did you know?" and Furneaux whirled round on the American instantly.
"By using the gray matter at the back of my head," was the reply. "No Chink ever taught Wong Li Fu how to put away two chesty individuals like Mr. Theydon and your painter, Mr. Winter. But I couldn't be sure till I had seen the ivory skull. Then I knew."
"So did I know yesterday morning," said Furneaux, "and a deuce of a time the discovery gave me. Anyhow, the street fight outside Innesmore Mansions at daybreak today settles the matter. There were two Japanese and one Chinaman. The Japs outed the policeman. Fortunately he and another man made a five-minute point at each end of the mansions, and, as No. 1 failed to turn up, No. 2 went to look for him. He saw the end of the row, and ran to help, blowing his whistle for assistance. Unfortunately for us, two of the three confounded blackguards escaped."
"O, you've got one, then?" cried Theydon.
"Yes, a Jap. The constable was wise enough to give him the point of his truncheon in the gullet, and that settled him."
"I wonder if he is the one who would have been shot had he broken into my flat," said Theydon musingly.
"Shot! Man alive, you'd never have heard him!"
"Not till he had a bullet lodged securely in his inside, it is true. Bates and I surveyed that lift last night, Mr. Furneaux, and regarded it as the weak part of our defenses, so we arranged that an automatic pistol should live up to its name, and fire at any one who opened the sliding panel."
"Did you now?" said Furneaux admiringly. "Whose brainy idea was that—yours or Bates's?"
"A joint effort," he said, with a self-satisfied smile.
"Well, I'm glad it didn't come off. British law is a fearsome and wonderful thing. You might both have got ten years for fixing a man-trap, to wit, a lethal engine. However, during the next few days you're going to change your abode. Tell Bates and his wife that they need a holiday, and ought to visit relatives in Yorkshire or North Wales. Pack what you need for a week, at least, and make straight for Fortescue Square."
"Are you joking?" said Theydon, genuinely astounded.
"Do I look it?" And, indeed, the detective did not. "Winter has just settled that program with Mr. Forbes. You see, you're in this affair now, neck and crop, and it's easier for us to safeguard one place than two. You're pleased, aren't you? Doesn't a pretty girl live there?"
"Sir," said Handyside, "he's tickled to death, and that's a fact. I'm the only one to make a kick. I kind of reckoned on being allowed to play a walking-on part in this drama, but I look like being cut out in the new shuffle."
"I can make use of you," said Furneaux promptly. "You've seen Wong Li Fu, and would know him again?"
"Yes, sir."
"And you can tell a Japanese from a Chinaman at sight?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good. You're enrolled. Next thing you'll be receiving an ivory skull, too. These beggars are the smartest crowd I've come across in twenty years. I think they would have beaten us if it hadn't happened that Mr. Theydon and you, each of you strangers to the Forbes family, were selected by fate to intervene at psychological moments. The Young Manchus and their allies had the ground surveyed thoroughly. They even had us of the Yard marked down. Oh, it's a plot and a half, I can assure you, and the worst thing is that the real struggle is yet ahead. All that has happened before is mere skirmishing compared with what's to come."
"Is that why you covered up your tracks, even in this hotel, before you came to my room?" inquired Handyside.
"It is, and let me tell you that you're a living example of a contradiction in terms. You use your brains, Mr. Handyside, yet you smoke a cigar calculated to atrophy the keenest intellect. You, an American, chewing a vile Burmese Cheroot! Cre' nom d'un pipe! When this bubble has burst I must reason with you!"
CHAPTER XIV
WHEREIN THEYDON SUFFERS FROM FAINT HEART
Furneaux, with that phenomenally clear mind of his, had perceived and expressed in one trenchant sentence the outstanding and almost unique feature of the tragic mystery which centered around the death of Edith Lester. Theydon's connection with either international finance or the rebirth of China was remote as that of the man in the moon. Yet he had been pitchforked by fate into an active and, indeed, dominating influence over those phases of both undertakings which were peculiar to London.
Theydon mused on this element in an unprecedented situation as he sat in the taxicab which bore him swiftly to Innesmore Mansions. Another quite abnormal condition was the ignorance of London with regard to the fierce struggle now being waged in its midst.
On the one hand, a few Oriental fanatics—most of whom were probably less swayed by racial enthusiasm than by good payment for services rendered—were carrying out the orders of a master criminal with a sublime indifference to the laws framed by the "foreign devils" whom they despised; on the other were ranged the three members of the Forbes family and Theydon himself, supported by the forces of the Crown, it was true, but singularly isolated from the knowledge and sympathy of their fellow-citizens.
Miss Beale hardly counted. The servants in Fortescue Square shared with Bates and his wife a sort of territorial interest in the fight. When Fortune picked an occasional warrior for the fray she chose a man from Chicago, a motorcyclist from Eastbourne, a policeman in Charing Cross road.
How portentous had been that hand raised to stem the traffic at a congested corner on the Monday night! Into what a vortex of crime and passion had it not pointed, all unknowing!
If the cab in which Theydon was hurrying home from Daly's Theater had not been delayed by the dispute between driver and policeman, he would never have known that the millionaire visited Innesmore Mansions, and the subsequent course of the night's history might have left him wholly unaffected.
Then his wayward thoughts took to brooding on the gray car which shadowed him from Waterloo to Fortescue Square, and again from the square to his own abode. If it held some member of the Embassy staff, why had no more been heard of it? And what had Winter and Furneaux meant by hinting that far wider issues were bound up with the affair than the authorities were yet at liberty to divulge? The attack on Forbes, sinister and malevolent in its scope and purpose, was, in a sense, open warfare. But it was impossible to guess what part, if any, the official representatives of China filled in the fray. Were they active allies of Scotland Yard or did they hold what is known in the law courts as a watching brief? He could not tell. He only knew that each successive period of twenty-four hours broadened the area covered by the struggle, and there, at least, he found solid backing for the little detective's demand that the threatened people should dwell under one roof. His pulses quickened at the notice that this new departure implied constant association with Evelyn Forbes. Yet, what did it avail? Why should he dream of fanning into a fiercer fury the flame of his love? As matters stood, he had about as much chance of marrying Evelyn Forbes as of becoming Emperor of China!
The incongruity of the situation was illustrated with cruel accuracy by the fact that he could ill afford the stoppage of his work demanded by the present trend of events. He earned what might be regarded as a good income by his pen, but his expenses were not light, and he had deemed himself fortunate the previous year when he was able to invest a hundred pounds!
As a matter of fact, the interest on his "securities" paid for his gloves and ties; another lucky year might see him provided for life with boots and socks! He pictured himself—if he were idiot enough, when all this turmoil was ended, to pose as a suitor for Evelyn Forbes's hand—explaining his financial position to the millionaire, and wilting under the scornful amusement in those earnest, deep-seeing eyes. Phew! He grew hot at the mere notion of such folly.
Little wonder, therefore, that the driver of the taxi should gaze quizzically after Theydon's alert figure as it vanished in the stairway of Innesmore Mansions.