The Complete Detective Sgt. Elk Series (6 Novels in One Edition). Edgar Wallace
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Once more were the Nine Men in the bill of every newspaper in London. Once more the cables hummed from world’s end to world’s end, and slowly, item by item, came fragmentary scraps of news which Scotland Yard pieced together.
“Of all extraordinary developments,” said the London Journal, “in any great criminal case, nothing has ever equalled, in its improbability, the present phase of this remarkable case.
“And now we have reached the stage which we confidently hope will be a final one. It is clear that these men, having command of enormous riches, gained at the sacrifice of life, and by the ruin of thousands of innocent people, secured to their service the Captain of the Brazilian warship, Maria Braganza. So that somewhere in the wide seas of the world is a stolen battleship, having on board a congregation of the world’s worst rascals, Napoleonic in the largeness of their crimes.
“Many and fantastic are the suggestions that have been put forward as to the whereabouts of the Nine Men of Cadiz. One of our contemporaries draws a fanciful picture of life on some gorgeous Southern Pacific isle, out of the track of steamers, and pictures the Nine Men living in a condition of Oriental splendour, an existence of dolce far nlente. Such a supposition is, of course, on the face of it absurd. Such an island exists only in the fancy of the romantic writer. The uninhabited portions of the globe are few, and are, in the main, of the character of the Sahara desert. Wherever life can be sustained, wherever comfort and freedom from disease wait the newcomer, be sure the newcomer has already arrived.”
This much is quoted from the Journal because it approaches near enough to truth and actuality to merit quotation.
That Baggin had based all his plans on the supposition that such an island existed, and could be discovered, we now know. He was the possessor of an imagination, but his geographical knowledge was faulty.
The “idea,” that scrap of paper which Count Poltavo had risked his neck to obtain, was simple enough now — up to a point.
THE “IDEA” THE SOLUTION
“Suppose we separated, “Some spot,” meant
where to meet? Must be some place on land,
some spot; yet that would
be dangerous.”
“Otherwise, must be The latitude and longitude
easily remembered. Especially of sea rendezvous
as it is difficult for must be easy to remember.
nontechnical (?) to fix in
mind, and one cipher
makes all the difference.”
“Suggest we rendezvous at Lolo.”
This last was the only part of the little clue that offered any difficulty to T.B. The Gazetteer supplied no explanation,
Nor could the Admiralty help. The naval authorities did their best to unravel the mystery of “Lolo.”
A conference of the Ambassadors met in London, and it was jointly agreed that the nations should act in concert to bring the Maria Braganza and her crew to justice as speedily as possible. The Brazilian Government agreed to indemnify the Powers in their action, and, in the event of the destruction of the ship being necessitated by resistance on the part of its rebel captain, to accept an agreed sum as compensation.
There are surprising periods of inaction in the record of all great accomplishments, which those who live, rather than those who read the stories of achievements, realise.
There were weeks of fretting and days of blank despair in one room at Scotland Yard. For the examination of all clues led to the one end. Somewhere in the world were the Nine Men of Cadiz — but where, none could say. Every port in every civilised land was alert. Captains of mail steamers, of grimy little tramps, of war vessels of every nation, watched for the battleship. Three British cruisers, detached unostentatiously from the Home Fleet, cruised unlikely seas, but with no good result.
Then began the new terror.
T.B. had always had one uncomfortable feeling, a feeling that the dissipation of the Nine had not dispelled, and that was the knowledge that somewhere in Europe the machinery set up with devilish ingenuity by Poltavo still existed. Who were the desperate and broken men who acted as agents to the Nine? Whoever they were, they had been well chosen.
The weeks passed without further news of the ship, and T.B. was beginning to worry, for good reasons. He had an elaborate chart supplied to him by the Admiralty, which showed him, from day to day, the amount of provisions and coal such a ship as the Maria Braganza would require, and he knew that she must be running short. Then, one morning, he received a clue.
A telegram came to Scotland Yard, which began:
“OFFICER COMMANDING GIBRALTAR REPORTS THAT HIS WIRELESS STATION HAD BEEN INTERCEPTING MESSAGES IN CODE WHICH BEAR SOME RESEMBLANCE TO THOSE OF N.H.C. FULL MESSAGES HAVE BEEN FORWARDED HERE FOR DECODING. SOME OF THEM ARE UNINTELLIGIBLE, BUT ONE PORTION OF A MESSAGE WE HAVE BEEN ABLE TO MAKE READ: ‘…ACCEPT YOUR ASSURANCE AND EXPLANATION; WE HAVE STILL SPLENDID FIELD FOR ENTERPRISE; I WILL JOIN YOU AT LOLO WITH SHIPLOAD OF PROVISIONS AND COLLIER ON JUNE 1ST. IN MEANTIME, IF YOU DO AS I SUGGEST, WE CAN MAKE TERMS WITH GOVERNMENTS AND, MOREOVER, FIND EMPLOYMENT FOR AGENTS WHO ARE AT PRESENT DISCONTENTED…’ MESSAGE BEYOND THIS UNDECIPHERABLE WITH EXCEPTION OF WORDS ‘DESTRUCTION,’ ‘EASILY OBTAINABLE,’ AND ‘INSURE.’ THIS MESSAGE OBVIOUSLY BETWEEN POLTAVO AND MARIA BRAGANZA—’ COMMANDER FLEET, GIBRALTAR, HAS SENT H.M.S. DUNCAN, ESSEX, KENT, WITH SIX DESTROYERS, INTO ATLANTIC PICK UP MARIA BRAGANZA.’”
T.B. read the message again, folded it carefully, and placed it in his breast pocket. There was one word in Poltavo’s message that revealed, in a flash, the nature of the new terror with which the Nine Men of Cadiz threatened the world.
29. A Matter of Insurance
You pass up a broad stone staircase at one end of the Royal Exchange, and come to a landing where, confronting you, are two big swing-doors that are constantly opening and closing as bareheaded clerks and top-hatted brokers go swiftly in and out.
On the other side of the doors is a small counter where a man in uniform checks, with keen glance, each passerby. Beyond the counter are two rooms, one leading to the other, shaped like the letter “L,” and in the longer of the two sit, in innumerable pews, quiet men with fat notebooks. From desk to desk flutter the brokers bargaining their risks, and there is a quiet but eager buzz of voices through which, at intervals, boom the stentorian tones of the porter calling by name the members whose presence is required outside.
A stout man made a slow progress down one of the aisles, calling at the little pews en route, making notes in a silver-mounted book he held in his hand.
He stopped before the pew of one of the biggest underwriters. “Raglan Castle?” he said laconically, and the underwriter looked up over his spectacles, then down at the slip of paper the man put before him.
“One per cent?” he asked, in some surprise, and the other nodded.
“How much?” he asked.
The underwriter tapped the slip of paper before him.
“Ten thousand pounds at 5s. per centum,” he said. “I can do that.” He initialled the slip, and the man passed on.
He went the round of the room, stopped to exchange a joke with an acquaintance, then descended the stone stairs.
Back to his stuffy little office went the broker, with little thought that he had been engaged in any unusual variety of business. In his private room he found his client; a thickset man