Nude in Mink by Sax Rohmer (classic literature books txt) 📖

as calmly as you can, and please give me all the facts.”

“I’ll do my best. I’m sorry to hear that we are brothers in misfortune, Mr. Donovan… The facts are fairly simple. I have already told Inspector Ives that I met Jean in Algiers, late in ‘44. She was working for the French propaganda people; and—we grew fond of one another. I may add that, as well as being highly talented, Jean is—lovely.”

“All Sumuru’s women are lovely.”

Forrester paused, staring.

“Did you speak, Dr. Maitland?”

“No,” Maitland murmured. “Forgive me. I was thinking aloud.”

“Oh!” Forrester’s expression was a puzzled one. “I returned to England some time before Jean. But of course we corresponded. Then, at last, I got a letter to tell me that she was coming home. She gave me no address, but, a week later, I received a telegram. It was rather mysterious. It asked me to meet her in the porch of St. George’s Church, Hanover Square, that night at nine o’clock—”

“You hear that, Maitland?” cried Donovan. “It was the very night I met Claudette!”

Maitland nodded.

“It was, Donovan. Go on, Mr. Forrester. The night was a foggy one, I recall.”

“It’s amazing you should remember that, Dr. Maitland—but it was. I met Jean. She seemed to be frightened—of something—or of someone. I cant quite describe her mood. She looked wonderful—exquisite, but…”

And Ian Forrester gave an account of the meeting which was so vivid that no one of the three men present ever forgot it.

3

Fog was so dense by the time that he reached their strange trysting place that at first he failed to discover Jean shrinking in the shadow of a church pillar. She ran to him—threw herself into his arms.

“Ian, darling! It’s been just plain hell to be separated from you!”

She was trembling wildly.

“But, Jean! Why this queer meeting—out in the street?”

Some of Jean’s secret terror had touched her lover. He was dismayed …

“Don’t ask me, darling! Please don’t ask me. I know how odd it must seem. But there’s no other way. Just five minutes with you, and then—I must bolt!”

“But, Jean—my dear! Bolt where? What’s the urgency? I’m at work like a pack-mule on my Hamlet production at the theatre—but surely we can meet for lunch tomorrow?”

Jean clung to him tightly—as if, he said, she feared that someone would tear her away.

“Ian—it’s impossible,” she declared, breathlessly.

“Impossible?”

“Just impossible—”

“You are terribly worried about something, Jean. My darling! What is it? What has gone wrong? Your father doesn’t object?”

“Oh, no—my dear! Father would never object to you. It isn’t Father—”

“Then what is it?”

But, Jean, slipping from his arms, turned like a trapped thing, staring through the fog.

“Who’s that?” she whispered. “Over there? No—opposite the church!”

Forrester began once more to share her singular fears. But he tried to reply calmly.

“Unless I’m mistaken, a passing policeman.”

“Oh! Please forgive me!” She pressed her head against his shoulder. He could feel her heart racing. “I know how queer I must seem. Ian—I will get a note to you at the theatre—tomorrow. Now, I must go!”

He did not release her.

“Go? But where? Why? Can’t we cut along and have some supper at Ciro’s or somewhere?”

But Jean tore herself away.

“No. Don’t ask me why again. I’ll try to explain—next time…”

4

“And,” said Forrester sadly, “she was gone! I did my best to follow her, but I lost her in the fog.”

Forrester dropped into a chair, as if exhausted by his unhappy memories so sharply revived.

There were some moments of silence in Inspector Ives’s office before Steel Maitland spoke.

“And where did you see her next, Mr. Forrester?”

“I have met her three times since then, always by appointment made by her on a note sent to the theatre.”

Forrester replied without raising his bowed head. “And where did these meetings take place?”

“In Kensington Gardens. Always, Jean seemed to be terrified—distraught. She watched every passer-by. She refused to tell me where she was staying or how she was employed. But two days ago—our last meeting—I forced a confession from her… She was in the clutches of some damnable secret society—a society with a world-wide organisation!”

He stood up, confronting the three who listened, an angry, unhappy figure.

“Ah!” Maitland muttered. “Now we’re coming to it!”

“She was forbidden to marry without the consent of her superior. This, apparently, had been declined. But Jean was desperate. She asked me to arrange with my sister, who lives in Kent, to put her up and keep her hidden. I was to meet her, with my car, at the Albert Memorial, and drive her straight down there. When we parted, I followed her. It was dusk—”

All listened tensely.

“Yes, yes!” Maitland prompted—“And where did she go?”

“This is the queerest thing of all.” Forrester paused, looking from face to face. “She slipped in at a side entrance to the grounds of Lorimer House!”

“Lorimer House,” said Donovan. “You mean the house that used to belong to Sir Martin Lorimer, the Victorian painter—a show place, nowadays?”

“It was a show place, before the late war, Mr. Donovan,” Ives interrupted. “But during the war and right up to now it has been the headquarters of the St. Erik Ambulance Corps.”

“Is that so?” Donovan looked frankly bewildered. “I ran across units of their outfit on almost every battle front I covered. Highly efficient. Wasn’t it founded by the Baroness Rikter—widow of the Swedish millionaire?”

Forrester replied.

“It was. And the Baroness herself—a really strange coincidence—had called on me at the theatre, only about a week before—”

“What’s that?” rapped Maitland. “What for?”

“To ask me to donate the first night’s box office returns to St. Erik’s! With great regret, I was forced to decline. My management wouldn’t hear of it. But I promised the old lady a substantial cheque. She is simply charming, of course.”

Steel Maitland stood up suddenly and began to walk about.

“Must be,” he muttered. “H’m! Extraordinary. What did you do?”

“I could think of nothing to do. Besides, Jean had made me promise to do nothing except to make those arrangements until we met again… Well, she never turned up! I waited until this morning—then phoned Lorimer House. I asked to speak to the Baroness Rikter. They put me through.”

“Well?” Donovan urged, excitedly.

Forrester shook his head.

“The Baroness was most sympathetic. But she assured me that Jean Barlow was quite unknown to her!”

“Phew!” Maitland’s promenade grew swifter. “What did you do, then?”

“I came straight here, to Scotland Yard—”