"Why?" said Mr. Manderton aloud, addressing a laurel-bush.

CHAPTER XIII

JEEKES

Mr. Albert Edward Jeekes, Hartley Parrish's princ.i.p.al private secretary, lunched with Lady Margaret, Mary and Horace. Dr. Romain seemed not to have got over his embarra.s.sment of the morning, for he did not put in an appearance.

Mr. Jeekes was an old young man who supported bravely the weight of his Christian names, a reminder of his mother having occupied some small post in the household of Queen Victoria the Good. He might have been any age between 35 and 50 with his thin sandy hair, his myopic gaze, and his habitual expression of worried perplexity.

He was a shorthand-writer and typist of incredible dexterity and speed which, combined with an unquenchable energy, had recommended him to Hartley Parrish. Accordingly, in consideration of a salary which he would have been the first to describe as "princely," he had during the past four years devoted some fifteen hours a day to the service of Mr.

Hartley Parrish.

He was unmarried. When not on duty, either at St. James's Square, Harkings, or Hartley Parrish's palatial offices in Broad Street, he was to be found at one of those immense and gloomy clubs of indiscriminate membership which are dotted about the parish of St. James's, S.W., and to which Mr. Jeekes was in the habit of referring in Early-Victorian accents of respect.

"When I heard the news at the club, Miss Trevert," said Jeekes, "you could have knocked me down with a feather. Mr. Parrish, as all of us knew, worked himself a great deal too hard, sometimes not knocking off for his tea, even, and wore his nerves all to pieces. But I never dreamed it would come to this. Ah! he's a great loss, and what we shall do without him I don't know. There was a piece in one of the papers about him to-day--perhaps you saw it?--it called him 'one of the captains of industry of modern England.'"

"You were always a great help to him, Mr. Jeekes," said Mary, who was touched by the little man's hero-worship; "I am sure you realized that he appreciated you."

"Well," replied Mr. Jeekes, rubbing the palms of his hands together, "he did a great deal for _me_. Took me out of a City office where I was getting two pound five a week. That's what he did. It was a shipping firm. I tell you this because it has a bearing, Miss Trevert, on what is to follow. Why did he pick me? I'll tell you.

"He was pa.s.sing through the front office with one of our princ.i.p.als when he asked him, just casually, what Union Pacific stood at. The boss didn't know.

"'A hundred and eighty-seven London parity,' says I. He turned round and looked at me. 'How do you know that?' says he, rather surprised, this being in a shipping office, you understand.

"'I take an interest in the markets,' I replied. 'Do you?' he says.

'Then you might do for me,' and tells me to come and see him."

"I went. He made me an offer. When I heard the figure ... my word!"

Mr. Jeekes paused. Then added sadly:

"And I had meant to work for him to my dying day!"

They were in the billiard-room seated on the selfsame settee, Mary reflected, on which she and Robin had sat--how long ago it seemed, though only yesterday! Mary had carried the secretary off after luncheon in order to unfold to him a plan which she had been turning over in her mind ever since her conversation with the detective.

"And what are you going to do now, Mr. Jeekes?" she asked.

The little man pursed up his lips.

"Well," he said, "I'll have to get something else, I expect. I'm not expecting to find anything so good as I had with Mr. Parrish. And things are pretty crowded in the City, Miss Trevert, what with all the boys back from the war, G.o.d bless 'em, and glad we are to see 'em, I'm sure.

I hope you'll realize, Miss Trevert, that anything I can do to help to put Mr. Parrish's affairs straight...."

"I was just about to say," Mary broke in, "that I hope you will not contemplate any change, Mr. Jeekes. You know more about Mr. Parrish's affairs than anybody else, and I shall be very glad if you will stay on and help me. You know I have been left sole executrix...."

"Miss Trevert,"--the little man stammered in his embarra.s.sment,--"this is handsome of you. I surely thought you would have wished to make your own arrangements, appoint your own secretaries...."

Mr. Jeekes broke off and looked at her, blinking hard.

"Not at all," said Mary. "Everything shall be as it was. I am sure that Mr. Bardy will approve. Besides, Mr. Jeekes, I want your a.s.sistance in something else...."

"Anything in my power...." began Jeekes.

"Listen," said Mary.

She was all her old self-composed self now, a charming figure in her plain blue serge suit with a white silken shirt and black tie--the best approach to mourning her wardrobe could afford. Already the short winter afternoon was drawing in. Mysterious shadows lurked in the corners of the long and narrow room.

"Listen," said Mary, leaning forward. "I want to know why Mr. Parrish killed himself. I mean to know. And I want you, Mr. Jeekes, to help me to find out."

Something stirred ever so faintly in the remote recesses of the billiard-room. A loose board or something creaked softly and was silent.

"What was that?" the girl called out sharply. "Who's there?"

Mr. Jeekes got up and walked over to the door. It was ajar. He closed it.

"Just a board creaking," he said as he resumed his seat.

"I want your aid in finding out the motive for this terrible deed,"--Mary Trevert was speaking again,--"I can't understand.... I don't see clear...."

"Miss Trevert," said Mr. Jeekes, clearing his throat fussily, "I fear we must look for the motive in the state of poor Mr. Parrish's nerves. An uncommonly high-strung man he always was, and he smoked those long black strong cigars of his from morning till night. Sir Winterton Maire told him flatly--Mr. Parrish, I recollect, repeated his very words to me after Sir Winterton had examined him--that, if he did not take a complete rest and give up smoking, he would not be answerable for the consequences. Therefore, Miss Trevert...."

"Mr. Jeekes," answered the girl, "I knew Mr. Parrish pretty well. A woman, you know, gets to the heart of a man's character very often quicker than his daily a.s.sociates in business. And I know that Mr.

Parrish was the last man in the world to have done a thing like that. He was so ... so undaunted. He made nothing of difficulties. He relied wholly on himself. That was the secret of his success. For him to have killed himself like this makes me feel convinced that there was some hidden reason, far stronger, far more terrible, than any question of nerves...."

Leaning forward, her hands clasped tightly in front of her, Mary Trevert raised her dark eyes to the little secretary's face.

"Many men have a secret in their lives," she said in a low voice. "Do you know of anything in Mr. Parrish's life which an enemy might have made use of to drive him to his death?"

Her manner was so intense that Mr. Jeekes quite lost his self-composure. He clutched at his _pince-nez_ and readjusted them upon his nose to cover his embarra.s.sment. The secretary was not used to gazing at beautiful women whose expressive features showed as clearly as this the play of the emotions.

"Miss Trevert," he said presently, "I know of no such secret. But then what do I--what does any one--know of Mr. Parrish's former life?"

"We might make enquiries in South Africa?" ventured the girl.

"I doubt if we should learn anything much through that," said the secretary. "Of course, Mr. Parrish had great responsibilities and responsibility means worry...."

A silence fell on them both. From somewhere in the dark shadows above the fire glowing red through the falling twilight a clock chimed once.

There was a faint rustling from the neighborhood of the door. Mr. Jeekes started violently. A coal dropped noisily into the fireplace.

"There was something else," said Mary, ignoring the interruption, and paused. She did not look up when she spoke again.

"There is often a woman in cases like this," she began reluctantly.

Mr. Jeekes looked extremely uncomfortable.