“What’s that?” Gryde demanded.
“All in the Globe,” said an exhausted voice. “Rum case, by Jove!”
Gryde took up the special Globe and turned it over languidly. He had hardly’ expected to find the case public. But all the same it was, and nothing had been lost in the display of the juicy item:
BURGLARY AT WINDSOR CASTLE
INGENIOUS AND SUCCESSFUL FRAUD
AN INDIAN PRINCE IS DRUGGED AND IMPERSONATED BY THIEVES
From information just received it is evident that last night a clever and successful attempt at burglary was carried out at Windsor Castle.
It appears that H.R.H. the Mahrajah of Curriebad was summoned to Windsor for some purpose of State, and this seems to have been known to the miscreants. The Prince was lured away to Epsom by an individual claiming to be an old friend of his, the pretext being an invitation to luncheon. There he and his attendants were drugged and locked in a deserted house whilst the pseudo Indians repaired to Windsor.
What happened there we are not in a position to say, but early this morning the Prince and his attendants escaped from their prison-house, and lost no time in laying the case before the proper authorities. The police are extremely reticent upon the point, but we have the best authority for saying that during the night the daring thieves carried away from Windsor articles to the value of thousands of pounds. How they managed to get clear away is a mystery, for though the sham Indians were seen to enter their reserved carriage at Windsor, it is certain they did not detrain en route. Up to the present nothing has been heard or seen of them.
At the last moment we are informed that a large bundle of Oriental robes have been picked up on the line near Slough. How they got there must for the present remain a mere matter for conjecture.
Gryde smiled as he laid the paper aside.
“Looks to me like a hoax,” he said,
“Depend upon it, our friend the Mahrajah got screwed and imagined the whole thing. Burglary at Windsor Castle! The whole thing is too absurd.”
With which Gryde went off to play pool, at which game, as usual, he proved singularly successful. But he declined to stay late.
“No,” he said; “I was up nearly all night. Some other time, perhaps. But you chaps may depend upon it those ‘Indians’ will never be caught. See you fellows in a day or two. I’m going out of town to-morrow for a time.”
But Gryde’s tools never saw him again. They had pooled their plunder, and Gryde was to dispose of it. Yet days and weeks went by, and like the raven,
“Still is sitting, never flitting,”
they tarried for the master who came not.
“Some day,” growled No. 1, “we shall meet Vaughan again; then let him look to himself. I should know him anywhere.”
Vain boast, fond delusion. Tools it was necessary for Gryde to have, but as to using them and making familiar as Gryde with them—never! A myth was “Vaughan,” and as a myth he is likely to remain.
THE SILVERPOOL CUP
CHAPTER I
SACKVILLE MAYNE was still sober, although it was nearly two. The marble clock in the Mornington Arms Hotel recorded the hour and the phenomenon. Years of vinous environment has not yet robbed Mayne of the manorial air, although the necessary acres for the part were gone long ago.
Neither had Mayne quite lost the art of dining. He had done ample justice to the dinner presented by his peripatetic host the Duke de Cavour. The wines left nothing to be desired.
“I am charmed,” said the Duke in quite passable English, “charmed to have met you again. Our last foregathering in Naples was many years ago.”
For Mayne’s part he had forgotten the incident entirely. The Duke’s memory was evidently more trustworthy than his own. All Mayne knew was that he had been in Naples at the time his noble host had mentioned. The latter, an elderly buck with small eyes and a ludicrous pointed moustache, nodded over his glass.
“Those were pleasant days,” he said, “twenty years ago! Dear me! And yet when I saw you in the billiard room last night I recognised you instantly. And what horses you used to drive in those days!”
Mayne smiled. The Duke had touched him on a tender spot. As the fond mother clings to the reprobate son who spells the family ruin, so did Mayne still love the equine flesh which had been his destruction.
“I’ve come down in the world,” he said. “Egad, how I manage to live upon my paltry little place is a mystery even to myself. But I still continue to have a bit of blood about me. It isn’t every man who can boast of having bred and run two Derby winners.”
“The old Godolphin blood, I presume?” suggested the Duke.
Mayne nodded. There was a bond of union between himself and his host. All he knew about the latter he had gleaned that day from the Almanach de Gotha. The exclusive volume in question recorded the fact that de Cavour was an enthusiast where racing was concerned. In a hazy kind of way, he wondered what so great a man was doing in Mornington.
“You race still?” the Duke asked.
“Oh no, I can’t afford it. I only wish I could. I’ve got a colt entered for the Royal Clarendon Stakes at Oldmarket— run-off next week, you know—but I shall have to forfeit. Bar Sinister can beat any horse in the race bar the favourite—ay, and even beat Rialto too, if wound up.”
“Come, my friend, you are not so poor as all that.”
Mayne smiled into his glass. Good wine develops the philosophical side of a man’s nature. It also taps the well-springs of confidence.
“Indeed I am,” he said; “and yet with a little capital, I think I could see my way clear. I would sell my soul for £1,000.”
“Men are prepared to take big risks for sums like that.”
“I know it. I am prepared to undertake anything short of manslaughter.”
The Duke paused in the manipulation of a cigarette in his slim fingers.
