Chapter Twenty Five. Held in Bondage

Long afterwards, when the bitterness of that moment had ceased to rankle in my heart, the Prior and Casteno related how eagerly they had watched me from that long lancet-shaped window while I boldly advanced to the detective. For their own part, they were sure Naylor meant mischief to me, but as to the means he would employ they were all at sea, and so they were for the time all strain and attention.

Luckily, I, too, was well on my guard, and so I did not show any undignified haste in the negotiations. Indeed, I purposely asked the inspector to explain why he had sent so earnest a message to me, and, finally cornered, he began the serious part of the conversation.

“I suppose you guess,” he said, looking aimlessly first to one side of him and then to the other, “why I’ve brought a posse of men with me and surrounded that queer place I found you in?” And with a wave of the hand he indicated the monastery.

“In truth, I don’t,” I answered promptly, “unless,” and here I paused rather effectively, “unless, Naylor, you have taken leave of your senses.”

The man tried to smile, but it was a sickly effort, foredoomed to failure.

“Ah,” he observed, “you always were a hot ’un, Mr Glynn, in any game of ‘bluff’ but it won’t do this time—you’ve gone a bit too far for your own comfort—and we’re going to see you worsted.”

“Well, that’s all right,” I responded cheerfully. “You won’t object to that, will you? It isn’t love for me that’s making you look so precious uneasy, now, is it? Well, then, get on with your work, I shan’t object.” And producing my cigarette case I opened it and passed it carelessly to my companion, who pushed it rather petulantly on one side.

“I don’t want to smoke—I am much too serious for that,” he snapped.

“Oh,” I rejoined. “Well, I am not.” And I struck a match and lit a cigarette.

“I don’t think I ought to beat about the bush any longer,” he proceeded after an irritated glance at my magnificent assumption of carelessness. “The fact is just this, I hold warrants for the arrest of yourself and that young Spanish adventurer, José Casteno, or to give him his proper name, Joseph Zouche.”

“Indeed,” said I, trying to look politely interested, “that’s news if you like. On what charge, pray?”

“Robbery, with violence, on Worcester Racecourse—three old manuscripts, the property of Mr Peter Zouche, the hunchback, who held them as bailee!”

“You surprise me,” I remarked. “Really, you do. Where does Worcester happen to be?” And I gave him a look of mild and innocent inquiry that I believe would have done credit to a child of six.

“You will find out all the geography you care to learn in the police station,” he said, stiffly repressing a very obvious temptation to swear roundly; “for the present you must consider yourself under arrest.” And he beckoned one of his men from a distance and told him to go to St. Bruno’s and to ask for José Casteno, who joined us a few moments later, clad in ordinary clothes, and was then told of the charge against us, whilst I perched myself on the root of a fallen tree and went on puffing away at my cigarette.

“Now,” said Naylor in conclusion, much impressed by the manner of his own eloquence, “if you two gentlemen don’t mind, one of my mates will fetch a four-wheeler, and we’ll drive off to Bow Street.”

“Do,” I put in, “it will be warmer there than it is here.” And I pretended to shiver as I added: “It seems to me, Naylor, there is always a cold streak in the air on Hampstead Heath; don’t you think so?”

The man shot me a look charged with malice and uncharitableness. But he did not take the bait. “I have,” he went on with a certain amount of hesitation, “a search warrant, duly executed to go over that house there—St. Bruno’s. Of course, I don’t want to make myself needlessly unpleasant, so if you would like to hand over the manuscripts, the subjects of the charge against you, I will not put it into execution.”

José looked at me, and I looked at him. We would both of us have dearly liked to have palmed off those forgeries upon this short-tempered individual; but it would not do.

“We know nothing about your business,” I said slowly, and, taking my cue, my friend nodded in support. “You must do really what strikes you as the best; but,” and the inspector’s eyes glittered, expecting some concession or admission, “don’t—don’t ask us any questions,” I added sweetly, “for that is beyond your duty and outside your place.”

With a muffled curse Naylor turned on his heel and despatched a messenger for the cab he had mentioned. Then he summoned two or three other constables, handed them certain documents, and whispered to them quickly certain instructions. Afterwards a four-wheeler drove up, and giving our words that we would make no effort to escape, the three of us stepped inside, and began that long and tedious journey to Bow Street.

The most weary rides, however, come to an end some time—and so did this. At length the police station was reached, and we all walked boldly into the charge office, where the warrant was read over to us, to which we made no reply, of course; and, pending our formal remand by a magistrate, I begged and obtained permission that we should be both placed in the same cell. In answer to the usual question: Did we wish to communicate with any legal advisers or friends? both Casteno and I said: “Yes.” After a whispered consultation we decided on this plan of action. I sent this telegram:

“Cooper-Nassington, House of Commons, SW.

“Casteno and I have been arrested on extraordinary charge of robbery with violence, and lodged at Bow Street. Please see hunchback and explain error, and do your best to secure our immediate release.—Hugh Glynn.”

“It will not, then, be my fault if the round-table conference fails to come off,” I reasoned. But at the bottom of my heart, I own, I felt strangely disturbed at the turn affairs had taken. I could not rid myself of some curious suspicion that Lord Fotheringay and his friends had got some new trick to work, and that, after all, we might be now, quite unconsciously, riding for a nasty fall.

Casteno himself elected to appeal to Lord Cyril, and after we had been both searched and had all our valuables taken from us he was permitted to take a sheet of notepaper and to write as follows:—

“Bow Street Police Station.

“Dear Lord Cyril,—The matter is too serious for me to stand on any ceremony with you, and, therefore, I write quite straightforwardly to you, to report what you will doubtless hear in the course of your official duties—that Mr Hugh Glynn, the Secret Investigator, and myself have been arrested, and are now detained at the above address on some trumped-up charge of stealing certain manuscripts from my father on Worcester Racecourse.

“This action of the authorities, of course, quite precludes all chance of our meeting you and Colonel and Miss Napier and Lord Fotheringay at Stanton Street to-night. I put it to you now quite pointedly whether it is to the welfare of England that this interview should not take place?

“I suggest that you see the Home Secretary and get this action quashed. Otherwise, please regard our offer to treat with you as withdrawn, and, if necessary, we shall appeal to His Majesty the King himself, to see that there is no party jugglery with so vital a national issue as this recovery of the sacred lake of Tangikano. As to the charge of theft and assault, that, of course, is absurd, and must fail.

“Yours obediently, José Zouche Casteno.”

This note was read very carefully by the officers in charge of the station. But they had evidently received some secret instructions about us, for they pretended to treat it quite as an ordinary and commonplace communication, and permitted Casteno himself to enclose it in an envelope and hand it to a constable to carry to the Foreign Office.

Then we were conducted to a cell and left to our own devices, and for a time we kept ourselves lively enough, speculating on what would be the issue of the strong commanding line we had taken.

But as hour after hour slipped by and we received no sign from the outer world our hearts began to sink within us. Maybe, too, the atmosphere of that small, tightly-barred cell, with its narrow walls and depressing suggestions, had its baneful effect upon us. At all events, a sensation of fear seemed to seize us. We felt caged—bound—removed from the live, throbbing world of action to which we had grown so accustomed, and then, thus deprived of movement, we insensibly began to languish. All at once we realised what freedom really means—that it yields of itself a thousand pleasures, as a fish is surrounded by the unconscious sustenances of the sea.

Finally, as the night began to close in, a heavy step was heard in the whitewashed passage outside, and the wicket door was thrust open.

“Here is tea for two,” cried a gruff voice, “also a letter for José Casteno.” And I hastened to the entrance and received a tray on which stood two coarse mugs of tea and three or four huge slabs of real police-station bread and butter.

Trembling with excitement Casteno seized the letter that had been brought for him and tore open the envelope, on the flap of which was embossed in red the Royal Arms, with the words “Foreign Office” let into the outer circle. Then he unfolded the note, which, in response to a gesture from him, I read over his shoulder.

“Foreign Office, Whitehall, SW.

“Sir,—I am desired by His Majesty’s Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to acknowledge your letter of this day’s date and to inform you that the subject-matter thereof has no connection with him in either a personal or official capacity.

“I have the honour to remain, Sir, Your most obedient servant, Reginald Wyke, Assistant Secretary.

“To José Zouche Casteno, The Police Station, Bow Street, WC.”

“What a terrible snub,” I cried, pushing the tray on to the wooden bedstead. “What can it mean?”

“They’ve done us, that’s all,” panted Casteno, his eyes flashing with indignation. “Either they’ve got hold of the manuscripts when they searched St. Bruno’s, or we’ve been sold in some fashion we least expect.”

“Is it Cooper-Nassington?” I hazarded. “Remember, I have had no reply to my telegram!”

“I don’t know,” said the Spaniard, gloomily beginning to pace up and down the cell. “We must wait, I suppose, before we can see. At present we’ve played our cards to the bitter end, and we’ve got nowhere.”

“How about the king?” I queried nervously.

“We can do nothing there until we see what Cooper-Nassington has developed into.” He relapsed into moody reflection. For a few minutes we did not exchange a word, and then, stopping his restless promenade suddenly, he gripped me excitedly by the arm. “I’ve got it,” he cried, “I’ve got it. Deserted by all, we’ll try the Jesuits.”

“And sell England, I suppose,” I answered coldly. “Not a bit of it.”

“Oh no. We shall thus procure even more powerful adherents for England than even Lord Cyril is. We will strike a bargain with them, to side with us.”

“You won’t succeed,” I said.

“I will,” he thundered, and he caught the chain attached to a prisoner’s bell and rung it violently.

“Mind,” I returned impressively, “you do this thing against my better judgment, and when you know for a fact that the Jesuits have been as keen almost to get hold of these documents as we have. Bad as our plight is now, I am sure it will be a thousand times worse after you have entrusted our secrets to these subtle sons of St. Ignatius. Make no mistake. Understand you have been warned, and that you do this thing with your eyes wide open.”

“I understand perfectly,” he rejoined. “But I am at the last ditch. I shall turn now and fight ruffians of the stamp of Cuthbertson with his own weapons. He has insulted me grossly in that last letter of his, penned by an assistant secretary, I see, and I will repay him ‘a tooth for a tooth, an eye for an eye, burning for burning’!” And his hands clenched, and upon his features there glowered a look of diabolical rage.

I would have said more, but just then a police sergeant answered his summons, and at his request brought him a fresh sheet of notepaper and an envelope, as well as pad, pen, ink, and blotting paper. Thereon he sat down once again on the side of the bed and wrote as under:

“Bow Street Police Station, Cell 12,973.

“To The Rev. Father Provincial of the Society of Jesus, Church of the Immaculate Conception, Farm Street, Berkeley Square, W.

“Rev. Father,—As one who was for some years as a small boy educated at your society’s Stoneyhurst College, I beg to crave your assistance. A friend and I have been arrested on a perfectly frivolous and futile charge for grave purposes of the State, connected with the disappearance of three manuscripts relating to the sacred lake of Tangikano, in which I understand your society has a very real and vital interest. Can you, therefore, make it convenient to come and see me on the matter, or at least send a representative to me who is capable of giving me the best and most disinterested advice at this juncture? If so, words will fail to express my gratitude to you.

“Your distracted servant, José Zouche Casteno.”

“Please have that sent at once,” he said, passing the letter open for the officer to read.

“Any answer?” replied the man, taking the note and preparing to leave.

“Yes; pray tell the constable to wait,” returned Casteno, and the sergeant disappeared, and once more we were alone.

For my own part, I was too disgusted then to wrangle any further with the Spaniard. In a swift comprehensive fashion I realised that it was too late to upbraid, the mischief now was done, and that all I could do was to stand by and fight as best I could for the welfare of my own country independent of any adventurers like Cuthbertson on the one hand or of the Jesuits on the other.

After all, I saw, if I became too vocal, Casteno was in no mood to brook lectures from me. He always had a remedy against me—he could ask to be placed in a separate cell, and then I should be in a worse position than ever. I should know nothing of what he was doing to injure England, nothing at all.