Frank Froest - The Grell Mystery

Foyle acknowledged the introduction.

‘From the colonies, I suppose, Mr Maxwell? I suppose Eden has told you he’s just come over.’ Eden surveyed the detective with wide-open, innocent blue eyes in which there dwelt hurt reproach. ‘I hate to separate you, but I’ve got important business with him. Perhaps you’ll meet another time.’

‘Yes, you’ll excuse me now, old man,’ chimed in Eden blandly. ‘Call for me at the Palatial at eleven tomorrow, and we’ll make a day of it.’

Maxwell had no sooner accepted his dismissal than Foyle led the other over to his table. Eden walked with the manner of one uncertain what was about to happen.

‘It is all right, Mr Foyle,’ he protested eagerly. ‘It is all right . I haven’t touched him for a sou.’

Foyle began on the soup placidly.

‘You’re a joker, Jimmy,’ he smiled. ‘Don’t get uneasy. I’m not going to carry you inside. Only you’ll have to leave the Palatial tonight, Jimmy—tonight, do you understand? And if Maxwell turns up with a complaint against you there’ll be pretty bad trouble. You’ll be put out of temptation for good and all. There’s such a thing as preventive detention in this country now, you know.’

The Garden of Eden looked pained.

‘Truth, Mr Foyle, I haven’t done a thing,’ he declared earnestly. ‘I’m trying the straight game now.’

Heldon Foyle wagged his head.

‘And staying at the Palatial,’ he smiled. ‘Oh, Jimmy, Jimmy! I believe you, of course.’ And he went on with his soup.

Suddenly he looked up. ‘When did you last see Goldenburg?’ he demanded curtly. ‘No nonsense, mind, Jimmy.’

Eden’s face had cleared. ‘So that’s the lay, is it?’ he said with relief. ‘I saw the bills out for him, and I don’t mind helping you if I can, Mr Foyle. He was never what you’d call a proper pal, and I don’t bear any malice, though you’ve just done me out of a cool five hundred. That mug who’s just gone’—he jerked his head towards the door—‘was going to follow my tip and back a horse that won’t win tomorrow. That’s a bit hard, isn’t it, Mr Foyle?’

From his breast-pocket Foyle took a ten-pound note and slid it across the table. He followed Eden’s meaning.

‘Cough it up,’ he advised.

The Garden of Eden took the note and thrust it into his trousers pocket.

‘He was in Victoria Station, talking to a foreign-looking chap, on Wednesday night.’ A look of astonishment crossed his face while he spoke. ‘By the living jingo, there’s the very man he was talking to coming in now.’

Foyle folded his serviette neatly and rose.

‘Right, Jimmy. I’ll talk to you later. Go to the Yard and wait till I come,’ he said, and, walking swiftly across the room, thrust his arm through that of the new arrival.

‘You are the man who used to be Mr Grell’s valet,’ he said quietly in French. ‘I am a police officer, and you must come with me.’

THE man tried to jerk himself free, but the detective’s fingers closed tightly about his wrist.

‘There is no use making a scene, my man,’ he said, still speaking in French, his voice stern, but pitched in a low key. ‘You are Ivan something-or-other, and you know of the murder of your master. So come along.’

‘It’s a mistake,’ protested the other volubly in the same language. His words slurred into each other in his excitement. ‘I am not the man you take me for. I am Pierre Bazarre, a jeweller of Paris, and I have my credentials. I will not submit to this abominable outrage. I know nothing of M. Grell; you shall not arrest me—’

Heldon Foyle cut him short. He had, without the appearance of force, quietly forced his prisoner outside the restaurant and signalled to a passing taxicab.

‘I am not arresting you,’ he said, ignoring the protestations of the other. ‘I am going to detain you till you give a satisfactory explanation of your reason for leaving Mr Grell’s house on the night of the murder.’

They were on the edge of the pavement close to the cab. Ivan with a quick oath wheeled inward, and struck savagely at the superintendent’s face. Foyle’s grip did not relax. He merely lowered his head, seemingly without haste, and, as the man swung forward with the momentum of the blow, jabbed with his own free hand at his body. So neatly was it done that passers-by saw nothing but an apparently drunken man collapse on the pavement in spite of the endeavours of his friend to hold him up.

The whole breath had been knocked out of Ivan’s body by those two swift body-blows. Before he could recover, Foyle had lifted him bodily into the cab.

‘King Street,’ he said quietly to the driver, and sat down opposite to Ivan, alert and watchful.

‘Sorry if I hurt you,’ he apologised. ‘It will be all right in a minute. It has only upset your wind a little. That will pass off.’

Ivan, his hands pressed tightly to the pit of his stomach, groaned. Presently he straightened himself up, and Foyle, calmly ignoring the assault, produced a cigar-case.

‘Have a cigar? I’ve no doubt you’ll be able to make things all right when we get to the station. There’s nothing to worry about. You will just have a little talk with me, and as soon as one or two points are cleared up you’ll be able to go.’

The case was struck angrily aside. Foyle smiled, and although his whole body was taut in anticipation of any fresh attempt at violence, he quietly struck a match and lit one himself.

‘As you like,’ he said imperturbably. ‘They’re good cigars. I have them sent over to me by a friend direct from Havana.’

All the while he was speaking he was scrutinising the man who had been Grell’s valet with deliberate care. Ivan was sleek and well-groomed, with a dark face and prominent cheekbones that betrayed his Caucasian origin. The brows were drawn tightly in a surly frown; a heavy dark moustache hid the upper lip, and though the shoulders were sloping he was obviously a man of considerable physical strength.

Foyle felt that it was going to be no easy matter to win this man’s confidence. Yet he was determined to do so. Beyond the fact that he had vanished when the murder was discovered, there was nothing so far to suggest that he was the actual culprit. Certain it was, however, that he must have knowledge of matters which would prove valuable. If he would volunteer the information, well and good. The detective did not wish to have to question him, for such a course, however advisable it might appear, could be made to assume an ugly look in the hands of the astute counsel, should the man be charged with the crime. Where by French or American methods a statement might have been extracted by bullying or by cross-examination, here it had to be extracted by diplomacy if possible.

Sullen and silent, Ivan alighted from the cab as it drew up under the blue lamp outside King Street police station. He passed arm-in-arm with Foyle up the steps. With a nod to the uniformed inspector in the outer office, the superintendent led him into the offices set apart for the divisional detachment of the Criminal Investigation Department. A broad-shouldered man with side whiskers, who was writing at a desk, looked up as they entered.

‘Good morning, Mr Norman,’ said Foyle. ‘This gentleman wants to tell me something about the Grell case. Just give him a chair, will you, and send in a shorthand writer who understands French to take a statement.’

‘I shall make no statement,’ broke in the Russian angrily, speaking in French, but with a readiness that showed he was able to follow English. ‘It’s all a mistake—a mistake for which you will pay heavily.’

‘Ah! that’s just what I wish to get at. There seems to be a little confusion. Perhaps I have been over-zealous, but the fact is, Monsieur—er—Bazarre, you are wearing a false moustache, and that rather aroused my suspicions—see?’