had opened
and that someone was at my back.

195

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"It is really quite useless trying to frighten
me. I am safe, because I am dealing with an
intelligent man and not with the ordinary
half-witted criminal. You do not want my
life in silly revenge. If you call in your men
and strangle me between you what earthly
good would it do you?"

He was looking beyond me and the passion
— a sudden white-hot passion like an epilepsy
— was dying out of his face.

"A mistake, James," he said. "You can

go."

The door closed softly at my back.

"Yes. A mistake. I have a considerable
admiration for you, Mr. Lumley, and should
be sorry to be disappointed."

He laughed quite like an ordinary mortal.
"I am glad this affair is to be conducted on a
basis of mutual respect. Now that the melo-
dramatic overture is finished, let us get to
the business."

"By all means," I said. "I promised to
deal with you frankly. Well, let me put my
last cards on the table. At half-past nine pre-

196

THE POWER-HOUSE

cisely the duplicate of that statement of mine
which you annexed this morning will be
handed to Scotland Yard. I may add that the
authorities there know me, and are proceed-
ing under my advice. When they read that
statement they will act on it. You have there-
fore about one and a half, or say one and
three-quarter hours to make up your mind.
You can still secure your freedom, but it must
be elsewhere than in England."

He had risen to his feet, and was pacing up
and down the room.

"Will you oblige me by telling me one
thing," he said. "If you believe me to be, as
you say, a dangerous criminal, how do you
reconcile it with your conscience to give me a
chance of escape? It is your duty to bring me
to justice."

"I will tell you why," I said. "I, too, have
a weak joint in my armour. Yours is that you
only succeed under the disguise of high re-
spectability. That disguise, in any case, will
be stripped from you. Mine is Pitt-Heron.
I do not know how far he has entangled him-

197

THE POWER-HOUSE

self with you, but I know something of his
weakness, and I don't want his career ruined
and his wife's heart broken. He has learned
his lesson, and will never mention you and
your schemes to a mortal soul. Indeed, if I
can help it, he will never know that anyone
shares his secret. The price of the chance of
escape I offer you is that Pitt-Heron's past
be buried for ever."

He did not answer. He had his arms
folded, walking up and down the room, and
suddenly seemed to have aged enormously.
I had the impression that I was dealing with
a very old man.

"Mr. Leithen," he said at last, "you are
bold. You have a frankness which almost
amounts to genius. You are wasted in your
stupid profession, but your speculative powers
are not equal to your other endowments, so
you will probably remain in it, deterred by an
illogical scruple from following your true
bent. Your true metier, believe me, is what
shallow people call crime. Speaking 'with-
out prejudice,' as the idiot solicitors say, it

198

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would appear that we have both weak spots
in our cases. Mine, you say, is that I can only
work by using the conventions of what we
agreed to call the Machine. There may be
truth in that. Yours is that you have a friend
who lacks your iron-clad discretion. You
offer a plan which saves both our weaknesses.
By the way, what is it?"

I looked at my watch again. "You have
ample time to catch the night express to
Paris."

"And if not?"

"Then I am afraid there may be trouble
with the police between ten and eleven
o'clock."

"Which for all our sakes would be a pity.
Do you know you interest me uncommonly,
for you confirm the accuracy of my judgment.
I have always had a notion that some day I
should run across to my sorrow just such a
man as you. A man of very great intellectual
power I can deal with, for that kind of brain
is usually combined with the sort of high-
strung imagination on which I can work. The

199

THE POWER-HOUSE

same with your over-imaginative man. Yes
Pitt-Heron was of that type. Ordinary brains
do not trouble me, for I puzzle them. Now
you are a man of good average intelligence.
Pray forgive the lukewarmness of the phrase;
it is really a high compliment, for I am
an austere critic. If you were that and no
more you would not have succeeded. But you
possess also a quite irrelevant gift of imagina-
tion. Not enough to upset your balance, but
enough to do what your mere lawyer's talent
could never have done. You have achieved a
feat which is given to few — you have partially
understood me. Believe me, I rate you high.
You are the kind of four-square being bedded
in the concrete of our civilisation, on whom I
have always felt I might some day come to
grief. . . . No, no, I am not trying to wheedle
you. If I thought I could do that I should be
sorry, for my discernment would have been at
fault"

"I warn you," I said, "that you are wasting
precious time."

He laughed quite cheerfully.
200

THE POWER-HOUSE

"I believe you are really anxious about my
interests," he said. "That is a triumph in-
deed. Do you know, Mr. Leithen, it is a mere
whimsy of fate that you are not my disciple.
If we had met earlier and under other circum-
stances I should have captured you. It is be-
cause you have in you a capacity for disciple-
ship that you have succeeded in your opposi-
tion."

"I abominate you and all your works," I
said, "but I admire your courage."

He shook his head gently.

"It is the wrong word. I am not cour-
ageous. To be brave means that you have
conquered fear, but I have never had any fear
to conquer. Believe me, Mr. Leithen, I am
quite impervious to threats. You come to me
to-night and hold a pistol to my head. You
offer me two alternatives, both of which mean
failure. But how do you know that I regard
them as failure? I have had what they call a
good run for my money. No man since Na-
poleon has tasted such power. I may be will-
ing to end it. Age creeps on and power may

20 1

THE POWER-HOUSE

grow burdensome. I have always sat loose
from common ambitions and common affec-
tions. For all you know I may regard you as
a benefactor."

All this talk looks futile when it is written
down, but it was skilful enough, for it was
taking every atom of exhilaration out of my
victory. It was not idle brag. Every syllable
rang true, as I knew in my bones. I felt my-
self in the presence of something enormously
big, as if a small barbarian was desecrating
the colossal Zeus of Pheidias with a coal ham-
mer. But I also felt it inhuman, and I hated
it and I clung to that hatred.

"You fear nothing and you believe noth-
ing, I said. "Man, you should never have
been allowed to live."

He raised a deprecating hand. "I am a
sceptic about most things," he said, "but, be-
lieve me, I have my own worship. I venerate
the intellect of man. I believe in its un-
dreamed-of possibilities, when it grows free
like an oak in the forest and is not dwarfed
in a flower-pot. From that allegiance I have

202

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never wavered. That is the God I have never
forsworn."

I took out my watch.

"Permit me again to remind you that time
presses."

"True," he said smiling, "the continental
express will not wait upon my confession.
Your plan is certainly conceivable. There
may be other and easier ways. I am not cer-
tain. I must think. . . . Perhaps it would be
wiser if you left me now, Mr. Leithen. If I
take your advice there will be various things
to do. . . . In any case there will be much
to do. . . ."

He led me to the door as if he were an
ordinary host speeding an ordinary guest. I
remember that on my way he pointed out a
set of Aldines and called my attention to their
beauty. He shook hands quite cordially and
remarked on the fineness of the weather.
That was the last I saw of this amazing man.

It was with profound relief that I found
myself in Piccadilly in the wholesome com-
pany of my kind. I had carried myself boldly

203

THE POWER-HOUSE

enough in the last hour, but I would not have
gone through it again for a king's ransom.
Do you know what it is to deal with a pure
intelligence, a brain stripped of every shred
of humanity? It is like being in the company
of a snake.

I drove to the club and telephoned to Mac-
gillivray, asking him to take no notice of my
statement till he heard from me in the morn-
ing. Then I went to the hospital to see Chap-
man.

That leader of the people was in a furious
temper and he was scarcely to be appeased by
my narrative of the day's doings. Your La-
bour Member is the greatest of all sticklers
for legality, and the outrage he had suffered
that morning had grievously weakened his
trust in public security. The Antioch Street
business had seemed to him eminently right;
if you once got mixed up in melodrama you
had to expect such things. But for a Member
of Parliament to be robbed in broad daylight
next door to the House of Commons upset the
foundations of his faith. There was little the

204

THE POWER-HOUSE

matter with his body and the doctor promised
that he would be allowed up next day, but his
soul was a mass of bruises.

It took me a lot of persuasion to get him to
keep quiet. He wanted a public exposure of
Lumley, a big trial, a general ferreting out
of secret agents, the whole winding up with a
speech in Parliament by himself on this last
outrage of Capitalism. Gloomily he listened
to my injunctions to silence. But he saw the
reason of it and promised to hold his tongue
out of loyalty to Tommy. I knew that Pitt-
Heron's secret was safe with him.

As I crossed Westminster Bridge on my
way home the night express to the Continent
rumbled over the river. I wondered if Lum-
ley was on board or if he had taken one of the
other ways of which he had spoken.

205

CHAPTER IX
RETURN OF THE WILD GEESE

CHAPTER IX

RETURN OF THE WILD GEESE

I DO not think I was surprised at the news
I read in The Times next morning.
Mr. Andrew Lumley had died suddenly in
the night of heart failure, and the newspapers
woke up to the fact that we had been enter-
taining a great man unawares. There was an
obituary in "leader" type of nearly two col-
umns. He had been older than I thought —
close on seventy — and The Times spoke of
him as a man who might have done anything
he pleased in public life, but had chosen to
give to a small coterie of friends what was
due to the country. I read of his wit and
learning, his amazing connoisseurship, his so-
cial gifts, his personal charm. According to
the writer, he was the finest type of cultivated
amateur, a Beckford with more than a Beck-
ford's wealth and none of his folly. Large

209

THE POWER-HOUSE

private charities were hinted at, and a hope
was expressed that some part at least of his
collections might come to the nation.

The halfpenny papers said the same thing
in their own way. One declared he reminded
it of Atticus, another of Maecenas, another of
Lord Houghton. There must have been a
great run on biographical dictionaries in the
various offices. Chapman's own particular
rag said that, although this kind of philan-
thropist was a dilettante and a back-number,
yet Mr. Lumley was a good specimen of the
class and had been a true friend to the poor.
I thought Chapman would have a fit when he
read this. After that he took in the Morning
Post.

It was no business of mine to explode the
myth. Indeed I couldn't even if I had wanted
to, for no one would have believed me unless
I produced proofs, and these proofs were not
to be made public. Besides I had an honest
compunction. He had had, as he expressed
it, a good run for his money, and I wanted the
run to be properly rounded off.

210

RETURN OF THE WILD GEESE

Three days later I went to the funeral. It
was a wonderful occasion. Two eminent
statesmen were among the pallbearers, Roy-
alty was represented, and there were wreaths
from learned societies and scores of notable
people. It was a queer business to listen to
that stately service which was never read over
stranger dust. I was thinking all the time of
the vast subterranean machine which he had
controlled, and which now was so much old
iron. I could dimly imagine what his death
meant to the hosts who had worked blindly
at his direction. He was a Napoleon who left
no Marshals behind him. From the Power-
House came no wreaths or newspaper trib-
utes, but I knew that it had lost its power. . . .

De mortuis, etc. My task was done, and it
only remained to get Pitt-Heron home.

Of the three people in London besides my-
self who knew the story — Macgiilivray, Chap-
man and Felix — the two last might be trusted
to be silent, and Scotland Yard is not in the
habit of publishing its information. Tommy,
of course, must some time or other be told; it

211

THE POWER-HOUSE

was his right; but I knew that Tommy would
never breathe a word of it. I wanted Charles
to believe that his secret died with Lumley,
for otherwise I don't think he would have
ever come back to England.

The thing took some arranging, for we
could not tell him directly about Lumley's
death without giving away the fact that we
knew of the connection between the two. We
had to approach it by a roundabout road. I
got Felix to arrange to have the news tele-
graphed to and inserted by special order in a
Russian paper which Charles could not avoid
seeing.

The device was successful. Calling at
Portman Square a few days later I learned
from Ethel Pitt-Heron's glowing face that
her troubles were over. That same evening a
cable to me from Tommy announced the re-
turn of the wanderers.

It was the year of the Chilian Arbitration,
in which I held a junior brief for the British

212

RETURN OF THE WILD GEESE

Government, and that and the late sitting of
Parliament kept me in London after the end
of the term. I had had a bad reaction from
the excitements of the summer, and in these
days I was feeling pretty well hipped and
overdone. On a hot August afternoon I met
Tommy again.

The sun was shining through my Temple
chambers, much as it had done when he
started. So far as I remember the West Ham
brief which had aroused his contempt was
still adorning my table. I was very hot and
cross and fagged, for I had been engaged in
the beastly job of comparing half a dozen
maps of a despicable little bit of South Amer-
ican frontier.

Suddenly the door opened, and Tommy,
lean and sunburnt, stalked in.

"Still at the old grind," he cried, after we
had shaken hands. "Fellows like you give me
a notion of the meaning of Eternity."

"The same uneventful sedentary life," I re-
plied. "Nothing happens except that my

213

THE POWER-HOUSE

scale of fees grows. I suppose nothing will
happen till the conductor comes to take the
tickets. I shall soon grow fat."

"I notice it already, my lad. You want a
bit of waking up or you'll get a liver. A little
sensation would do you a lot of good."

"And you?" I asked. "I congratulate you
on your success. I hear you have retrieved
Pitt-Heron for his mourning family."

Tommy's laughing eyes grew solemn.

"I have had the time of my life," he said.
"It was like a chapter out of the Arabian
Nights with a dash of Fenimore Cooper. I
feel as if I had lived years since I left Eng-
land in May. While you have been sitting
among your musty papers we have been rid-
ing like moss-troopers and seeing men die.
Come and dine to-night and hear about our
adventures. I can't tell you the full story, for
I don't know it, but there is enough to curl
your hair."

Then I achieved my first and last score at
the expense of Tommy Deloraine.

214

RETURN OF THE WILD GEESE

"No," I said, "you will dine with me in-
stead and / will tell you the full story. All
the papers on the subject are over there in my
safe."

THE END

215

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