'I don't know. That's what has been worrying me. Does the train make any stops between here and Bristol?'
'Just one: Exeter, I think. We should be there very shortly.'
'We'll know, then, anyhow. But that's not the point. Mr. Stone, you had some information to give Sir Henry Merrivale about an international agent, or plain spy, once known as L?'
'That's right,' said Stone, studying me. He had now become like a man playing poker, or like a man in a witness-box.
'Did you ever hear of Paul Hogenauer?'
'No.’
'Hogenauer now lives in England, apparently at peaceful business. During the war be was a member of the German intelligence service in Berlin. He has always been known as a conscientious and honest man. Recently he has been working on an experiment or invention, for which he said he needed money. Therefore, he offered to betray the identity of L. for two thousand pounds.'
Stone's expression did not change: he remained puffing gently and almost tenderly at his cigar.
'To-night Hogenauer was murdered. He was poisoned with strychnine, under some very curious circumstances. This may or may not be connected with L. but you can see the probability. If you know anything about L., it's vitally important that you should tell us what it is. We don't have any credentials on us, but at least you know who we are. If we could find out who L. is, and what he's doing'
'I know who he is,' said Stone, 'and what he's doing.'
He sat back into the corner, squaring his shoulders into it. Briefly, I thought I could see in those deceptive blue eyes something like scepticism, but he appeared to come to a decision. First, he solemnly got out his cigar- case and offered it to me, as though it were a handshake to seal a bond. Then he took a wallet from his breast- pocket, and a sheaf of papers.
'That's fair enough. I'll tell you,' he said. 'But first I want to hear something from you: you'll see why. So I suppose you'll want to see my credentials. I'm from Pittsburgh — I happen to be Assistant Commissioner of Police. Understand, I only came into this semi-officially, and because the Secretary of War at Washington happens to be a great friend of mine. Take a look at these. Also, here's an introductory letter from the Secretary of War. Also a passport….
'Now then,' he added, lighting a match for my cigar, 'if you think you can trust me, tell me the whole story from A to Izzard. Then I'll swap information, and I don't think you'll be the loser. Well?'
'Go on, Ken,' said Evelyn. 'I want to get it straight myself. And there are a couple of questions H.M. told me to ask you.'
This time I went over the business at great length, while the night-wind grew cooler through the window, and the wheels clacked drowsily, and Stone's white suit accumulated cinders.
so,' I said, 'we've got another instalment of puzzles since H.M. got the last bulletin. It's now not only an affair of furniture changed in a room, and two missing books, and four pairs of cuff-links. Add to that a ?100 note hidden away in a newspaper which Mrs. Antrim says she found cast away in the scullery. I'm not for a moment suggesting that Mrs. Antrim poisoned Hogenauer. She'd hardly feed a man with strychnine out of her own laboratory, and then rush over to make sure he'd taken it. But just how does she figure in the muddle? Then there's Serpos. Who is Serpos? What is he? On the face of it, there's nothing whatever to connect Serpos with Hogenauer. Yet the evening Hogenauer is poisoned is the evening Serpos chooses to run away with… whatever he did run away with. Look here, Evelyn, you were with H.M. back there. What the devil did Serpos steal, anyway?'
She shook her head. She was hunched back into a travelling-coat, her hands cradled in her sleeves, and the hazel eyes looked more subdued now.
'I don't know. You don't seem to realize, Ken, that it's only been a couple of hours since this whole thing started. Back there they were all rushing about, and swearing, and I rather got elbowed aside. They only saw a use for me, and said what a nice gal I was, when you were stranded in Moreton Abbot without money or clothes.' She looked up and grinned. 'You seem to have done fairly well for yourself, though,' she crowed. 'Ken, I hate to say it, but I'm almost proud of you.'
Stone grunted.
'Well, if you ask me,' he said, 'it's taking fool risks. I tell you, this fellow Merrivale is even crazier than he's made out! This is no place for you, young lady.' He glowered at Evelyn, who wrinkled her nose at him, and then she commenced to study the floor with an expression of sinister wisdom. 'If I understand you… by the way, fhat is your name, actually?'
`Blake.'
'You're absolutely positive of that?' 'Yes.'
'All right,' said Stone, in some relief. 'If I understand you, you're sent smack-bang to burgle a hotel room before Keppel gets back to Bristol. It seems to me you're taking a whale of a big risk, because you don't know just when Keppel is due back. Hogenauer thought he'd be out to-night, yes. But I wouldn't call Hogenauer too good a judge of what's likely to happen: Hogenauer's dead. There's something rotten in the whole set-up, especially as-' He checked himself, and brooded. 'Seems to me you treat burglary pretty lightly over here. How are you going to work it? Do you know Bristol?'
I know Bristol very well, for I like it above all English cities. And I paritularly remembered the Cabot Hotel, which is at the top of College Green, just after you pass the Cathedral and the Library; large, old-fashioned, comfortable, and sedate. -
'It shouldn't be very difficult,' I told him. 'I'll engage a room on the same floor as Keppel. Even if he's got his door locked, it's an old-fashioned place and you can almost open the doors with a hairpin.'
'H'm,' said Stone. 'Well, it's your funeral. But what does Merrivale think of it?'
Evelyn had been peering out of the windows; we were coming into Exeter. She turned round as though she fere about to say something, in a worried fashion. Then she regarded Stone, and shook her head.
'No fair play! Never mind what H. M. thinks of it, for the moment. But it's your turn now, Mr. Stone. You said, if Ken fould tell you everything that happened, you'd make an exchange. Right? You said you'd tell us who L. is, and what he's doing?'
Stone contemplated her with the same sceptical and half-amused expression. He nodded.
'All right,' he conceded. 'I'll tell you just exactly what you want to know. L.'s real name is Lord — John Stuart Lord, to be exact. He was originally an American citizen, though he's pretended to be a good many nationalities and always got away with it. And you want to know what he's doing now? He's lying under six feet of earth in Woodlawn Road Cemetery…. What I'm trying to tell you is that L died of pneumonia, in Pittsburgh, over six weeks ago.'
CHAPTER NINE
The Two Clergymen
Stone sat back, contemplating us gently, and chuckled.
'Then Hogenauer lied when he said-' Evelyn cried, after a pause.
'Yes, Hogenauer lied.'
'Wait a minute!' I protested. 'This is rather strong news to spring on us all of a sudden. Hogenauer was pretty positive that L. was alive, and in England, a week ago. I'm not necessarily doubting you, but have you got any proof of what you say?'
'Plenty of proof,' said Stone. He broke off as a ticket-collector came in, and Evelyn slipped into my hand the ticket she had bought at Moreton Abbot. The ticket-collector was a spare sandy-haired man-with a spare sandy moustache: a Scot if I ever saw one. We were all uneasily silent when he took our tickets, for the train was pulling into Exeter, and if news of a wanted man had been sent ahead we should hear it very soon. The ticket-collector grunted and withdrew.
'I got into it by accident,' Stone pursued, 'and this is the way it happened. I was out at Forbes Field-that's the ballpark at home — seeing a game, and afterwards I dropped into the Schenley Hotel. The manager's a friend of mine: he called me aside and asked whether I could see someone upstairs. He said this fellow was dying, and
