The Secret of Chimneys Read Free Page B

of the river. Like all dagos, he couldn't swim.'
    'Wait a minute, has this story anything to do with the other business?'
    'Nothing whatever, though, oddly enough, now I remember it, the man was a Herzoslovakian. We always called him Dutch Pedro, though.'
    Anthony nodded indifferently.
    'Any name's good enough for a dago,' he remarked. 'Get on with the good work, James.'
    'Well, the fellow was sort of grateful about it. Hung around like a dog. About six months later he died of fever. I was with him. Last thing, just as he was pegging out, he beckoned me and whispered some excited jargon about a secret - a gold mine, I thought he said. Shoved an oilskin packet into my hand which he'd always worn next his skin. Well, I didn't think much of it at the time. It wasn't until a week afterwards that I opened the packet. Then I was curious, I must confess. I shouldn't have thought that Dutch Pedro would have had the sense to know a gold mine when he saw it - but there's no accounting for luck -'
    'And at the mere thought of gold, your heart beat pitter-pat as always,' interrupted Anthony.
    'I was never so disgusted in my life. Gold mine, indeed! I dare say it may have been a gold mine to him, the dirty dog. Do you know what it was? A woman's letters - yes, a woman's letters, and an Englishwoman at that. The skunk had been blackmailing her - and he had the impudence to pass on his dirty bag of tricks to me.'
    'I like to see your righteous heat, James, but let me point out to you that dagos will be dagos. He meant well. You had saved his life, he bequeathed to you a profitable source of raising money - your high-minded British ideals did not enter his horizon.'
    'Well, what the hell was I to do with the things? Burn 'em, that's what I thought at first. And then it occurred to me that there would be that poor dame, not knowing they'd been destroyed, and always living in a quake and a dread lest that dago should turn up again one day.'
    'You've more imagination than I gave you credit for, Jimmy,' observed Anthony, lighting a cigarette. 'I admit that the case presented more difficulties than were at first apparent. What about just sending them to her by post?'
    'Like all women, she'd put no date and no address on most of the letters. There was a kind of address on one - just one word. “Chimneys”.'
    Anthony paused in the act of blowing out his match, and he dropped it with a quick jerk of the wrist as it burned his finger.
    'Chimneys?' he said. 'That's rather extraordinary.'
    'Why, do you know it?'
    'It's one of the stately homes of England, James. A place where kings and queens go for weekends, and diplomats foregather and diplome.'
    'That's one of the reasons why I'm so glad that you're going to England instead of me. You know all these things,' said Jimmy simply. 'A josser like myself from the backwoods of Canada would be making all sorts of bloomers. But someone like, you who's been to Eton and Harrow -'
    'Only one of them,' said Anthony modestly.
    'Will be able to carry it through. Why didn't I send them to her, you say? Well, it seemed to me dangerous. From what I could make out, she seemed to have a jealous husband. Suppose he opened the letter by mistake. Where would the poor dame be then? Or she might be dead - the letters looked as though they'd been written some time. As I figured it out, the only thing was for someone to take them to England and put them into her own hands.'
    Anthony threw away his cigarette, and coming across to his friend, clapped him affectionately on the back.
    'You're a real knight-errant, Jimmy,' he said. And the backwoods of Canada should be proud if you. I shan't do the job half as prettily as you would.'
    'You'll take it on, then?'
    'Of course.'
    McGrath rose, and going across to a drawer, took out a bundle of letters and threw them on the table.
    'Here you are. You'd better have a look at them.'
    'Is it necessary? On the whole, I'd rather not.'
    'Well, from what you say about this Chimneys place,