Inspector French's Greatest Case by Freeman Wills Crofts

coming down, and that he had asked him, Mr. Gething, to do it instead. It seemed that Mr. Duke had got information from a confidential agent at Constantinople that a member of the old Russian aristocracy had escaped with his family jewels from the clutches of the Bolsheviks, and that he now wished to dispose of the whole collection for what it would bring. He was at one time Duke Sergius of one of the Ural provinces—I have the name in my book upstairs—but was now passing himself off as a Pole under the name Francisko Loth. The collection was one of extraordinary excellence, and Mr. Duke believed it could be purchased for a third, or even less, of its real value. He had approached the duke through the agent, and had offered to deal. The trouble, however, was that the Soviet Government had learned of the duke’s escape, and were displaying immense energy in the hope of recapturing him. Their agents were scouring the whole of Europe, and Loth was in mortal terror, for discovery meant certain death. Mr. Gething told me straight also, that should I succeed in purchasing, my life would not be worth a tinker’s curse until I had handed over the stuff. He said that, recognising this, Mr. Duke considered that my commission should be substantially increased, and he asked me was I willing to take on the job.”
    â€œAnd you agreed?”
    â€œWell, what do you think? Of course I agreed. I asked for further details, and he let me have them. For both my own safety and Loth’s, I was to take extraordinary precautions. My name is pretty well known in dealers’ circles over Europe, and therefore would be known to the Soviet emissaries, so I was to take another. I was to become John Harrison, of Huddersfield, a tinplate manufacturer. I was not to write to the office direct, but to send my reports, if any were necessary, to Mr. Herbert Lyons, a friend of Mr. Duke’s, who lived not far from him at Hampstead. If I had to write, I was to be most careful to phrase my letter so that were I suspected and my correspondence tampered with, it would not give the affair away. Instructions to me would be sent to Harrison and written on plain notepaper, and would be worded in a similar careful way. Mr. Gething gave me a code by which I could wire the amount agreed on, when the money would be sent me by special messenger; that is, if we could come to terms.”
    Vanderkemp paused and glanced at the Inspector, but the latter not speaking, he continued:
    â€œLoth was hidden in Constantinople, but was trying to come west. He was not sure whether he could do so best by land or sea. If he could get out of Turkey by land, he would work his way up the Danube to Austria and Switzerland, and would stop eventually at the Beau-Sejour Hotel in Chamonix. If that proved impossible, he would try to leave by sea, and would travel by one of the Navigazione Generale Italiana boats to Genoa, and thence to Barcelona, where he would put up at the Gomez Hotel, that is, this one. He had let Mr. Duke know through his Constantinople friend that if he didn’t turn up at Chamonix by the 4th, it would mean either that the Bolsheviks had caught him, or that he was making for Barcelona. My instructions, therefore, were to go to Chamonix, put up at the Beau-Sejour, and look out until the 4th for a tall, white-complexioned, dark-haired man named Francisko Loth. If by that time he had not turned up, I was to move on here. I was to wait here for a fortnight, at the end of which time, if I had still heard nothing of him, I was to go on to Constantinople, look up Mr. Duke’s agent, and try for news of Loth’s fate.”
    â€œAnd you carried out the instructions?”
    â€œYes. I went to Chamonix, and stayed there for a week. Seeing no one who could possibly be the man, I came on here, and have been waiting here ever since. To-morrow I proposed to leave for Constantinople.”
    French threw away the butt of his cigar and selected