He was a pinched little man with a weak chin, and he obviously wavered.
”Oo d’ye want to talk to?’ he asked.
‘Scotland Yard,’ I said, ‘the home of the police. Lord bless you, there can’t be no harm in that. Ye’ve only got to ring up Scotland Yard - I’ll give you the number - and give the message to Mr Macgillivray. He’s the head bummer of all the bobbies.’
‘That sounds a bit of all right,’ he said. ‘The old man ‘e won’t be back for ‘alf an hour, nor the sergeant neither. Let’s see your quid though.’
I laid a pound note on the form beside me. ‘It’s yours, mate, if you get through to Scotland Yard and speak the piece I’m goin’ to give you.’
He went over to the instrument. ‘What d’you want to say to the bloke with the long name?’ ‘Say that Richard Hannay is detained at the A.P.M.‘s office in Claxton Street. Say he’s got important news - say urgent and secret news - and ask Mr Macgillivray to do something about it at once.’ ‘But ‘Annay ain’t the name you gave.’
‘Lord bless you, no. Did you never hear of a man borrowin’ another name? Anyhow that’s the one I want you to give.’
‘But if this Mac man comes round ‘ere, they’ll know ‘e’s bin rung up, and I’ll ‘ave the old man down on me.’
It took ten minutes and a second pound note to get him past this hurdle. By and by he screwed up courage and rang up the number. I listened with some nervousness while he gave my message - he had to repeat it twice - and waited eagerly on the next words.
‘No, sir,’ I heard him say, “e don’t want you to come round ‘ere. E thinks as ‘ow - I mean to say, ‘e wants -‘
I took a long stride and twitched the receiver from him.
‘Macgillivray,’ I said, ‘is that you? Richard Hannay! For the love of God come round here this instant and deliver me from the clutches of a tomfool A.P.M. I’ve got the most deadly news. There’s not a second to waste. For God’s sake come quick!’ Then I added: ‘Just tell your fellows to gather Ivery in at once. You know his lairs.’
I hung up the receiver and faced a pale and indignant orderly. ‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘I promise you that you won’t get into any trouble on my account. And there’s your two quid.’
The door in the next room opened and shut. The A.P.M. had returned from lunch …
Ten minutes later the door opened again. I heard Macgillivray’s voice, and it was not pitched in dulcet tones. He had run up against minor officialdom and was making hay with it.
I was my own master once more, so I forsook the company of the orderly. I found a most rattled officer trying to save a few rags of his dignity and the formidable figure of Macgillivray instructing him in manners.
‘Glad to see you, Dick,’ he said. ‘This is General Hannay, sir. It may comfort you to know that your folly may have made just the difference between your country’s victory and defeat. I shall have a word to say to your superiors.’
It was hardly fair. I had to put in a word for the old fellow, whose red tabs seemed suddenly to have grown dingy.
‘It was my blame wearing this kit. We’ll call it a misunderstanding and forget it. But I would suggest that civility is not wasted even on a poor devil of a defaulting private soldier.’
Once in Macgillivray’s car, I poured out my tale. ‘Tell me it’s a nightmare,’ I cried. ‘Tell me that the three men we collected on the Ruff were shot long ago.’
‘Two,’ he replied, ‘but one escaped. Heaven knows how he managed it, but he disappeared clean out of the world.’
‘The plump one who lisped in his speech?’
Macgillivray nodded.
‘Well, we’re in for it this time. Have you issued instructions?’
‘Yes. With luck we shall have our hands on him within an hour. We’ve our net round all his haunts.’
‘But two hours’ start! It’s a big handicap, for you’re dealing with a genius.’
‘Yet I think we can manage it. Where are you bound for?’
I told him my rooms in Westminster and then to my old flat in Park Lane. ‘The day of disguises is past. In half an hour I’ll be Richard Hannay. It’ll be a comfort to get into uniform again. Then I’ll look up Blenkiron.’
He grinned. ‘I gather you’ve had a riotous time. We’ve had a good many anxious messages from the north about a certain Mr Brand. I couldn’t discourage our men, for I fancied it might have spoiled your game. I heard that last night they had lost touch with you in Bradfield, so I rather expected to see you here today. Efficient body of men the Scottish police.’
‘Especially when they have various enthusiastic amateur helpers.’
‘So?’ he said. ‘Yes, of course. They would have. But I hope presently to congratulate you on the success of your mission.’
‘I’ll bet you a pony you don’t,’ I said.
‘I never bet on a professional subject. Why this pessimism?’
‘Only that I know our gentleman better than you. I’ve been twice up against him. He’s the kind of wicked that don’t cease from troubling till they’re stone-dead. And even then I’d want to see the body cremated and take the ashes into mid-ocean and scatter them. I’ve got a feeling that he’s the biggest thing you or I will ever tackle.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN The Valley of Humiliation
I collected some baggage and a pile of newly arrived letters from my rooms in Westminster and took a taxi to my Park Lane flat. Usually I had gone back to that old place with a great feeling of comfort, like a boy from school who ranges about his room at home and examines his treasures. I used to like to see my hunting trophies on the wall and to sink into my own armchairs But now I had no pleasure in the thing. I had a bath, and changed into uniform, and that made me feel in better fighting trim. But I suffered from a heavy conviction of abject failure, and had no share in Macgillivray’s optimism. The awe with which the Black Stone gang had filled me three years before had revived a thousandfold. Personal humiliation was the least part of my trouble. What worried me was the sense of being up against something inhumanly formidable and wise and strong. I believed I was willing to own defeat and chuck up the game.
Among the unopened letters was one from Peter, a very bulky one which I sat down to read at leisure. It was a curious epistle, far the longest he had ever written me, and its size made me understand his loneliness. He was still at his German prison-camp, but expecting every day to go to Switzerland. He said he could get back to England or South Africa, if he wanted, for they were clear that he could never be a combatant again; but he thought he had better stay in Switzerland, for he would be unhappy in England with all his friends fighting. As usual he made no complaints, and seemed to be very grateful for his small mercies. There was a doctor who was kind to him, and some good fellows among the prisoners.
But Peter’s letter was made up chiefly of reflection. He had always been a bit of a philosopher, and now, in his isolation, he had taken to thinkin hard, and poured out the results to me on pages of thin paper in his clumsy handwriting. I could read between the lines that he was having a stiff fight with himself. He was trying to keep his courage going in face of the bitterest trial he could be called on to face - a crippled old age. He had always known a good deal about the Bible, and that and the
He mentioned that after much consideration he had reached the conclusion that the three greatest men he had ever heard of or met were Mr Valiant-for-Truth, the Apostle Paul, and a certain Billy Strang who had been with him in Mashonaland in ‘92. Billy I knew all about; he had been Peter’s hero and leader till a lion got him in the Blaauwberg. Peter preferred Valiant-for-Truth to Mr Greatheart, I think, because of his superior truculence, for, being very gentle himself, he loved a bold speaker. After that he dropped into a vein of self-examination. He regretted that he fell far short of any of the three. He thought that he might with luck resemble Mr Standfast, for like him he had not much trouble in keeping wakeful, and was also as ‘poor as a howler’, and didn’t care for women. He only hoped that he could imitate him in making a good end.
Then followed some remarks of Peter’s on courage, which came to me in that London room as if spoken by his living voice. I have never known anyone so brave, so brave by instinct, or anyone who hated so much to be told so. It was almost the only thing that could make him angry. All his life he had been facing death, and to take risks seemed to him as natural as to get up in the morning and eat his breakfast. But he had started out to consider the very thing which before he had taken for granted, and here is an extract from his conclusions. I paraphrase him, for
