The Clue of the Silver Key by Edgar Wallace (free biff chip and kipper ebooks .TXT) 📖

except that he wouldn’t be down today.’

 

‘Have you reported this to your head office?’

 

No report had been made. It was not a very extraordinary happening. Bank

managers do occasionally decide to stay away from business; and, as it

happened, there had been no inquiries by phone from headquarters, and the

fact had not been mentioned.

 

‘It will go in, of course, in the daily report,’ said the accountant. ‘To

tell you the truth, I was under the impression that Mr Moran had gone up

to the City and had interviewed the managing director; so that when I

heard he was taking his leave I naturally supposed that he had persuaded

head office to change its mind. Has anything happened to Mr Moran?’ he

asked anxiously.

 

‘I hope not, I’m sure,’ said Smith with spurious solicitude. ‘Did he bank

with you?’

 

‘He had an account at this branch, but carried only a small balance,’

explained the accountant. ‘There was a little trouble about speculation a

few years back, and naturally, I suppose, Mr Moran did not run his main

account through us, not wishing the directors to know his business. I can

tell you for your private information that he banks with the Southern

Provincial. I know that, because once, when his account with us was low,

he paid in a cheque on that bank to put it in credit. May I ask, Mr

Smith, what is the reason for this inquiry?’

 

In a few words Surefoot told him of the murder.

 

‘Yes, we carry Mr Lyne’s account. It is a fairly large one—not as large

as it used to be—he is a money-lender and has a lot of money out.’

 

Smith looked at his watch. ‘Is it possible to see any of the directors at

headquarters?’

 

The accountant was doubtful, but he put through a telephone call, only to

return with the information that all the directors had gone home.

 

‘If Mr Moran doesn’t turn up in the morning—’

 

‘He won’t,’ said Surefoot.

 

‘Well, if he doesn’t, I’d be glad if you saw the head office. I really

ought not to be giving you any kind of information, either about Mr Moran

or about any of our customers. Just one moment.’ He went behind a desk

and consulted a clerk. After a while he came back. ‘I might tell you

this, whether I get into trouble or not, that the late Mr Lyne drew sixty

thousand pounds from the bank yesterday—that is to say, the cheque came

in to us and was cleared last night. It was a bearer cheque and passed

through some bank in the Midlands. I can’t give you the exact details,

but I’ve no doubt head office will give you the authorization.’

 

When Surefoot returned to Scotland Yard he found a group of officers in

his room. They were saying good-bye to John Kelly, who was leaving at

midnight for the United States.

 

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, when he heard Surefoot’s idea. ‘Nothing would have

given me greater pleasure than to have got in on a murder case. I read it

in the evening papers. Have there been any developments?’ Surefoot told

him what he had learned at the bank and the American nodded. ‘You might

do worse than look out for a man called Arthur Ryan,’ he said. ‘I know

that he’s in England—I’ll send you some photographs of him taken when I

was in Chicago. That was part of his graft, running banking accounts,

switching somebody else’s money from one to the other. You’d never guess

he was that kind of bird.’

 

Surefoot was forced to resign, with regret, the invitation to an informal

farewell dinner. The Chief Constable was waiting for him, a little

impatiently, for his dinner hour was more formal.

 

‘We’ll have to circulate a description of Moran,’ said the chief when he

had finished, ‘but it must be done without publicity, or we’ll be getting

ourselves into all sorts of trouble. The fact that he keeps a couple of

rifles in his room means nothing. Even I know him as a rifle shot. So far

as we are aware, there is nothing wrong at the bank, and the only

circumstance connecting him with the crime is the old man’s note. Have

you got it?’

 

Mary had handed the note to the detective, who produced it from his

pocket and spread it on the table.

 

The Chief Constable nodded.

 

‘The fact that he wants to see Moran again—had he seen him before?’

 

‘Two days ago, according to Binny, the servant—not for two years,

according to Moran,’ said Surefoot slowly, and the Chief looked up.

 

‘Moran said he hadn’t seen—’

 

Surefoot nodded.

 

‘That’s just what he said. I asked him casually the night before the

murder when he had seen Lyne last. He said two years ago. This is

absolutely definite. Now, why did he say he hadn’t seen him when he had?

And why did old Lyne, when he sent that note, say “Bring Moran,” and

immediately follow this by asking for a police officer to be in

attendance? There’s only one explanation—that he’d discovered something

about Moran and intended either to confront him or threaten him with

police action. Moran applies for urgent leave from the bank, and this

isn’t granted. He doesn’t come to the bank, and I think we’ll find, when

I make inquiries at their head office, that the directors know nothing

about his being away. Moran had the handling of the old man’s account,

and if there was anything wrong it meant prison for him; probably the

only person who could say whether anything was wrong was Lyne himself. He

dies—somebody puts a bullet in him—half an hour before Moran leaves

London. That’s circumstantial, but better circumstantial evidence than

most people are convicted on. If you want anything clearer than that,

lead me to it.’

 

He continued his inquiries throughout the evening, and about a quarter of

an hour before the curtain came down—the penultimate curtain, as it

proved—on Cliffs of Fate, he called at the theatre. Mike Hennessey had

gone home, as his manager dramatically described, ‘a broken man’.

 

‘He’d set his heart on this play, Mr Smith—’ began the little manager,

but Surefoot silenced him.

 

‘Nobody could set their hearts on a lousy play like this,’ he said. ‘It

doesn’t appeal either to the intelligent or the theatrical classes.’

 

He went through the pass door to the stage, and down a long corridor to

Mary’s dressing-room. Dick Allenby, as he had expected, was with her. She

looked tired; evidently the old man’s death had been a greater shock to

her than either Dick or Surefoot Smith could have expected.

 

‘Oh, yes, the play comes off; but things aren’t so bad with poor Mike as

he expected. His cheque turned up and he was able to pay the company and,

I hope, himself.’

 

She could tell him nothing about Hervey Lyne, but she was very

informative about Leo Moran when he began to question her. He heard the

story of his midnight call—it was news to Dick also.

 

‘But, Mary, I don’t understand. He wanted you to sign a transfer—’

 

‘Did you notice the name of the shares?’ interrupted Surefoot.

 

This she had seen but could not remember. Surefoot, who knew a great deal

about the City and had been in many financial cases, suggested that it

must be a foreign stock. It is the rule on certain foreign Stock

Exchanges that shares cannot be transferred by a trustee without the

approval and signature of the beneficiaries for whom he is acting.

 

‘There’s nothing fishy about that,’ said Surefoot thoughtfully. ‘Even if

he was a buyer, old Lyne wouldn’t have put his name to a transfer unless

he had his money’s worth.’

 

Surefoot could do little more that night. Lyne’s documents were being

carefully examined and tabulated, and the place of the murder was roped

off and guarded, a precautionary measure justified when, at midnight, the

surgeon’s report came through.

 

Hervey Lyne had been killed by a bullet which passed through his heart

from behind. Actually no bullet was found in the body, and Surefoot gave

orders that at daybreak every inch of the lawn where the murder was

committed should be searched for the spent bullet. By nine o’clock he was

in the City, awaiting the arrival of the great men of the bank. As he had

expected, no leave had been granted to Leo Moran, against whose name

there was a black mark in the bank’s books.

 

‘He was a very capable manager, and very popular with our clients;

otherwise, I doubt if we should have kept him after his speculations. We

know nothing against him whatever, except of course, this act of

indiscipline.’

 

‘If he’s gone away he has simply taken French leave?’ asked Surefoot.

 

‘Exactly,’ said the managing director, ‘and that is a very serious

offence. We believe he is in Devonshire—at least, that is where he said

he was going.’

 

Surefoot smiled. ‘He’s not in Devonshire—I can tell you that,’ he said.

‘He left by a specially chartered plane from London at twenty minutes

past four yesterday afternoon for Cologne. Another plane was waiting to

take him to Berlin, and there we have not as yet traced him.’

 

The managing director looked at him open-mouthed. Surefoot thought he

turned a little pale.

 

‘Berlin?’

 

He could hardly believe it. One could almost see his mind working. Leo

Moran’s branch carried very heavy accounts, and a branch manager who

disappears suddenly, and in suspicious circumstances, might not have gone

empty-handed.

 

‘I shouldn’t imagine anything is wrong.’ He was very much perturbed.

‘Beyond the fact that he speculated—and, of course, one never knows to

what length a gambler will go—he was a very honest, high-principled man.

He had, I know, dreams of making a great fortune, but then we have all

passed through that stage without doing anything dishonest.’

 

He pressed a bell.

 

Nevertheless, I will have an immediate examination of the books, and I

shall send down our two best inspectors. We must replace Mr Moran at

once.’

 

Surefoot had managed to get a very accurate description of Leo Moran, but

could find no photograph of him. He should not be difficult to trace; he

was almost completely bald, which fact, however, he could disguise, if he

had reason for disguise at all, with a wig—

 

Surefoot stopped in his reasoning and frowned. A wig! He remembered the

three wigs he had found in a little room over the garage in Baynes Mews;

and he recalled, too, the name of Mr Washington Wirth who lived in the

Midlands…Sixty thousand pounds had gone from Lyne’s account on the

previous day through a Midland branch bank.

 

He asked for and secured authority for obtaining complete information

regarding any account that was in Moran’s branch and, armed with this, he

went back to the bank and interviewed the chief accountant.

 

‘I happen to know the state of Mr Lyne’s account up till a few days ago,’

he said. ‘By error he wrote a note to his ward on the back of the

statement.’

 

He produced it from his pocket, and the accountant examined it. ‘I’ll

just check this up,’ he said. ‘This would not of course, show the sixty

thousand pounds which was debited the day before yesterday.’

 

The accountant was gone a long time, then came back to the little office

where the interview was being held, and put the statement on the table.

By it was a sheet of paper, on which he had scribbled a number of

figures.

 

‘This statement is entirely inaccurate,’ he said. ‘It seems to