The Mysterious Mr. Miller

“A fatal mistake,” Miller declared. “I wonder he didn’t get across to Greece. The police couldn’t have touched him there. He knew the law of extradition quite as well as you or I. To go to South America is simply running into the arms of the police.”

“I question whether he is in America,” the doctor said, examining deliberately the contents of another of the pigeon-holes. “The report may have been circulated by the police themselves – as reports so often are – to put the fugitive off his guard. No, I should think that he is more likely in Paris, or Vienna, or Berlin. He could reach either capital by the through train from Rome. He probably put on a suit of workman’s clothes and travelled third-class with a stick and a bundle. That’s the safest way to get out of the country – don’t you think so? We’ve both done it more than once,” he laughed.

There was something distinctly humorous to me in the owner of the Manor at Studland travelling as an Italian labourer among the unwashed third-class passengers and passing the guards at the frontier with his worldly belongings tied up in a dirty handkerchief.

And yet that is a course very often adopted by the international thief as the safest way in which to pass from one country to another.

“Gran Dio!” ejaculated Gavazzi a moment later, as he held a small packet open in his hand. “Money! Look!”

Both men bent eagerly, and I saw that the doctor held in his hand a thick packet of yellow bank-notes secured by an elastic band – thousand-franc notes they were, and there could not be less than fifty of them.

“What good fortune!” cried Miller. “It was worth doing after all.”

“I told you it was. This was his secret bank. Probably there’s more inside.”

In an instant the three men tore out the contents of the pigeon-holes and scattered them upon the floor in their eagerness to secure what the dead man had hidden there.

“Here’s another lot!” exclaimed the young man, holding up a second packet, while a few minutes later Miller himself discovered two fat packets, each note for one thousand francs. A fourth packet was discovered containing English twenty-pound notes and some German paper money.

Those were exciting moments. The men scrambled and snatched the packets from each other, tearing them open in their fierce eagerness to ascertain whether they contained notes. In the eyes of all three was that terrible lust for gold that impels men to great crimes, that fierce passion that renders men unconscious of their actions.

Time after time smaller packets were discovered, which they thrust into their pockets uncounted.

There was wealth there – wealth that would place all three of them beyond the necessity of those subterfuges by which they had previously lived – an ill-gotten hoard of bank-notes which I calculated to be of the value of many thousands of English pounds sterling.

And I was witness of their unexpected good fortune, for which the poor unfortunate man in charge had been foully done to death.

Miller suddenly discovered a large packet of thousand-franc notes in the back of the cupboard and pocketed them – a packet double the size of the first – whereupon a fierce quarrel instantly ensued.

Both the doctor and the young man declared that the money should be properly divided, while Miller flatly refused.

Hot words arose – quick accusations and recriminations, the men raising their voices all unconsciously, when of a sudden something entirely unexpected occurred.

The men were silent in an instant – silent in awe.

The clock, hitherto unnoticed by them, had stopped ticking.

Chapter Thirty Three

Certain Persons are Inquisitive

The half-open door through which I had been watching the men’s mysterious movements, and the discovery of the fugitive’s hidden wealth, suddenly closed of its own accord, with the heavy clang of iron.

Besides startling me, it left me in semi-darkness in the great salon.

I heard them rush frantically towards it, trying to open it, but their efforts were unavailing. Loud imprecations escaped them, for they believed that some person had imprisoned them. If they succeeded in escaping they would certainly discover me, therefore my position was one of extreme peril.

But I recollected the strange ticking of that clock which had commenced when the secret cupboard had been opened. The ticking had now ceased, therefore the door had closed automatically upon the intruders. By some clever contrivance Nardini had connected his secret hiding-place with the door that had been strengthened and lined with steel, enamelled white to match the wood-work of the salon. By a clockwork arrangement the door would evidently close upon the inquisitive person who opened the cupboard at a certain time afterwards.

When the little clock standing upon the pearl-inlaid cabinet had suddenly broken the silence by ticking it had attracted my attention, but I quickly forgot it in watching the trio so narrowly. The study window was evidently strongly barred, as were all the windows of the ground floor of the villa, the bars being built into the wall outside the house in such a manner that they could only be filed through, an operation which would take considerable time even with proper tools.

They hammered upon the door and threw their weight upon it, but it did not budge. Evidently by the same mechanical contrivance several strong steel bolts had been shot into their sockets.

The trio at the very moment of their sudden acquisition of Nardini’s dishonestly obtained wealth had been entrapped.

“We’re discovered!” I heard Miller cry in English.

“Whoever has found us has locked us in!”

It never occurred to them that the cupboard and the door were connected, or that Nardini had invented such an ingenious contrivance in order to entrap any thief who might discover his secret.

“We must get out of this as quickly as possible!” Gavazzi exclaimed breathlessly. “Let’s make the division of the money afterwards.”

“The window!” suggested the younger man, but a rapid examination proved it to be too strongly barred.

I heard them within the room consulting with each other as to what could be done, and was amused at their chagrin, having discovered the dead man’s hoard only to be so unexpectedly imprisoned with the wealth upon them.

The two Italians showered fierce imprecations upon whoever had bolted them in, and vowed that the police should never take them alive. They knew, too well, the serious charge they would have to face, for they knew that the body of the detective left in charge would be discovered behind the side door.

A heavy piece of furniture was brought to play upon the study door, but the sound made as they battered with it revealed to them that they were endeavouring to break down iron.

“Hush!” cried Miller suddenly. “We mustn’t make a noise like that. There are probably contadini living in the vicinity, and it will awaken them.”

“Bah!” responded the doctor. “They’ll only believe that it’s a ghost. Here the contadini are most superstitious.”

“But the carabinieri are not,” remarked the young accomplice apprehensively. “My own idea is that we’ve been followed. I noticed a man in a dark suit looking very hard at us when we left the train.”

“What kind of man?” the doctor inquired quickly.

“Looked like an Inglese signore, rather tall, about thirty, and wore a dark suit.”

“Why in the name of Fate didn’t you mention it to us at the time?” cried Miller. “An Inglese! Who could he possibly be? Have you ever seen him before?”

“Never.”

“Then he may have followed us here and alarmed the carabinieri!” gasped the doctor. “We must escape – before they arrest us!”

I saw that the young thief had noticed me when I had followed them out into the darkness from the station at Tivoli. He would therefore recognise me if we met again.

They would, no doubt, make a desperate attempt at escape. Yet should I raise the alarm and call the police? Was it policy on my part to do so? If Lucie’s father were arrested, Lucie herself must surely be implicated, and perhaps through Gordon-Wright my own dear love might also find herself in the criminal’s dock.

The mystery had grown so complicated and so inexplicable that I feared to take any step towards the denunciation of the thieves.

My only policy was to wait and to watch.

I recollected Ella’s appeal to me to remain silent concerning the scoundrel under whose banal thrall she had so mysteriously fallen, and I feared that if I made my statement it might lead to the fellow’s arrest.

What, I wondered, was the true explication of the mystery of the unknown girl being found in that room wherein the three thieves were entrapped? Who was she? What did Lucie know concerning her?