Cabinet.
‘Yes, I’ve heard all about it,’ he said, in his thin, rasping voice. ‘Where is Sir Joseph?’
He beckoned Jim, who was known to him and, pushing his way through the crowd of members, went back with him along the corridor to his room.
‘Were you in the House when Sir Joseph spoke?’ he asked.
‘Yes, sir,’ said Jim.
‘Just tell me what happened.’
Briefly, almost word for word, Jim Carlton repeated the astonishing speech.
‘He must be mad,’ said the Chancellor emphatically. ‘There is not a word of truth in the whole story, unless —well, something may have happened since I saw him last.’
‘Can’t you issue a denial?’
Mr Kirknoll bit his lip. ‘In the absence of the Prime Minister, I suppose I should, but I can’t do that until I have seen Sir Joseph.’
A thought struck Jim. ‘He is not what one would describe as a neurotic man, is he?’
‘No man less so,’ said the Chancellor emphatically. ‘He is the sanest person I’ve ever met. Is his secretary in the House?’
He rang a bell and sent a messenger in search, whilst he endeavoured to telephone the absent Ministers.
The secretariat of Downing Street were evidently engaged in a similar quest, with the result that until one in the morning neither had managed to communicate with the head of the Government.
‘We can’t stop this getting into the newspapers, I suppose?’
‘It is in,’ said the Chancellor laconically. ‘I’ve just had a copy of the first editions. Why he did it, heaven only knows! He has certainly smashed the Government. What other result will follow I dare not think about.’
‘What do you think will be the first result of Sir Joseph’s speech?’
The Minister spread out his hands. ‘The markets of course will go to blazes, but that doesn’t interest us so much as the feeling it may create in France. Unhappily, the French Ambassador is in Paris on a short visit.’
Jim left him talking volubly on the Paris line and at three o’clock in the morning was reading a verbatim report of Sir Joseph Layton’s remarkable lapse. The later editions carried eight lines in heavy type:
‘We are informed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer that the Bonn incident has never been before the Cabinet for discussion, and it is not regarded as being of the slightest importance. The Chancellor informs us that he cannot account for Sir Joseph Layton’s extraordinary statement in the House of Commons.’
All night long Jim literally sat on the doorstep of Whitehall Gardens, waiting without any great hope for Sir Joseph’s return. He learnt that the Prime Minister was returning from the West by special train; and that a statement had already been issued repudiating that of the Foreign Minister.
The opening of the Stock Exchange that morning was witnessed by scenes which had no parallel since the outbreak of the War. Stocks declined to an incredible extent, and even the banks reacted to the panic. It was too early to learn what had happened in New York, the British being five hours in advance of Eastern American time, and only at four o’clock that afternoon was the position on Wall Street revealed. Heavy selling—all gilt-edged stocks depreciated; the failure of a big broking house, were the first consequences observable in the press. In France the Bourse had been closed at noon, but there was heavy street selling; and one famous South African stock, which was the barometer in the market, had dropped to its lowest level.
At five o’clock that evening a statement was issued to the press over the signatures of the Prime Ministers of Britain and France.
‘There is no truth whatever in the statement that a state of tension exists between our two countries. The Bonn incident has been from first to last regarded as trivial, and the speech of the British Foreign Minister can only have been made in a moment of regrettable mental aberration.’
For Jim the day’s interest had nothing whatever to do with stock exchanges or the fall of shares; nor yet the fortune which he knew was being gathered, with every minute that passed, by Harlow and his agents. His interest was solely devoted to the mystery of Sir Joseph Layton’s disappearance.
There had been present at Harlow’s reception a very large number of notable people, many of whom were personal friends of the missing Minister. They were emphatic in declaring that he had not returned to Park Lane; and they were as certain that Harlow had not left the house after Sir Joseph’s departure. More than this, there were two policemen on duty at the door; and they were equally certain that Sir Joseph had not returned. The suggestion was made that the Minister had gone to his country house in Cheshire, but when inquiry was set on foot it was learned that the house and the shooting had been rented by a rich American.
Immediately he had returned to London the Prime Minister flew to Paris. When he got back Jim saw him, and the chief officer of state was a greatly worried as well as a very tired man.
‘Sir Joseph Layton has to be found!’ he said, thumping his table. ‘I tell you this, Carlton, as I have told your superiors, that it was, impossible, unless Sir Joseph went mad, that he should have stood up in the House of Commons and said something which he knew to be absolutely untrue, and which he himself would repudiate! Have you seen this man Harlow?’
‘Yes, sir,’ said Jim.
‘Did he tell you what was discussed by any chance? Was it the so-called Bonn incident?’
‘Harlow says that they just talked about the Middle East and nothing else during the few minutes the Foreign Minister vas in his house. And really, sir, I don’t see how they could have had any very lengthy discussion; they were not together more than a few minutes. Apparently Sir Joseph went into a little room which Harlow uses for his more confidential interviews and drank a glass of wine. They then talked about the reception and Sir Joseph congratulated him on bringing the warring elements together. It seems to have been, according to Harlow’s account, the most uninteresting talk.’
The Prime Minister walked up and down the room with long strides, his chin on his chest.
‘I can’t understand it, I can’t understand it!’ he muttered. And then, abruptly: ‘Find Sir Joseph Layton.’ That terminated the interview for Jim.
He was rattled, badly rattled, and in his distraction he could think of only one sedative. He rang up Aileen Rivers at her office and asked her to come to tea with him at the Automobile Club.
Aileen realised from the first that Jim was directly occupied by a mystery that was puzzling not only the country but the whole of the civilised world. But she understood also the reason he had sent for her, and the thought that she as being of use to him was a very pleasant one.
As soon as he met her he plunged straight into the story of his trouble.
‘He may have been kidnapped, of course, and I should say it was very likely, though the distance between Palace Yard and Whitehall Gardens is very short; and Whitehall so full of police that it hardly seems possible. We have advertised for the taximan who drove him away from the House, but so far have had no reply.’
‘Perhaps the taximan was also kidnapped?’ she suggested.
‘Perhaps so,’ he admitted. ‘I do wish Foreign Ministers weren’t so godlike that they have to travel alone! If he’d only waited a few minutes I would have joined him.’ And then, with a smile: ‘I’m laying my burdens upon you and you’re wilting visibly.’
‘I’m not,’ she affirmed.
She considered a moment before she asked:
‘Could I not help you?’
He stared at her in amused wonder.
‘How on earth could you help me? I’m being rude I know, but I can’t exactly see—’
She was annoyed rather than hurt by his scepticism.
‘It may be a very presumptuous thing to offer assistance to the police,’ she said with a faint hint of sarcasm, ‘but I think what may be wrong with you now is that you want—what is the expression?—a new angle?’
‘I certainly want several new angles,’ he confessed ruefully.
‘Then I’ll start in to give you one. Have you seen my uncle?’
His jaw dropped. He had forgotten all about Arthur Ingle; and never once had he associated him with the Minister’s disappearance.
‘What a fool I am!’ he gasped.
She examined his face steadily, as though she were considering whether or not to agree. In reality her mind
