Men of Affairs Part 9

Richard agreed that it looked like gold and asked where he found it.

"I made it," came the astonis.h.i.+ng reply. "You needn't worry, it is gold all right. Bear any test." He restored it to the bag. "Seems stupid,"

he went on, "that here am I, with the knowledge to command millions, and I haven't a sou in my pocket. Cheap process, too, once you've got the plant. Dirt cheap. 'Course it's getting the plant's the trouble. No one'll believe me. Disheartening. Took that sample to the Bank of England--they asked me where I bought it--bought it! Lord! Oh well--one of these days, I suppose. Meet again perhaps. G'bye."

And with a cheery wave of the hand he vaulted the railings and ran lightly across the gra.s.s.

"I'm d.a.m.ned," said Richard. "If a fellow like that can make gold it follows to reason I ought to be able to make good."

It was after nine o'clock when Richard turned down the Earl's Court Road.

He stopped before a small sweet stuff shop, attracted by a card in the window which read, "Letters may be addressed here, 1d."

"I suppose a man, even in my circ.u.mstances, ought to have a town address," he argued. "After all, one never knows."

Accordingly he entered and registered under the modest name of John Tidd.

To the little old lady who wrote it down in a small laundry book devoted to the purpose, he said he was probably going abroad and later might send a request to forward correspondence. It was a dignified and pleasant transaction although he was conscious of a feeling that he would have created a more agreeable impression had he retained his necktie.

Coming out of the shop he fell into line with the tide of city workers moving southward to the underground station. These were the n.o.bility of commerce who picked up the reins of office at nine forty-five--persons of substance in no way to be confused with the eight-thirty worker. It was an honourable a.s.sociation to walk down the Earl's Court Road in such company. Richard swung along at an even gait with an important looking individual in a hard felt hat to the right of him and a stout gentleman with a King Edward beard to the left. The three entered Earl's Court Station abreast and approached the barrier, where Richard stepped aside and let them pa.s.s through. Leaning against the grill gates was a man reading a folded copy of the _Daily Sketch_. He looked at Richard for an instant, then looked again searchingly. The repeated action attracted Richard's notice and their eyes met.

"Hardly worth while, is it?" said the man.

"I beg your pardon," Richard returned.

"Oh, that's quite all right--but I really wouldn't bother with it." He pointed at the opening of Richard's waistcoat and smiled. "That's rather a sound notion--no tie--distracts the eye from looking too keenly at the face. You nearly pa.s.sed me."

"To be perfectly frank," Richard answered, "I shouldn't have bought crepe if I had."

The man laughed.

"Getting pretty sick of it, aren't you?" he queried.

A sure conviction possessed Richard that he was in the presence of a lunatic.

"On the contrary," he replied, "I'm just beginning to enjoy myself."

"Well, well, there's no accounting for tastes. But I should have thought you'd have had enough of railway stations. Better go home and stay there."

Richard shook his head sympathetically.

"Try taking a little more soda in it," he suggested. "You'd be a different man inside a week. So long."

The watcher by the gate was smiling pleasantly to himself as Richard turned away.

It was nearly one o'clock when his wanderings brought him back to the neighbourhood of Piccadilly. He had spent the intervening hours, with little enough success, at the labour bureau in Westminster. From there he had walked across the Mall and found an empty bench under the trees in Green Park looking up Park Lane. He had hardly seated himself when he saw a man come out of a big doorway opposite and hurry eastward in the direction of Piccadilly Circus. Even at the distance Richard had no difficulty in recognising the diner who overnight had nodded to him at the Berkeley.

"Half a mind to give him a shout," he thought, but on reflection "I don't know though, he seems in the deuce of a hurry and I can't imagine he's any work to give away."

It would have saved Cranbourne a lot of trouble if he had followed his first inclination.

CHAPTER 6.

CONCERNING A TIE.

Not a word had been received from Cranbourne. From the moment he left Lord Almont's flat he disappeared completely. That was Cranbourne's way, for once an idea started in his brain he rested not until it has been realised or disproved. He had given himself three days to find a human duplicate of Barraclough and among a population of seven millions the task was no easy one. His quarry had dined at the Berkeley on the twenty-fourth instant but beyond that point information languished.

The redoubtable Brown, prince of head waiters, who knew the affairs of most of his customers as intimately as his own, was able to offer little or no a.s.sistance. He remembered the gentleman who had dined alone in a tweed suit and had said something about having no dress clothes. He believed he had seen him in uniform during the earlier parts of the war but couldn't recall the regiment. Had an impression he paid for his dinner with the last of the notes in his pocket but that might mean nothing. "A pleasant gentleman, spoke crisply and had a smile." John, of the cloakroom, recalled a half crown thrown on his little counter in return for a soft hat--"Wait a bit, sir, by a Manchester hatter I believe," and a rainproof coat "rather thinnish and brown."

The Manchester hat stuck in Cranbourne's throat a trifle since it widened the circle of enquiry.

The porter at the revolving door believed the gentleman had gone toward Piccadilly--walking. Yes, he was sure he hadn't taken a cab. Gave him a s.h.i.+lling and five coppers.

Cranbourne thanked them and spent the rest of the day pa.s.sing in and out of every well known grill room in London. It was sound enough reasoning but it brought no results. At twelve o'clock the same night he paid a flying visit to all the dancing rooms--Murray's, Giro's, Rector's, The Emba.s.sy, Savoy and half a dozen others. At three o'clock he rang up Daimler's, hired a car and drove to Brighton because many men come up from Brighton by day and bring no evening clothes. Besides the time of his departure from the Berkeley plus a walk to Victoria Station more or less synchronised with the down train to Brighton. He spent the best part of the following day racing through hotel lists and looking up visitors at Brighton, Eastbourne, Hastings and Folkestone.

He was back in Town again by 7.30, at the Theatre Library, where he bought a single ticket for twelve musical plays and revues selecting them from the cla.s.s of entertainment Barraclough himself would have been likely to attend. It was a restless evening, das.h.i.+ng from one place to another and sorting over the audiences in the narrow margin of time allowed by intervals. Afterwards he spent an hour by the fountain in Piccadilly Circus keenly examining the thousands of pa.s.sers-by.

It was very late indeed when he struck one hand against the other and cried out,

"Oh, my Lord, what a fool I am."

A new significance had suddenly suggested itself as a result of Brown's repet.i.tion of the mysterious diner's remark, "I repeat I have no evening clothes." Cranbourne had taken it to imply that there had been no time to dress but why not accept it literally.

Two whole days wasted looking at men in white s.h.i.+rt fronts and black coats!

"Lord, what an idiot I am. Alter your line of thought and alter it quick."

He began to walk briskly, muttering to himself as he strode along.

"No dress clothes--deuce of an appet.i.te. Chap who had sc.r.a.ped up a few guineas perhaps to do himself well--on the bust. No, that won't do.

Ordered his dinner too well for that. Had the air of a man accustomed to the best places. Brown said so. A s.h.i.+lling and five coppers to the porter. Queer kind of tip! What in blazes was the fellow doing? What sort of company does he keep?"

Cranbourne jumped into a taxi and returned to the Berkeley. It was closed but a night porter admitted him.

"Look here, I want to get hold of Brown," he said.

"You're in luck, sir," the man returned. "One of our visitors 'as been giving a supper and Mr. Brown was in charge. If 'e 'asn't gone I'll try and get him for you."

He returned a moment later with Brown following.

"Tremendously sorry," said Cranbourne, "but I want to ask you a few more questions about that fellow I spoke of."

"I've been thinking about him myself, sir, and one or two things have come to mind. Remembered his tie for instance."

"Yes."

"Old Etonian colours," said Brown.

Cranbourne nodded enthusiastically.