Part 12 (2/2)

It was Mr. Van Adams!

I could not repress a violent start, the thing was so sudden. What did this gathering of the clans mean? He noticed my movement at once, and looked at me with inquiry in his eyes. The lavatory was quite empty save for our two selves, and my decision was taken at once.

”Mr. Van Adams?” I asked.

”Sure!” he replied. ”You have the floor--shoot!”

”You don't know me?”

”Not from the great Lum-tum, though your voice is kind of homey.”

”I'm Sir John Custance. Danjuro's been faking me up. He's down here with me.”

”Gee!” said Mr. Van Adams. ”Aren't you the fresh thing now, Sir John? So you're down for the obsequies incog.? That's what I've come for--matter of respect. Flew down from Park Lane after breakfast.”

”I'm on my way west. We only stopped here for an hour or two, as Danjuro had some business.”

”I've ordered lunch in a private room overlooking the square. Come right up, Sir John, you'll be able to see everything from there.”

”Thank you. But I'm still in the dark. I'm right away from the office now, as you know. I saw Commander Muir Lockhart here just now, but I couldn't speak to him....”

He took me by the arm and led me along the corridor to the lift.

”Captain Lashmar, of your force and the five men of the patrol boat are being buried to-day,” he said; ”also Captain Swainson, of the _Atlantis_, and the boys murdered on _his_ s.h.i.+p.”

I flushed under my dye. I had never heard a word of it. I felt an absolute beast as we entered the private room, and I tried to explain to the millionaire.

”Think you callous and unfeeling?” he said in answer. ”Guess I know better than that, my friend. You're out to prevent just such a spectacle as we're going to witness from ever happening again. You're playing a better game than prancing along at the head of a procession.

You're getting busy at the heart of things. Now sit down and share the pork bosom and beans, or whatever they've given us. And tell me all about it.”

We sat down to lunch, and after a gla.s.s of Burgundy, I told Van Adams of all that had occurred, and also expressed my complete confidence in Danjuro.

”You're right,” he said. ”There isn't an investigator on the globe that'd carry a tune to him. He has his orders to stick to you right through and he'll carry them out. That little man's got a brain like the Mammoth Cave, and he's without human pa.s.sions, save only one--he'd go to h.e.l.l in a paper suit for me! See here----” and the millionaire told me a string of anecdotes about the uncanny little j.a.p that would make the fortunes of a writer of Romance.

He was still on the same subject when he stopped in the middle of a sentence.

The noise in the square outside was suddenly hushed, and we heard a m.u.f.fled chord of music. Rising from our chairs we went to the windows.

Everywhere, as far as eye could reach, was a black sea of heads, from among which the slender clocktower on its island in the centre rose like a sentinel.

The pavements were lined by troops, soldiers and sailors in equal proportions, and there was a flutter as of falling leaves as every head was bared and the piercing sweetness of Chopin's ”Funeral March” filled all the air.

Then they came, following the band: thirteen coffins covered with flowers, thirteen brave heroes, who would never slant down the long reaches of the upper air again.

After the hea.r.s.es walked Paget and Fowles, the two heroic airmen who had called the rescuing s.h.i.+p by wireless, and then came the chaplains and Muir Lockhart.

For my part I saw the whole procession in a dream. The head of the Transatlantic Air Line, the Mayor and Corporation in their robes--the stately funereal pomp of it all seemed unsubstantial and unreal.

Mr. Van Adams was kneeling a yard or two away from the window. His head was bent, he had a crucifix and a string of golden beads in his hands, and was saying prayers. Who would have thought it of this master of millions with the pike-like jaw? I suppose he was a Catholic.

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