“And if you are a minute later, don’t come back,” said Jesse Trasmere.
As the old man’s valet, Walters had exceptional opportunities for discovering something more about his master than Mr. Trasmere would care to have known. He was for a very particular reason anxious to know what the basement contained. Once he had met a man who had been engaged in the building of the house, and learnt that there was a room below, built of concrete, but though he had, with the greatest care and discretion, searched for keys which might, during the daily absence of his employer, reveal the secret of this underground room he had never succeeded in laying his hand upon them. Mr. Trasmere had apparently only one key, a master key, which he wore round his neck at night, and in the same inaccessible position in his clothing during the daytime, and Walters’ search had been in vain, until one morning, when taking Mr. Trasmere his shaving-water, the servant found him suffering from one of those fainting fits which periodically overcame him. There was a cake of soap handy and Walters was a resourceful man.
Mr. Trasmere looked up from his plate and fixed his servant with his grey-blue eyes.
“Has anybody called this morning?”
“No, sir.”
“Have any letters come?”
“Only a few. They are on your desk, sir.”
Mr. Trasmere grunted.
“Did you put the notice in the paper that I was leaving town for two or three days?” he asked.
“Yes, sir,” said Walters.
Jesse Trasmere grunted again.
“A man is coming from China, and I don’t want to see him,” he explained. He was oddly communicative at moments to his servant, but Walters, who knew his master extremely well, did not make the mistake of asking questions. “No, I don’t want to see him,” the old man chewed a toothpick reflectively and his unattractive face bore an expression of distaste. “He was a partner of mine, twenty, thirty years ago, a card-playing, gambling, drinking man, who gave himself airs because—well, never mind what he gave himself airs about,” he said impatiently, as though he anticipated a question which he should have known never would have been put to him. “He was that kind of man.”
He stared at the fireless grate with its red brick walls and its microscopic radiator and clicked his lips.
“If he comes, he is not to be admitted. If he asks questions, you’re not to answer. You know nothing … about anybody. Why he’s coming at all … well, that doesn’t matter. He’s just trash, a soakin’ dope. He had his chance, got under it and went to sleep. Phew! That fellow! He might have been rich, but he sold … and sold. A soak! Rather drink than sit in the Empress of China’s council … she’s dead. White trash … nothing … h’m.”
He glared up of a sudden and asked harshly:
“Why the hell are you listening?”
“Sorry, sir, I thought. …”
“Get out!”
“Yes, sir,” said Walters with alacrity.
For half-an-hour old Jesse Trasmere sat where the valet had left him, the red end of his toothpick leaping up and down eccentrically. Then he got up, and, going to an old-fashioned bureau, opened the glass front.
He brought to the table a shallow bowl of white porcelain, half-filled with Indian ink. His second visit to the secretaire produced a thick pad of paper. It was unusually large and its texture of a peculiar character. From an openwork iron box he took a long-handled brush and sitting down again dipped the fine point into the ink.
Another long interval of inaction and he commenced to write, beginning at the top right-hand corner and working down the page. The grotesque and intricate Chinese characters appeared with magic rapidity. He finished one column and commenced another and so until the page was covered except for two spaces beneath the last and the penultimate line.
Laying down the brush, he felt with the slow deliberation of age, in his right-hand waistcoat pocket and pulled out an ivory cylinder as big round as a large pencil. He slipped one end out and pressed it on the paper. When he took the stamp away there appeared within a red circle two Chinese characters. This was Jesse Trasmere’s “hong,” his sign manual; a thousand merchants from Shanghai to Fi Chen would honour cheques which bore that queer mark, and those for startling sums.
When the paper was dry he folded it into a small compass and getting up, went to the empty fireplace. Outside on the stairs a deeply-interested Walters craned his neck to see what happened. From his position and through the fanlight above the door, he commanded a view of at least a third of the room. But now Jesse had passed out of sight and although he stretched himself perilously he could not see what was happening. Only, when the old man reappeared the paper was no longer in his hand.
He touched a bell and Walters came at once.
“Remember,” he rasped, “I am not at home—to anybody!”
“Very good, sir,” said Walters a little impatiently.
Mr. Trasmere had gone out that afternoon when the visitor called.
It was unfortunate for the old man’s scheme that the China mail had made a record voyage and had arrived thirty-six hours ahead of her scheduled time. Mr. Trasmere was not a reader of newspapers, or he would have learnt the fact in that morning’s paper.
Walters answered the bell after some delay, for he was busily engaged in his own room on a matter that was entirely private to himself, and when he did answer the tinkling summons it was to find a brown-faced stranger standing on the broad step. He was dressed in an old suit which did not fit him, his linen was stained and his boots were patched, but his manner would not have been out of place in Lorenzo the Magnificent.
With his hands thrust into his trousers pockets, his soiled soft hat on the back of his head, he met the enquiring and deferential gaze of Walters
