John Creasey - Meet The Baron

Lady Mary had obviously exerted all her influence to get the doctor into the house quickly, for Mannering had only just finished bathing the wound when someone tapped softly at the door. He hurried across the room as Lady Mary called out: “I’m here, John.”

He opened the door, to see Lady Mary waiting with a tall grey-faced man he had seen somewhere before. The doctor hurried into the room as Mannering pointed towards the wounded man.

“Is he . . .” began Lady Mary again.

“He’ll be all right,” said Mannering, and he managed a smile that was not wholly forced. His relief at the escape the younger man had had was very real, and he dared hardly think of the effect Long’s death would have had on him. He felt sick as he realised that the theft of the Overndon pearls had nearly resulted in the American’s suicide.

“You’re sure?” asked Lady Mary, and Mannering saw that she was looking very old and very weary.

“Quite sure,” he said, pulling a chair towards her. “But sit down.”

She smiled at him as she obeyed gladly enough.

“I often wish,” she said, “you’d married into the family, John.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” countered Mannering.

As he spoke he was thinking that if he had done, if Marie Overndon had reacted differently when he had told her that he had been worth a thousand a year, neither more nor less, this wouldn’t have happened. But it might have been worse, thank God! That was the thought that echoed time and time again through his mind.

“Who’s the doctor?” he asked.

“Saunders,” said Lady Mary. “As reliable as they’re made, my dear. There won’t be any gossip about it, that’s certain . . .”

She broke off as Saunders turned round from his patient.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” he said, with a quick smile. “Slight concussion, Lady Mary, and the wound, but nothing to worry about.” He looked at Mannering somewhat oddly. “There’s a rather nasty bruise on his shoulder,” he added.

Mannering did not speak, but he shrugged his shoulders.

The bruise, he knew, had been caused by the chair — and how he blessed it!

The doctor smiled a little, but made no comment.

“I’ll get him to bed,” said Lady Mary, as if she were speaking of a child. “Could you find me a nurse, doctor?”

Saunders promised that he would, and went off quickly.

When Mannering left Gerry’s room half an hour later the American was still unconscious, but his breathing was better. It was certain that he would regain consciousness very soon. A nurse, sent round by Saunders, had taken charge, and Mannering was not sorry to have a rest. He felt utterly weary and spent from the reaction.

Lady Mary watched him pouring out a stiff peg of whisky, and she suggested surprisingly — for she rarely touched spirits — that she should have a tot herself. Lady Mary was continually saying and doing things that were unexpected, and the manner of her request made him smile.

She sipped the drink gingerly, but pronounced it welcome. Then she smiled at him.

“What made you come along?” she demanded.

Mannering managed to laugh.

“I’d seen Gerry earlier this afternoon,” he said, “and I’d heard that the police were going to question him. It struck me that he was in a pretty bad way, and I felt anxious.”

“Blast those bloody pearls!” said Lady Mary very suddenly.

Mannering was so completely taken aback that he could only stare. Lady Mary gave a rather grim little chuckle.

“It’s surprising,” she said, “what some of us old ones are capable of, young man. I said it, and I meant it. Those pearls started the trouble, and if Emma Kenton had had more sense than to spend five thousand silly pounds on a paltry necklace this wouldn’t have happened.”

“But there were other things there,” protested Mannering.

“Don’t try and make me logical,” snapped Lady Mary. She smiled, robbing her words of any offence. “And don’t forget, young man, that she’s talked for weeks about these pearls. Anyone has had ample opportunity to get dummies made . . .”

“You seem to know the whole story,” said Mannering easily. Inwardly he was remarking on the publicity that Lady Kenton had given to the pearls. If Bristow wanted something else to heighten his suspicions of the Dowager here it was.

“I made George talk,” said Lady Mary, with a faint smile. “He’s a dear, is George, but he couldn’t keep a secret from anyone with two eyes in his head. It’s a nasty business, but it won’t hurt Marie, and it might do Emma a bit of good.”

Lady Kenton, thought Mannering, wasn’t very popular. He lit a cigarette, and a few moments later refused Lady Mary’s offer to stay for a day or two.

“I’ll wait until the Colonel gets back,” he said, “in case you’re feeling jumpy . . .”

“Jumpy?” snapped Lady Mary. “What have I got to feel jumpy about? Don’t talk nonsense, John! But I’d like you to stay.”

Mannering smiled to himself at her change of front. The next half-hour passed quickly, but he was glad when Belton and Wagnall returned, and when their congratulations on his rescue were over. The only remark which interested him, from those two gentlemen, was Wagnall’s: “But I wish I knew why he had those dummies, all the same.”

So did Mannering. He felt uneasy about the dummy pearls, and he puzzled over them for some time.

And then he reminded himself of the jolt the police would get on the following morning, and he smiled.

Gretham Street, Chelsea, where Detective-Inspector Bristow lived with his wife and family, looked very much the same that morning — the morning following Gerry Long’s unsuccessful attempt to commit suicide — as it did on every other morning. The other thirty-seven housewives dispatched their husbands to their daily tasks, and only the Bristow household continued to slumber.

Bristow had been working very late on the previous night, and he had persuaded his wife to forget the alarm-clock. It was nearly half-past eight when the detective turned over in bed, gazed dreamily out of the window, saw his wife sleeping very soundly, smiled, pressed his lips against her hair without disturbing her, and then crept very gently out of bed.

He was a very happy man in his home-life, and nothing pleased him more than to get his wife an early cup of tea without first waking her. He enjoyed himself so much that morning that he had taken the tea upstairs and enjoined his daughter to wake up — his two sons, at that time, were holidaying in North Wales — before looking at the paper.

When he did look he just stared. He saw nothing but the printed blur. He could hardly believe his eyes. Things like this didn’t happen. They couldn’t!

But this had.

Bristow lit a cigarette with a hand which trembled in spite of his efforts to control it, and not until he had drawn at it several times did he trust himself to read farther than the headlines. For the headlines — due to the fact that news was scarce and that there had been no real sensation for several weeks — were sprawled right across the front-page in heavy black letters:

THIEF CHALLENGES SCOTLAND YARD WHO IS THE BARON?

The Baron! Bristow muttered the name to himself a dozen times. The Baron! The name that had been on his tongue for months past, the elusive and, until that morning, secretive and comparatively unknown name of the thief who had started with the Dowager Countess of Kenton’s brooch and who had continued with a dozen or more thefts, completely hoodwinking the police every time, was now in black and white in front of him.

The Baron . . .

Bristow swore as he had rarely sworn in his life.

As he read the story he scowled. He was still inclined to think that he was dreaming, that this thing couldn’t be true, but the facts were there in front of him.