Chapter XXII: A Council of War

Captain Burgoyne went away from his little supper-party with feelings which yielded him anything but pleasure. Blair’s third notion, as he called it, had worked out--just as Blair had believed it would work out. There was now no doubt whatever as to the actual thief of the diamond necklace--Mrs. Walsingham had fallen into the trap so cunningly set for her as easily and completely as her worst enemy could have wished. She had become possessed of the paste imitation; she had worn the real article. And this was the woman to whom young Dick, generous, impetuous, unsuspecting, woefully ignorant of the world and its wickedness, had plighted himself in the most serious obligation which life knows! It was dreadful, it was unspeakable, it was--Burgoyne could find no words in which to express what he felt.

“But, by God, it must not and shall not be!” he said, half-aloud, as he tramped steadily up St. James’s Street, having walked homewards to cool his head and to think. “The youngster shall be got out of the hands of that woman and that man if I spend my last penny in effecting his release. But--how’s it to be done?”

That question was still agitating his mind when he, Blair, and Frances Leverton met next morning at the flat in Acacia Mansions. He listened in silence while Blair gave Frances a crisp and clear account of the happenings of the previous evening--how that Mrs. Walsingham had appeared at the theatre in a necklace; how that at supper she had been induced to take it off and to let him examine it as a historical curiosity; how that he, an expert in precious stones, had known at once that it was formed of genuine and valuable diamonds. The case, said Blair, was plain as plain could be: the real necklace had been in her possession when Richard Shrewsbury bought the imitation one, and, having both at her command, she had appeared in the real one, and had, all unconsciously, proclaimed her guilt to Burgoyne and himself.

“And the whole question now, Ralph,” concluded Blair, turning from Frances to Burgoyne, “is--what are you going to do?”

“Save the boy!” snapped out Burgoyne. “Save the boy!”

“Just so,” agreed Blair. “That’s the end in view, but what about the means? You can prosecute this woman if you choose--it will make a fine and an interesting story to tell in a criminal court. The ins and outs may seem a little involved and intricate, but that will add to the fascination, and give the newspapers some excellent copy. But--your young friend is so impulsive, and so quixotic, and so generous of heart, and the woman evidently has so much power over him that the probability is that at the first note of danger she would turn to him, claim his protection, and force him into an immediate marriage. And that is what you want to prevent at all costs.”

“Of course!” said Burgoyne. “All that I want is to save the boy. Hang the necklace, and hang prosecuting the woman!--though I think she ought to be put out of the way of doing these things. What I want is to get that youngster out of the clutches of those two. Isn’t--isn’t there some way by which we could do it quietly, but very thoroughly?”

Blair looked at Frances, who had been listening to everything with quiet but concentrated attention.

“Well,” he said. “We’ve certainly got a hold on the woman. We’re in this position--we can go to her and say, ‘Now, my good lady, we know and we can prove who stole Captain Burgoyne’s necklace from the late Mr. Leverton’s safe--you did! Unless you agree to drop Mr. Richard Shrewsbury, we shall call in the police.’ That much we can do as regards her--what attention she would give to our threat I don’t know. I think she might show fight, or, at any rate, want to bargain. But as regards Carsdale, which case is, in certain respects, the more serious of the two, seeing that he has full command of the youngster’s money, the matter is different. We--that is, you and I, Burgoyne--know nothing against Carsdale to give us any hold on him. Now, if Miss Leverton, as I shrewdly suspect, has anything against him, has any hold on him----”

He paused and looked narrowly at Frances. And Frances turned away and looked out of the window by her desk.

“If it is really necessary,” she said after a pause of silence, “if it is really necessary to do something to--to save Mr. Shrewsbury, I have, or I could have, a hold on Carsdale. I did not mention it to you before, but I have been slowly going through my father’s papers, and at last, with some difficulty, I have found out--something. Something that is--well, quite sufficient. He robbed my father.”

Blair uttered a sharp exclamation.

“Ah! You have proof of that?” he said.

“So much proof,” replied Frances, “that Mr. Winch has advised me to prosecute him.”

“Mr. Winch knows all the facts?” asked Blair.

“He has known them since yesterday afternoon,” Frances answered. “I was not certain of them myself until yesterday morning--as soon as I was certain, I consulted Mr. Winch, who, it seems, had had some notion of the truth.”

“And you have decided upon--what?” said Blair.

Frances shook her head.

“Upon--nothing,” she replied. “Nothing--until I had seen you. And--if I am to be frank with you--my own personal feeling is that if I alone were concerned, I should do nothing. If you really want to know, I do not wish to have my father’s name brought up. He is dead, and it would do no good to prosecute Carsdale, and--if it were left to me--I should let the whole matter drop. But----”

She paused, and the two men, watching her narrowly, saw that she felt more than an ordinary diffidence in saying what was in her mind.

“I think we know what you mean, Miss Leverton,” said Blair. “Isn’t it that if your hold over Carsdale could be potential in saving Mr. Shrewsbury from him you wouldn’t feel justified in refusing to let him know positively that you have that hold?”

Burgoyne suddenly started into voice and activity.

“Yes, but look here, Blair, Miss Leverton can’t go and say to this fellow, ‘Give up interfering with young Shrewsbury, or I’ll hand you over to the police!’” he said. “Of course she can’t. The thing’s impossible. He’d say at once, ‘What concern is it of yours?’ No, no--that won’t do.”

Frances thanked him with a look for putting her own thoughts into words. But Blair smiled quietly.

“My dear Ralph,” he said. “I hadn’t the slightest intention of asking Miss Leverton to go to Carsdale in order to deliver any such ultimatum. You have got to remember that, up to now, so far as we know, so far as we believe, Carsdale’s relations with your young friend are strictly sound and honourable, though we have a firm conviction that they will not continue to be so. No--I was not thinking of asking Miss Leverton to do any such thing. But there is a person who might put matters to Carsdale plainly and unmistakably.”

“Who’s that?” asked Burgoyne, uneasily. “You don’t mean myself?”

“Not I!” laughed Blair. “I mean Mr. Winch. Mr. Winch is a solicitor, Mr. Winch is a co-executor under the will of the late Mr. Barclay Leverton. Mr. Winch, in going into the affairs of the late Mr. Leverton, has discovered that Mr. Leverton was defrauded by Carsdale--am I justified in saying that?” he added, turning to Frances.

“Mr. Winch called it fraud,” she answered. “Yes--fraud.”

“Very good,” said Blair. “Then Mr. Winch is in a position--the strongest possible position--to go to Carsdale and say, ‘I find, on the clearest proof, that you have defrauded the estate which I am administering. You are liable to serious punishment. I give you the alternative. You must make restitution; you must admit your guilt in writing; you must cease to act for young Mr. Shrewsbury, whose business you acquired by wrongly appropriating a letter which was intended for my late client and should have been given to his legal representatives. Unless you do this I shall hand you over to the police!’ Nothing could be clearer. The immediate point is--will Mr. Winch consent to do this?”

“Yes,” replied Frances. “Mr. Winch will consent, if I put the whole matter before him. And he will do it thoroughly, too.”

“Good!” said Blair. “Then that disposes of Carsdale. Now for the woman, Mrs. Walsingham.”

Burgoyne groaned and looked down at his toes, and Blair smiled at Frances. “Mrs. Walsingham,” he repeated. “Don’t be afraid, Ralph. I was about to remark that I will see Mrs. Walsingham myself.”

Burgoyne sat erect, staring his surprise.

“You don’t mean it!” he exclaimed.

“I mean it, quite seriously,” answered Blair. “I will see her, and talk to her, and when I have finished I think she may have something to say to me which may be interesting. But there is one thing that must be done--must!--before Mr. Winch sees Carsdale and I see Mrs. Walsingham.”

Burgoyne and Frances looked their interrogation.

“Shrewsbury must be got out of the way for a few days,” continued Blair. “That’s absolutely necessary. And you, Burgoyne, must manage it.”

“And perhaps you’ll tell me how to manage it!” said Burgoyne, a little irritably. “From what I’ve seen of affairs, it’s very evident to me that the youngster runs to either Carsdale or this woman on even the smallest matters. Besides, I haven’t even the smallest excuse for taking him away for a few days.”

“Surely you can make one,” said Blair, laughing. “Come--isn’t there some part of the country in which you were deeply interested as a boy and would like to see again and don’t want to visit all by yourself? Your old home--your old school--anything, anywhere will do.”

“And that shows how little you appreciate the state of things,” said Burgoyne with a grim smile. “If I so much as mentioned the matter, I know what he’d do. He’d immediately be for making a motor trip of it, and for taking the woman along. He’d be sure to say, ‘Bring your friend, Captain Blair, and we’ll have a grand old time!’ No, that won’t do, Gavin--you’ll have to think of something better than that.”

“Get him to run over to Paris with you for a few days,” suggested Blair. “He’s never been there, and it might appeal to him.”

“And I say to that,” answered Burgoyne, “that just the same objection applies. He would be for making a party. If I were dead, or dying, or lying in a ditch with a broken limb, he’d come anywhere like a shot, but----”

“Then you must go somewhere and have a fictitious accident,” said Blair. “That boy must be away at the time of these interviews. You must go across to France, invent something, and get him over. You must!”

Burgoyne knitted his brows and frowned, and for a moment appeared to be thinking hard. At last he looked up and slowly gazed from one to the other of the two faces before him.

“I won’t!” he said stoutly. “But I’ll tell you what I will do. I’ll go over to Paris whenever you like, and I’ll send the boy a message that will bring him there--alone--without inventing any fibs. And--if you two think it wise--I’ll then take upon myself to tell him the plain truth about this woman. The proof you can give him when we come back. I’ll do that, and, by Gad, he’ll believe me! Now, what do you say to that? That seems to me the straight thing to do.”

Frances nodded her complete assent with a readiness which did not escape Blair’s watchful eyes. And Burgoyne suddenly spoke again.

“It won’t be an easy job, Gavin,” he said. “I’d rather do--well, most of the things I have done, than do it. But it seems to me the straight thing to do. I hate to have to do it--he’ll take it hard, sir!”

“I don’t know,” remarked Blair, quietly. “I don’t know.”

Burgoyne stared at him.

“You don’t know?” he said. “Why, he’s infatuated----”

“Better say bewitched, and have done with it,” said Blair. “My own impression is that, in his quieter moments, the lad’s regretting what he’s done, and----”

Frances rose and began to shuffle her papers, bending her head over them.

“Is there anything else that you gentleman require me for?” she asked. “Remember--I’m a business woman, and I’ve all my morning’s work before me.”

Blair was quick to appreciate a situation; he saw that the girl had no desire to have Richard Shrewsbury’s feelings for Mrs. Walsingham discussed before her. And so, in a few words, the interview was brought to an end and an understanding arrived at. Burgoyne was to go across to Paris and get Richard over; on the day of his arrival there Mr. Winch was to see Carsdale and Blair was to call on Mrs. Walsingham; the result of those visits was to be wired to Burgoyne.

“And then we shall see--what we shall see,” said Blair, as he and Burgoyne parted, a little later. “But--we shall save him.”

Burgoyne turned into Richard’s rooms feeling sick at heart about the whole sordid business. And there Kedgin presented him with a sealed note, which, on opening, he found to be from Mr. Levanter, of Bond Street. And Mr. Levanter presented his compliments, and if Captain Burgoyne would do him the honour to call, Mr. Levanter had news to communicate which he believed would interest Captain Burgoyne greatly.