“Where you shot your son?” asked Peter coolly, and only for a second did the man’s self-possession leave him. His face turned a dusky red and then a pale yellow.
“I shot my son there, did I? Peter, you’re getting old and dopy! You’ve been dreaming again, Peter. Shot my son!”
“I’ll come to this fool dinner of yours.”
“And Marney?” suggested the other.
“Marney doesn’t put her foot inside the doors of the Highlow,” said Peter calmly. “You’re mad to imagine I would allow that. I can’t answer for Johnny, but I’ll be there.”
“What about Thursday?” suggested the old man.
“Any day will suit me,” said Peter impatiently. “What time do you want us?”
“Half-past eight. Just a snack and a talk. We may as well have a bit of food to make it cheerful, eh, Peter? Remember that dinner we had a few days before we smashed the Southern Bank? That must be twenty years ago. You split fair on that, didn’t you? I’ll bet you did – I had the money! No taking a million dollars and calling it a hundred and twenty thousand pounds, eh, Peter?”
This time Peter stood by the door, and the jerk of his head told Emanuel Legge that the moment for persiflage had passed.
“I want to settle this matter.” The earnestness of his manner did not deceive Peter. “You see, Peter, I’m getting old, and I want to go abroad and take the boy with me. And I want to give him a chance too – a goodlooking lad like that ought to have a chance. For I’ll tell you the truth – he’s a single man.”
Peter smiled.
“You can laugh! He married Lila – you’ve got a record of that, but have you taken a screw at the divorce list? That takes the grin off your face. They were divorced a year after they were married. Lila got tired of the other man and came back to Jeff. You’re a looker-up; go and look up that! Ask old Reeder—”
“Ask him yourself,” said Peter “He’s in the garden.”
He had no sooner said the words than he regretted them. Emanuel was silent for a while.
“So Reeder’s here, in the garden, is he? He’s come for a squeak. But you can’t, because you’ve nothing to squeak about. What does he want?”
“Why don’t you ask him?”
“That fellow spends his life wandering about other people’s gardens,” grumbled Emanuel.A disinterested observer might have imagined that Mr. Reeder’s passion for horticulture was the only grievance against him. “He was round my garden yesterday. I dare say he told you? Came worrying poor Jeff to death. But you always were fond of busies, weren’t you, Peter? How’s your old friend Craig? I can’t stand them myself, but then I am a crook. Thursday will suit you, Peter? That gives you six days.”
“Thursday will suit me,” said Peter. “I hope it will suit you.”
As he came back on to the lawn Reeder and the girl were coming into view up the steps, and without preliminary he told them what had passed.
“I fear,” said Mr. Reeder, shaking his head sadly, “that Emanuel is not as truthful a man as he might be. There was no divorce. I was sufficiently interested in the case to look up the divorce court records.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I think your dinner party at the Highlow – is that the name? – will be an interesting one,” he said. “Are you sure he did not invite me?” And again Peter saw that glint of humour in his eyes.
Chapter XXIII
Mr. Emanuel Legge had a great deal of business to do in London. The closing of the club had sadly interfered with the amenities of the Highlow, for many of its patrons and members were, not unnaturally, reluctant to be found on premises subject, at any moment, to the visitation of inquisitive police officers. Stevens, the porter, had been reinstated, though his conduct, in Emanuel’s opinion, had been open to the gravest suspicion. In other ways he was a reliable man, and one whose services were not lightly to be dispensed with. To his surprise, when he had come to admonish the porter, that individual had taken the wind out of his sails by announcing his intention of retiring unless the staff was changed. And he had his way, the staff in question being the elevator boy, Benny.
“Benny squeaked on me,” said Stevens briefly, “and I’m not going to have a squeaker round.”
“He squeaked to me, my friend,” said Emanuel, showing his teeth unpleasantly. “He told me you tried to shield Johnny Gray.”
“He’s a member, ain’t he?” asked the porter truculently. “How do I know what members you want put away, and what members you want hidden? Of course, I helped the Captain – or thought I was trying to help him. That’s my job.”
There was a great deal of logic in this. Benny, the elevator boy, was replaced.
Stepping out of the lift, Emanuel saw the prints of muddy boots in the hall, and they were wet.
“Who is here?” he asked.
“Nobody in particular.”
Legge pointed to the footprints.
“Somebody has been here recently,” he said.
“They’re mine,” said Stevens without hesitation. “I went out to get a cab for Monty Ford.”
“Are there any mats?” snapped Emanuel.
Stevens did not answer.
There was a great deal of work for Emanuel to do. For example, there was the matter of a certain house in Berkeley Square to be cleared off. Though he was no longer in active work, he did a lot of crooked financing, and the house had been taken with his money. It was hired furnished for a year, and it was the intention of his associates to run an exclusive gambling club. Unfortunately, the owner, who had a very valuable collection of paintings and old jewellery, discovered the character of the new tenant (a dummy of Legge’s) and had promptly cancelled the agreement. Roughly, the venture had cost Emanuel a thousand, and he hated losing good money.
It was late that night when he left the club. He was sleeping in town, intending to travel down to his convalescent son by an early train in the morning. It had been raining heavily, and the street was empty when he went out of the club, pulling the collar of his macintosh about his neck.
He had taken two strides when a man stepped out of the shadow of a doorway and planted himself squarely in his path. Emanuel’s hand dropped to his pocket, for he was that rarest variety of criminal, an English gunman.
“Keep your artillery out of action, Legge,” said a voice that was strangely familiar.
He peered forward, but in the shadow he could not distinguish the stranger’s face.
“Who are you?”
“An old friend of yours,” was the reply. “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten all your pals! Why, you’ll be passing a screw in the street one of these days without touching your hat to him.”
And then it dawned upon Emanuel.
“Oh… you’re Fenner, aren’t you?”
“I’m Fenner,” admitted the man. “Who else could I be? I’ve been waiting to see you, Mr. Emanuel Legge. I wondered if you would remember a fellow you sent to the triangle… fifteen lashes I had. You’ve never had a ‘bashing,’ have you, Legge? It’s not so nice as you’d think. When they’d took me back to my cell and put that big bit of lint on my shoulder,