Red Aces by Edgar Wallace

Lynn. When he got to the hotel he asked for his friend, but was told that he had not arrived, nor had he made reservation of the rooms which had been agreed upon.
    From that moment he disappeared from human ken, and neither Machfield nor any of his friends were able to trace him. It was no accident: it was a deliberate double-cross. Machfield played the game as far as he was able, and when Lamontaine was released from prison and came to Paris, a broken man, for his young wife had died while he was in gaol, he helped the croupier as well as he could, and together they came to England to establish gaming-houses, but primarily to find Lynn and force him to disgorge.
    There was another person on the track of Lynn. McKay, who had been robbed, as he knew after the French court proceedings, employed me to trace him, but for certain reasons I was unable to justify his confidence.
    I do not know in what year or month Lamontaine and Machfield located their man. It is certain that “Mr Wentford”, as he called himself, lived in increasing fear of their vengeance. When they did locate him he proved to be an impossible man to reach. I have no doubt that the house was carefully reconnoitred, his habits studied, and that attempts were made to get at him. But those attempts failed. It is highly probable, though no proof of this exists, that he was well informed as to his enemy’s movements, for so far as can be gathered from the statement of his niece and checked by the admissions of Machfield, Lynn never left his house except on the days when Machfield and Lamontaine were in Paris – they frequently went to that city over the weekend.
    It was Lamontaine who formed the diabolical plan which was eventually to lead to Wentford’s death. He knew that the only man admitted to the house was the mounted policeman who patrolled that part of the country, so he studied police methods, even got information as to the times on which the beat was patrolled, and on the night of the murder, soon after it was dark, he travelled down to Beaconsfield by car through the storm, accompanied by Machfield.
    Lamontaine at some time or other had been on the French stage (he spoke perfect English) and I have no doubt was in a position to make himself up sufficiently well to deceive Wentford into opening the door. At seven o’clock Constable Verity left the station and proceeded on his patrol. At seven-thirty he was ruthlessly murdered by a man who stepped out of his concealment and shot him point-blank through the heart.
    The body was taken into a field and laid out, the two murderers hoping that the snow would cover it. Lamontaine was already wearing the uniform of a police constable, and, mounting the horse, he rode on to Wentford’s house. The old man saw him through the window, and, suspecting nothing, got down and opened the door.
    He may not have realized that anything was wrong until he was back in his parlour, for it was there that he was struck down. The two men intended leaving him in the cottage, but a complication arose whilst they were searching the place, or endeavouring to open the safe behind the bookcase, The telephone rang, and they heard Margot Lynn say that she was coming on but was delayed. One of them answered in a disguised voice.
    The thing to do now was to remove the body. Lifting it out, they laid it over the horse’s saddle, and, guiding the nervous animal down to the road, led it towards Beaconsfield. Here a second complication arose: the lights of Mr Enward’s car were seen coming toward them. The body was dropped by the side of the road, and the constable took his place on the horse’s back. The animal was smothered with the blood of the murdered man, and the clerk of Mr Enward, the lawyer, taking the bridle quite innocently, must have rubbed his sleeve along the shoulder, for it was afterwards discovered that his coat was stained. That gave me my first clue, and I was able, owing to my peculiar mind, to reconstruct the crime as