Dope

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Thus, a fellow with a low forehead and a weakly receding chin, Kerry
classified as a dullard, a witling, unaware that if the brow were but
low enough and the chin virtually absent altogether he might stand in
the presence of a second Daniel. Physiognomy is a subtle science, and
the exceptions to its rules are often of a sensational character. In
the same way Kerry looked for evasion, and, where possible, flight, on
the part of one possessing a guilty conscience. Mollie Gretna was a
phenomenal exception to a rule otherwise sound. And even one familiar
with criminal psychology might be forgiven for failing to detect guilt
in a woman anxious to make the acquaintance of a prominent member of
the Criminal Investigation Department.

Pausing for a moment in the entrance of the club, and chewing
reflectively, Kerry swung open the door and walked out into the
street. He had one more cover to "beat," and he set off briskly,
plunging into the mazes of Soho crossing Wardour Street into old
Compton Street, and proceeding thence in the direction of Shaftesbury
Avenue. Turning to the right on entering the narrow thoroughfare for
which he was bound, he stopped and whistled softly. He stood in the
entrance to a court; and from further up the court came an answering
whistle.

Kerry came out of the court again, and proceeded some twenty paces
along the street to a restaurant. The windows showed no light, but the
door remained open, and Kerry entered without hesitation, crossed a
darkened room and found himself in a passage where a man was seated in
a little apartment like that of a stage-door keeper. He stood up, on
hearing Kerry's tread, peering out at the newcomer.

"The restaurant is closed, sir."

"Tell me a better one," rapped Kerry. "I want to go upstairs."

"Your card, sir."

Kerry revealed his teeth in a savage smile and tossed his card on to
the desk before the concierge. He passed on, mounting the stairs at
the end of the passage. Dimly a bell rang; and on the first landing
Kerry met a heavily built foreign gentleman, who bowed.

"My dear Chief Inspector," he said gutturally, "what is this, please?
I trust nothing is wrong, eh?"

"Nothing," replied Kerry. "I just want to look round."

"A few friends," explained the suave alien, rubbing his hands together
and still bowing, "remain playing dominoes with me."

"Very good," rapped Kerry. "Well, if you think we have given them time
to hide the 'wheel' we'll go in. Oh, don't explain. I'm not worrying
about sticklebacks tonight. I'm out for salmon."

He opened a door on the left of the landing and entered a large room
which offered evidence of having been hastily evacuated by a
considerable company. A red and white figured cloth of a type much
used in Continental cafes had been spread upon a long table, and three
foreigners, two men and an elderly woman, were bending over a row of
dominoes set upon one corner of the table. Apparently the men were
playing and the woman was watching. But there was a dense cloud of
cigar smoke in the room, and mingled with its pungency were sweeter
scents. A number of empty champagne bottles stood upon a sideboard and
an elegant silk theatre-bag lay on a chair.

"H'm," said Kerry, glaring fiercely from the bottles to the players,
who covertly were watching him. "How you two smarts can tell a domino
from a door-knocker after cracking a dozen magnums gets me guessing."

He took up the scented bag and gravely handed it to the old woman.

"You have mislaid your bag, madam," he said. "But, fortunately, I
noticed it as I came in."

He turned the glance of his fierce eyes upon the man who had met him
on the landing, and who had followed him into the room.

"Third floor, von Hindenburg," he rapped. "Don't argue. Lead the way."

For one dangerous moment the man's brow lowered and his heavy face
grew blackly menacing. He exchanged a swift look with his friends
seated at the disguised roulette table. Kerry's jaw muscles protruded
enormously.

"Give me another answer like that," he said in a tone of cold
ferocity, "and I'll kick you from here to Paradise."

"No offense--no offense," muttered the man, quailing before the
savagery of the formidable Chief Inspector. "You come this way,
please. Some ladies call upon me this evening, and I do not want to
frighten them."

"No," said Kerry, "you wouldn't, naturally." He stood aside as a door
at the further end of the room was opened. "After you, my friend. I
said 'lead the way.'"

They mounted to the third floor of the restaurant. The room which they
had just quitted was used as an auxiliary dining and supper-room
before midnight, as Kerry knew. After midnight the centre table was
unmasked, and from thence onward to dawn, sometimes, was surrounded by
roulette players. The third floor he had never visited, but he had a
shrewd idea that it was not entirely reserved for the private use of
the proprietor.

A babel of voices died away as the two men walked into a room rather
smaller than that below and furnished with little tables, cafe
fashion. At one end was a grand piano and a platform before which a
velvet curtain was draped. Some twenty people, men and women, were in
the place, standing looking towards the entrance. Most of the men and
all the women but one were in evening dress; but despite this common
armor of respectability, they did not all belong to respectable
society.

Two of the women Kerry recognized as bearers of titles, and one was
familiar to him as a screen-beauty. The others were unclassifiable,
but all were fashionably dressed with the exception of a masculine-
looking lady who had apparently come straight off a golf course, and
who later was proved to be a well-known advocate of woman's rights.
The men all belonged to familiar types. Some of them were Jews.

Kerry, his feet widely apart and his hands thrust in his overcoat
pockets, stood staring at face after face and chewing slowly. The
proprietor glanced apologetically at his patrons and shrugged. Silence
fell upon the company. Then:

"I am a police officer," said Kerry sharply. "You will file out past
me, and I want a card from each of you. Those who have no cards will
write name and address here."

He drew a long envelope and a pencil from a pocket of his dinner
jacket. Laying the envelope and pencil on one of the little tables:

"Quick march!" he snapped. "You, sir!" shooting out his forefinger in
the direction of a tall, fair young man, "step out!"

Glancing helplessly about him, the young man obeyed, and approaching
Kerry:

"I say, officer," he whispered nervously, "can't you manage to keep my
name out of it? I mean to say, my people will kick up the deuce.
Anything up to a tenner. . . ."

The whisper faded away. Kerry's expression had grown positively
ferocious.

"Put your card on the table," he said tersely, "and get out while my
hands stay in my pockets!"

Hurriedly the noble youth (he was the elder son of an earl) complied,
and departed. Then, one by one, the rest of the company filed past the
Chief Inspector. He challenged no one until a Jew smilingly laid a
card on the table bearing the legend: "Mr. John Jones, Lincoln's Inn
Fields."

"Hi!" rapped Kerry, grasping the man's arm. "One moment, Mr. 'Jones'!
The card I want is in the other case. D'you take me for a mug? That
'Jones' trick was tried on Noah by the blue-faced baboon!"

His perception of character was wonderful. At some of the cards he did
not even glance; and upon the women he wasted no time at all. He took
it for granted that they would all give false names, but since each of
them would be followed it did not matter. When at last the room was
emptied, he turned to the scowling proprietor, and:

"That's that!" he said. "I've had no instructions about your
establishment, my friend, and as I've seen nothing improper going on
I'm making no charge, at the moment. I don't want to know what sort of
show takes place on your platform, and I don't want to know anything
about you that I don't know already. You're a Swiss subject and a dark
horse."

He gathered up the cards from the table, glancing at them carelessly.
He did not expect to gain much from his possession of these names and
addresses. It was among the women that he counted upon finding patrons
of Kazmah and Company. But as he was about to drop the cards into his
overcoat pocket, one of them, which bore a written note, attracted his
attention.

At this card he stared like a man amazed; his face grew more and more
red, and:

"Hell!" he said--"Hell! which of 'em was it?"

The card contained the following:--

Lord Wrexborough
Great Cumberland Place, V. 1
"To introduce 719. W."

CHAPTER XXVI

THE MOODS OF MOLLIE

Early the following morning Margaret Halley called upon Mollie Gretna.

Mollie's personality did not attract Margaret. The two had nothing in
common, but Margaret was well aware of the nature of the tie which had
bound Rita Irvin to this empty and decadent representative of English
aristocracy. Mollie Gretna was entitled to append the words "The
Honorable" to her name, but not only did she refrain from doing so but
she even preferred to be known as "Gretna"--the style of one of the
family estates.

This pseudonym she had adopted shortly after her divorce, when she had
attempted to take up a stage career. But although the experience had
proved disastrous, she had retained the nom de guerre, and during the
past four years had several times appeared at war charity garden-
parties as a classical dancer--to the great delight of the guests and
greater disgust of her family. Her maternal uncle, head of her house,
said to be the most blase member of the British peerage and known as
"the noble tortoise," was generally considered to have pronounced the
final verdict upon his golden-haired niece when he declared "she is
almost amusing."

Mollie received her visitor with extravagant expressions of welcome.

"My dear Miss Halley," she cried, "how perfectly sweet of you to come
to see me! of course, I can guess what you have called about. Look! I
have every paper published this morning in London! Every one! Oh!
poor, darling little Rita! What can have become of her!"

Tears glistened upon her carefully made-up lashes, and so deep did her
grief seem to be that one would never have suspected that she had
spent the greater part of the night playing bridge at a "mixed" club
in Dover Street, and from thence had proceeded to a military
"breakfast-dance."

"It is indeed a ghastly tragedy," said Margaret. "It seems incredible
that she cannot be traced."

"Absolutely incredible!" declared Mollie, opening a large box of
cigarettes. "Will you have one, dear?"

"No, thanks. By the way, they are not from Buenos Ayres, I suppose?"

Mollie, cigarette in hand, stared, round-eyed, and:

"Oh, my dear Miss Halley!" she cried, "what an idea! Such a funny
thing to suggest."

Margaret smiled coolly.

"Poor Sir Lucien used to smoke cigarettes of that kind," she
explained, "and I thought perhaps you smoked them, too."

Mollie shook her head and lighted the cigarette.

"He gave me one once, and it made me feel quite sick," she declared.

Margaret glanced at the speaker, and knew immediately that Mollie had
determined to deny all knowledge of the drug coterie. Because there is
no problem of psychology harder than that offered by a perverted mind,
Margaret was misled in ascribing this secrecy to a desire to avoid
becoming involved in a scandal. Therefore:

"Do you quite realize, Miss Gretna," she said quietly, "that every
hour wasted now in tracing Rita may mean, must mean, an hour of agony
for her?"

"Oh, don't! please don't!" cried Mollie, clasping her hands. "I cannot
bear to think of it."

"God knows in whose hands she is. Then there is poor Mr. Irvin. He is
utterly prostrated. One shudders to contemplate his torture as the
hours and the days go by and no news comes of Rita."

"Oh, my dear! you are making me cry!" exclaimed Mollie. "If only I
could do something to help. . . ."

Margaret was studying her closely, and now for the first time she
detected sincere emotion in Mollie's voice--and unforced tears in her
eyes. Hope was reborn.

"Perhaps you can," she continued, speaking gently. "You knew all
Rita's friends and all Sir Lucien's. You must have met the woman
called Mrs. Sin?"

"Mrs. Sin," whispered Mollie, staring in a frightened way so that the
pupils of her eyes slowly enlarged. "What about Mrs. Sin?"

"Well, you see, they seem to think that through Mrs. Sin they will be
able to trace Kazmah; and wherever Kazmah is one would expect to find
poor Rita."

Mollie lowered her head for a moment, then glanced quickly at the
speaker, and quickly away again.

"Please let me explain just what I mean," continued Margaret. "It
seems to be impossible to find anybody in London who will admit having
known Mrs. Sin or Kazmah. They are all afraid of being involved in the
case, of course. Now, if you can help, don't hesitate for that reason.
A special commission has been appointed by Lord Wrexborough to deal
with the case, and their agent is working quite independently of the
police. Anything which you care to tell him will be treated as
strictly confidential; but think what it may mean to Rita."

Mollie clasped her hands about her right knee and rocked to and fro in
her chair.

"No one knows who Kazmah is," she said.

"But a number of people seem to know Mrs. Sin. I am sure you must have
met her?"

"If I say that I know her, shall I be called as a witness?"

"Certainly not. I can assure you of that."

Mollie continued to rock to and fro.

"But if I were to tell the police I should have to go to court, I
suppose?"

"I suppose so," replied Margaret. "I am afraid I am dreadfully
ignorant of such matters. It might depend upon whether you spoke to a
high official or to a subordinate one; an ordinary policeman for
instance. But the Home office agent has nothing whatever to do with
Scotland Yard."

Mollie stood up in order to reach an ash-tray, and:

"I really don't think I have anything to say, Miss Halley," she
declared. "I have certainly met Mrs. Sin, but I know nothing whatever
about her, except that I believe she is a Jewess."

Margaret sighed, looking up wistfully into Mollie's face. "Are you
quite sure?" she pleaded. "Oh, Miss Gretna, if you know anything--
anything--don't hide it now. It may mean so much."

"Oh, I quite understand that," cried Mollie. "My heart simply aches
and aches when I think of poor, sweet little Rita. But--really I don't
think I can be of the least tiny bit of use."

Their glances met, and Margaret read hostility in the shallow eyes.
Mollie, who had been wavering, now for some reason had become
confirmed in her original determination to remain silent. Margaret
stood up.

"It is no good, then," she said. "We must hope that Rita will be
traced by the police. Good-bye, Miss Gretna. I am so sorry you cannot
help."

"And so am I!" declared Mollie. "It is perfectly sweet of you to take
such an interest, and I feel a positive worm. But what can I do?"

As Margaret was stepping into her little runabout car, which awaited
her at the door, a theory presented itself to account for Mollie's
sudden hostility. It had developed, apparently, as a result of
Margaret's reference to the Home office inquiry. Of course! Mollie
would naturally be antagonistic to a commission appointed to suppress
the drug traffic.

Convinced that this was the correct explanation, Margaret drove away,
reflecting bitterly that she had been guilty of a strategical error
which it was now too late to rectify.

In common with others, Kerry among them, who had come in contact with
that perverted intelligence, she misjudged Mollie's motives. In the
first place, the latter had no wish to avoid publicity, and in the
second place--although she sometimes wondered vaguely what she should
do when her stock of drugs became exhausted--Mollie was prompted by no
particular animosity toward the Home office inquiry. She had merely
perceived a suitable opportunity to make the acquaintance of the
fierce red Chief Inspector, and at the same time to secure notoriety
for herself.

Ere Margaret's car had progressed a hundred yards from the door,
Mollie was at the telephone.

"City 400, please," she said.

An interval elapsed, then:

"Is that the Commissioner's office, New Scotland Yard?" she asked.

A voice replied that it was.

"Could you put me through to Chief Inspector Kerry?"

"What name?" inquired the voice.

Mollie hesitated for three seconds, and then gave her family name.

"Very well, madam," said the voice respectfully. "Please hold on, and
I will enquire if the Chief Inspector is here."

Mollie's heart was beating rapidly with pleasurable excitement, and
she was as confused as a maiden at her first rendezvous. Then:

"Hello," said the voice.

"Yes?"

"I am sorry, madam. But Chief Inspector Kerry is off duty."

"Oh, dear!" sighed Mollie, "what a pity. Can you tell me where I could
find him?"

"I am afraid not, madam. It is against the rules to give private
addresses of members of any department."

"Oh, very well." She sighed again. "Thank you."

She replaced the receiver and stood biting her finger thoughtfully.
She was making a mental inventory of her many admirers and wondering
which of them could help her. Suddenly she came to a decision on the
point. Taking up the receiver:

"Victoria 8440, please," she said.

Still biting one finger she waited, until:

"Foreign office," announced a voice.

"Please put me through to Mr. Archie Boden-Shaw," she said.

Ere long that official's secretary was inquiring her name, and a
moment later:

"Is that you, Archie?" said Mollie. "Yes! Mollie speaking. No, please
listen, Archie! You can get to know everything at the Foreign office,
and I want you to find out for me the private address of Chief
Inspector Kerry, who is in charge of the Bond Street murder case.
Don't be silly! I've asked Scotland Yard, but they won't tell me. You
can find out. . . . It doesn't matter why I want to know. . . . Just
ring me up and tell me. I must know in half an hour. Yes, I shall be
seeing you tonight. Good-bye. . . ."

Less than half an hour later, the obedient Archie rang up, and Mollie,
all excitement, wrote the following address in a dainty scented
notebook which she carried in her handbag.

CHIEF INSPECTOR KERRY,
67 Spenser Road, Brixton.

CHAPTER XXVII

CROWN EVIDENCE

The appearance of the violet-enamelled motor brougham upholstered in
cream, and driven by a chauffeur in a violet and cream livery, created
some slight sensation in Spenser Road, S.E. Mollie Gretna's
conspicuous car was familiar enough to residents in the West End of
London, but to lower middle-class suburbia it came as something of a
shock. More than one window curtain moved suspiciously, suggesting a
hidden but watchful presence, when the glittering vehicle stopped
before the gate of number 67; and the lady at number 68 seized an
evidently rare opportunity to come out and polish her letter-box.

She was rewarded by an unobstructed view of the smartest woman in
London (thus spake society paragraphers) and of the most expensive set
of furs in Europe, also of a perfectly gowned slim figure. Of Mollie's
disdainful face, with its slightly uptilted nose, she had no more than
a glimpse.

A neat maid, evidently Scotch, admitted the dazzling visitor to number
67; and Spenser Road waited and wondered. It was something to do with
the Bond Street murder! Small girls appeared from doorways suddenly
opened and darted off to advise less-watchful neighbors.

Kerry, who had been at work until close upon dawn in the mysterious
underworld of Soho was sleeping, but Mrs. Kerry received Mollie in a
formal little drawing-room, which, unlike the cosy, homely dining-
room, possessed that frigid atmosphere which belongs to uninhabited
apartments. In a rather handsome cabinet were a number of trophies
associated with the detective's successful cases. The cabinet itself
was a present from a Regent Street firm for whom Kerry had recovered
valuable property.

Mary Kerry, dressed in a plain blouse and skirt, exhibited no trace of
nervousness in the presence of her aristocratic and fashionable
caller. Indeed, Mollie afterwards declared that "she was quite a
ladylike person. But rather tin tabernacley, my dear."

"Did ye wish to see Chief Inspector Kerry parteecularly?" asked Mary,
watching her visitor with calm, observant eyes.

"Oh, most particularly!" cried Mollie, in a flutter of excitement. "Of
course I don't know what you must think of me for calling at such a
preposterous hour, but there are some things that simply can't wait."

"Aye," murmured Mrs. Kerry. "'Twill be yon Bond Street affair?"

"Oh, yes, it is, Mrs. Kerry. Doesn't the very name of Bond Street turn
your blood cold? I am simply shivering with fear!"

"As the wife of a Chief Inspector I am maybe more used to tragedies
than yoursel', madam. But it surely is a sair grim business. My
husband is resting now. He was hard at work a' the night. Nae doubt
ye'll be wishin' tee see him privately?"

"Oh, if you please. I am so sorry to disturb him. I can imagine that
he must be literally exhausted after spending a whole night among
dreadful people."

Mary Kerry stood up.

"If ye'll excuse me for a moment I'll awaken him," she said. "Our
household is sma'."

"Oh, of course! I quite understand, Mrs. Kerry! So sorry. But so good
of you."

"Might I offer ye a glass o' sherry an' a biscuit?"

"I simply couldn't dream of troubling you! Please don't suggest such a
thing. I feel covered with guilt already. Many thanks nevertheless."

Mary Kerry withdrew, leaving Mollie alone. As soon as the door closed
Mollie stood up and began to inspect the trophies in the cabinet. She
was far too restless and excited to remain sitting down. She looked at
the presentation clock on the mantelpiece and puzzled over the
signatures engraved upon a large silver dish which commemorated the
joy displayed by the Criminal Investigation Department upon the
occasion of Kerry's promotion to the post of Chief Inspector.

The door opened and Kerry came in. He had arisen and completed his
toilet in several seconds less than five minutes. But his spotlessly
neat attire would have survived inspection by the most lynx-eyed
martinet in the Brigade of Guards. As he smiled at his visitor with
fierce geniality, Mollie blushed like a young girl.

Chief Inspector Kerry was a much bigger man than she had believed him
to be. The impression left upon her memory by his brief appearance at
the night club had been that of a small, dapper figure. Now, as he
stood in the little drawing-room, she saw that he was not much if
anything below the average height of Englishmen, and that he possessed
wonderfully broad shoulders. In fact, Kerry was deceptive. His compact
neatness and the smallness of his feet and hands, together with those
swift, lithe movements which commonly belong to men of light physique,
curiously combined to deceive the beholder, but masked eleven stones
(*note: 1 stone = 14 pounds) of bone and muscle.

"Very good of you to offer information, miss," he said. "I'm willing
to admit that I can do with it."

He opened a bureau and took out a writing-block and a fountain pen.
Then he turned and stared hard at Mollie. She quickly lowered her
eyes.

"Excuse me," said Kerry, "but didn't I see you somewhere last night?"

"Yes," she said. "I was sitting just inside the door at--"

"Right! I remember," interrupted Kerry. He continued to stare. "Before
you say any more, miss, I have to remind you that I am a police
officer, and that you may be called upon to swear to the truth of any
information you may give me."

"Oh, of course! I know."

"You know? Very well, then; we can get on. Who gave you my address?"

At the question, so abruptly asked, Mollie felt herself blushing
again. It was delightful to know that she could still blush. "Oh--
I . . . that is, I asked Scotland Yard "

She bestowed a swift, half-veiled glance at her interrogator, but he
offered her no help, and:

"They wouldn't tell me," she continued. "So--I had to find out. You
see, I heard you were trying to get information which I thought
perhaps I could give."

"So you went to the trouble to find my private address rather than to
the nearest police station," said Kerry. "Might I ask you from whom
you heard that I wanted this information?"

"Well--it's in the papers, isn't it?"

"It is certainly. But it occurred to me that someone. . . connected
might have told you as well."

"Actually, someone did: Miss Margaret Halley."

"Good!" rapped Kerry. "Now we're coming to it. She told you to come to
me?"

"Oh, no!" cried Mollie--"she didn't. She told me to tell her so that
she could tell the Home office."

"Eh?" said Kerry, "eh?" He bent forward, staring fiercely. "Please
tell me exactly what Miss Halley wanted to know."

The intensity of his gaze Mollie found very perturbing, but:

"She wanted me to tell her where Mrs. Sin lived," she replied.

Kerry experienced a quickening of the pulse. In the failure of the
C.I.D. to trace the abode of the notorious Mrs. Sin he had suspected
double-dealing. He counted it unbelievable that a figure so
conspicuous in certain circles could evade official quest even for
forty-eight hours. K Division's explanation, too, that there were no
less than eighty Chinamen resident in and about Limehouse whose names
either began or ended with Sin, he looked upon as a paltry evasion.
That very morning he had awakened from a species of nightmare wherein
719 had affected the arrest of Kazmah and Mrs. Sin and had rescued
Mrs. Irvin from the clutches of the former. Now--here was hope. 719
would seem to be as hopelessly in the dark as everybody else.

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