Book: The Vanished Messenger

E >> E. Phillips Oppenheim >> The Vanished Messenger




"That's not the sort of talk I understand," he declared curtly.
"Let us understand one another, if we can. What is to happen to me,
if I refuse to give you that word?"

Mr. Fentolin held his hand in front of his eyes, as though to shut
out some unwelcome vision.

"Dear me," he exclaimed, "how unpleasant Why should you force me
to disclose my plans? Be content, dear Mr. Dunster, with the
knowledge of this one fact: we cannot part with you. I have thought
it over from every point of view, and I have come to that conclusion;
always presuming," he went on, "that the knowledge of that little
word of which we have spoken remains in its secret chamber of your
memory."

Mr. Dunster smoked in silence for a few minutes.

"I am very comfortable here," he remarked.

"You delight me," Mr. Fentolin murmured.

"Your cook," Mr. Dunster continued, "has won my heartfelt
appreciation. Your cigars and wines are fit for any nobleman.
Perhaps, after all, this little rest is good for me."

Mr. Fentolin listened attentively.

"Do not forget," he said, "that there is always a limit fixed,
whether it be one day, two days, or three days."

"A limit to your complacence, I presume?"

Mr. Fentolin assented.

"Obviously, then," Mr. Dunster concluded, "you wish those who sent
me to believe that my message has been delivered. Yet there I must
confess that you puzzle me. What I cannot see is, to put it bluntly,
where you come in. Any one of the countries represented at this
little conference would only be the gainers by the miscarriage of
my message, which is, without doubt, so far as they are concerned,
of a distasteful nature. Your own country alone could be the
sufferer. Now what interest in the world, then, is there left - what
interest in the world can you possibly represent - which can be the
gainer by your present action?"

Mr. Fentolin's eyes grew suddenly a little brighter. There was a
light upon his face strange to witness,

"The power which is to be the gainer," he said quietly, " is the
power encompassed by these walls,"

He touched his chest; his long, slim fingers were folded upon it.

"When I meet a man whom I like," he continued softly, "I take him
into my confidence. Picture me, if you will, as a kind of Puck.
Haven't you heard that with the decay of the body comes sometimes
a malignant growth in the brain; a Caliban-like desire for evil to
fall upon the world; a desire to escape from the loneliness of
suffering, the isolation of black misery?"

Mr. John P. Dunster let his cigar burn out. He looked
steadfastly at this strange little figure whose chair had
imperceptibly moved a little nearer to his.

"You know what the withholding of this message you carry may mean,"
Mr. Fentolin proceeded. "You come here, bearing to Europe the word
of a great people, a people whose voice is powerful enough even to
still the gathering furies. I have read your ciphered message. It
is what I feared. It is my will, mine - Miles Fentolin's - that
that message be not delivered."

"I wonder," Mr. Dunster muttered under his breath, "whether you are
in earnest."

"In your heart," Mr. Fentolin told him, "you know that I am. I can
see the truth in your face. Now, for the first time, you begin to
understand."

"To a certain extent," Mr. Dunster admitted. "Where I am still in
the dark, however, is why you should expect that I should become
your confederate. It is true that by holding me up and obstructing
my message, you may bring about the evil you seek, but unless that
word is cabled back to New York, and my senders believe that my
message has been delivered, there can be no certainty. What has
been trusted to me as the safest means of transmission, might, in
an emergency, be committed to a cable."

"Excellent reasoning," Fentolin agreed. "For the very reasons you
name that word will be given."

Mr. Dunster's face was momentarily troubled. There was something in
the still, cold emphasis of this man's voice which made him shiver.

"Do you think," Mr. Fentolin went on, "that I spend a great fortune
buying the secrets of the world, that I live from day to day with
the risk of ignominious detection always hovering about me - do
you think that I do this and am yet unprepared to run the final risks
of life and death? Have you ever talked with a murderer, Mr. Dunster?
Has curiosity ever taken you within the walls of Sing Sing? Have you
sat within the cell of a doomed man and felt the thrill of his touch,
of his close presence? Well, I will not ask you those questions. I
will simply tell you that you are talking to one now."

Mr. Dunster had forgotten his extinct cigar. He found it difficult
to remove his eyes from Mr. Fentolin's face. He was half fascinated,
half stirred with a vague, mysterious fear. Underneath these wild
words ran always that hard note of truth.

"You seem to be in earnest," he muttered.

"I am," Mr. Fentolin assured him quietly. "I have more than once
been instrumental in bringing about the death of those who have
crossed my purposes. I plead guilty to the weakness of Nero.
Suffering and death are things of joy to me. There!"

"I am not sure," Mr. Dunster said slowly, "that I ought not to
wring your neck."

Mr. Fentolin smiled. His chair receded an inch or two. There was
never a time when his expression had seemed more seraphic.

"There is no emergency of that sort," he remarked," for which I am
not prepared."

His little revolver gleamed for a minute beneath his cuff. He
backed his chair slowly and with wonderful skill towards the door.

"We will fix the period of your probation, Mr. Dunster, at - say,
twenty-four hours," he decided. "Please make yourself until then
entirely at home. My cook, my cellar, my cigar cabinets, are at
your disposal. If some happy impulse," he concluded, "should show
you the only reasonable course by dinnertime, it would give me the
utmost pleasure to have you join us at that meal. I can promise
you a cheque beneath your plate which even you might think worth
considering, wine in your glass which kings might sigh for, cigars
by your side which even your Mr. Pierpont Morgan could not buy.
Au revoir!"

The door opened and closed. Mr. Dunster sat staring into the open
space like a man still a little dazed.




CHAPTER XVIII

The beautiful but somewhat austere front of St. David's Hall seemed,
in a sense, transformed, as Hamel and his companion climbed the worn
grey steps which led on to the broad sweep of terrace. Evidently
visitors had recently arrived. A dark, rather good-looking woman,
with pleasant round face and a ceaseless flow of conversation, was
chattering away to Mr. Fentolin. By her side stood another woman who
was a stranger to Hamel - thin, still elegant, with tired, worn face,
and the shadow of something in her eyes which reminded him at once of
Esther. She wore a large picture hat and carried a little Pomeranian
dog under her arm. In the background, an insignificant-looking man
with grey side-whiskers and spectacles was beaming upon everybody.
Mr. Fentolin waved his hand and beckoned to Hamel and Esther as they
somewhat hesitatingly approached.

"This is one of my fortunate mornings, you see, Esther!" he exclaimed,
smiling. "Lady Saxthorpe has brought her husband over to lunch. Lady
Saxthorpe," he added, turning to the woman at his side, "let me present
to you the son of one of the first men to realise the elusive beauty
of our coast. This is Mr. Hamel, son of Peter Hamel, R.A. - the
Countess of Saxthorpe."

Lady Saxthorpe, who had been engaged in greeting
Esther, held out her hand and smiled good-humour-
edly at Hamel.

"I know your father's work quite well," she declared, "and I don't
wonder that you have made a pilgrimage here. They tell me that he
painted nineteen pictures - pictures of importance, that is to say
- within this little area of ten miles. Do you paint, Mr. Hamel?"

"Not at all," Hamel answered.

"Our friend Hamel," Mr. Fentolin intervened, "woos other and sterner
muses. He fights nature in distant countries, spans her gorges with
iron bridges, stems the fury of her rivers, and carries to the
boundary of the world that little twin line of metal which brings
men like ants to the work-heaps of the universe. My dear Florence,"
he added, suddenly turning to the woman at his other side, "for the
moment I had forgotten. You have not met our guest yet. Hamel,
this is my sister-in-law, Mrs. Seymour Fentolin."

She held out her hand to him, unnaturally thin and white, covered
with jewels. Again he saw something in her eyes which stirred him
vaguely.

"It is so nice that you are able to spend a few days: with us, Mr.
Hamel," she said quietly. "I am sorry that I have been too
indisposed to make your acquaintance earlier."

"And, Mr. Fentolin continued, "you must know my young friend here,
too. Mr. Hamel - Lord Saxthorpe."

The latter shook hands heartily with the young man.

"I knew your father quite well," he announced. "Queer thing, he
used to hang out for months at a time at that little shanty on the
beach there. Hardest work in the world to get him away. He came
over to dine with us once or twice, but we saw scarcely anything
of him. I hope his son will not prove so obdurate."

"You are very kind," Hamel murmured.

"Mr. Hamel came into these parts to claim his father's property,"
Mr. Fentolin said. "However, I have persuaded him to spend a day
or two up here before he transforms himself into a misanthrope.
What of his golf, Esther, eh?"

"Mr. Hamel plays very well, indeed," the girl replied.

"Your niece was too good for me," Hamel confessed.

Mr. Fentolin smiled.

"The politeness of this younger generation," he remarked, "keeps
the truth sometimes hidden from us. I perceive that I shall not
be told who won. Lady Saxthorpe, you are fortunate indeed in the
morning you have chosen for your visit. There is no sun in the
world like an April sun, and no corner of the earth where it shines
with such effect as here. Look steadily to the eastward of that
second dike and you will see the pink light upon the sands, which
baffled every one until our friend Hamel came and caught it on
his canvas."

"I do see it," Lady Saxthorpe murmured. "What eyes you have, Mr.
Fentolin! What perception for colour!"

"Dear lady," Mr. Fentolin said, "I am one of those who benefit by
the law of compensations. On a morning like this I can spend hours
merely feasting my eyes upon this prospect, and I can find, if not
happiness, the next best thing. The world is full of beautiful
places, but the strange part of it is that beauty has countless
phases, and each phase differs in some subtle and unexplainable
manner from all others. Look with me fixedly, dear Lady Saxthorpe.
Look, indeed, with more than your eyes. Look at that flush of wild
lavender, where it fades into the sands on one side, and strikes the
emerald green of that wet seamoss on the other. Look at the liquid
blue of that tongue of sea which creeps along its bed through the
yellow sands, through the dark meadowland, which creeps and oozes
and widens till in an hour's time it will have become a river. Look
at my sand islands, virgin from the foot of man, the home of
sea-gulls, the islands of a day. There may be other and more
beautiful places. There is none quite like this."

"I pity you no longer," Lady Saxthorpe asserted fervently. "The
eyes of the artist are a finer possession than the limbs of the
athlete."

The butler announced luncheon, and they all trooped in. Hamel
found himself next to Lady Saxthorpe.

"Dear Mr. Fentolin has been so kind," she confided to him as they
took their places. "I came in fear and trembling to ask for a very
small cheque for my dear brother's diocese. My brother is a
colonial bishop, you know. Can you imagine what Mr. Fentolin has
given me?"

Hamel wondered politely. Lady Saxthorpe continued with an air of
triumph.

"A thousand pounds! Just fancy that - a thousand pounds! And some
people say he is so difficult," she went on, dropping her voice.
"Mrs. Hungerford came all the way over from Norwich to beg for the
infirmary there, and he gave her nothing."

"What was his excuse? " Hamel asked.

"I think he told her that it was against his principles to give to
hospitals," Lady Saxthorpe replied. "He thinks that they should be
supported out of the rates."

"Some people have queer ideas of charity," Hamel remarked. "Now I
am afraid that if I had been Mr. Fentolin, I would have given the
thousand pounds willingly to a hospital, but not a penny to a
mission."

Mr. Fentolin looked suddenly down the table. He was some distance
away, but his hearing was wonderful.

"Ah, my dear Hamel," he said, "believe me, missions are very
wonderful things. It is only from a very careful study of their
results that I have brought myself to be a considerable supporter
of those where I have some personal knowledge of the organisation.
Hospitals, on the other hand, provide for the poor what they ought
to be able to provide for themselves. The one thing to avoid in
the giving away of money is pauperisation. What do you think,
Florence?"

His sister-in-law, who was seated at the other end of the table,
looked across at him with a bright but stereotyped smile.

"I agree with you, of course, Miles. I always agree with you. Mr.
Fentolin has the knack of being right about most things," she
continued, turning to Lord Saxthorpe. "His judgment is really
wonderful."

"Wish we could get him to come and sit on the bench sometimes, then,"
Lord Saxthorpe remarked heartily. "Our neighbours in this part of
the world are not overburdened with brains. By-the-by," he went on,
"that reminds me. You haven't got such a thing as a mysterious
invalid in the house, have you?"

There was a moment's rather curious silence. Mr. Fentolin was
sitting like a carved figure, with a glass of wine half raised to
his lips. Gerald had broken off in the middle of a sentence and
was staring at Lord Saxthorpe. Esther was sitting perfectly still,
her face grave and calm, her eyes alone full of fear. Lord
Saxthorpe was not an observant man and he continued, quite
unconscious of the sensation which his question had aroused.

"Sounds a silly thing to ask you, doesn't it? They're all full of
it at Wells, though. I sat on the bench this morning and went into
the police-station for a moment first. Seems they've got a long
dispatch from Scotland Yard about a missing man who is supposed to
be in this part of the world. He came down in a special train on
Tuesday night - the night of the great flood - and his train was
wrecked at Wymondham. After that he was taken on by some one in a
motor-car. Colonel Renshaw wanted me to allude to the matter from
the bench, but it seemed to me that it was an affair entirely for
the police."

As though suddenly realising the unexpected interest which his
words had caused, Lord Saxthorpe brought his sentence to a
conclusion and glanced enquiringly around the table.

"A man could scarcely disappear in a civilised neighbourhood like
this," Mr. Fentolin remarked quietly, "but there is a certain
amount of coincidence about your question. May I ask whether it
was altogether a haphazard one?"

"Absolutely," Lord Saxthorpe declared. "The idea seems to be that
the fellow was brought to one of the houses in the neighbourhood,
and we were all rather chaffing one another this morning about it.
Inspector Yardley - the stout fellow with the beard, you know - was
just starting off in his dogcart to make enquiries round the
neighbourhood. If any one in fiction wants a type of the ridiculous
detective, there he is, ready-made."

"The coincidence of your question," Mr. Fentolin said smoothly, "is
certainly a strange one. The mysterious stranger is within our
gates."

Lady Saxthorpe, who had been out of the conversation for far too
long, laid down her knife and fork.

"My dear Mr. Fentolin!" she exclaimed. "My dear Mrs. Fentolin!
This is really most exciting! Do tell us all about it at once. I
thought that the man was supposed to have been decoyed away in a
motor-car. Do you know his name and all about him?"

"There are a few minor points," Mr. Fentolin murmured, "such as
his religious convictions and his size in boots, which I could
not swear about, but so far as regards his name and his occupation,
I think I can gratify your curiosity. He is a Mr. John P. Dunster,
and he appears to be the representative of an American firm of
bankers, on his way to Germany to conclude a loan."

"God bless my soul!" Lord Saxthorpe exclaimed wonderingly. "The
fellow is actually here under this roof! But who brought him?
How did he find his way?"

"Better ask Gerald," Mr. Fentolin replied. "He is the abductor.
It seems that they both missed the train from Liverpool Street,
and Mr. Dunster invited Gerald to travel down in his special train.
Very kind of him, but might have been very unlucky for Gerald.
As you know, they got smashed up at Wymondham, and Gerald, feeling
in a way responsible for him, brought him on here; quite properly,
I think. Sarson has been looking after him, but I am afraid he has
slight concussion of the brain."

"I shall remember this all my life," Lord Saxthorpe declared
solemnly, "as one of the most singular coincidences which has ever
come within my personal knowledge. Perhaps after lunch, Mr.
Fentolin, you will let some of your people telephone to the
police-station at Wells? There really is an important enquiry
respecting this man. I should not be surprised," he added,
dropping his voice a little for the benefit of the servants,
"to find that Scotland Yard needed him on their own account."

"In that case," Mr. Fentolin remarked, "he is quite safe, for Sarson
tells me there is no chance of his being able to travel, at any rate
for twenty-four hours."

Lady Saxthorpe shivered.

"Aren't you afraid to have him in the house?" she asked, "a man who
is really and actually wanted by Scotland Yard? When one considers
that nothing ever happens here except an occasional shipwreck in
the winter and a flower-show in the summer, it does sound positively
thrilling. I wonder what he has done."

They discussed the subject of Mr. Dunster's possible iniquities.
Meanwhile, a young man carrying his hat in his hand had slipped in
past the servants and was leaning over Mr. Fentolin's chair. He
laid two or three sheets of paper upon the table and waited while
his employer glanced them through and dismissed him with a little
nod.

"My wireless has been busy this morning," Mr. Fentolin remarked.
"We seem to have collected about forty messages from different
battleships and cruisers. There must be a whole squadron barely
thirty miles out."

"You don't really think," Lady Saxthorpe asked, "that there is any
fear of war, do you, Mr. Fentolin?

He answered her with a certain amount of gravity. "Who can tell?
The papers this morning were bad. This conference at The Hague is
still unexplained. France's attitude in the matter is especially
mysterious."

"I am a strong supporter of Lord Roberts," Lord Saxthorpe said,
"and I believe in the vital necessity of some scheme for national
service. At the same time, I find it hard to believe that a
successful invasion of this country is within the bounds of
possibility."

"I quite agree with you, Lord Saxthorpe," Mr. Fentolin declared
smoothly. "All the same, this Hague Conference is a most mysterious
affair. The papers this morning are ominously silent about the
fleet. From the tangle of messages we have picked up, I should say,
without a doubt, that some form of mobilisation is going on in the
North Sea. If Lady Saxthorpe thinks it warm enough, shall we take
our coffee upon the terrace?"

"The terrace, by all means," her ladyship assented, rising from her
place. "What a wonderful man you are, Mr. Fentolin, with your
wireless telegraphy, and your telegraph office in the house, and
telephones. Does it really amuse you to be so modern?"

"To a certain extent, yes," Mr. Fentolin sighed, as he guided his
chair along the hall. "When my misfortune first came, I used to
speculate a good deal upon the Stock Exchange. That was really the
reason I went in for all these modern appliances."

"And now?" she asked. "What use do you make of them now?"

Mr. Fentolin smiled quietly. He looked out sea-ward, beyond the
sky-line, from whence had come to him, through the clouds, that
tangle of messages.

"I like to feel," he said, "that the turning wheel of life is not
altogether out of earshot. I like to dabble just a little in the
knowledge of these things."

Lord Saxthorpe came strolling up to them.

"You won't forget to telephone about this guest of yours?" he
asked fussily.

"It is already done," Mr. Fentolin assured him. "My dear sister,
why so silent?"

Mrs. Fentolin turned slowly towards him. She, too, had been
standing with her eyes fixed upon the distant sea-line. Her face
seemed suddenly to have aged, her forced vivacity to have departed.
Her little Pomeranian rubbed against her feet in vain. Yet at the
sound of Mr. Fentolin's voice, she seemed to come back to herself
as though by magic.

"I was looking where you were looking," she dedared lightly,
"just trying to see a little way beyond. So silly, isn't it?
Chow-Chow, you bad little dog, come and you shall have your dinner."

She strolled off, humming a tune to herself. Lord Saxthorpe watched
her with a shadow upon his plain, good-humoured face.

"Somehow or other," he remarked quietly, "Mrs. Fentolin never seems
to have got over the loss of her husband, does she? How long is it
since he died?"

"Eight years," Mr. Fentolin replied. "It was just six months after
my own accident."

"I am losing a great deal of sympathy for you, Mr. Fentolin," Lady
Saxthorpe confessed, coming over to his side. "You have so many
resources, there is so much in life which you can do. You paint,
as we all know, exquisitely. They tell me that you play the violin
like a master. You have unlimited time for reading, and they say
that you are one of the greatest living authorities upon the
politics of Europe. Your morning paper must bring you so much that
is interesting."

"It is true," Mr. Fentolin admitted, "that I have compensations
which no one can guess at, compensations which appeal to me more as
time steals on. And yet -"

He stopped short.

"And yet?" Lady Saxthorpe repeated interrogatively.

Mr.. Fentolin was watching Gerald drive golf balls from the lawn
beneath. He pointed downwards.

"I was like that when I was his age," he said quietly.




CHAPTER XIX

Mr. Fentolin remained upon the terrace long after the departure of
his guests. He had found a sunny corner out of the wind, and he sat
there with a telescope by his side and a budget of newspapers upon
his knee. On some pretext or another he had detained all the others
of the household so that they formed a little court around him.
Even Hamel, who had said something about a walk, had been induced
to stop by an appealing glance from Esther. Mr. Fentolin was in one
of his most loquacious moods. For some reason or other, the visit
of the Saxthorpes seemed to have excited him. He talked continually,
with the briefest pauses. Every now and then he gazed steadily
across the marshes through his telescope.

"Lord Saxthorpe," he remarked, "has, I must confess, greatly
excited my curiosity as to the identity of our visitor. Such a
harmless-looking person, he seems, to be causing such a commotion.
Gerald, don't you feel your responsibility in the matter?"

"Yes, sir, I do!" Gerald replied, with unexpected grimness. "I
feel my responsibility deeply."

Mr. Fentolin, who was holding the telescope to his eye, touched
Hamel on the shoulder.

"My young friend," he said, "your eyes are better than mine. You
see the road there? Look along it, between the white posts, as far
as you can. What do you make of that black speck?"

Hamel held the telescope to his eye and steadied it upon the little
tripod stand.

"It looks like a horse and trap," he announced. "Good!" Mr.
Fentolin declared. "It seemed so to me, but I was not sure. My eyes
are weak this afternoon. How many people are in the trap?"

"Two," Hamel answered. "I can see them distinctly now. One man is
driving, another is sitting by his side. They are coming this way."

Mr. Fentolin blew his whistle. Meekins appeared almost directly.
His master whispered a word in his ear. The man at once departed.

"Let me make use of your eyes once more," Mr. Fentolin begged.
"About these two men in the trap, Mr. Hamel. Is one of them, by any
chance, wearing a uniform?"

"They both are," Hamel replied. "The man who is driving is wearing
a peaked hat. He looks like a police inspector. The man by his side
is an ordinary policeman."

Mr. Fentolin sighed gently.

"It is very interesting," he said. "Let us hope that we shall not
see an arrest under my roof. I should feel it a reflection upon my
hospitality. I trust, I sincerely trust, that this visit does not
bode any harm to Mr. John P. Dunster."

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