It was at that moment that the telephone bell rang, after a slight hesitation Hugh picked up the receiver.
“Very well,” he grunted, after listening for a while “I will tell him.”
He replaced the receiver and turned to the American.
“Mr. Ditchling will be here for the meeting at two, and Peterson will be late,” he announced slowly.
“What’s Ditchling when he’s at home?” asked the other.
“One of the so-called leaders,” answered Hugh briefly turning over the pages of the ledger. “Here’s his dossier, according to Peterson. ‘Ditchling, Charles. Good speaker; clever; unscrupulous. Requires big money; worth it. Drinks.’”
For a while they stared at the brief summary, and then the American burst into a guffaw of laughter.
“The mistake you’ve made, Captain, in this county is not giving Peterson a seat in your Cabinet. He’d have the whole caboose eating out of his hand; and if you paid him a few hundred thousands a year, he might run straight and grow pigs as a hobby…”
II
It was a couple of hours later that Hugh rang up his rooms in Half Moon Street. From Algy, who spoke to him, he gathered that Phyllis and her father were quite safe, though the latter was suffering in the manner common to the morning after. But he also found out another thing—that Ted Jerningham had just arrived with the hapless Potts in tow, who was apparently sufficiently recovered to talk sense. He was still weak and dazed, but no longer imbecile.
“Tell Ted to bring him down to The Elms at once,” ordered Hugh. “There’s a compatriot of his here, waiting to welcome him with open arms.”
“Potts is coming, Mr. Green,” he said, putting sown the receiver. “Our Hiram C. And he’s talking sense. It seems to me that we may get a little light thrown on the activities of Mr. Rocking and Herr Steinemann, and the other bloke.”
The American nodded slowly.
“Von Gratz,” he said. “I remember his name now. Steel man. Maybe you’re right, Captain, and that he know something; anyway, I guess Hiram C. Potts and I stick closer than brothers till I restore him to the bosom of his family.”
But Mr. Potts, when he did arrive, exhibited no great inclination to stick close to the detective; in fact, he showed the greatest reluctance to enter the house at all. As Algy has said, he was still weak and dazed, and the sight of the place where he had suffered so much produced such an effect on him that for a while Hugh feared he was going to have a relapse. At length, however, he seemed to get back his confidence and was persuaded to come into the central room.
“It’s all right, Mr. Potts,” Drummond assured him over and over again. “Their gang is dispersed, and Lakington is dead. We’re all friends here now. You’re quite safe. This is Mr. Green, who has come over from New York especially to find you and take you back to your family.”
The millionaire stared in silence at the detective, who rolled his cigar round in his mouth.
“That’s right, Mr. Potts. There’s the little old sign.” He threw back his coat, showing the police badge, and the millionaire nodded. “I guess you’ve had things humming on the other side, and if it hadn’t been for the Captain here and his friends they’d be humming still.”
“I am obliged to you, sir,” said the American, speaking for the first time to Hugh. The words were slow and hesitating, as if he was not quite sure of his speech. “I seem to remember your face,” he continued, “as part of the awful nightmare I’ve suffered the last few days—or is it weeks? I seem to remember having seen you, and you were, always kind.”
“That’s all over now, Mr. Potts,” said Hugh gently. “You got into the clutches of the most infernal gang of swine, and we’ve been trying to get you out again.” He looked at him quietly. “Do you think you can remember enough to tell us what happened at the beginning? Take your time,” he urged. “There’s no hurry.”
The others drew nearer eagerly, and the millionaire passed his hand dazedly over his forehead.
“I was stopping at the Carlton,” he began, “with Granger, my secretary. I sent him over to Belfast on a shipping deal and—” He paused and looked round the group. “Where is Granger?” he asked.
“Mr. Granger was murdered in Belfast, Mr. Potts,” said Drummond quietly, “by a member of the gang that kidnapped you.”
“Murdered! Jimmy Granger murdered!” He almost cried in his weakness. “What did the swine want to murder him for?”
“Because they wanted you alone,” explained Hugh. “Private secretaries ask awkward questions.”
After a while the millionaire recovered his composure, and with many breaks, and pauses the slow, disjointed story continued.
“Lakington! That was the name of the man I met at the Carlton. And then there was another… Peter… Peterson. That’s it. We all dined together, I remember, and it was after dinner, in my private sitting-room, that Peterson put up his proposition to me… It was a suggestion that he thought would appeal to me as a business man. He said—what was it?—that he could produce a gigantic syndicalist strike in England—revolution, in fact; and that as one of the biggest ship-owners—the biggest, in fact—outside this country, I should be able to capture a lot of the British carrying trade. He wanted two hundred and fifty thousand pounds to do it, paid one month after the result was obtained… Said there were others in it…”
“On that valuation,” interrupted the detective thoughtfully, “it makes one million pounds sterling.”
Drummond nodded. “Yes, Mr. Potts; and then?”
“I told him,” said the millionaire, “that he was an infernal scoundrel, and that I’d have nothing whatever to do with such a villainous scheme. And then—almost the last thing I can remember—I saw Peterson look at Lakington. Then they both sprang on me, and I felt something prick my arm. And after that I can’t remember anything clearly. Your face, sir”—he turned to Drummond—“comes to me out of a kind of dream; and yours, too,” he added to Darrell. “But it was like a long, dreadful nightmare, in which vague things, over which I had no power, kept happening, until I woke up late last night in this gentleman’s house.” He bowed to Ted Jerningham, who grinned cheerfully.
“And mighty glad I was to hear you talking sense again, sir,” he remarked. “Do you mean to say you have no recollection of how you got there?”
“None, sir; none,” answered the millionaire. “It was just part of a dream.”
“It shows the strength of the drug those swine used on you,” said Drummond grimly. “You went there in an aeroplane, Mr. Potts.”
“An aeroplane!” cried the other in amazement. “I don’t remember it. I’ve got no recollection of it whatever. There’s only one other thing that I can lay hold of, and that’s all dim and muzzy… Pearls… A great rope of pearls… I was to sign a paper; and I wouldn’t… I did once, and then there was a shot, and the light went out, and the paper disappeared…”
“It’s at my bank at this moment, Mr. Potts,” said Hugh; “I took that paper, or part of it, that night.”
“Did you?” The millionaire looked at him vaguely. “It was to promise them a million dollars