A little talk with the stage manager at the theatre showed that the girl had never attended any of the morning rehearsals and had missed one of the matinées. Michael saw this part of the scheme plainly enough. Kate, through her spies, had discovered that Boltover had an acquaintance who had a friend at the theatre. She had come to the stage with no other object than making a friend of the girl who all unwittingly was the instrument by which she was to meet Reggie.
The detective knew that this was no chance acquaintance. He followed the manoeuvres of Kate through all their devious paths. He took the opportunity in the afternoon to call upon Reggie at his office which was something between a board room and a boudoir.
Reggie’s theoretical interests were multifarious. He was the nominal head of a dozen different corporations which his industrious father had created for his profit. In practice he knew very little about any of them and nothing about some.
“I hope your lady was not alarmed,” said Michael, with spurious anxiety.
“Oh, no, the lady was not alarmed; oh, no,” said Reggie, shaking his head violently. “Oh, dear no. She was not alarmed. Of course, it would have been different if she had been alone, but being with me, naturally she—er she—er was not alone.”
“Naturally,” agreed Michael.
“No, she was not alarmed,” said Mr. Boltover, “in fact, she was very cool, remarkably cool. I have never seen anybody so cool.”
“I hope when you see her again,” said Michael, “you will tell her I asked.”
“Certainly,” said Mr. Boltover heartily; “certainly I shall tell her you asked.” And he added after a moment, “When I meet her again.”
“She seemed, if you will forgive the impertinence, so interested in everything,” encouraged Michael.
“You are quite right,” said Reggie eagerly, “you are perfectly right. That just describes her. She is interested in everything.”
“It is nice to meet people who are interested in one’s business,” Michael went on artlessly. “I never mind people being interested in my business, do you?”
“Oh, dear no,” replied Mr. Boltover in alarm, as though the very thought that anybody should be discouraged from an interest in his affairs, caused him acute mental unhappiness; “oh, dear no. Certainly not. Not at all.”
“Of course,” smiled Michael, “she could not very well understand all the complexities of your business, Mr. Boltover—it is such an enormous one.”
“Well,” hesitated the other, “I don’t know. I am not so sure. She is a very intelligent young lady. I was talking to her about my business when this dreadful affair happened and she was so calm that she just went on talking about it, don’t you know. My business, I mean. I thought it was a most remarkable instance of coolness. I was telling one of our directors today about it, and he thought it was a remarkable instance of coolness. Yes, even when I was taking her home she told me a lot about herself and—things. Her grandfather is a very wealthy man, a financier. I didn’t know that.”
Michael might have said that he too was unaware of the fact, but he knew just the moment when a tactless interpolation might dry up the fount of Mr. Boltover’s eloquence.
“Very intelligent lady indeed,” wandered Mr. Boltover, “oh, yes, I was talking about her grandfather—he is a very rich man. She thought that he might be able to take one of our properties off our hands. I was awfully surprised. Naturally, I did not think she had any money being in the chorus and all that—I hope I haven’t been indiscreet?” he asked anxiously. “You possibly did not know that she was on the stage.”
“Oh, yes, I did,” said Michael with a smile; “you have betrayed nothing, Mr. Boltover.”
“I am awfully glad,” replied the other, relieved; “what was I saying, about her grandfather, yes. I think I might sell him that property. I hate parting with properties—we have refused quite a number of good offers—sheer sentiment, don’t you know?”
“But perhaps this is not a paying property.”
“Oh, no, not at all,” said Mr. Boltover; “by no manner of means whatever. Still we don’t like parting with them. Of course, I talk a lot of rot about people wanting to buy the works and I always tell that great joke about a lunatic—ha, ha—but really it isn’t true. No, not really true, oh, no.”
Michael had never heard the great joke about the lunatic. What he was anxious to hear were details of Kate’s projected purchase but in this he was foiled. There was precious little of the business man about Mr. Reggie Boltover but one lesson he had learnt, and learnt thoroughly, and that was the art of silence. His revered father was wont to say, “If you never open your mouth, Reggie, nobody will know what an ass you are,” and in business, at any rate, Reggie most religiously lived up to this injunction.
What was the girl’s object?
Michael was puzzled. Strangely enough the obvious never occurred to him, or if it did he dismissed it without a second consideration. He did not look upon Kate as the type that would find any amusement, whatever the profit might be, in the inveigling of a young fool to the altar. Kate wanted the excitement, not the money. That was her history. He had first met her when he was in the Special Department and it had been over a little matter of a King’s messenger’s despatch bag which on a cross-channel journey had mysteriously disappeared, though it was practically handcuffed to the owner’s wrist, that he had first become acquainted with the girl. He was interested in her, but only mildly so, because, at the time, he arrived at a somewhat hasty judgment. It was later, when the strongroom of the Muranic
