The Pleasure Cruise Mystery (21 page)

“Great Scott! The very woman I've been looking for!” exclaimed Vereker, jumping from his easy chair and bringing his hand down on the table with a crash.

“I didn't think you were that soft, Mr. Vereker,” said the inspector, with a sly twinkle in his eye.

“No, no, Heather! She's the woman in the case!” stammered Vereker in his eagerness.

“So I gathered from your yarn this evening. She was living about a year ago at Percy Street, near Victoria Station. She must have come down a bit in the world. You'll understand my meaning. Rum how a big railway station has a subtle connection with the oldest trade in the female world, but sellable stuff must find a market. Fish go to Billingsgate; meat to Smithfield, and so on. Terrible but true!”

“Well I'm damned!” interrupted Vereker. “I must get a move on and start the hunt from Percy Street. This is getting exciting, Heather.”

“Wait a jiff, Mr. Vereker. My best bit of news I've kept to the last. Miss Maureen O'Connor has just been reported to the police as missing from a flat in Sussex Gardens. I found she had a very sumptuous place there. Her stock had evidently boomed of late and, apart from possessing a considerable bank balance, a nice car and a staff of servants, she left a considerable amount of jewellery in her flat. Her maid says that for some time she has been very excitable and queer in her actions. One day she said she was going into the country for a rest and, packing her bag, set out alone. From that moment she vanished and hasn't been heard of since. The maid reported the matter to the local police, and now the affair is in our hands. We've been trying to trace her whereabouts. So far we've been unsuccessful. Now, Mr. Vereker, I've given you a start and you've got to put a jerk into it. Get busy!”

“Heather, this is great. The annoying bits of my puzzle are beginning to tumble into position.”

“I had an idea I'd gathered the vital pieces together and put them into your hands. What are you going to do next?”

“I'm going to start on a painting holiday tomorrow, Heather. Colvin has put Firle House, his place in Sussex, at my disposal. I intend to make myself comfortable there until he returns. Those Sussex Downs are the very devil to paint. Serene, imperturbably serene, they whisper to you of the slowly unfolding destiny of man, of his past, his fretful, uncertain, tentative struggle against the stubborn resistance of Nature—of themselves in fact. It's only a murmurous whisper, hardly audible when a soft sou'wester sweeps and sighs in summer over their suavely rounded backs. I've heard that voice; its calm, persuasive tones give me strength and courage in moments of despair. I begin to experience some of their philosophical indifference to the nervous agitation of modern life. What do money and love and fame and wars matter? You've only to see a Baby Austin climbing one of their slopes to gather their attitude to the cosmos. All that's left to us is beauty, and beauty is all… beauty is…”

“Did you get that nine gallon of Burton in as I instructed you, Mr. Vereker?” asked Heather after coughing noisily.

“Yes. Albert has been taking care of it. He says it's in nice condition now.”

“Albert'll be in a nice condition if we leave him alone with it much longer. I'll sample it before I go.”

Heather rose from his chair, pressed the electric bell at his side and a few minutes later Albert appeared with a tray on which were a foaming quart jug and two pewter tankards.

“By jingo, Albert, you're a thought reader!” exclaimed Heather on his entry.

“Middlin good guesser, sir, that's all. Nice drop of Button that, if I may take the liberty of sayin' so. Reminds me o' mother's milk with a flavour of 'oney. It's a good companion to any lonesome soul.”

“You've sampled it, I'll bet,” replied Heather, smiling.

“Just a heggcupful now and then to see 'ow it was getting on, sir. You can't muzzle the hox as treads the corn. It's as near perfection now as our young Prince of Wales. God bless 'im!”

With this solemn benediction Albert left the room, and Heather, filling his tankard, emptied it at a draught.

“I feel a better man already,” he breathed noisily and, fumbling in his pocket, produced a photograph and handed it to Vereker. “That's Miss Maureen O'Connor, a recent portrait,” he added.

Vereker took the print and scrutinised it eagerly for some seconds. He was bubbling over with excitement.

“She's a captivating creature,” he remarked.

“Now, now, come off the captivation business, Mr. Vereker. You're not interested in her that way. The vital question is, is she like her sisters, Beryl and Constance?”

“They're all very much alike,” replied Vereker, smiling.

“I thought so,” continued Heather and, rising from his chair, prepared to leave. “Before you go down to Firle House and start listening to what the Sussex Downs whisper about beauty, I would run round to Sussex Gardens and listen to what Miss O'Connor's maid has to say. You're not a police officer, and though I'm a bit of a success with women I think you'd get more out of her than I did.”

“Not a bad idea, Heather. Did she give you the frosty paw?”

“No, no,” said Heather, glancing at himself in a mirror and twirling his moustaches, “but the words ‘Scotland Yard' make a girl forget a chap's handsome and human. You'd better be Miss O'Connor's long lost brother or cousin or faithful lover. Perhaps a faithful lover who has been jilted would be best. Romance is a good worm when you're fishing for information. Most girls snap at it without thinking about barbed hooks and all that.”

“Detection's a heartless game at times, Heather,” remarked Vereker reflectively.

“Yes, I sometimes go home and sob myself to sleep thinking what a cruel, cruel man I am. Burglars and murderers don't know that side of my nature or they'd like me better. Perhaps they weep bitterly themselves when they think how badly they treat me. Life's a rum show without the Sussex Downs whispering about it and letting the cat out of the bag, Mr. Vereker.”

“I'll run round to Sussex Gardens tomorrow, Heather, and if I find out anything important I'll ring you up. Then I'll go down to Firle House.”

“Good. Keep in touch with me. I like to give a trier like yourself a helping hand. When I'm with you I always feel like a great painter encouraging a promising young pupil in a difficult career.”

With these words, spoken with inimitable smugness, Heather took his leave, and Vereker, picking up the photograph of Maureen O'Connor from the table where he had temporarily laid it, looked at it very carefully and then slipped it into his pocket book.

“Came the dawn!” he soliloquised with a smile and prepared to turn in.

I

You are Miss Maureen O'Connor's maid?” asked Vereker as he stood on the threshold of Maureen's flat in Sussex Gardens.

“Yes, sir, but Miss O'Connor's not at home,” replied the girl, looking at her visitor with anxiety and suspicion in her glance.

“I'm quite aware of that. That's just why I called,” replied Vereker.

“Are you from Scotland Yard, sir?” came the question.

“God forbid. I'm a friend, a great friend, of Miss O'Connor's. My name is Vereker. I was informed by Scotland Yard that she was missing. How they found out my address I don't know, unless some one here told them.”

“Nobody here told them as far as I know.”

“Strange how they discover things at Scotland Yard. May I come in? I should like to have a private talk with you, Miss…”

“Marchant,” supplied the maid.

“Miss Marchant,” concluded Vereker, and was promptly shown into a beautifully furnished sitting-room.

“Would you mind closing the door, Miss Marchant?” asked Vereker when he had taken a seat. “I want to talk very confidentially to you.”

Miss Marchant, with some show of apprehension, closed the door and took a seat facing her caller.

“Are you a relative of Miss O'Connor's?” asked the maid when she had come to the conclusion that Vereker was not a police official.

“No, I am no relation at all. I heard she was missing, and as I'm—well, shall I say deeply interested in Maureen, I came to see if I could get any information at all about her.”

Miss Marchant, evidently from the country and gifted with that ingenuous shrewdness which is a peculiar trait of those who have lived a rural life, at once jumped to conclusions on Vereker's use of her mistress's Christian name. She promptly assumed that it hinted at some affair of the heart and that this Mr. Vereker, clever as he might think himself, was unable to conceal it from her. He was without doubt one of Miss O'Connor's admirers, and from the solemnity of his face probably one whose affection was not adequately returned. She had seen that hungry look before. There were several others in the same sad plight. She knew their general symptoms and had sympathised with them on many occasions.

“I'm terribly sorry to hear of her disappearance like this. I can't make it out. Was she very unhappy?” asked Vereker, instilling a world of sadness into his voice.

“Of late she's been acting very queer, sir. I didn't know what to make of her.”

“Poor Maureen! A man in the case as usual!” remarked Vereker, his whole bearing drooping with grief.

“Two,” admitted Miss Marchant, shaking her head at the admission. “I told her no good would come of one of them. I never liked the look of him, and she seemed afraid of him, like a rabbit with a stoat. Whenever he came to the flat she was all at sixes and sevens, and he nearly always bullied her and left her in tears.”

“I think I know the man by sight. Dark fellow,” essayed Vereker.

“Yes, that's him. Dark, with flashing eyes. Very handsome, but he looked wicked—one of Satan's own. She called him Mig or Miggie. I don't know his surname, but it sounded something like ‘dice'. He was a foreigner. The other was a real gentleman; always remembered to leave me something. His name was Mesado. Though I don't hold with foreigners and usually can't abide them, I must say I liked him. He was kind and thoughtful and was very good to Miss O'Connor until they quarrelled over something or other and he went away and left her.”

“I know them both,” said Vereker, “especially Mr. Dias. He's a scoundrel if I'm any judge of character. Was the quarrel with Mr. Mesado the cause of Maureen suddenly going away and not returning?”

“I couldn't say exactly. Miss O'Connor didn't tell me all about her private affairs, or bedroom secrets as she always called them, but I gathered that Mr. Mesado warned her to have nothing to do with Mr. Mig. She must have refused, and so Mr. Mesado never called again.

“Jealousy, I suppose?” remarked Vereker reflectively.

“Mebbe, but Mr. Mesado always treated her more like an uncle than er—you know. He used to bring her flowers and chocolates and all that sort of thing and always behaved most polite. She told me he was a relation, a distant relation.”

“He's her brother-in-law,” said Vereker.

“Well I never! She never let on about that. Very close in some things she is,” exclaimed Miss Marchant with unconcealed surprise.

“Did Mr. Mesado help her financially?” asked Vereker.

“He was always making her presents and paying off her debts. I used to tell her it wouldn't last and that she ought to put most of it by, but she wouldn't listen to me. As for Mr. Mig, he used to sponge on her for everything—money, clothes, food—fairly bled her white. At last Mr. Mesado refused to help her any more until she got rid of Mr. Mig.”

“Was Mr. Dias the cause of their final quarrel?” asked Vereker.

“Indirectly, I should say.”

“Looks very much as if Mr. Mesado was in love with Miss Maureen,” remarked Vereker.

“Love or no love, I advised her to stick to Mr. Mesado. He had the money and was real generous. It's all very well talking about love, but you can't quarrel with your bread and butter. What's the use of being in love with a sponger without a bean?”

“Did Mr. Mesado give her a regular allowance as well as presents?”

“Oh, yes, a thousand a year, bought her a lovely car and paid the rent of her flat here. He was a fairy godfather, so to speak. She was a fool not to get rid of Mr. Mig. He was no earthly good to her, but I know she was very fond of him. Used to sit on his knee and make a fuss of him and call him ‘Mig darling'. Some women have no sense when they get sweet on a man. She fair went crackers on Mig!”

“Did Mr. Mig, as you call him, know Mr. Mesado before the latter called on Maureen?”

“Oh, yes, he brought him here. They had evidently become acquainted with one another when they were in the Argentine. They often spoke of a Miss Penteado and others as their mutual friends.”

“I see,” said Vereker, lost in thought. It was now clear to him that Dias had ferreted out the Diss family history and become acquainted with Miss Maureen O'Connor with a very definite purpose.

“When exactly did Miss Maureen leave here?” he asked.

“On Friday the 23rd of March. She said she was fed up with London and all lovers and was going into the country for a week-end, but I'm sure that Mr. Mig was at the back of her going. I heard him telling her that she must go or he would finish with her. I think he wanted her to make it up with Mr. Mesado because he found the money getting tight.”

“Did she give you any idea where she was going?” asked Vereker, deeply interested.

“Not definitely. She simply said she was going into the country, somewhere in Sussex, for the week-end.”

“Take much luggage with her?”

“Only just what she would need. A tweed costume which she was wearing, an evening dress, dress shoes and a few other things she would need. She left all her jewellery here in my charge except a very valuable diamond necklace.”

“I remember that necklace. Cinnamon and white diamonds.”