The Complete Detective Sgt. Elk Series (6 Novels in One Edition). Edgar Wallace
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It must have been whilst Poltavo was in Paris that the ruling spirit of the Maria Braganza discovered that Count Poltavo was indispensable, and that strange reconciliation occurred. Through what agency Baggin and he came into touch is not known. It is generally supposed that the warship ventured close to the French or Spanish coast and sent a message of good will flickering through space, and that some receiving station, undiscovered and undemolished — there must have been a score of such stations — received it, and transmitted it to Poltavo.
News of him came to Smith from Van Ingen, who, following a faint clue of the Spanish dancer, had gone to Tangier. Work at the Embassy had become unendurable to him, since the disappearance of the Nine Men had marked also the disappearance of Doris, and despite the expostulations of the ambassador, who was sorely distressed by certain international complications of the situation — for both Baggin and Grayson were Americans — despite also the detective’s blunt advice to let the business alone and return to the Embassy, Van Ingen had set forth on his wild-goose chase.
The afternoon of his arrival, he climbed to the Marshan, the plateau that commands Tangier. Here are villas, in which Moorish, Spanish, and English styles of architecture, struggling for supremacy, have compromised in a conglomerate type. And here, idling along the promenade, scanning every figure as it passed, he had come face to face with Catherine Dominguez.
At his start of surprise, for he had not expected such good fortune, the lady paused, uncertainly. The young man uncovered with a sweeping bow.
“Pardon!” he exclaimed gallantly, in Spanish, “but so often have I seen the lovely face of the ‘Belle Espagnole’ in the newspapers that I recognised it before I was aware!”
Catherine nodded amiably, and, at a word of invitation, Van Ingen fell into step beside her.
That night he cabled to the detective:
POLTAVO IN TANGIER. C. DOMINGUEZ WILL SELL HIS WHEREABOUTS FOR £5,000. VAN INGEN.
To this he received the laconic reply, “Coming.”
The trap which the detective laid, as the Sud Express fled shrieking through the night, was simple. To capture Count Poltavo while the “Mad Terror” remained afloat would be imbecile. But to frighten him by a pseudo-attack out into the open, and then follow him to the Nine — Smith smiled over the commonsense of his little scheme, and fell asleep.
His interview, two mornings later, with Catherine Dominguez was most amiable — both ignored their last meeting — and satisfactory, save in one small particular. Upon reflection, the lady had raised her price. For £10,000 she would divulge her secret. And the detective, after a few protests, acceded to her demands. After all, she ran a certain risk in betraying a man like the count. He thought, grimly, of Hyatt and Moss.
At the conclusion of the conference, he wrote her a check.
She shook her head, smiling.
“I should prefer banknotes,” she said gently. Smith appeared to hesitate. “Very well,” he replied finally. “But, in that case, you must wait until tomorrow. If your information is good — the check will be also.”
She took it from his hand, and he rose.
“Ver’ good, Senor Smit’,” she replied, looking up at him with an engaging smile. “I will trust you.” She fingered the paper absently. Smith looked down at her. Something, he knew, she had left untold, and he waited.
“One small thing I had almost forgot,” she murmured pensively. “Count Poltavo leaves for — Lolo — tonight.”
Catherine Dominguez had not lied. Perhaps, she had some secret grudge against the Nine, whose faithful agent she had been, or perhaps she was tired of obscure flittings, and wished to buy indemnity by confession. The detective never knew. Nevertheless, he felt grateful to her.
*
That night, a slender man, wearing a felt hat and a cappa, descended the steps of one of the villas of the Marshan, and walked through the garden.
There was a man standing in the middle of the white road, his hands in his overcoat pocket, the red glow of his cigar a point of light in the gloom. Farther away, he saw the figures of three horsemen.
“Count Poltavo, I suppose,” drawled a voice — the voice of T.B. Smith. “Put up your hands or you’re a dead man.”
32. Poltavo Leaves Hurriedly
In an instant the road was filled with men; they must have been crouching in the shadow of the grassy plateau, but in that same instant Poltavo had leapt back to the cover of the garden. A revolver banged behind him; and, as he ran, he snatched his own revolver from his pocket, and sent two quick shots into the thick of the surrounding circle. There was another gate at the farther end of the garden; there would be men there, but he must risk it. He was slight and had some speed as a runner; he must depend upon these gifts.
He opened the gate swiftly and sprang out. There were three or four men standing in his path. He shot at one point-blank, dodged the others, and ran. He judged that his pursuers would not know the road as well as he. Shot after shot rang out behind him. He was an easy mark on the white road, and he turned aside and took to the grass. He was clear of the houses now, and there was no danger ahead, but the men who followed him were untiring.
Presently he struck the footpath across the sloping plain that led to the shore, and the going was easier.
It was his luck that his pursuers should have missed the path. His every arrangement worked smoothly, for the boat was waiting, the men at their oars, and he sprang breathlessly into the stern.
It was a circumstance which might have struck him as strange, had he been in a condition for calm thought, that the horsemen who were of the party that surrounded him had not joined in pursuit.
But there was another mystery that the night revealed. He had been on board the Doro — as his little ship was called — for an hour before he went to the cabin that had been made ready for him. His first act was to take his revolver from his pocket, preparatory to reloading it from the cartridges stored in one of his trunks.
Two chambers of the pistol were undischarged, and, as he jerked back the extractor, these two shells fell on the bed. He looked at them stupidly.
Both cartridges were blank!
*
Had he heard T.B. Smith speaking as he went flying down the road, Poltavo might have understood.
“Where’s the dead man?” asked T.B.
“Here, sir,” said Van Ingen cheerfully.
“Good.” Then, in French, he addressed a figure that stood in the doorway.
“Were you hurt, mademoiselle?”
Catherine’s little laugh came out to him. “I am quite safe,” she said quietly. He was going away, but she called him.
“I cannot understand why you allowed him to escape—” she began. “That you should desire blank cartridges to be placed in his revolver is not so difficult, but I do not see—”
“I suppose not,” said T.B. politely, and left her abruptly.
He sprang onto a horse that was waiting, and went clattering down the hill, through the Sole, down the narrow main street that passes the mosque; dismounting by the Custom House, he placed his horse in charge of a waiting soldier, and walked swiftly along the narrow wooden pier. At the same time as the count was boarding the Doro, T.B. and Van Ingen were being rowed in a cockleshell of a pinnace to the long destroyer which lay, without lights, in the bay.
They swung themselves up a tiny ladder onto the steel deck that rang hollow under their