desirous of talking about nothing — it had been a trying day for him.
“Oh, the usual thing; wants to tell us the greatest crime that ever happened — a great London crime that the police have not discovered.”
“Dear me!” said T.B. politely, “wants payment in advance?”
“No; that’s the curious thing about it,” said the reporter. “All he wants is protection.” T.B. stopped dead and faced the young man. He dropped the air of boredom right away.
“Protection?” he said quickly, “from whom?”
“That is just what he doesn’t say — in fact, he’s rather vague on that point — why don’t you go up and see Delawn, the editor?”
T.B. thought a moment.
“Yes,” he nodded. “That is an idea. I will go at once.”
In the holy of holies, the inner room within the inner room, wherein the editor of the London Morning Journal saw those visitors who were privileged to pass the outer portal, T.B. Smith sat, a sorely puzzled man, a scrap of disfigured paper in his hands.
He read it again and looked up at the editor.
“This might of course be a fake,” he said.
“It doesn’t read like a fake,” said the other.
“Admitting your authority on the subject of fakes, Tom,” said T.B., — they were members of the same club, which fact in itself is a license for rudeness,—” I am still in the dark. Why does this — what is his name?”
“Escoltier.”
“Why does this man Escoltier write to a newspaper, instead of coming straight to the police?”
“Because he is a Frenchman, I should imagine,” said the editor. “The French have the newspaper instinct more highly developed than the English.” T.B. looked at his watch.
“Will he come, do you think?”
“I have wired to him,” said the editor. T.B. read the paper again. It was written in execrable English, but its purport was clear. The writer could solve the mystery of Hyatt’s death, and for the matter of that of the Moss murder.
T.B. read it and shook his head.
“This sort of thing is fairly common,” he said; “there never was a bad murder yet, but what the Yard received solutions by the score.”
A little bell tinkled on the editor’s desk, and he took up the receiver of the telephone.
“Yes?” he said, and listened. Then, “Send him up.”
“Is it — ?”
“Monsieur Escoltier,” said the editor. A few seconds later the door was opened, and a man was ushered into the room. Short and thickset, with a two days’ growth of beard on his chin, his nationality was apparent long before he spoke in the argot of the lowly born Parisian. His face was haggard, his eyes heavy from lack of sleep, and the hand that strayed to his mouth shook tremulously.
“I have to tell you,” he began, “about M’sieur Moss and M’sieur Hyatt.” His voice was thick, and as he spoke he glanced from side to side as though fearful of observation. There was something in his actions that vividly reminded the detective of his interview with Hyatt. “You understand,” the man went on incoherently, “that I had long suspected N.H.C. — It was always so unintelligible. There was no such station and—”
“You must calm yourself, monsieur,” said T.B., speaking in French; “ — begin at the beginning, for as yet my friend and myself are entirely in the dark. What is N.H.C., and what does it mean?”
It was some time before the man could be brought to a condition of coherence. The editor pushed him gently to the settee that ran the length of the bay window of his office.
“Wait,” said the journalist, and unlocking a drawer, he produced a silver flask.
“Drink some of this,” he said.
The man raised the brandy to his lips with a hand that shook violently, and drank eagerly.
“C’est bien,” he muttered, and looked from one to the other.
“I tell you this story because I am afraid to go to the police — they are watching the police office—”
“In the first place, who are you?” demanded T.B.
“As to who and what I am,” said the stranger, nodding his head to emphasise his words, “it would be better that I should remain silent.”
“I do not see the necessity,” said the detective calmly. “So far as I can judge from what information I have, you are a French soldier — an engineer. You are a wireless telegraph operator, and your post of duty is on the Eiffel Tower.”
The man stared at the speaker, and his jaw dropped.
“M’sieur!” he gasped.
“Hyatt was also a wireless operator; probably in the employ of the Marconi Company in the west of England. Between you, you surprised the secret of a mysterious agency which employs wireless installations to communicate with its agents. What benefits you yourself may have derived from your discovery I cannot say. It is certain that Hyatt, operating through Moss, made a small fortune; it is equally certain that, detecting a leakage, the ‘Nine Men’ have sent a clever agent to discover the cause—”
But the man from the Eiffel Tower had fainted.
“I shall rely on you to keep the matter an absolute secret until we are ready,” said T.B., and the editor nodded. “The whole scheme came to me in a flash. The Eiffel Tower! Who lives on the Eiffel Tower? Wireless telegraph operators. Our friend is recovering.”
He looked down at the pallid man lying limply in an armchair.
“I am anxious to know what brings him to London. Fright, I suppose. It was the death of Moss that brought Hyatt, the killing of Hyatt that produced Monsieur Escoltier.”
The telegraphist recovered consciousness with a shiver and a groan. For a quarter of an hour he sat with his face hidden in his hands. Another pull at the editor’s flask aroused him to tell his story — a narrative which is valuable as being the first piece of definite evidence laid against the Nine Bears.
He began hesitatingly, but as the story of his complicity was unfolded he warmed to his task. With the true Gaul’s love for the dramatic, he declaimed with elaborate gesture and sonorous phrase the part he had played.
“My name is Jules Escoltier, I am a telegraphist in the corps of engineers. On the establishment of the wireless telegraphy station on the Eiffel Tower in connection with the Casa Blanca affair, I was appointed one of the operators. Strange as it may sound, one does not frequently intercept messages, but I was surprised a year ago to find myself taking code despatches from a station which called itself ‘ N.H.C.’ There is no such station known, so far as I am aware, and copies of the despatches which I forwarded
