Chapter 31 Mrs.Collinson Holds Her Own

PROFESSOR BLINKWELL AND Kindell entered the waiting taxi together, each feeling that he had been victor in the verbal skirmish from which they came.

Kindell felt that there was evidence of success in the mere fact that the Professor, with whatever protests of ignorance, had consented to accompany him. He had a sanguine hope that, however cunningly it might be cloaked, the Professor's real purpose was to assure himself of Irene's safety, and arrange for her release from whatever detention she might be experiencing.

On his side, Professor Blinkwell, with greater subtlety, saw that he had been invited to do what he wished, but would otherwise have considered too dangerous. He felt that he was acting in a natural manner, and as an innocent man, impelled by friendly feeling, would be likely to do.

Mrs. Collinson would be wamed before his arrival that he was a stranger to her. Apart from that, she could not give much away, even though she were subject to persuasion or threats, for on the matter which Kindell was investigating there was very little she knew. . . .

They were admitted at once, though the hour was becoming late. Becky showed them into an empty room, and asked for their names. She returned immediately to say that her mistress would be with them in a few minutes.

Five minutes later the lady entered the room. Her fingers were on a blouse-button, which she fastened as she appeared. Without mentioning the matter at all, she implied that the visit had surprised her when she had been preparing for rest.

"Mr. Kindell?" she asked tentatively, looking at the Professor as she spoke. He corrected her error, introducing himself and his companion. He added: "Mr. Kindell is concerned about a muddle which has occurred, and a young lady he believes to be lost. He will explain it better than I should be able to do."

Mrs. Collinson looked at Kindell as though he wcre an enigma she could neither understand nor approve.

"This," she asked, "is really Mr. Kindell? Then I should be glad if he would explain what has occurred, and the use which he has made of this house. You may not know that he was here a few hours ago, and then spoke of himself as though he were another man. He was a messenger from the American Embassy. Or at least that was what he said then."

Kindell was quick to answer that which had not been addressed to him: "That was what I was. But I wished to see whether you knew me, in view of the use which had been made of my name here."

"Then I can tell you at once that I never heard as much as your name till I got the postcard to say that you were sending something here which your friend would collect, and, if there had been any address upon it I should have written to say that it was a liberty which I could not permit."

"Might I see that postcard?"

"You could with pleasure if it had not been destroyed. It lay about for a day or so, and then I put it on the fire. Actually, I thought it had been wrongly addressed to me."

"Then you might have given it back to the postman."

"I thought of that. But what use would it have been? It had no address on it except mine, and that was correct."

She lied readily, having thought out this explanation beforehand. Professor Blinkwell, listening in admiration, thought that he had underestimated her capacities for duplicity. Perhaps he might have made greater use of her in the past than he had thought wise to do!

Kindell did not know how much to believe, by which her effort of imagination may be classified as a success. He was not fully convinced, for the presence of Myra at the house was a certain fact, by which others must be assessed. But he was uncertain how much Mrs. Collinson might have been accomplice, or merely tool.

As the latter, she might know less, but what she did know she should be the more ready to tell. As he considered this, he had a doubt of whether Professor Blinkwell s presence was to be the advantage which he had hoped. But none of these reflections could change the direction of his attack.

"What we want to know now," he said, "is, in particular, the name and address of the man to whom the wrong case was delivered."

"It wasn't delivered anywhere. Your man came and took it away."

"That was what I meant. But he wasn't my man at all. It's his name and address that I am anxious to know."

"But that doesn't sound sense. You must have arranged for him to call."

"I know nothing about it. The case was not mine, nor was it sent by me. My name was used without my authority or knowledge."

Mrs. Collinson had the look of one who accepts a surprising fact, and is endeavouring to adjust her mind to its implications.

"I wonder," she said, "why anyone should have done that. But it's quite natural that you feel annoyed."

"Mr. Kindell," Professor Blinkwell interposed, "is more than annoyed. There is a young lady involved in the matter who cannot be found, and he is anxious to trace her without delay."

"Then I'm sorry," the lady replied, "but I can't do much to help you. All I know is that someone came in a car and said he was from Mr. Kindell and took the case - the first one - away. I didn't see him myself."

"But your maid must have seen him," the Professor insisted "Will you permit us to question her?"

Mrs. Collinson's reply was to touch the bell. When the girl appeared, she said, "Becky, I want you to tell these gentlemen all you can remember about the man who called for the case."

"I didn't notice him that particular. He was quite a nice gentleman."

Kindell asked, "I suppose you'd know him if you should see him again."

"Oh, yes, sir. I think I should."

"Can you describe-him?"

The girl appeared to make a genuine effort of memory. She said he was dark. But not so very. Short. But not that short She thought he had been wearing a grey suit. It all amounted to nothing. Both the Professor and Mrs. Collinson appeared to be anxious to persuade her to talk, and to stimulate her memory. But Kindell saw that it was a useless pursuit. His real anxiety had become to decide whether he were being elaborately fooled.

But even if that were so, it did not follow that it was not the Professor's purpose to lead to Irene's recovery - perhaps by such a method as should place him under an obligation he could not easily decline to admit.

Yet, be that as it might, it appeared evident that they were to have little assistance from either of the women who were now before them. Either they were telling all that they knew, or the Professor's influence (if he had any) was not being exerted in the right way.

The idea came to him (in which he was wrong) that as Gustav had provided the label giving Mrs. Collinson's address, he might also know that to which the case was being taken away. And it was with the intention of reminding the Professor of the danger which (as he rightly hoped) might lie in any confession the French waiter could be persuaded to make that he said aloud:

"There's one chance yet. We don't know what the French police may be getting from Gustav now."

"Yes," Professor Blinkwell agreed readily, "their methods may be getting quite a lot from him, if I remember the sort he was. The trouble would be to know what to believe."

To himself, Kindell admitted the force of that argument. The man who had professed to be his own messenger to Irene, and had given her the valise in his name, would not be likely to be short of a useful lie.

"Yes," he said, "there's always that difficulty."

"Perhaps," the Professor suggested, "they'd have a better prospect of getting him to say what you want to know if he were not afraid that it might be used against him in connection with the policeman's murder."

"I daresay they would."

"I suppose the police here are a good deal more concerned about the American girl."

It was a statement rather than a question, but Kindell had become sufficiently familiar with the subtlety of the Professor's conversational methods to accept it differently. He regarded it as a leading question. Or rather, as an indication of the lines on which a business deal might be arranged. "Than about Reynard's murder you mean? I should say they are. That's a headache for Paris rather than Scotland Yard. But they'll naturally be anxious that Miss Thurlow should not get into any trouble here."

"There may be the offer of a reward, if the young lady should not be promptly found?"

"I should think there will. But I hope we shall have her back before there's time to advertise that."

"May I suggest that an assurance that whoever may be holding her now will not be required to explain the reason for her detention - if a channel for such communication could be discovered - might be of material assistance? That is, if she really be detained against her own will, as you seem disposed - perhaps too readily - to assume?"

"Yes. Perhaps it would. But it would be a difficult undertaking to give."

"By the police, yes. But if you could make such a bargain yourself, into which they might not intrude, I should suppose, if the safety of the daughter of the American Ambassador should be involved, it is a case where they might be willing to close their eyes?"

"You think her safety is really at stake?"

"I can only infer from what I have heard from you - but it is for you to judge rather than me."

Kindell hesitated how to reply. His own inclination was to place Irene's safety before any other consideration, and - she being who she was--he saw that the police might take the same view. But he saw also that it would be an exceedingly difficult bargain to define, and one which he had no authority to make. Even a personal promise, such as a private citizen might feel free to give, was a dereliction of duty by him unless he had permission for what he did. What, he wondered, would the consequence be, if he should not bargain, but threaten? If he should challenge these treacherous criminals by an assertion that the police were already aware of their nefarious activities, and that their positions, perilous already, would be tenfold worse if they should not aid him in securing her safe return from wherever - as he would protest - they must know her to be?

But if he should take this course, and be confronted only by indignation and denial? What should he do then? Was it not better to accept Professor Blinkwell's suggestion, and endeavour to come to terms in a more delicate way?

The girl interrupted the moment's silence which his hesitation involved. She had been standing uncertainly at the door, neither having been required to stay nor given permission to go. "Is there anything more, ma'am?" she asked.

Her question reminded Kindell of one thing that he had not asked, because he knew it already, but he saw that her reply might be an indication of how far he should believe her on other points. He said: "Just a moment, Becky. Can you tell me what kind of car the man came in?"

"Do you mean the first man, sir, or the second?"

"I don't understand you. You didn't say there were two."

"There was the man who fetched the second case."

"How long ago was that?"

"About an hour ago, sir. Perhaps a bit less."

"What sort of a man was he?"

"He was rather thin, sir. I didn't look at him particularly. He seemed in a hurry."

"You didn't tell me about this, Becky," her mistress said, with a faint note of rebuke in her voice.

"No, ma'am. I didn't know that I need."

Professor Blinkwell asked, "Did he return the first case when he took the other away?"

"No, sir. He said that would be sent back in the morning."

"And what sort of car did he have?" Kindell went on.

"It looked like a taxi, sir. I feel sure that's what it was."

It all sounded plausible enough. If they were all acting it was being cleverly done. Yet he was far from sure. But he saw one thing he did not like. Only Irene had known that he was returning to the house with the second case.

The man in the grey car might have opened the first one and seen the nature of its contents. But that would give him no reason to expect that the second would be subsequently delivered with its contents intact. The natural inference would be very different from that.

Either these people were giving him concocted lies, or Irene must herself have supplied the information which had caused the second man to come, and that implied that she had been in contact - in conversation - either voluntary or otherwise - with the man she had been pursuing. That was not what she had agreed to do. She was to have followed only. It did no more than confirm what he had already supposed. But it was an unwelcome confirmation, and, in view of the way in which her taxi had been returned to the rank, it had a most sinister sound. He resumed his interrupted conversation with Professor Blinkwell by saying "Yes, I suppose you're right, that I'm the one to judge; but, all the same, I should be glad to know what you think."

Professor Blinkwell's tone was considerate as he replied:

"I don't want to be an alarmist, and I should be very sorry to say anything that would make you additionally anxious. But from the facts you have given me, I do think that it would be prudent to endeavour to get in touch with the parties concerned, and make the best bargain you can for the young lady's release."

"You think that could be done?"

"I think it ought to be tried. I would indeed make an effort for you myself - I could not, of course, undertake that it would succeed - but I might have to pledge my word that there would be no subsequent punitive action of any kind. You would have to go back to Scotland Yard and telephone me an explicit authority to that effect."

"Very well. I'll see what I can do."

"Then you had better have the taxi in which we came, as time is important to you. I will get another, and shall be back at my own house by when you will be getting through to me."

The Professor looked as though he had something further to say, but Kindell was through the door without waiting to hear.

When he had gone, and Becky had left the room, the Professor said: "I can see that you have a reliable maid. And your own attitude was exactly that which the position required. I shall not forget."

He shook hands with Mrs. Collinson with more than his usual amiability, but when he was alone in the taxi which he had hailed for his own use his jaw was hard set and there was black anger and ruthless cruelty in his eyes.

"The fool," he thought. "The damned fool. To land me in this!" As to Snacklit, he had no doubt at all. His days must be nearly done. But as to Irene, even if the police should be willing to make such a bargain as he had proposed, he was not sure that it would be wise to carry it out. He was clear of complicity now. Clear of anything that could be proved. Dead men tell no tales. And it is the same with girls. The question needed most careful thought.