"Mr. Osborne has not yet arrived," he said as, after a word of explanation, we shook hands, "but I expect him any minute, and he is expecting you. Will you come in and wait?"

As I had not previously been to Preston's house its appearance surprised me. One does not a.s.sociate a police detective, even an ex-detective, with a taste in things artistic, but here on all sides was evidence of refinement and a cultured mind--shelves loaded with carefully selected books, volumes by cla.s.sic authors; treatises on art; standard works by deep thinkers of world-wide repute, while on the walls hung mezzotints I knew to be extremely rare. In addition there were several beautiful statues, cloisonne vases from Tokio and Osaka, antique furniture from Naples and from Florence, also treasures from Burma, the West Indies, and New Guinea.

The door opened, and the maid announced: "Baron Poppenheimer."

"Ah, my dear Baron," Preston exclaimed as he advanced to meet him, "this is a real pleasure; I didn't expect you so soon, but, as you are here, come and sit down," and he drew forward a chair. "But first let me present to you Mr. Michael Berrington, a friend of our mutual friend Jack Osborne's."

"Delighted to meet you--delighted, I am sure," Baron Poppenheimer said, with a slight accent, extending two fingers--a form of handshake which I particularly dislike. "Dreadfully cold again, is it not?--hein?

Dreadfully cold, I am sure."

His appearance rather amused me. His was a queer figure. He wore a thick, dark blue box-cloth overcoat, double-breasted, with large pearl b.u.t.tons, and a wide collar of yellow fur, which came well down on the shoulders; the fur cuffs matched it. His gloves were woolly ones, lavender-coloured, and the black silk hat which he carried in his right hand was burnished until it rivalled the shine of his patent boots--the "uppers" being hidden by spats. He had curly, black hair; black, rather bushy eyebrows; and a small imperial. While he carried a stout malacca cane with a large gold head to it, and in his left eye was a gold-rimmed monocle secured round his neck by a broad black ribbon.

We conversed for a little time, and from his talk I could see that he was something of a character. He knew many of my friends, and, upon my repeating my name to him, he seemed to know a good deal about me. I expressed surprise at this, whereupon he looked up at Preston, who stood immediately behind me, and observed drily:

"I believe I could tell Mr. Berrington almost as much about himself as I was able to tell you, Preston; what do you think?"

"Baron Poppenheimer is an extraordinarily clever clairvoyant and palmist, Mr. Berrington," Preston said. "I place such implicit confidence in his forecasts that I persuade him, whenever I can, to help me in my work. Yesterday he took it into his head to read my palms, and he told me things about myself that staggered-me--I almost begin to believe in black magic!"

I became greatly interested.

"I wish I could some day persuade the Baron to read my palms," I exclaimed, "Palmistry has always rather appealed to me."

"So?" Baron Poppenheimer answered. "I will read your palms for you now, if you will, I am sure."

He took my right hand, flattened it, palm upward, on his knee, studied it closely for a moment or two, then, after a few moments' silence, began to talk fluently and rapidly. The things he told me about myself, things I had done, even things I had only thought, made me almost gape with amazement. Then he took my left hand, examined both sides of it closely through his monocle, and continued his disclosures. He told me to within a day or two how long I had been engaged to be married, and described Dulcie's appearance to the life; he even went so far as to tell me exactly how she talked. For some moments I wondered if Preston could have coached the Baron in my movements; then I remembered that the Baron had told me things about myself of which Preston knew nothing.

"And that is all I have to tell you, my dear Mike," the "Baron" suddenly exclaimed in quite a different voice. I sprang back in my chair as I looked up sharply. Jack Osborne had pulled off his black, curly wig, and sat laughing loudly. Preston too was considerably amused.

"Yes, George," Jack said at last, "that disguise will do; you certainly are a marvel in the art of 'make-up.' If I can deceive Mike Berrington, who is one of my oldest friends, I shall be able to hoodwink anybody.

Now you had better try your hand on Mike. What sort of person do you propose to turn him into? I have told you that he is an excellent actor, and can mimic voices to perfection."

Osborne then explained why he had telegraphed to me. Preston had made a discovery--a rather important discovery. Exactly what it was they would not tell me then, but Preston had suggested that on that very night the three of us should visit Easterton's house in c.u.mberland Place, where Gastrell's reception had taken place, wearing effectual disguises which he would attend to, and see for ourselves what there was to be seen. It was...o...b..rne, I now learned for the first time, who had effected the introduction between Hugesson Gastrell and "Lord Cranmere"--the actual Lord Cranmere had been consulted by Jack on the subject of his being impersonated, and when Jack had outlined to him his plan and told him why the detective, Preston, wished to impersonate him, Lord Cranmere had entered into the spirit of the thing and given his consent. He had, indeed, expressed no little alarm when Jack had told him how the mysterious, unseen individual at the house in Grafton Street had cross-questioned him with regard to Eldon Hall, Cranmere's place in Northumberland, the whereabout of the safe that Cranmere had bought ten months previously, the likelihood of there being a priests' hiding-hole at Eldon, and so on.

"The whole idea regarding to-night, and our plan of action, originates with Preston," Jack said to me. "He believes--in fact, he is almost sure--that Gastrell and his a.s.sociates know nothing of him by repute as a detective, also that they don't know him by sight, or by name either.

He says, however, that they believe they are now personally acquainted with Lord Cranmere, upon whose property we think they have evil designs.

'Lord Cranmere' is now, in turn, going to introduce to Gastrell and his a.s.sociates two particular friends of his. Those friends will be 'Baron Poppenheimer' and--who is Cranmere's other friend to be, George?" he inquired, looking up at Preston.

"'Sir Aubrey Belston,'" Preston answered at once. "Mr. Berrington is not at all unlike Sir Aubrey, in build as well as in feature."

"'Baron Poppenheimer' and 'Sir Aubrey Belston,'" Jack said, "who in private life are Jack Osborne and Michael Berrington. And if George disguises you and coaches you as well as he did me, I undertake to say that n.o.body will suspect that you are not actually Sir Aubrey Belston."

CHAPTER XIV

IN THE MISTS

At a quarter to one in the morning Cranmere's big, grey, low-built car slid noiselessly along Wigmore Street and drew up at the entrance to one of the most imposing-looking houses in c.u.mberland Place.

The imposing footman got down and rang the bell--he pressed the b.u.t.ton four times in succession, as "Lord Cranmere" had told him to do. Almost at once the door was opened, and from the car window we saw a tall man in knee-breeches silhouetted, while a little way behind him stood another man. "Lord Cranmere" stepped out of the car, and we followed him--"Baron Poppenheimer" and "Sir Aubrey Belston." In point of fact, the real Sir Aubrey Belston was at that moment somewhere in the Malay States, making a tour of the world.

"Lord Cranmere" had told the chauffeur that he would not require him again that night, and I had noticed the man touch his hat in the belief that this actually was his employer who addressed him, for the real Earl of Cranmere had lent us his car. I heard the car purr away in the darkness, and an instant later the door of number 300 c.u.mberland Place shut noiselessly behind us.

The footman in knee-breeches and powdered head, who had admitted us, led us without a word across the large hall, turned into a long corridor dimly-lit by tinted electric lamps, turned to the left, then to the right, then showed us into a small, comfortably-furnished room in which a fire burned cheerily, while in a corner a column printing machine ticked out its eternal news from the ends of the earth. We waited several minutes. Then the door opened and Hugesson Gastrell entered.

Like ourselves, he was in evening clothes. He advanced, shook hands cordially with "Lord Cranmere," saying that he had received his telephone message.

"These are my friends of whom I spoke," Cranmere said, "Baron Poppenheimer and Sir Aubrey Belston."

"Delighted to meet you," Gastrell exclaimed. "Any friend of Cranmere's is welcome here; one has, of course, to be careful whom one admits on these occasions--isn't that so, Cranmere? Come upstairs and have some supper."

We followed him, ascending to the first floor. In a large, high-ceilinged, well-lit room an elaborate supper was spread. There were seats for thirty or forty, but only ten or a dozen were occupied. A strange atmosphere pervaded the place, an atmosphere of secrecy, of mystery. As we entered, the people at supper, men and women, had glanced up at us furtively, then continued their conversation. They talked more or less under their breath.

Gastrell called for a bottle of "bubbly," and about half an hour later we rose. The room was by this time deserted. Following Gastrell along a narrow pa.s.sage, we presently found ourselves in a room larger than the one we had just left. Here between forty and fifty men and women sat at several tables. At one _chemin-de-fer_ was in progress; at another _pet.i.ts chevaux_; at a third the game which of late years has become so popular in certain circles--"Sandown Park." On all the tables money was heaped up, and on all sides one heard the musical c.h.i.n.k of gold and the crackle of bank-notes. n.o.body spoke much. Apparently all present were too deeply engrossed to waste time in conversation.

As I glanced about me I noticed several people I knew intimately, and four or five I knew only by sight, people well known in Society. I was on the point of bowing to one woman I knew, who, looking up, had caught my eye; just in time I remembered that she would not recognize me in my disguise. Then a man nodded to me, and I nodded back. He looked rather surprised at seeing me, I thought, and at once it flashed across me that of course he was under the impression that I was Sir Aubrey Belston, and probably he had heard that Sir Aubrey was travelling round the world.

Gastrell, after a few minutes' conversation, found us places at a table where "Sandown Park" was being played. As I seated myself I found, facing me, Jasmine Gastrell, and for some moments I felt uncomfortable.

I could feel her gaze upon my face as she scrutinized me closely, but even she did not penetrate my disguise.

"Lord Cranmere" sat upon the opposite side of the table, "Baron Poppenheimer" on my side, two seats from me. On my right was one of the unintelligent-looking women I had met at Connie Stapleton's dinner party at the Rook Hotel in Newbury; on my immediate left a man I did not know.

Connie Stapleton I had looked about for, but she was nowhere visible.

So this was one of the ways Gastrell ama.s.sed money--he ran a gaming-house! I now began to see his object in cultivating the acquaintance of people of rank and wealth; for I had long ago noticed that Jasmine and Hugesson Gastrell never missed an opportunity of becoming acquainted with men and women of position. Also I began to grasp Preston's line of action. Disguised as the Earl of Cranmere, who was known to be extremely rich, he had cleverly ingratiated himself with the Gastrells and led them on to think him rather a fool who could easily be gulled. Jack had more than once told me how artfully Preston played his cards when on the track of people he suspected and wished to entrap, so that I could well imagine Preston's leading the Gastrells on to ensnare him--as they no doubt supposed they were doing. For that he would not have been admitted to this gambling den--it evidently became one at night--unless the Gastrells had believed they could trust him and his friends implicitly, I felt certain.

My friends tell me that I am a rather good actor, and Preston's coaching in Sir Aubrey Belston's mannerisms and ways of talking had given me a measure of self-confidence. When, therefore--I had played for a quarter of an hour and won a good deal--Jasmine Gastrell suddenly addressed me, I did not feel disconcerted.

"I mean to follow your lead," she said. "You are so extraordinarily lucky. How is it you manage to win every time?"

"Not every time," I corrected. "It's quite easy if you set about it in the right way."

"I wish I knew the right way," she answered, fixing her eyes on me in the way I knew so well. "Won't you tell me how you do it?"

"Different people must 'do it,' as you put it, in different ways," I said. "Forgive my asking, but are you superst.i.tious?"

She broke into rippling laughter.

"Superst.i.tious? I?" she exclaimed. "Oh, that's the last thing my enemies would accuse me of being!"

I paused, looking hard at her.

"And yet," I said seriously, "judging by your eyes, I should say that you are remarkably psychic, and most people who are psychic are superst.i.tious up to a point."

I went on looking at her, staring right into her eyes, which she kept set on mine. She did not in the least suspect my ident.i.ty--I was now positive of that. I had spoken all the time in an a.s.sumed voice.

"Yes," I said at last, impressively.