IV.  —  The Red Hand Draws Blank

SIR RALPH felt the whiz of bullets as they passed him, heard the smash of the picture they struck on the opposite wall, and jumped back, white and shaking. Tillizini reached out his hand and thrust the girl back to cover with one motion.

In an instant he was down on his knees, crawling quickly to the window. He reached up his hands, threw up the sash, and leant out suddenly. For a second he stood thus, and then a jet of flame leapt from his hand, and they were deafened with the report of his Browning. Again he fired, and waited. Then he turned, and came back to them, a beatific smile illuminating his face.

"You were saying," he said calmly, "that these things do not happen in England?"

His voice was even and unshaken. The hand that raised a spotless white handkerchief to wipe a streak of blood from his forehead, did not tremble.

"What happened?" asked Sir Ralph, in agitation. "It must have been a poacher or something. Those beggars hate me!"

"Poachers do not use Mauser pistols," said Tillizini quietly. "If you take the trouble to dig out the bullets from your wall, which I am afraid is somewhat damaged, you will discover that they bear no resemblance whatever to the pellets which, I understand, filled the cartridges of your friends. No," he smiled, "those shots were not intended for you, Sir Ralph. They were very much intended for me."

He looked wistfully out of the window.

"I'm afraid I didn't hit him," he said. "I saw him fairly distinctly as he made his way through the trees."

"Who was it?" asked Sir Ralph anxiously.

Tillizini looked at him with an expression of slyness.

"Who was it?" he answered, deliberately. "I think it was the Italian who sent William Mansingham to your house to receive a packet."

"But from whom?" asked Sir Ralph.

"That we shall know some day," replied the other, evasively.

*      *      *      *      *

Sir Ralph went down to the railway station to meet Tillizini and to see him off. He was consumed with curiosity as to the result of the interview which he had granted the detective.

Whether he had the right of instructing the warders of the local gaol to admit Tillizini was a moot point; but since the Italian had such extraordinarily wide powers deputed to him by the Home Office, it was probable that the interview would have taken place even without Sir Ralph's permission.

The Chairman had hinted that it would be graceful, if not decent, for Tillizini to see the prisoner in his presence, but the Italian had artistically overlooked the suggestion.

It was five minutes before the train left that Tillizini sprang out of the fly which brought him to the station entrance. He was smoking a long, thin cigar, and was, as Sir Ralph judged, tremendously pleased with himself, for between his clenched teeth he hummed a little tune as he strode through the booking-hall on to the platform.

"Well?" asked the Chairman, curiously, "what had our friend to say for himself?"

"Nothing that you do not know," replied the other, brightly. "He merely repeated the story that he told in the dock about my mysterious fellow-countryman. He gave me one or two details, which were more interesting to me than they would be to you."

"Such as?" suggested Sir Ralph.

"Well," Tillizini hesitated. "He told me that his instructor had informed him that the packet would be small enough to put in his waistcoat pocket."

Sir Ralph smiled sarcastically.

"There are a dozen objects in my collection which might be carried in a man's waistcoat pocket. No!" he corrected himself, "there are at least fifty. By the way," he said suddenly, "you've never asked to see my collection."

Tillizini shook his head vigorously, amusement in his eyes.

"That would be unnecessary," he said. "I know every article you have, Sir Ralph, its size, its origin, almost the price you paid for it."

Sir Ralph turned to him in surprise.

"But how?" he asked wonderingly. "I have only my private catalogue, and no copy exists outside my house."

"Very good," said Tillizini. "Let me enumerate them."

He told them off on his hands, finger by finger.

"Number 1, an Egyptian locket from the Calliciti collection — gold, studded with uncut rubies — value, £420. Number 2, a plaque of Tanagra ware, rather an unusual specimen in a frame of soft gold, inscribed with Syrian mottoes. Number 3, a crystal medallion, taken by Napoleon from Naples, on the inverse side a bust of Beatrice D'Este, on the reverse side Il Moro, the Duke of Milan, value — by the way, I didn't give you the previous value because I don't know it — £600. Number 4, a Venetian charm in the shape of a harp — "

"But," gasped Sir Ralph, "these facts, regarding my collection are only known to me.

"They are also known to me," said the other.

The train had come in as they were speaking. Tillizini walked towards an empty carriage, and entered it. He closed the door behind him, and leant out of the window.

"There are many things to be learnt, and this is not the least of them," he said. "Between the man with the secret, and the man who knows that secret, there are intermediaries who have surprised the first and informed the second."

Sir Ralph was puzzling this out when the train drew out of the station, and its tail lights vanished through the tunnel which penetrates Burboro' Hill.

Left to himself, Tillizini locked both doors and pulled down all the blinds of his carriage. He had no doubt as to the sinister intentions of the man or men who had dogged his footsteps so persistently since he had left London. If he was to be killed, he decided that it should not be by a shot fired by a man from the footboard.

It was a fast train from Burboro' to London, and the first stop would be at London Bridge. He took the central seat of the carriage, put his feet up upon the opposite cushions, laid his Browning pistol on the seat beside him, and composed himself to read. He had half a dozen London papers in the satchel which was his inseparable companion.

One of these he had systematically exhausted on the journey down; he now turned his attention to another. His scrutiny was concentrated upon the advertisement columns. He did not bother with the agonies, because he knew that no up-to-date criminal would employ such method of communication.

One by one he examined the prosaic announcements under the heading "Domestic Servants Wanted." He reached the end without discovering anything exciting. He laid the paper down and took up another.

Half-way down the "Domestic Wants" column his eye was arrested by a notice. To the ordinary reader it was the commonplace requirement of an average housewife. It ran:—

"Cook-General; Italian cooking preferred. Four in family. Fridays; not Thursdays as previously announced. State amount willing to give."

The address was an advertising agency in the City. He read it again; took a little penknife from his waistcoat pocket, and carefully cut it from the paper.

There were many peculiarities about that announcement. There was a certain egotism in the "Fridays, not Thursdays as previously announced," which was unusual in this type of advertisement. Who cared whether it was Thursday or Friday that had been previously given, presumably, as the evening "out"?

But the glaring error in the advertisement lay in the last paragraph. The average advertiser would be more anxious to know what wages the newcomer would require, and would most certainly never suggest that the "Cook-General" whose services were sought, should contribute, in addition to her labour, anything in the nature of payment for the privilege."

Tillizini looked up at the roof of the carriage in thought. To-day was Monday. Something had been arranged for Thursday. It had been postponed till the following day. For that something a price was to be paid, possibly an advance on the original price agreed upon was demanded. The advertiser would hardly undertake to perform the service without some previous agreement as to price.

He did not in any way associate the announcement with the recent events at Highlawn; they were but part of the big game which was being played. The emissaries of that terrible society whose machinations he had set himself to frustrate were no doubt travelling by the same train. He was so used to this espionage that he ignored it, without despising it. He was ever prepared for the move, inevitable as it seemed to him, which would be made against his life and against his security.

It was too much to expect that the "Red Hand" would forgive him the work he had accomplished in America. He had cleared the United States from the greatest scourge of modern times.

It was no fault of his that they had taken advantage of the lax emigration laws of England to settle in the Metropolis.

He replaced the papers in his satchel, and just before the train ran into London Bridge he let up the spring blinds of the compartment. It was dark, and wet, and miserable. He made no attempt to alight at the station. It was not a safe place, as he knew by experience, for a threatened man to end his journey.

There were dark tunnels which led to the main entrance of the station — tunnels in which a man might be done to death, if by chance he were the only passenger negotiating the exit; and no one would be any the wiser for five minutes or so, sufficient time, that, to allow these professional murderers to escape.

Outside Waterloo he pulled the blinds down again. He did these things automatically, without any fear. He took the same precaution as the everyday citizen takes in crossing the road. He looked from left to right before crossing this dangerous highway of his.

Flush with the railway bridge which crosses the river to Charing Cross station is a footpath, Old Hungerford footbridge.

Three men were waiting there at intervals that wet and blusterous night to watch the Burboro' train come in. They saw it from a position which enabled them, had the opportunity presented, of shooting into the carriage.

Tillizini did not know this, but he could guess it. It was not an unlikely contingency.

On the crowded station of Charing Cross he was safe enough. Moreover, there were two men, who had spent the afternoon unostentatiously wandering about the station, who picked him up as he came through the barrier.

He gave one of them a little nod, which none but the keenest observer would have noticed.

The two Scotland Yard men, whose duty it was to shadow him in London, walked closely behind him, and remained upon the pavement outside until he had entered the waiting electric brougham.