The King of Diamonds: A Tale of Mystery and AdventureTracy, Louis
General
The King of Diamonds: A Tale of Mystery and Adventure
Tracy, Louis
Detective and mystery stories; Fiction
"A vulgar swindle!" she murmured to herself. "How is it possible for a
police magistrate to be taken in in such manner! I suppose the Jew
person knows more about it than appears on the surface. But how came the
boy to give that name? It is sufficiently uncommon to be remarkable. How
stupid it was of Julie to mislay my dressing case. It would be really
interesting to know what has become of those people, and now I may have
to leave town before I can find out."
How much further her disjointed comments might have gone it is
impossible to say, but at that moment a French maid entered the room and
gazed inquiringly around the various small tables with which it was
filled. At last she found the lady, who was breakfasting alone, and sped
swiftly toward her.
"I am so glad, milady," she said, speaking in French. "The bag has found
itself at the police station. The cabman brought it there, and, if you
please, milady, as the value was given as eight pounds, he claimed a
reward of one pound."
"Which you will pay yourself. You lost the bag," was the curt reply.
"Where is it?"
The maid's voice was somewhat tearful as she answered:
"In milady's room. I paid the sovereign."
Her ladyship rose and glided gracefully toward the door, followed by the
maid, who whispered to a French waiter--bowing most deferentially to
the guest as he held the door open--that her mistress was a cat. He
confided his own opinion that her ladyship was a holy pig, and the two
passed along a corridor.
Lady Morland hastily tore open the recovered dressing case, and
consulted an address book.
"Oh! here it is," she cried, triumphantly. "Number three, Johnson's
Mews, Mile End Road, E. What a horrid-smelling place. However, Messrs.
Sharpe & Smith will now be able to obtain some definite intelligence for
me. Julie! My carriage in ten minutes."
Thus it happened that during the afternoon, a dapper little clerk
descended from an omnibus in the neighborhood of Johnson's Mews, and
began his inquiries, as all Londoners do, by consulting a policeman.
Certain facts were forthcoming.
"A Mrs. Anson, a widow, who lived in Johnson's Mews? Yes, I think a
woman of that name died a few weeks ago. I remember seeing a funeral
leave the mews. I don't know anything about the boy. Sometimes, when I
pass through there at night, I have seen a light in the house. However,
here it is. Let's have a look at it."
The pair entered the mews and approached the deserted house. The
solicitor's clerk knocked and then tried the door; it was locked. They
both went to the window and looked in. Had Philip hanged himself, as he
intended, they would have been somewhat surprised by the spectacle that
would have met their eyes. As it was, they only saw a small room of
utmost wretchedness, with a mattress lying on the floor in front of the
fireplace. An empty tin and a bundle of old letters rested on a rickety
chair, and a piece of sacking was thrust through two broken panes in
the small window opposite.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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