The Greatest Thrillers of Edgar Wallace. Edgar Wallace
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the Greek once after his return, but since all his efforts to secure information concerning the whereabouts of John Lexman and his wife — the main reason for his visit — had been in vain, he had not repeated his visit.
The house in Cadogan Square was a large one, occupying a corner site. It was peculiarly English in appearance with its window boxes, its discreet curtains, its polished brass and enamelled doorway. It had been the town house of Lord Henry Gratham, that eccentric connoisseur of wine and follower of witless pleasure. It had been built by him “round a bottle of port,” as his friends said, meaning thereby that his first consideration had been the cellarage of the house, and that when those cellars had been built and provision made for the safe storage of his priceless wines, the house had been built without the architect’s being greatly troubled by his lordship. The double cellars of Gratham House had, in their time, been one of the sights of London. When Henry Gratham lay under eight feet of Congo earth (he was killed by an elephant whilst on a hunting trip) his executors had been singularly fortunate in finding an immediate purchaser. Rumour had it that Kara, who was no lover of wine, had bricked up the cellars, and their very existence passed into domestic legendary.
The door was opened by a well-dressed and deferential manservant and T.X. was ushered into the hall. A fire burnt cheerily in a bronze grate and T.X. had a glimpse of a big oil painting of Kara above the marble mantlepiece.
“Mr. Kara is very busy, sir,” said the man.
“Just take in my card,” said T.X. “I think he may care to see me.”
The man bowed, produced from some mysterious corner a silver salver and glided upstairs in that manner which well-trained servants have, a manner which seems to call for no bodily effort. In a minute he returned.
“Will you come this way, sir,” he said, and led the way up a broad flight of stairs.
At the head of the stairs was a corridor which ran to the left and to the right. From this there gave four rooms. One at the extreme end of the passage on the right, one on the left, and two at fairly regular intervals in the centre.
When the man’s hand was on one of the doors, T.X. asked quietly, “I think I have seen you before somewhere, my friend.”
The man smiled.
“It is very possible, sir. I was a waiter at the Constitutional for some time.”
T.X. nodded.
“That is where it must have been,” he said.
The man opened the door and announced the visitor.
T.X. found himself in a large room, very handsomely furnished, but just lacking that sense of cosiness and comfort which is the feature of the Englishman’s home.
Kara rose from behind a big writing table, and came with a smile and a quick step to greet the visitor.
“This is a most unexpected pleasure,” he said, and shook hands warmly.
T.X. had not seen him for a year and found very little change in this strange young man. He could not be more confident than he had been, nor bear himself with a more graceful carriage. Whatever social success he had achieved, it had not spoiled him, for his manner was as genial and easy as ever.
“I think that will do, Miss Holland,” he said, turning to the girl who, with notebook in hand, stood by the desk.
“Evidently,” thought T.X., “our Hellenic friend has a pretty taste in secretaries.”
In that one glance he took her all in — from the bronze-brown of her hair to her neat foot.
T.X. was not readily attracted by members of the opposite sex. He was self-confessed a predestined bachelor, finding life and its incidence too absorbing to give his whole mind to the serious problem of marriage, or to contract responsibilities and interests which might divert his attention from what he believed was the greater game. Yet he must be a man of stone to resist the freshness, the beauty and the youth of this straight, slender girl; the pink-and-whiteness of her, the aliveness and buoyancy and the thrilling sense of vitality she carried in her very presence.
“What is the weirdest name you have ever heard?” asked Kara laughingly. “I ask you, because Miss Holland and I have been discussing a begging letter addressed to us by a Maggie Goomer.”
The girl smiled slightly and in that smile was paradise, thought T.X.
“The weirdest name?” he repeated, “why I think the worst I have heard for a long time is Belinda Mary.”
“That has a familiar ring,” said Kara.
T.X. was looking at the girl.
She was staring at him with a certain languid insolence which made him curl up inside. Then with a glance at her employer she swept from the room.
“I ought to have introduced you,” said Kara. “That was my secretary, Miss Holland. Rather a pretty girl, isn’t she?”
“Very,” said T.X., recovering his breath.
“I like pretty things around me,” said Kara, and somehow the complacency of the remark annoyed the detective more than anything that Kara had ever said to him.
The Greek went to the mantlepiece, and taking down a silver cigarette box, opened and offered it to his visitor. Kara was wearing a grey lounge suit; and although grey is a very trying colour for a foreigner to wear, this suit fitted his splendid figure and gave him just that bulk which he needed.
“You are a most suspicious man, Mr. Meredith,” he smiled.
“Suspicious! I?” asked the innocent T.X.
Kara nodded.
“I am sure you want to enquire into the character of all my present staff. I am perfectly satisfied that you will never be at rest until you learn the antecedents of my cook, my valet, my secretary—”
T.X. held up his hand with a laugh.
“Spare me,” he said. “It is one of my failings, I admit, but I have never gone much farther into your domestic affairs than to pry into the antecedents of your very interesting chauffeur.”
A little cloud passed over Kara’s face, but it was only momentary.
“Oh, Brown,” he said, airily, with just a perceptible pause between the two words.
“It used to be Smith,” said T.X., “but no matter. His name is really Poropulos.”
“Oh, Poropulos,” said Kara gravely, “I dismissed him a long time ago.”
“Pensioned hire, too, I understand,” said T.X.
The other looked at him awhile, then, “I am very good to my old servants,” he said slowly and, changing the subject; “to what good fortune do I owe this visit?”
T.X. selected a cigarette before he replied.
“I thought you might be of some service to me,” he said, apparently giving his whole attention to the cigarette.
“Nothing would give me greater pleasure,” said Kara, a little eagerly. “I am afraid you have not been very keen on continuing what I hoped would have ripened into a valuable friendship, more valuable to me perhaps,” he smiled, “than to you.”
“I am a very shy man,” said the shameless T.X., “difficult to a fault, and rather apt to underrate my social attractions. I have come to you now because you know everybody — by the way, how long have you had your secretary!” he asked abruptly.
Kara looked up at the ceiling for inspiration.
“Four, no three months,” he corrected, “a very efficient young lady who came to me from one of the training establishments. Somewhat uncommunicative, better educated than most girls in her position — for example, she speaks and writes modern Greek fairly well.”
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