The Chestermarke InstinctFletcher, J. S. (Joseph Smith)
General
The Chestermarke Instinct
Fletcher, J. S. (Joseph Smith)
Detective and mystery stories
"I spotted him, of course, from your description, as soon as he got out
of the train," replied Gandam. "No mistaking him, naturally--he's an
extra good one to watch. He'd no luggage--not even a handbag. I followed
him to the taxi-cabs. I was close by when he stepped into one, and I
heard what he said. 'Stage door--Adalbert Theatre.' Off he went--I
followed in another taxi. I stopped mine and got out, just in time to
see him walk up the entry to the stage-door. He went in. It was then
half-past eleven; they were beginning to close. I waited and waited
until at last they closed the stage-door. I'll take my oath he'd never
come out!--never!"
Starmidge made a face of intense disgust.
"No, of course he hadn't!" he exclaimed. "He'd gone out at the front. I
suppose that never struck you? I know that stage-door of the
Adalbert--it's up a passage. If you'd stood at the end of that passage,
man, you could have kept an eye on the front and stage-door at the same
time. But, of course, it never struck you that a man could go in at the
back of a place and come out at the front, did it? Well--that's off for
the present. And so am I."
Vexed and disappointed that Gabriel Chestermarke had not been tracked to
wherever he was staying in London, Starmidge went out, hailed a
taxi-cab, and was driven down to the city. He did not particularly
concern himself about Gabriel's visit to the stage-door of the Adalbert
Theatre; it was something, after all, to know he had gone there: if need
arose, he might be traced from that theatre, in which, very possibly, he
had some financial interest. What Starmidge had desired to ascertain
was the banker's London address: he had already learned in Scarnham that
Gabriel Chestermarke was constantly in London for days at a time--he
must have some permanent address at which he could be found. And
Starmidge foresaw that he might wish to find him--perhaps in a hurry.
But just then his chief concern was with another banking
firm--Vanderkiste's. He walked slowly along Lombard Street until he came
to the house--a quiet, sober, eminently respectable-looking old business
place, quite unlike the palatial affairs in which the great banking
corporations of modern origin carry on their transactions. There was no
display of marble and plaster and plate glass and mahogany and heavy
plethoric fittings--a modest brass plate affixed to the door was the
only sign and announcement that banking business was carried on within.
Equally old-fashioned and modest was the interior--and Starmidge was
quick to notice that the clerks were all elderly or middle-aged men,
solemn and grave as undertakers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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