The Stretton Street Affair

The dodge was one often practised by hotel thieves. But what proof had I that the lawyer from Burgos had prepared that bolt? I had no means of knowing when the screws had been rendered unstable, or by whom. It might have been done even before I had occupied that room, for the paste was hard and crumbling.

Nevertheless the fact remained that my door had been prepared for a midnight theft, and I had found a stranger in my room. So with a resolve to make further inquiry next morning, I threw myself down and slept.

I must have been tired and overwrought, for it was past nine o’clock when I awoke and drew up the blinds.

Then as I crossed to ring the bell for my coffee and hot water I made a very curious discovery.

CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH

ANOTHER STRANGE DISCLOSURE

On the ground, close to my bed, were three brass-headed carpet pins which had apparently spilt accidentally out of a box.

The sharp point of each was upturned, and it was a marvel that during the night I had not stepped upon them.

How had they come there? Was it by accident or design that they were beside my bed?

At first I wondered whether the hotel upholsterer had been at work on the previous day and had left them behind. He might have used them for pinning down my carpet.

I took one up and examined it. Next second I stood aghast.

The others I also took up, handling them very gingerly, for around the points of each was some colourless transparent substance which looked like vaseline. Such a substance was not ordinarily upon the points of carpet pins.

A horrible thought flashed across my mind. Therefore I carefully placed the three pins upon the small glass tray upon the dressing-table, and dressed as quickly as I could, reflecting the while upon my adventure with the stranger whom I had taken to be a thief.

I shaved, swallowed the coffee which the young waiter brought me, and at once descended to the bureau; when in French I inquired of the clerk for Señor Salavera. He examined the register and replied politely:

“We have no one of that name staying here, señor.”

“What?” I cried. “He was in Room 175 last night!”

“Number 175 was Señor Solier,” replied the smart young clerk. “He paid his bill and left just after seven o’clock this morning.”

“But I saw his identification papers – his passport – letters addressed to him as Señor Salavera!”

“That may be so, señor,” was the suave reply. “But he registered here as Señor Solier.” And then he dropped into English, which he spoke very fairly. “Of course people who stay at hotels do not always give their correct names. They do not wish them published in visitors’ lists in the newspapers. Perhaps it is only natural,” and he smiled.

“Have you any one named Pedro Espada in the hotel?” I inquired.

Again he consulted his register, but shook his head.

“Nobody of that name,” he replied.

I hesitated. Then I asked:

“Did the gentleman who spent the night in Room 175 depart alone?”

The reception-clerk called the uniformed concierge, and asked:

“Did Number 175 leave alone?”

“Yes,” was the reply. “He caught the early express for Zaragoza. He was going on to Barcelona, he told me. He went in the omnibus.”

“No one with him?”

“Nobody.”

“When did he arrive?” I asked.

“The night before last. He was alone – with only a handbag. I charged him with a deposit for his room.”

“Have you ever seen him before?” I asked.

“Never to my recollection.”

“Neither have I,” remarked the concierge. “He seemed very afraid of being seen. I noticed him in the lounge last night. He left this morning quite suddenly, and without taking anything – even a cup of coffee.”

“He left in a violent hurry – eh?” I exclaimed, well knowing the reason. “Well,” I added, “I wish to see the manager.”

“I will inform him,” the clerk replied, and he went to the telephone. A minute later, after exchanging a few words in Spanish, he turned to me, saying:

“You will find the manager’s office on the first floor. If you take the lift the man will direct you, señor.”

A few minutes later I was seated in the office of an elderly bald-headed man, a typical hôtelier, courteous, smiling, and eager to hear any complaint that I might have to make.

At once I told him of my curious adventure of the previous night, and of the sudden flight of the mysterious stranger whom I had discovered in my room.

“That is certainly strange, sir,” he replied in English. “His excuse was a very ingenious one, to say the least. I think we ought to inform the police. Do you not agree?”

I told him of my discovery of the carpet pins, and asked his advice as to whom I might send them for chemical analysis.

At once he suggested Professor Vega, of the Princesa Hospital in the Calle Alberto Aguilera, adding:

“The Professor often dines here. If you wish, I will take you to him.”

So still leaving the three carpet pins upon the little glass tray I wrapped it in paper and together we went round to the hospital, where I was introduced to a tall, narrow-faced, grey-haired man in a long linen coat. To him I explained how I had found the pins on the carpet beside my bed, and asking whether he would submit them to examination.

He looked at them critically, first with the naked eye and afterwards by means of a large reading-glass. Then he grunted in dissatisfaction and promised that next day, or the day after, he would tell me the result of his analysis.

As we drove back to the hotel the manager remarked:

“It is a very curious affair, sir, to say the least. One does not scatter carpet pins about a bedroom, and particularly when the points are smeared with some mysterious substance. If they had been there before you retired to bed the chambermaid must certainly have seen them. She makes a round of the rooms each night at ten o’clock. Besides, the facts that the bolt had been tampered with, and also that the man who occupied 175 left so early and so hurriedly, are additionally suspicious. Yes,” he added, “I think we ought to see the police.”

With that object he took me at once to Señor Andrade, the Chief of Police, a short, stout, alert little man, who heard me with keen interest and seemed very puzzled.

“The intruder’s explanation was certainly a very clever one,” he remarked in French. “It is a pity you did not demand to see his friend, Pedro Espada. If you had, you would have discovered him to be nonexistent.”

“But he was so clever,” I answered. “He told me that at that hour he could not discover in which room his friend was really sleeping.”