The Pawns Count Part 5

"Oh, mistress is going to ask Joseph all right," she a.s.sured him, "but I want a little information from you, too. You've got to earn your freedom, you know, Ha.s.san. Come, what do they do with the people who disappear from the restaurant?"

"Not understand," was the almost piteous reply.

Pamela sighed. She had again the air of one being patient with a child.

"See here, Ha.s.san," she went on, "a few days ago I went over that restaurant from top to bottom with the manager. There is the musicians'

room, isn't there, just over the entrance hall? I suppose those little gla.s.s places in the floor are movable, and then one can hear every word that is spoken below. I am right so far, am I not?"

Ha.s.san answered nothing. His breathing, however, had become a little deeper.

"An unsuspecting person, pa.s.sing from the toilet rooms upstairs, could easily be induced to enter. I think that there must be another exit from that room. Yes?"

"Yes!" Ha.s.san faltered.

"To where?"

"The wine-cellars."

"And from there?"

Ha.s.san was suddenly voluble. Truth unlocked his tongue.

"Not know, mistress--not know another thing. No one enters wine-cellar but three men. One of those not know. If I guess--I, Ha.s.san--I look at little chapel left standing in waste place. Perhaps I wonder sometimes, but I not know."

Pamela drew three notes from her gold purse, smoothed them out and handed them over.

"Three pounds, Ha.s.san, silence, and good day! You'll live longer if you open your windows now and then, and get a little fresh air, instead of praying yourself hoa.r.s.e."

Again the black figure swayed perilously towards her. She affected not to notice, not to notice the hand which seemed for a moment as though it would s.n.a.t.c.h the door handle from her grasp. She pa.s.sed out pleasantly and without haste. The last sound she heard was a groan.

"Done your bit o' business, eh?" the landlady asked curiously.

Pamela nodded a.s.sent.

"Rather an odd sort of lodger for you, isn't he?"

"Not so odd as his visitors," the woman retorted, with an evil sneer.

Pamela pa.s.sed into the narrow street and drew a long sigh of relief.

Then she entered her car and gave the chauffeur an address from the slip of paper which she carried in her hand. When they stopped outside the little block of flats he prepared to follow her.

"Tough neighbourhood this, madam," he said.

"Maybe, George," she replied, waving him back, "but you've got to stay down here. If the man I am going to see thought I was frightened of him I wouldn't have a chance. If I am not down in half an hour you can try number 18C."

The chauffeur resumed his place on the driving-seat of the car. Pamela, heartily disliking her surroundings, was escorted by a shabby porter to a shabbier lift.

"You'll find Mr. Joseph in," the lift boy a.s.sured her with a grin.

Pamela found the number at the end of an unswept stone pa.s.sage. At her third summons the door was cautiously opened by a large, repulsive-looking woman, with a ma.s.s of peroxidised hair. She stared at her visitor first in amazement, then in rapidly gathering resentment.

"Mr. Joseph is at home," she admitted truculently, in response to Pamela's inquiry. "What might you be wanting with him?"

"If you will be so good as to let me in I will explain to Mr. Joseph,"

Pamela replied.

The woman seemed on the point of slamming the door. Suddenly there was a voice from behind her shoulder. Joseph appeared--not the smiling, joyous Joseph of Henry's but a sullen-looking negro, dressed in shirt and trousers only, with a heavy under-lip and frowning forehead.

"Let the lady pa.s.s and get into the kitchen, Nora," he ordered, "Come this way, mam."

Pamela followed her guide into a parlour, redolent of stale cigar smoke, with oilcloth on the floor and varnished walls, an abode even more horrible than Ha.s.san's lair. Joseph closed the door carefully behind him, and made no apology for his dishabille. He simply faced Pamela.

"Say, what is it you want with me?" he demanded truculently.

"A trifle," she answered. "The key of the chapel in the little plot of waste ground next Henry's."

She meant him to be staggered, and he was. He reeled back for a moment.

"What the h.e.l.l are you talking about?" he gasped.

"Facts," Pamela replied. "Do you want to save yourself, Joseph? You can do it if you choose."

He folded his arms and stood in front of the closed door. Without a collar, his neck bulged unpleasantly behind. There was nothing whatever left of the suave and genial chef d'orchestra.

"Save myself from what, eh? Just let me get wise about it."

Pamela's eyebrows were daintily elevated.

"Dear me!" she murmured. "I thought you were more intelligent. Listen.

You know where we met last? Let me remind you. You were playing in the Winter Garden at Berlin, and the gentleman whom I was with, an attache at the American Emba.s.sy, spoke to you. He told me a good deal about your past life, Joseph, and your present one. You are in the pay of the Secret Service of Germany. Am I to go to Scotland Yard and tell them so?"

He looked at her wickedly.

"You'd have to get out of here first."

"Don't be silly," she advised him contemptuously. "Remember you're talking to an American woman and don't waste your breath. You can be in the Secret Service of any country you like, without interference from me. On the other hand, there's just one thing I want from you."

"What is it? I haven't got any key."

"I want to discover exactly what has become of Captain Graham," she declared.

"What, the guy that missed his lunch to-day?" he growled.

"I see you know all about it," she continued equably.

"So he's your spark, is he?" Joseph observed slowly, his eyes blinking as he leaned a little forward.

"On the contrary," Pamela replied, "I have never met him. However, that's beside the point. Do I have the key of that chapel?"