He was not quite sure that he would have been ready with this glib explanation.
“I should love to go too,” said Sheila, looking wistfully at the ever-resourceful Smeaton, whom she now frankly accepted as the disposer of their destinies.
“Forgive me if I oppose you this once, my dear Miss Monkton,” he said in his kindest and most diplomatic manner. “Two are not always company in detective business, unless they’ve been trained to work together. Besides, I shall want Mr Wingate to keep in close touch with me on the ’phone, and he will have no time to look after a lady.”
Having settled that matter, he turned to Wingate. “First of all, here are a couple of my cards; one to show the post-office if there is anything awkward – this for the chief constable of Brighton if you have need of his assistance. I will scribble an introduction on it.” He suited the action to the word. “Now, the sooner you are off the better. I will put Miss Monkton into a taxi. You be off, and try to get hold of that wire.”
There was no resisting his powerful personality. He controlled the situation like an autocrat.
“Stay, just one thing more. I shall be at Scotland Yard till seven, and at home about eight. Here is my private ’phone number, if unseen developments arise.”
He thought of everything, he foresaw the improbable. They were lost in admiration. At the moment of departing, he rather damped their enthusiasm by muttering, almost to himself:
“If I could put my hand on one of my own men, I wouldn’t trouble you, but there is no time, and delay is dangerous.”
A hasty hand-shake to Sheila, a fond lover’s look into her eyes, and Wingate was out of the post-office, and into a taxi, en route for Victoria.
He thought of her all the time he was travelling to Brighton. In these last few days her great sorrow had brought her very near to him. He had read her disappointment when Smeaton had forbidden her to accompany him. But she would not resent that on him; she knew he was working in her interests, that his one thought was to help in solving the tragic mystery that was clouding her young life.
The train arrived at Brighton punctual to the minute, and mindful of Smeaton’s remark that delay was dangerous, he drove straight to the post-office.
He was, in a certain sense, elated with the mission that had been entrusted him, through the mere accident of Smeaton not having had time to put his hand on an experienced man. But he felt some trepidation as he walked through the swing-doors. Surely people who set forth on detective work must have nerves of steel and foreheads of triple brass.
He bought some stamps first, not because he wanted them, but in order to screw up his courage to sticking-point.
A sharp-featured, not too amiable-looking young woman served him. When he had completed his purchase, he asked in as cordial a voice as he could assume:
“Are there any letters or telegrams for the name of Herbert?”
The young woman regarded him with a suspicious glance.
“Is your name Herbert, may I ask?”
At that moment, he blessed Smeaton for the lie which he had made him a present of at starting. He proceeded to retail it for the young woman’s benefit.
She smiled a sour smile, and he felt his face flush. Decidedly he wanted more experience.
“Nothing doing this time,” she said insolently, in a rasping cockney voice. “You’d better hurry up next time. The real owner of the telegram took it away half-an-hour ago!”
Chapter Seven.
The Mysterious Mrs Saxton
After Wingate’s hurried departure, Smeaton put Sheila into a taxi, and quickly took his way back to Scotland Yard. Here he found a note awaiting him from the Home Secretary, requesting him to step round to the Home Office.
They knew each other well, these two men, and had been brought together several times on affairs of public importance. Before he had thrown all his energies into politics Mr Carlingford had been one of the most successful barristers of the day. His intellect was of the keen and subtle order.
He was, of course, profoundly interested in the mysterious disappearance of his colleague, the Colonial Secretary, and had sent for the detective to talk over the matter.
“Sit down, Smeaton. Have you any news? I know you are not a man to let the grass grow under your feet.”
Smeaton explained the situation as it stood at present.
“We have partly identified one, and in my opinion the more important, of the two men who put him in the taxi. His name is given to me as Stent, and he is supposed to have a house somewhere in the neighbourhood of St. Albans. One of my best sergeants is down there to-day, making inquiries. I fancy we are also on the track of the second man.”
He added that it was to Farloe’s sister, Mrs Saxton, that he was indebted for the somewhat scanty information he possessed.
“I met that lady last winter at Mentone,” remarked the Home Secretary. “She was an attractive young woman, with ingratiating manners. I remember she introduced herself to me, telling me that her brother was Monkton’s secretary. My impression at the time, although I don’t know that I had any particular evidence to go on, was that there was just a little touch of the adventuress about her.”
“Precisely my impression,” agreed the man from “over the way.”
“I never took to that fellow, Farloe, either,” continued the statesman. “I don’t think Monkton was particularly attached to him, although he admitted he was the best secretary he ever had. I always thought there was something shifty and underhand about him.”
They talked for a few moments longer, exchanging probable and possible theories, and then Smeaton rose to take his leave.
“Well, Mr Carlingford, thanks to your kind help we have been able to keep it out of the Press so far. I hope our inquiries will soon bear some fruit,” he said, and then left the room.
Sheila had gone home feeling very sad and lonely. All her plans for the day had been upset by Wingate’s sudden journey to Brighton.
She had looked forward to spending some hours in the society of her lover. The excitement of the detective business in which they proposed to engage for the rest of the day would have taken her out of herself, and kept alive the courage which flagged sorely now and again, as she confronted the apparently insoluble problem of her beloved father’s disappearance.
Her luncheon finished, she went into her own dainty little sitting-room and tried to read. But she could not focus her attention. Her thoughts strayed away from the printed page, and at last she flung down the book impatiently.
“I wish that I had insisted on going down to Brighton with Austin,” she said to herself. “I think I must get out. I shall go mad if I stop within these four walls.”
As she was making up her mind, the door opened, and old Grant entered.
“A lady would like to see you. Miss,” he said. “She says her name is Saxton and that you know her, as she is Mr Farloe’s sister. She says she has been here once, but I don’t seem to remember her.”
Sheila was immediately interested. Their acquaintance was of the
