The Black House in Harley Street/Chapter 14

Macnaughten dropped into a chair in the hall and stared at the housekeeper as if he could neither credit her word nor his own senses.

"You don't mean to tell me," he suddenly burst out, "that Dr. van Mildart has only just left this house—this very house?"

"This very house, sir—his own house," replied the woman, with some show of asperity; "and as I said, not ten minutes ago."

Macnaughten turned his wondering gaze upon Miss Lamotte and seemed about to burst into a fit of laughter, which in a woman would have been called hysterical, but checked himself, and starting to his feet, made for the door.

"Which way did he go?" he exclaimed. "Who let him out? Did any one see him go up the street, or down the street, or———?"

"The first thing to do," said Miss Lamotte, quietly interrupting him, "is to find out what he did while he was here."

"Yes, yes!" said Macnaughten. "You're right. To tell you the truth, I'm so surprised, so amazed, ​that———" He broke off, and turned abruptly to the housekeeper. "What did he do while he was here in the house? Where did he go? How long was he here? Come!"

The housekeeper, who was a highly respectable person with considerable ideas of the dignity of her position, regarded Macnaughten with an expression in which resentment was mingled with wonder.

"Well, really, sir!" she exclaimed, "I don't know that it's any part of my duty to explain my master's movements to you or to anybody else. But since you're so insistent, I may say that as Mr. Pimpery left the house last night and has not returned, and as we have no footman just now owing to Service's death, Dr. van Mildart was not likely to be seen by anybody much, for he admitted himself, of course, and the servants were all at their respective duties. However, I did happen to see him as he was crossing the hall, and told him that there had been several patients to see him; and he replied," continued the housekeeper, with a significant glance at Miss Lamotte, "that neither he nor Miss Lamotte would be available for consultation to-day. Then he went into his private study, where no one is ever allowed but himself, and stayed there perhaps a quarter of an hour, and came out with the bag which he carries when he goes on visits, and went away. And if there's any mystery about it"—this with another glance at Miss Lamotte which was even more significant than the first—"I should like to be told of it; for what with the death of the footman and the dis​appearance of the butler, I feel that my nerves are being affected."

"The fact of the case is, Mrs. Blashfield," said Miss Lamotte, "Dr. van Mildart has committed a very dreadful crime, of which you will soon see accounts in the midday newspapers. This gentleman is a detective; and—since you may as well know it now as later—so am I. I have been keeping an eye on van Mildart ever since I came here. That was why I came. Now, then, can you tell us anything of which direction he took when he left the house?"

Mrs. Blashfield's countenance underwent several changes while Miss Lamotte thus addressed her. Her final expression signified that she had always known that there was something queer and underhand about the vanished Dr. van Mildart's lady assistant.

"I'm sure I can't, miss," she answered. "I heard the door close after him, but whether he went up or down I can't say."

"He's well known to all the cabmen about here," said Miss Lamotte, turning to Macnaughten. "Let's get to work. Send for assistance."

"I'll have a small army on his track in half an hour," responded Macnaughten. "Where's the telephone here? Oh, there. Now then, do you get to work on the one next door. Get on to the Press Association and the Central News and tell them that van Mildart was not killed in the smash, and has visited his house in Harley Street since and left it again. Describe him minutely, ​and tell 'em to get all the papers to get out specials with his description in big type. I'll get on to the police. Let's hustle—the old fox hasn't got much start."

So the house in Harley Street became transformed into a sort of police bureau. Important men came hurrying up from Scotland Yard and sent men of lesser importance scurrying all over London. Over London itself the news of the Prince's Gate affair spread like wildfire. Edition after edition of the papers came out, giving more or less accurate accounts of what had happened: printing the description of van Mildart in huge letters; speculating on what particular nest of crime it could have been that was set up in the wrecked house; and containing graphic and startling accounts of the way in which the two Goulburns, Moira Phillimore, and Christopher Aspinall had been enticed there. To tell the truth, most of these accounts were worked up by rapidly working reporters from very meagre details, for Moira and Maisie were in something like a state of collapse after their experiences, and could answer little to the questions put to them by those who, with great difficulty, obtained an interview with them, and Richard and Christopher, still excited and overstrained, could do little more than give a general impression of the events of their captivity. But by early afternoon the public, by piecing together the scattered and somewhat incoherent accounts which appeared in every newspaper, was able to make out the following facts:—

​I. That Dr. van Mildart, the famous nerve specialist of Harley Street, was also the head and moving spirit of a secret gang of dangerous criminals who had their headquarters at what had been supposed to be a first-class nursing home in Prince's Gate.

2. That the proceeds of many depredations upon private individuals in society were kept at those headquarters, and that van Mildart had so arranged matters that in the event of his finding himself in a corner he could possess himself of them for his own separate advantage and destroy the whole place by means of some infernal machine which he had made Miss Lamotte his cat's-paw in firing.

3. That the unexpected arrest of Pimpery had caused him to decide that there was then nothing left for him but a speedy retreat, and that he had taken advantage of his own cleverly executed arrangements to possess himself of whatever he and his confederates had secured, and had escaped by some secret method of retreat only known to himself.

4. That he had meant Miss Lamotte to perish in the general debacle, evidently believing that the effect of the explosion would extend to the secret chamber in which she was confined.

5. That van Mildart was now at large, and in possession of whatever booty he had carried away.

What that booty might exactly be was a question which largely occupied the minds of those who were very anxious to catch the ci-devant Harley Street specialist. In the opinion of Miss Lamotte, who was ​better qualified to speak on the matter than any one, it would certainly include the Maxton diamonds, and probably the results of similarly well-planned robberies perpetrated on other ladies who had come under van Mildart's influence. All these matters, enormously valuable though they were, could be packed into small compass and carried away. Then there would be van Mildart's own legitimate earnings, which, as Miss Lamotte well knew, had been enormous. No one knew better than she of the tremendous fees which had been paid him—he must have earned, she said, some twenty-five thousands of pounds a year during his brief period of extraordinary popularity.

"Where did he keep his banking account?" asked one of the inspectors from Scotland Yard.

That was a question which no one could answer.

True, it was known that he had kept an account at a bank in close proximity to his house, but a brief inquiry soon established the fact that it had simply been kept for the purpose of paying such matters as rent, rates, taxes, wages, and providing for ordinary daily expenses. No great sum had ever been paid into it, and the balance was insignificant. It appeared to have been his custom to pay in so much money in notes once a month—none of the cheques paid to him by his wealthy clients had ever been passed through it.

"We knew of course that Dr. van Mildart was a very wealthy man," said the manager, "and we always supposed that he kept his principal account elsewhere—​this we regarded as a mere household account, though it was a fairly heavy one."

Nor could any clue be obtained as to what he might have carried away in this particular respect by inquiry at the banks on which his clients had drawn cheques for his fees. The Countess of Maxton, for example, had given him several cheques at various times—at his own particular request they had in every case been made payable to bearer and cashed by himself over the counter in notes. Where, then, had he hoarded his earnings?

"Of course the notes can be traced," said Macnaughten. "They'll have been presented at the Bank of England from time to time. The probability is that he's sent his money out of the country. One thing's certain—he's got off with a considerable amount of wealth in one form or another. How much it amounts to——— Ah, well, let's wait a bit! We shall hear more."

It was not very long before they did hear more. In the course of the day a hansom came dashing up to the house in Harley Street, and a stoutish gentleman, very red of face and obviously in a state of high excitement, jumped out, ran up the steps at a speed which did his agility great credit, and inquired, without preface or a single clearing of his throat, if he could see Miss Phillimore at once. Miss Lamotte and Macnaughten, who were engaged in receiving reports from various quarters, saw him, and said that Miss Phillimore was next door and indisposed, and explained who they were.

​"I must see her at once!" exclaimed the newcomer. "I—I have just seen the newspapers, and I say I must at once see her. You understand? I am afraid there is something seriously wrong. The fact is, I am Mr. Cowden, of Cowden & Brooker, jewellers—you know, eh?—Bond Street, you know. Well, some time since Miss Phillimore entrusted us with a very valuable set of jewels—chiefly pearls and diamonds—which she wished reset. She was brought to us by her uncle, Dr. van Mildart, of whom I grieve to say I have just read such a dreadful account—an account which I hope is not true, by the bye?"

"True enough in the main," answered Macnaughten. "Pray continue, Mr. Cowden."

Mr. Cowden mopped his high forehead. He was palpably perspiring from sheer fright and anxiety and horror.

"Those jewels have been finished two or three days," he said. "They were lying at Miss Phillimore's disposal—in our safe, of course. And now—well, van Mildart's got them!"

"Van Mildart's got them!" exclaimed Miss Lamotte and Macnaughten in one breath.

"Impossible! How should he get them?"

"He has got them," answered the jeweller, again mopping his brow. "He got them this morning—called for them first thing."

"And you handed them over?"

"Of course we did! He produced his niece's order, with her own signature, which we recognised. We be​lieved in him, too, as a thoroughly respectable, honest man," groaned Mr. Cowden.

"Let us see the order," said Miss Lamotte.

The jeweller's trembling fingers produced a letter-case from the inside pocket of his frockcoat, and from several papers which it contained drew out one which he held up before the eyes of the two detectives. Miss Lamotte gave one glance at the signature, and nodded her head.

"I believe that's genuine," she said. "Indeed, I'm sure it is."

Mr. Cowden sighed with relief.

"We took it to be so, ma'am," he said. "We've often seen it."

"What was the value of those jewels?" inquired Macnaughten.

"Our estimate of their value," replied Mr. Cowden, with a perceptible emphasis on his first words, "was at least fifty thousand pounds."

"Well," said Macnaughten, "let's go next door and show Miss Phillimore that paper and see if she can account. And he scooped the whole lot, you say?"

"We had no option but to deliver the jewels to him," replied Mr. Cowden. "You will observe that Miss Phillimore desires us to hand over the jewels to her uncle, Dr. van Mildart, and adds that he will settle the account for the resetting. It was all in order."

"Did he pay for the resetting?"

"Oh, certainly, certainly! We gave him our proper form of receipt."

​"How did he pay—by cheque?"

"No—he paid in Bank of England notes."

Macnaughten stroked his chin.

"He's no ordinary man," he said. "He must have waited about somewhere until your place opened. By the bye, how was he dressed, and was he carrying anything?"

"He wore a dark morning suit, and he carried a brown leather bag—something like a brief bag, but larger," answered Mr. Cowden.

"Must have breakfasted quietly somewhere while waiting for your place to open," said Macnaughten reflectively. "Do you remember how he went away?"

"Yes, he went in a cab which I hailed myself from the corner of Grafton Street, and I heard him tell the driver to go to the Cavendish Square end of Harley Street," replied the jeweller.

"Cool as a cucumber and sharp as a fox," said Macnaughten. "Timed everything to a nicety. Well, let's go next door."

They found quite an assemblage in Richard Goulburn's library. There was Richard himself and Christopher, centres of groups; there was Mr. Conybeare and his wife, profoundly sympathetic with Maisie; there was the Countess of Maxton, talking thirteen to the dozen to Moira; there was the Earl of Maxton, lounging near the fireplace, pulling his moustache, and occasionally making remarks to himself; there were two lady journalists, very anxious to interview the heroines of this terrible adventure; there was a jour​nalist, who, unable to get any one to talk to him, was making copious notes about his surroundings. Everything was Babel and confusion, and Moira and Maisie looked very weary.

The entrance of Miss Lamotte and her two companions caused a temporary silence, and Richard hurried forward to ask if there was any further news.

"Yes," replied Miss Lamotte, indicating Mr. Cowden, who was bowing his respects to the Earl and Countess as old customers of his, "it turns out that Dr. van Mildart called at Messrs. Cowden & Brooker's, in Bond Street, this morning at ten o'clock. I am sorry to say, Miss Phillimore, that he obtained the diamonds and pearls which you left there to be reset."

Lord Maxton uttered a loud exclamation.

"More diamonds, begad!" he rapped out. "D'yah hear that, Dolly?—he's got Miss Phillimore's diamonds now. The fellah must eat diamonds, begad! I should ha' thought he'd got enough diamonds to last him his life when he got yours. Eh—what?"

"If he did get them, Freddie," sighed Lady Maxton, who was disposed to be tearful.

"Course he got 'em!" declared the Earl. "No doubt about it. Clear case, after all one hears now, begad! Got Miss Phillimore's now, you see. Mad on diamonds—dotty on 'em."

"But I don't understand," said Moira, looking from one to the other. "What is it, Mr. Cowden?"

"I can assure you it was all in order, Miss Phillimore," replied the jeweller, with some agitation. "We ​are very particular in our business in doing everything in order—indeed, we are obliged to be, considering the valuable nature of the matters entrusted to us."

"Diamonds very valuable things, yah know," said Lord Maxton, looking solemnly round the company. "Worth a lot o' money. Ours were worth two-fifty thou. Um! Wonder if we shall ever see 'em again. Fear not, begad—do indeed!"

"And as I was saying," continued Mr. Cowden, who had listened with great deference to his lordship's words of wisdom and had bowed business-like approval of every one of them, "as I was saying, all was in order. You called some time ago with your uncle, Miss Phillimore, to instruct us as to the resetting of your diamonds and pearls, and a few days since we wrote to inform you that the work was done———"

"I never received your letter, Mr. Cowden," said Moira.

Mr. Cowden's eyebrows went up.

"I assure you it was sent," he replied. "I wrote and posted it myself."

"To the house next door?" she asked.

"Yes," answered Mr. Cowden. "I knew of no other address."

"When would it arrive here?" she asked further.

Mr. Cowden considered.

"Some time yesterday," he replied.

"Ah!" she exclaimed, "that accounts for much. Well, go on."

"This morning your uncle called for the jewels, and ​showed us your formal order for the delivery to him. Here it is!"

Moira, looking very mystified, took the paper which the jeweller held before her and gazed at it earnestly. She shook her head.

"That is your signature, is it not?" asked Mr. Cowden anxiously.

"Yes," she answered, "it is my signature; but I never authorised the writing of such a letter. It is another trick."

They all crowded round her to look at the sheet of paper which she held in her hand. It was a small quarto sheet, such as is generally used for typewritten letters, and was stamped with van Mildart's Harley Street address in heavy black relief. The body of the letter was in type-script, and was a mere formal instruction to Messrs. Cowden & Brooker of New Bond Street to hand over to Dr. van Mildart the jewels entrusted to them for resetting. Then at the foot of the sheet appeared Moira's usual firm, bold signature. No one there who was acquainted with it would have doubted its authenticity.

"That is my signature," she repeated, "but I can't think however it came to be appended to this letter. I should never have dreamed of allowing any one but myself to receive those jewels from you, Mr. Cowden. They were all given to my mother by my father, or by my father and mother to me. And now, to suppose they're—lost."

​"Mons'ous shame, begad!" exclaimed the Earl. "Wish we could lay hands on the fellah, eh?"

Poor Mr. Cowden seemed inclined to wring his hands in sheer despair. Instead of doing so he mopped his forehead.

"You cannot conceive how pained we are, Miss Phillimore," he said. "It's the most awful calamity that has ever happened in our business, long-established as it is. But your signature, Miss Phillimore, your signa———"

"Oh, I don't think you are to blame in the least, Mr. Cowden," she made haste to say. "That is my signature, and I don't see how you could do otherwise than as you did, considering that you had every confidence in Dr. van Mildart—as, indeed, we all had at one time."

"Not me!" protested Christopher, whose sense of indignation was stronger than his love of grammar—"at least, not after I got to know him."

Goulburn was examining the sheet of paper which Moira had handed to him.

"Can you think how your signature came here, Moira?" he asked.

She shook her head at first; then an idea seemed to strike her.

"I have signed papers which Dr. van Mildart has witnessed when I first came to London," she answered. "Business things, you know. It is possible that he may have arranged papers so that I signed that, and that he kept it and had it filled up afterwards."

"It has been done on one of his typewriters, I sup​pose?" asked Macnaughten, examining the lettering.

"Yes, on the one he had in his study," answered Miss Lamotte. "I saw that at once."

"A clever scoundrel!" said somebody. Then there was a pause, and somebody else said, "I suppose there is no news from anywhere yet?"

"No," answered Macnaughten. "Everything's being done that could be done. I'm tired of calls to the telephone, and so, I should think, is Miss Lamotte. There's a perfect network spread for him all round London, but we've seen how sharp he is, and it's my impression that ten minutes' start of us which he got here will take some making up. However———"

At that moment the housekeeper from next door, who since hearing of her employer's delinquencies had done little else than deliver moral lectures upon their turpitude to any audience which she could find, was ushered into the room, clothed in an air of much mystery and reserve and smiling the fatuous smile of those weak people who are suddenly made ambassadors in great matters.

"If you please, Miss Lamotte," said she, bowing and curtseying to the assembled company, and especially to Lord and Lady Maxton, the former of whom screwed his monocle into his right eye and regarded her as if she had been a new and interesting arrival at the Zoo, "if you please, there is a person has just arrived next door who says that she believes she could tell something about Dr. van Mildart. But she refuses," continued the housekeeper, amidst a chorus of excla​mations, "she refuses to speak unless it is to some very responsible person. So I told her, Miss Lamotte, that you and Mr. Macnaughten were—ahem—detectives, and———"

"Fetch her here at once, please, Mrs. Blashfield," said Miss Lamotte, with a glance at Goulburn. "Bring her straight in."

"Oh—she said a person," said Lady Maxton in a loud whisper. "You don't think she might be—er—somebody sent by Dr. van Mildart to kill us all by throwing bombs at us? Do you think so, Freddie?"

"Can't tell, begad, till we see her, begad!" replied his lordship. "Might be, yah know. Never can tell. Doosed good fun, though."

The object of the Countess of Maxton's fears presently entered the library, proudly escorted by Mrs. Blashfield. She was a quiet-looking little woman, plainly and neatly dressed, and looked somewhat timid and nervous when she found herself in such a large room and amongst so many people. Macnaughten and Miss Lamotte went forward and spoke to her, and Goulburn gave her a chair, while Maisie brought her a cup of tea.

"There's something you wanted to tell us, isn't there?" said Macnaughten. "Don't be afraid—speak out. If you don't want whatever it is you have to say to go any further, it shan't. You think you know something about Dr. van Mildart—isn't that it?"

The woman nodded her head, and then took a sip at her tea.

​"Well, sir, perhaps I do, and perhaps I don't," she answered, seeming to gain some confidence. "Anyhow, I shall feel easier in my mind if I find out whether I do or not, and that was why I came to headquarters, as one may term it. I thought that there would be them in or about this Dr. van Mildart's house as would be able to tell me for certain if my suspicions was correct, and in that my husband agreed with me."

"Just so," said Macnaughten. "You were quite right. We'll tell you anything we can."

"Well, sir, it's this way—my name's Mrs. Hampson, and me and my husband, Mr. Hampson, which is a carpenter as works in Pentonville Road, lives in Lloyd Square, and that as no doubt you'll know, sir, is on the other side of King's Cross Road, going Myddelton Square way. And of course, the house being too big for just our two selves,—we've never had any children,—we've always taken in lodgers in such rooms as we didn't want, as most people does in that district."

"Yes, I understand," said Macnaughten.

"And it's maybe eighteen months since," continued Mrs. Hampson, having again sipped at her tea, "that, having a bed-sitting-room to let on my ground floor, I put a card in the window with 'Lodgings for a Single Gentleman' on it; and that day, sure enough, a gentleman calls, as I say, in the very description of this Dr. van Mildart as me and my husband finds described in the paper this afternoon—though of course our gentleman called himself Mr. Robert Sinclair. Well, he knocks ​at the door, and I opens it, and he says, 'If you're the landlady, I should like to look at that room you've to let,' and of course I showed him in. It's a very nice room, sir—quiet and well-furnished. 'That'll do for me,' he says, 'except that you can take the bed out, because I shall never use it.' Well, of course, that seemed a bit strange, and I dare say I looked surprised, for he went on: 'I'll tell you exactly what I want,' he says, 'and then you'll understand. I'm a traveller in cheap jewellery,' he says, 'and I've very often a good bit of business in this part of the town, and I want a room that I can use as a sort of office and stockroom. You see? Some days I might be here for two or three hours a day; some days I might never be here at all. I should certainly never sleep here. I'm willing to pay you a pound a week,' he says. 'What do you say?' Well, of course, a pound a week was very handsome, considerin' there was nothing to do for him, and so I spoke to my husband, as happened to be in at the time, and we agreed to let him the room. Well, the next day he had a safe put into the room and a queer new lock on the door, and that was all the alteration he made. After that he began coming. Sometimes he'd be a fortnight and never come near; sometimes he'd come several days running. He never stopped long at any time—usually he'd be there perhaps an hour. This morning it was that he came about half-past eleven, and it was then that I was a bit suspicious about him for the first time."

"Yes—and what aroused your suspicions?" in​quired Macnaughten, as Mrs. Hampson paused to accept more tea from Moira.

"Well, sir, he was, as I say, the very image of the description of this Dr. van Mildart," replied Mrs. Hampson, holding up a copy of a pink newspaper. "The same sort of beard and moustache, shape and colour and everything, and the same style of dressing—a bit sportish-like. This morning he comes bustling in just as I was going out, and I asked him if there was anything he'd be wanting, for I should be out for an hour. He said no, nothing, and went into his room as if he was in a hurry———"

"Was he carrying anything?" asked Miss Lamotte.

"Yes, miss—a brown bag like that described in this here paper. Well, I went out, and I was away about a quarter of an hour when I remembered that I'd left something that I particularly wanted. So I went back, me being then in the Pentonville Road. Just before turning down one of the side streets into our square I stepped into a shop for a moment,—a confectioner's it was,—and as I was standing waiting my turn I saw the man as we'd known as Mr. Sinclair pass. And you could have knocked me down with a feather at the sight of him-you could indeed!"

"Yes? Why?" asked Macnaughten.

"Because, sir," replied Mrs. Hampson solemnly, "in that quarter of an hour that I'd left him he'd shaved off his beard and moustache and was as clean as a baby what's newly born! But I knew him—I knew him!"