The Seven Dials Mystery

Chapter 13 THE SEVEN DIALS CLUB

Bundle reached 14 Hunstanton Street about six p.m. At that hour, as she rightly judged, the Seven Dials Club was a dead spot. Bundle's aim was a simple one. She intended to get hold of the ex-footman Alfred. She was convinced that once she had got hold of him the rest would be easy. Bundle had a simple autocratic method of dealing with retainers. It seldom failed, and she saw no reason why it should fail now.

The only thing of which she was not certain was how many people inhabited the club premises. Naturally she wished to disclose her presence to as few people as possible.

Whilst she was hesitating as to her best line of attack, the problem was solved for her in a singularly easy fashion. The door of No. 14 opened and Alfred himself came out.

"Good-afternoon, Alfred," said Bundle pleasantly.

Alfred jumped.

"Oh! good-afternoon, your ladyship. I – I didn't recognise your ladyship just for a moment."

Paying a tribute in her own mind to her maid's clothing, Bundle proceeded to business.

"I want a few words with you, Alfred. Where shall we go?"

"Well – really, my lady – I don't know – it's not what you might call a nice part round here – I don't know, I'm sure –"

Bundle cut him short.

"Who's in the club?"

"No one at present, my lady."

"Then we'll go in there."

Alfred produced a key and opened the door. Bundle passed in. Alfred, troubled and sheepish, followed her. Bundle sat down and looked straight at the uncomfortable Alfred.

"I suppose you know," she said crisply, "that what you're doing here is dead against the law?"

Alfred shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other.

"It's true as we've been raided twice," he admitted. "But nothing compromising was found, owing to the neatness of Mr. Mosgorovsky's arrangements."

"I'm not talking of the gambling only," said Bundle. "There's more than that – probably a great deal more than you know. I'm going to ask you a direct question, Alfred, and I should like the truth, please. How much were you paid for leaving Chimneys?"

Alfred looked twice round the cornice as though seeking for inspirations, swallowed three or four times, and then took the inevitable course of a weak will opposed to a strong one.

"It was this way, your ladyship. Mr. Mosgorovsky, he come with a party to visit Chimneys on one of the show days. Mr. Tredwell, he was indisposed like – an ingrowing toe-nail as a matter of fact – so it fell to me to show the parties over. At the end of the tour, Mr. Mosgorovsky, he stays behind the rest, and after giving me something handsome, he falls into conversation."

"Yes," said Bundle encouragingly.

"And the long and the short of it was," said Alfred, with a sudden acceleration of his narrative, "that he offers me a hundred pounds down to leave that instant minute and to look after this here club. He wanted someone as was used to the best families – to give the place a tone, as he put it. And, well, it seemed flying in the face of providence to refuse – let along that the wages I get here are just three times what they were as second footman."

"A hundred pounds," said Bundle. "That's a very large sum, Alfred. Did they say anything about who was to fill your place at Chimneys?"

"I demurred a bit, my lady, about leaving at once. As I pointed out, it wasn't usual and might cause inconvenience. But Mr. Mosgorovsky he knew of a young chap – been in good service and ready to come any minute. So I mentioned his name to Mr. Tredwell and everything was settled pleasant like."

Bundle nodded. Her own suspicions had been correct and the modus operandi was much as she had thought it to be. She essayed a further inquiry.

"Who is Mr. Mosgorovsky?"

"Gentleman as runs this club. Russian gentleman. A very clever gentleman too."

Bundle abandoned the getting of information for the moment and proceeded to other matters.

"A hundred pounds is a very large sum of money, Alfred."

"Larger than I ever handled, my lady," said Alfred with simple candour.

"Did you never suspect that there was something wrong?"

"Wrong, my lady?"

"Yes. I'm not talking about the gambling. I mean something far more serious. You don't want to be sent to penal servitude, do you, Alfred?"

"Oh, Lord! my lady, you don't mean it?"

"I was at Scotland Yard the day before yesterday," said Bundle impressively. "I heard some very curious things. I want you to help me, Alfred, and if you do, well – if things go wrong, I'll put in a good word for you."

"Anything I can do, I shall be only too pleased, my lady. I mean, I would anyway."

"Well, first," said Bundle, "I want to go all over this place – from top to bottom."

Accompanied by a mystified and scared Alfred, she made a very thorough tour of inspection. Nothing struck her eye till she came to the gaming room. There she noticed an inconspicuous door in a corner, and the door was locked.

Alfred explained readily.

"That's used as a getaway, your ladyship. There's a room and a door on to a staircase what comes out in the next street. That's the way the gentry goes when there's a raid."

"But don't the police know about it?"

"It's a cunning door, you see, my lady. Looks like a cupboard, that's all."

Bundle felt a rising excitement.

"I must get in here," she said.

Alfred shook his head.

"You can't, my lady; Mr. Mosgorovsky, he has the key."

"Well," said Bundle, "there are other keys."

She perceived that the lock was a perfectly ordinary one which probably could be easily unlocked by the key of one of the other doors. Alfred, rather troubled, was sent to collect likely specimens. The fourth that Bundle tried fitted. She turned it, opened the door and passed through.

She found herself in a small, dingy apartment. A long table occupied the centre of the room with chairs ranged round it. There was no other furniture in the room. Two built-in cupboards stood on either side of the fireplace. Alfred indicated the nearer one with a nod.

"That's it," he explained.

Bundle tried the cupboard door, but it was locked, and she saw at once that this lock was a very different affair. It was of the patent kind that would only yield to its own key.

"'Ighly ingenious, it is," explained Alfred. "It looks all right when opened. Shelves, you know, with a few ledgers and that on 'em. Nobody'd ever suspect, but you touch the right spot and the whole thing swings open."

Bundle had turned round and was surveying the room thoughtfully. The first thing she noticed was that the door by which they had entered was carefully fitted round with baize. It must be completely soundproof. Then her eyes wandered to the chairs. There were seven of them, three each side and one rather more imposing in design at the head of the table.

Bundle's eyes brightened. She had found what she was looking for. This, she felt sure, was the meeting place of the secret organisation. The place was almost perfectly planned. It looked so innocent – you could reach it just by stepping through the gaming room, or you could arrive there by the secret entrance – and any secrecy, any precautions were easily explained by the gaming going on in the next room.

Idly, as these thoughts passed through her mind, she drew a finger across the marble of the mantelpiece. Alfred saw and misinterpreted the action.

"You won't find no dirt, not to speak of," he said. "Mr. Mosgorovsky, he ordered the place to be swept out this morning, and I did it while he waited."

"Oh!" said Bundle, thinking very hard. "This morning, eh?"

"Has to be done sometimes," said Alfred. "Though the room's never what you might call used."

Next minute he received a shock.

"Alfred," said Bundle, "you've got to find me a place in this room where I can hide."

Alfred looked at her in dismay.

"But it's impossible, my lady. You'll get me into trouble and I'll lose my job."

"You'll lose it anyway when you go to prison," said Bundle unkindly. "But as a matter of fact, you needn't worry, nobody will know anything about it."

"And there ain't no place," wailed Alfred. "Look round for yourself, your ladyship, if you don't believe me."

Bundle was forced to admit that there was something in this argument. But she had the true spirit of one undertaking adventures.

"Nonsense," she said with determination. "There has got to be a place."

"But there ain't one," wailed Alfred.

Never had a room shown itself more unpropitious for concealment. Dingy blinds were drawn down over the dirty window panes, and there were no curtains. The windowsill outside, which Bundle examined, was about four inches wide! Inside the room there were the table, the chairs and the cupboards.

The second cupboard had a key in the lock. Bundle went across and pulled it open. Inside were shelves covered with an odd assortment of glasses and crockery.

"Surplus stuff as we don't use," explained Alfred. "You can see for yourself, my lady, there's no place here as a cat could hide."

But Bundle was examining the shelves.

"Flimsy work," she said. "Now then, Alfred, have you got a cupboard downstairs where you could shove all this glass? You have! Good. Then get a tray and start to carry it down at once. Hurry – there's no time to lose."

"You can't, my lady. And it's getting late, too. The cooks will be here any minute now."

"Mr. Mosgo-whatnot doesn't come till later, I suppose?"

"He's never here much before midnight. But oh, my lady –"

"Don't talk so much, Alfred," said Bundle. "Get that tray. If you stay here arguing, you will get into trouble."

Doing what is familiarly known as "wringing his hands," Alfred departed.

Presently he returned with a tray, and having by now realised that his protests were useless, he worked with a nervous energy quite surprising.

As Bundle had seen, the shelves were easily detachable. She took them down, ranged them upright against the wall, and then stepped in.

"H'm," she remarked. "Pretty narrow. It's going to be a tight fit. Shut the door on me carefully, Alfred – that's right. Yes, it can be done. Now I want a gimlet."

"A gimlet, my lady?"

"That's what I said."

"I don't know –"

"Nonsense, you must have a gimlet – perhaps you've got an auger as well. If you haven't got what I want, you'll have to go out and buy it, so you'd better try hard to find the right thing."

Alfred departed and returned presently with quite a creditable assortment of tools.

Bundle seized what she wanted and proceeded swiftly and efficiently to bore a small hole at the level of her right eye. She did this from the outside so that it should be less noticeable, and she dared not make it too large lest it should attract attention.

"There, that'll do," she remarked at last.

"Oh, but, my lady, my lady –"

"Yes?"

"But they'll find you – if they should open the door."

"They won't open the door," said Bundle. "Because you are going to lock it and take the key away."

"And if by any chance Mr. Mosgorovsky should ask for the key?"

"Tell him it's lost," said Bundle briskly. "But nobody's going to worry about this cupboard – it's only here to attract attention from the other one and make a pair. Go on, Alfred, someone might come at any time. Lock me in and take the key and come and let me out when everyone's gone."

"You'll be taken bad, my lady. You'll faint –"

"I never faint," said Bundle. "But you might as well get me a cocktail. I shall certainly need it. Then lock the door of the room again – don't forget – and take all the door keys back to their proper doors. And Alfred – don't be too much of a rabbit. Remember, if anything goes wrong, I'll see you through."

"And that's that," said Bundle to herself when, having served the cocktail, Alfred had finally departed.

She was not nervous lest Alfred's nerve should fail and he should give her away. She knew that his sense of self-preservation was far too strong for that. His training alone helped him to conceal private emotions beneath the mask of a well-trained servant.

Only one thing worried Bundle. The interpretation she had chosen to put upon the cleaning of the room that morning might be all wrong. And if so – Bundle sighed in the narrow confines of the cupboard. The prospect of spending long hours in it for nothing was not attractive.