"Here it is," she whispered. "Where are the fifty sovereigns?"
Maxwell-Pitt drew out a bag and gave it to her. She opened it, and looked at the contents, then put it in her pocket.
"Now go," she said. "_Vite!_"
Maxwell-Pitt moved towards the window. "I don"t want this," he said, pointing to the case.
"You don"t want it?" she exclaimed in astonishment. For a moment they stood there facing one another. Then a sudden thought struck her. She went to the bookcase, opened the drawer, and saw only one case there.
"You are more clever than I thought," she said. "I wished to take these away upstairs to-night, but the Captain he remained here late, and then madame wanted me. You have got the medal, but you shall not go away with it. Give it back to me."
[Ill.u.s.tration: "HE WAS WALKING IN HIS SLEEP, CONSCIOUS OF NOTHING."
(_p. 250._)]
Maxwell-Pitt shook his head.
Her eyes blazed in anger. "You will not? _Mon Dieu!_ then I sound the alarm."
"How will you account for this?" said Maxwell-Pitt, pointing to the case on the table.
"I do not know. I do not care," she answered. "Give me the medal, or I ring."
Her hand clutched the bell rope. "Shall I ring or not?" she demanded.
Again there was a sound at the door. Once more he turned off his light.
The door opened wide, and Captain Richards entered, carrying a lighted candle in his hand.
Maxwell-Pitt and Adele stood there transfixed. The light shone full on them, but Captain Richards took no heed of them. His eyes were fixed, staring into s.p.a.ce. He was walking in his sleep, conscious of nothing that was going on around him. He placed his candle on the side table, sat down in his easy chair, drew the book-rest towards him, and leaned back, staring vacantly at the pages of the open book.
Adele released the bell rope and held a warning finger to her lips. She stepped lightly to Maxwell-Pitt. "Sh! it is dangerous to awaken him,"
she whispered. "Once they awakened my cousin suddenly when he walked like that in his sleep. He was never the same here again," and she tapped her forehead. "Now go at once, but softly."
He clambered out, and then looked back through the window into the room.
Adele picked up the jewel case and put it into her pocket. There she touched the bag of gold. She pulled it out, looked at it for a moment, then stepped hastily to the window and flung it from her into the garden. She leaned out, and whispered, vindictively, "Take your money. I shall help the police. They shall catch you before the clock is round."
Then she stepped gently to the door. It closed behind her, and the sleep-walker was alone in the room.
Maxwell-Pitt picked up the bag of gold, and then cycled thirty miles. He caught an early train to London, and that evening he renewed his subscription to the Burglars" Club by exhibiting the Victoria Cross lately bestowed on Captain Sefton Richards by His Majesty.
On the following day, to his great astonishment, Captain Richards received the cross in a registered postal packet, with no word to explain the reason of its temporary absence; and a few days later a larger postal packet came for Mademoiselle Adele, which, on being opened, disclosed to her enraptured eyes fifty sovereigns.
Thus did Maxwell-Pitt attempt to atone for the burglary he had perpetrated. "After all," he thought, "the only person who will have been seriously inconvenienced by the transaction is the balloonist in Belgium--and he deserves it."
XII.
THE LAST CHRONICLE.
GILBERT BROWN, second Baron Lothersdale, was generally regarded as being the best business man in the country. His talent for affairs was doubtless hereditary, as his father had successfully kept a big emporium before seeking the parliamentary honours which led to higher things. His son, in his turn, entered Parliament, and quickly ran the gamut of two under-secretaryships and the Cabinet. The Lord Lieutenancy of Ireland and the Governor-Generalship of India would undoubtedly have been his, but for the impossibility of a.s.sociating Brown"s Bayswater Bazaar with those regal positions.
When, therefore, the last of six successive schemes for the reorganisation of the British Army had fallen to the parliamentary floor and broken in pieces, it was felt that there was only one man who could tackle the matter, and bring it to a successful issue. Lord Lothersdale"s tenure of the Postmaster-Generalship was remembered with pride by a grateful nation. Under his management the reply-postcard business, which had hitherto dragged and lost money, had become a popular and remunerative department, while his penny-in-the-slot form of application for Government annuities was an innovation as brilliant in conception as it was profitable in results.
When the country learnt that to Lord Lothersdale had been entrusted the task of reforming the Army it heaved a sigh of content, for it knew that the work was now as good as done; and when the news reached the Continent the officers of the Great General Staff of the German Army were noticed to wear a sad and pensive look unusual to them.
To accomplish the work that in the past twenty years alone had cost thousands of lives and millions of money, besides incidentally destroying six first-cla.s.s parliamentary reputations, Lord Lothersdale retired to Moors, his Berkshire seat, and there, in his study overlooking the deer park, he acc.u.mulated his evidence and dictated his Report.
From time to time paragraphs appeared in the papers that Lord Lothersdale was busy at his work, or that he was making progress therein, and at last word went round that he was now putting the final touches to his Report, which would be laid before the Cabinet the following week.
Then it was that his Grace of Dorchester decided that Mr. Drummond Eyre must show the same Report at the next meeting of the Burglars" Club, if he wished to continue his membership thereof.
George Drummond Eyre was a Leicestershire man, an ex-guardsman, and a shooter of big game. He received the news of his mission without comment, and proceeded to make himself acquainted with the habits of his lordship of Lothersdale. He was still pursuing these investigations when he read in the _Morning Mail_:--
"Lord Lothersdale is just completing his work of reorganising the British Army on paper with the thoroughness which we a.s.sociate with his name. Not content with revising the duties attached to the highest offices, with altering the length of service, and the pay of officer and private, his lordship is actually winding up with suggestions for a new full-dress uniform for our soldiers. The traditional red is to be discarded, and hues more in keeping with the aesthetic taste of the age will supplant it, in the hope of attracting a superior cla.s.s of men to the army. We hear that Mr. Bower, the eminent tailor, was last week at Moors, and that to-day a member of his staff will arrive there with sample uniforms for his lordship"s inspection. History is in making at Moors."
"Good!" said Eyre, with obvious satisfaction, as he read this paragraph.
"This fits in well. I"m in luck"s way."
That was at nine o"clock in the morning. At ten o"clock he drove up to Mr. Bower"s well-known establishment, and sent in a card on which was printed in unostentatious letters, "Mr. Luke Sinnott," and in the bottom corner "Criminal Investigation Dept., New Scotland Yard."
In a few minutes he was shown into Mr. Bower"s private room.
Mr. Bower was a ponderous gentleman. In a higher station of life he would have been a Dean.
"What can I do for you, Mr. Sinnott?" he inquired, eyeing his visitor over the top of his gold-rimmed gla.s.ses.
"I have come on important business, sir," said the pseudo-Sinnott. He went back to the door, and closed it cautiously, then deposited his hat and gloves on the table with a precision which impressed the tailor with a sense of deep mystery.
"I think you have just been to Moors," he said, after these preliminaries.
"That is so," replied the tailor, with unnatural indifference.
"And one of your people is going there to-day with some sample uniforms?"
"I am going there to-day with a sample uniform."
"Quite so. You are aware that Lord Lothersdale is working on a very important report?"
"Of course I am."
Mr. Sinnott came a step nearer to the tailor, and dropped his voice to an impressive whisper.
"What I am going to tell you," he continued, "is in the strictest confidence. A Continental Power that shall be nameless, but whose ident.i.ty you, as a man of the world, will be able to guess, is moving heaven and earth to get to know what that report contains. It is certain that whatever Lord Lothersdale suggests will be carried out by our government, and this will immediately influence the military policy of the Power in question. Moreover, there are some secret portions of this report which will never be made public. Therefore this foreign power is striving to get sight of it before it leaves Lord Lothersdale"s hands.