“The deuce you have!” French cried, pausing in the act of filling his pipe and immediately keenly interested. “Who is she?”
Caldwell drew his notebook from his pocket, and slowly turned the well-thumbed pages. His deliberation irritated his quicker-witted superior.
“Get along, Caldwell,” French grumbled. “Can’t you remember that much without your blessed book?”
“Yes, sir,” the man answered. “Here it is.” He read from the book. “Her name is Mrs. Henry Vane, and she lives in a small detached house in St. John’s Wood Road; Crewe Lodge is the name.”
“Good!” French said heartily. “I suppose you’re sure about it?”
“I think so, sir. I showed the photograph to three different parties, and they all said it was her.”
This sounded promising, particularly as French remembered that Dowds, the ex-doorkeeper at the Comedy, had stated that Miss Winter’s admirer was named Vane. He invited the constable to sit down and let him hear the details, offering him at the same time a fill of tobacco.
Constable Caldwell subsided gingerly into a chair as he took the proffered pouch.
“Thank you, sir, I don’t mind if I do.” He slowly filled and lighted his pipe, ramming down the tobacco with an enormous thumb. “It was this way, sir. I had that there circular of yours with the woman’s photo in my pocket when I went off duty early this afternoon. On my way home I happened to meet a friend, a young lady, and I turned and walked with her. For want of something to say, so to speak, I showed her the photo, not expecting anything to come of it, you understand. Well, the moment she looked at it, ‘I know that there woman,’ she said. ‘You what?’ I said. ‘You know her? Who is she, then?’ I said. ‘She’s a woman that comes into the shop sometimes,’ she said, ‘but I don’t just remember her name, though I have heard it,’ she said. ‘I should say the young lady, her I was speaking to, worked in a drapery shop until a couple of weeks ago, though she’s out of a job at the moment. ‘Well,’ I said, ‘I’d like to know her name. Can’t you remember it?’ ‘No,’ she said, she couldn’t remember it. She’d only heard it once, and hadn’t paid much attention to it.”
“Yes?” French murmured encouragingly as the constable showed signs of coming to an end.
“I said that if she couldn’t remember, that maybe some of the other young ladies might know it. She wasn’t having any at first, for I had promised to take her to tea and on to the pictures, and she was set on going. But when she saw I was in earnest, she gave in, and we went round to the shop she used to work in. After asking three or four of the girls, we found one that remembered the woman all right. ‘That’s Mrs. Vane,’ she said. ‘She lives up there in St. John’s Wood; Crewe Lodge is the name. I’ve made up her parcels often enough to know.’ ”
“Good,” French approved once more in his hearty voice.
“I thought I had maybe better make sure about it,” went on the constable in his slow, heavy way, “so I asked Miss Swann—that was the young lady that I was with—to walk round that way with me. I found the house near the Baker Street end, a small place and very shut in. I didn’t want to go up and make inquiries, so I asked Miss Swann if she’d go next door and ask if Mrs. Vane was in. She went and asked, and they told her to go next door; that was to Crewe Lodge. So when I saw it was all right, I put off going to the pictures for this evening and came straight here to tell you.”
French beamed on him.
“You’ve done well, Constable,” he declared. “In fact, I couldn’t have done it better myself. I shall see that you don’t lose by it. Take another fill of tobacco while I get ready, and then call a taxi and we’ll go right out now.”
He rang up Scotland Yard, asking for certain arrangements to be made, with the result that by the time he and Constable Caldwell reached the great building, two plain clothes men were waiting for them, one of whom handed French a small handbag and a warrant for the arrest of Mrs. Vane, alias Mrs. Ward, alias Mrs. Root of Pittsburg, U.S.A. Then the four officers squeezing into the taxi, they set off for St. John’s Wood Road.
Big Ben was striking half-past nine as they turned into Whitehall. The night was fine, but there was no moon, and outside the radius of the street lamps it was pitchy dark. The four men sat in silence after French had in a few words explained their errand to the newcomers. He and Caldwell were both in a state of suppressed excitement, French owing to the hope of an early solution of his difficulties, the constable to the possibilities of promotion which a successful issue to the expedition might involve. The other two looked upon the matter as a mere extra job of work, and showed a lamentable lack of interest in the proceedings.
They pulled up at St. John’s Wood Road, and dismissing the taxi, followed Constable Caldwell to the gate of a carriage drive which there pierced the high stone wall separating the houses from the street. On the upper bar of the gate were the words, “Crewe Lodge.” To the right hand was a wicket gate, but both it and the larger one were closed. Inside the wall was a thick belt of trees through which the drive curved back, and, lit up through the interstices of the branches by the street lamps, the walls and gable of a small house showed dimly beyond. No light was visible from the windows, and, after a moment’s hesitation, French opened the wicket gate and all four entered.
“Wait here among the trees, Pye and Frankland,” he whispered. “Caldwell,
