Rivals of Sherlock Holmes, The Page 16

  'Not at this juncture, Mr Dacre.'

  'I envy your moderation. Here's to the success of our search, Monsieur Valmont.'

  I felt sorry for the gay young fellow as with smiling face he drank the champagne.

  'Now, monsieur,' he went on, 'I am amazed to learn how much you have discovered. Really, I think tradespeople, solicitors, and all such should keep better guard on their tongues than they do. Nevertheless, these documents at my elbow, which I expected would surprise you, are merely the letters and receipts. Here is the communication from the solicitor threatening me with bankruptcy; here is his receipt dated the twenty-sixth; here is the refusal of the wine merchant, and here is his receipt for the money. Here are smaller bills liquidated. With my pencil we will add them up. Seventy-eight pounds – the principal debt – bulks large. We add the smaller items and it reaches a total of ninety-three pounds seven shillings and fourpence. Let us now examine my purse. Here is a five-pound note; there is a golden sovereign. I now count out and place on the table twelve and sixpence in silver and two pence in coppers. The purse thus becomes empty. Let us add the silver and copper to the amount on the paper. Do my eyes deceive me, or is the sum exactly a hundred pounds? There is your money fully accounted for.'

  'Pardon me, Mr Dacre,' I said, 'but I observe a sovereign resting on the mantelpiece.'

  Dacre threw back his head and laughed with greater heartiness than I had yet known him to indulge in during our short acquaintance.

  'By Jove,' he cried, 'you've got me there. I'd forgotten entirely about that pound on the mantelpiece, which belongs to you.'

  'To me? Impossible!'

  'It does, and cannot interfere in the least with our century calculation. That is the sovereign you gave to my man Hopper, who, knowing me to be hard-pressed, took it and shamefacedly presented it to me, that I might enjoy the spending of it. Hopper belongs to our family, or the family belongs to him. I am never sure which. You must have missed in him the deferential bearing of a man-servant in Paris, yet he is true gold, like the sovereign you bestowed upon him, and he bestowed upon me. Now here, Monsieur, is the evidence of the theft, together with the rubber band and two pieces of cardboard. Ask my friend Gibbes to examine them minutely. They are all at your disposition, Monsieur, and thus you learn how much easier it is to deal with the master than with the servant. All the gold you possess would not have wrung these incriminating documents from old Hopper. I was compelled to send him away to the West End an hour ago, fearing that in his brutal British way he might assault you if he got an inkling of your mission.'

  'Mr Dacre,' said I slowly, 'you have thoroughly convinced me – '

  'I thought I would,' he interrupted with a laugh.

  ' – that you did not take the money.'

  'Oho, this is a change of wind, surely. Many a man has been hanged on a chain of circumstantial evidence much weaker than this which I have exhibited to you. Don't you see the subtlety of my action? Ninety-nine persons in a hundred would say: "No man could be such a fool as to put Valmont on his own track, and then place in Valmont's hands such striking evidence." But there comes in my craftiness. Of course, the rock you run up against will be Gibbes's incredulity. The first question he will ask you may be this: "Why did not Dacre come and borrow the money from me?" Now there you find a certain weakness in your chain of evidence. I knew perfectly well that Gibbes would lend me the money, and he knew perfectly well that if I were pressed to the wall I should ask him.'

  'Mr Dacre,' said I, 'you have been playing with me. I should resent that with most men, but whether it is your own genial manner or the effect of this excellent champagne, or both together, I forgive you. But I am convinced of another thing. You know who took the money.'

  'I don't know, but I suspect.'

  'Will you tell me whom you suspect?'

  'That would not be fair, but I shall now take the liberty of filling your glass with champagne.'

  'I am your guest, Mr Dacre.'

  'Admirably answered, monsieur,' he replied, pouring out the wine, 'and now I offer you a clue. Find out all about the story of the silver spoons.'

  'The story of the silver spoons! What silver spoons?'

  'Ah! That is the point. Step out of the Temple into Fleet Street, seize the first man you meet by the shoulder, and ask him to tell you about the silver spoons. There are but two men and two spoons concerned. When you learn who those two men are, you will know that one of them did not take the money, and I give you my assurance that the other did.'

  'You speak in mystery, Mr Dacre.'

  'But certainly, for I am speaking to Monsieur Eugène Valmont.'

  'I echo your words, sir. Admirably answered. You put me on my mettle, and I flatter myself that I see your kindly drift. You wish me to solve the mystery of this stolen money. Sir, you do me honour, and I drink to your health.'

  'To yours, monsieur,' said Lionel Dacre, and thus we drank and parted.

  On leaving Mr Dacre I took a hansom to a café in Regent Street, which is a passable imitation of similar places of refreshment in Paris. There, calling for a cup of black coffee, I sat down to think. The clue of the silver spoons! He had laughingly suggested that I should take by the shoulders the first man I met, and ask him what the story of the silver spoons was. This course naturally struck me as absurd, and he doubtless intended it to seem absurd. Nevertheless, it contained a hint. I must ask somebody, and that the right person, to tell me the tale of the silver spoons.

  Under the influence of the black coffee I reasoned it out in this way. On the night of the twenty-third one of the six guests there present stole a hundred pounds, but Dacre had said that an actor in the silver spoon episode was the actual thief. That person, then, must have been one of Mr Gibbes's guests at the dinner of the twenty-third. Probably two of the guests were the participators in the silver spoon comedy, but, be that as it may, it followed that one at least of the men around Mr Gibbes's table knew the episode of the silver spoons. Perhaps Bentham Gibbes himself was cognisant of it. It followed, therefore, that the easiest plan was to question each of the men who partook of that dinner. Yet if only one knew about the spoons, that one must also have some idea that these spoons formed the clue which attached him to the crime of the twenty-third, in which case he was little likely to divulge what he knew to an entire stranger.

  Of course, I might go to Dacre himself and demand the story of the silver spoons, but this would be a confession of failure on my part, and I rather dreaded Lionel Dacre's hearty laughter when I admitted that the mystery was too much for me. Besides this I was very well aware of the young man's kindly intentions towards me. He wished me to unravel the coil myself, and so I determined not to go to him except as a last resource.

  I resolved to begin with Mr Gibbes, and, finishing my coffee, I got again into a hansom, and drove back to the Temple. I found Bentham Gibbes in his room, and after greeting me, his first inquiry was about the case.

  'How are you getting on?' he asked.

  'I think I'm getting on fairly well,' I replied, 'and expect to finish in a day or two, if you will kindly tell me the story of the silver spoons.'

  'The silver spoons?' he echoed, quite evidently not understanding me.

  'There happened an incident in which two men were engaged, and this incident related to a pair of silver spoons. I want to get the particulars of that.'

  'I haven't the slightest idea what you are talking about,' replied Gibbes, thoroughly bewildered. 'You will need to be more definite, I fear, if you are to get any help from me.'

  'I cannot be more definite, because I have already told you all I know.'

  'What bearing has all this on our own case?'

  'I was informed that if I got hold of the clue of the silver spoons I should be in a fair way of settling our case.'

  'Who told you that?'

  'Mr Lionel Dacre.'

  'Oh, does Dacre refer to his own conjuring?'

  'I don't know, I'm sure. What was his conjuring?'

&nb
sp; 'A very clever trick he did one night at dinner here about two months ago.'

  'Had it anything to do with silver spoons?'

  'Well, it was silver spoons or silver forks, or something of that kind. I had entirely forgotten the incident. So far as I recollect at the moment there was a sleight-of-hand man of great expertness in one of the music halls, and the talk turned upon him. Then Dacre said the tricks he did were easy, and holding up a spoon or a fork, I don't remember which, he professed his ability to make it disappear before our eyes, to be found afterwards in the clothing of some one there present. Several offered to bet that he could do nothing of the kind, but he said he would bet with no one but Innis, who sat opposite him. Innis, with some reluctance, accepted the bet, and then Dacre, with a great show of the usual conjurer's gesticulations, spread forth his empty hands, and said we should find the spoon in Innis's pocket, and there, sure enough, it was. It seemed a proper sleight-of-hand trick, but we were never able to get him to repeat it.'

  'Thank you very much, Mr Gibbes; I think I see daylight now.'

  'If you do you are cleverer than I by a long chalk,' cried Bentham Gibbes as I took my departure.

  I went directly downstairs, and knocked at Mr Dacre's door once more. He opened the door himself, his man not yet having returned.

  'Ah, monsieur,' he cried, 'back already? You don't mean to tell me you have so soon got to the bottom of the silver spoon entanglement?'

  'I think I have, Mr Dacre. You were sitting at dinner opposite Mr Vincent Innis. You saw him conceal a silver spoon in his pocket. You probably waited for some time to understand what he meant by this, and as he did not return the spoon to its place, you proposed a conjuring trick, made the bet with him, and thus the spoon was returned to the table.'

  'Excellent! excellent, monsieur! That is very nearly what occurred, except that I acted at once. I had had experiences with Mr Vincent Innis before. Never did he enter these rooms of mine without my missing some little trinket after he was gone. Although Mr Innis is a very rich person, I am not a man of many possessions, so if anything is taken, I meet little difficulty in coming to a knowledge of my loss. Of course, I never mentioned these abstractions to him. They were all trivial, as I have said, and so far as the silver spoon was concerned, it was of no great value either. But I thought the bet and the recovery of the spoon would teach him a lesson; it apparently has not done so. On the night of the twenty-third he sat at my right hand, as you will see by consulting your diagram of the table and the guests. I asked him a question twice, to which he did not reply, and looking at him I was startled by the expression in his eyes. They were fixed on a distant corner of the room, and following his gaze I saw what he was staring at with such hypnotising concentration. So absorbed was he in contemplation of the packet there so plainly exposed, now my attention was turned to it, that he seemed to be entirely oblivious of what was going on around him. I roused him from his trance by jocularly calling Gibbes's attention to the display of money. I expected in this way to save Innis from committing the act which he seemingly did commit. Imagine then the dilemma in which I was placed when Gibbes confided to me the morning after what had occurred the night before. I was positive Innis had taken the money, yet I possessed no proof of it. I could not tell Gibbes, and I dare not speak to Innis. Of course, monsieur, you do not need to be told that Innis is not a thief in the ordinary sense of the word. He has no need to steal, and yet apparently cannot help doing so. I am sure that no attempt has been made to pass those notes. They are doubtless resting securely in his house at Kensington. He is, in fact, a kleptomaniac, or a maniac of some sort. And now, monsieur, was my hint regarding the silver spoons of any value to you?'

  'Of the most infinite value, Mr Dacre.'

  'Then let me make another suggestion. I leave it entirely to your bravery; a bravery which, I confess, I do not myself possess. Will you take a hansom, drive to Mr Innis's house on the Cromwell Road, confront him quietly, and ask for the return of the packet? I am anxious to know what will happen. If he hands it to you, as I expect he will, then you must tell Mr Gibbes the whole story.'

  'Mr Dacre, your suggestion shall be immediately acted upon, and I thank you for your compliment to my courage.'

  I found that Mr Innis inhabited a very grand house. After a time he entered the study on the ground floor, to which I had been conducted. He held my card in his hand, and was looking at it with some surprise.

  'I think I have not the pleasure of knowing you, Monsieur Valmont,' he said, courteously enough.

  'No. I ventured to call on a matter of business. I was once investigator for the French Government, and now am doing private detective work here in London.'

  'Ah! And how is that supposed to interest me? There is nothing that I wish investigated. I did not send for you, did I?'

  'No, Mr Innis, I merely took the liberty of calling to ask you to let me have the package you took from Mr Bentham Gibbes's frock-coat pocket on the night of the twenty-third.'

  'He wishes it returned, does he?'

  'Yes.'

  Mr Innis calmly walked to a desk, which he unlocked and opened, displaying a veritable museum of trinkets of one sort and another. Pulling out a small drawer he took from it the packet containing the five twenty-pound notes. Apparently it had never been opened. With a smile he handed it to me.

  'You will make my apologies to Mr Gibbes for not returning it before. Tell him I have been unusually busy of late.'

  'I shall not fail to do so,' said I, with a bow.

  'Thanks so much. Good-morning, Monsieur Valmont.'

  'Good-morning, Mr Innis.'

  And so I returned the packet to Mr Bentham Gibbes, who pulled the notes from between their pasteboard protection, and begged me to accept them.

  Sebastian Zambra

  Created by Headon Hill (1857 – 1927)

  IN THE 1890s and early 1900s, Francis Edward Grainger wrote a large number of crime stories under the pseudonym of 'Headon Hill' which were published in the monthly magazines of the period and later collected in book form. In many ways his most original creation was Kala Persad, an elderly Hindu sage who is brought to London by a young man named Mark Poignand. This odd couple join forces to solve crimes in the capital. However, Headon Hill's most Sherlockian character is the private detective Sebastian Zambra. Indeed, some of the Zambra stories quite blatantly 'borrow' their plots from Conan Doyle stories. None of Headon Hill's narratives is particularly original and the crimes they describe rarely need a mastermind to solve them. In many ways, however, they are typical of their period and of the crime fiction which filled so many pages of the magazines of the late Victorian and Edwardian era. And who could resist a story which, whatever its other merits, has such a memorably eye-catching title as 'The Sapient Monkey'?

  The Sapient Monkey

  I WOULD ADVISE every person whose duties take him into the field of 'private enquiry' to go steadily through the daily papers the first thing every morning. Personally I have found the practice most useful, for there are not many causes célèbres in which my services are not enlisted on one side or the other, and by this method I am always up in my main facts before I am summoned to assist. When I read the account of the proceedings at Bow Street against Franklin Gale in connection with the Tudways' bank robbery, I remember thinking that on the face of it there never was a clearer case against a misguided young man.

  Condensed for the sake of brevity, the police-court report disclosed the following state of things. Franklin Gale, clerk, aged twenty-three, in the employment of Messrs. Tudways, the well-known private bankers of the Strand, was brought up on a warrant charged with stealing the sum of £500 – being the moneys of his employers. Mr James Spruce, assistant cashier at the bank, gave evidence to the effect that he missed the money from his till on the afternoon of July 22nd. On making up his cash for the day he discovered that he was short of £300 worth of notes and £200 in gold. He had no idea how the amount had been abstracted. The prisoner was an assistant boo
kkeeper at the bank, and had access behind the counter. Detective Sergeant Simmons said that the case had been placed in his hands for the purpose of tracing the stolen notes. He had ascertained that one of them – of the value of £5 – had been paid to Messrs. Crosthwaite & Co., tailors, of New Bond Street, on July 27th, by Franklin Gale. As a result, he had applied for a warrant, and had arrested the prisoner. The latter was remanded for a week, at the end of which period it was expected that further evidence would be forthcoming. I had hardly finished reading the report when a telegram was put into my hands demanding my immediate presence at 'Rosemount', Twickenham. From the address given, and from the name of 'Gale' appended to the despatch, I concluded that the affair at Tudways' Bank was the cause of the summons. I had little doubt that I was to be retained in the interests of the prisoner, and my surmise proved correct.