Mr. Standfast - John Buchan (autobiographies to read TXT) 📗

days I had slipped clean out of their ken.

As I went over all the incidents, I asked if everything was yet lost. I had failed to hoodwink Ivery, but I had found out his post office, and if he only believed I hadn’t recognized him for the miscreant of the Black Stone he would go on in his old ways and play into Blenkiron’s hands. Yes, but I had seen him in undress, so to speak, and he knew that I had so seen him. The only thing now was to collar him before he left the country, for there was ample evidence to hang him on. The law must stretch out its long arm and collect him and Gresson and the Portuguese Jew, try them by court martial, and put them decently underground.

But he had now had more than an hour’s warning, and I was entangled with red-tape in this damned A.P.M.’s office. The thought drove me frantic, and I got up and paced the floor. I saw the orderly with rather a scared face making ready to press the bell, and I noticed that the fat sergeant had gone to lunch.

“Say, mate,” I said, “don’t you feel inclined to do a poor fellow a good turn? I know I’m for it all right, and I’ll take my medicine like a lamb. But I want badly to put a telephone call through.”

“It ain’t allowed,” was the answer. “I’d get ’ell from the old man.”

“But he’s gone out,” I urged. “I don’t want you to do anything wrong, mate, I leave you to do the talkin’ if you’ll only send my message. I’m flush of money, and I don’t mind handin’ you a quid for the job.”

He was a pinched little man with a weak chin, and he obviously wavered.

“ ’Oo d’ye want to talk to?” he asked.

“Scotland Yard,” I said, “the home of the police. Lord bless you, there can’t be no harm in that. Ye’ve only got to ring up Scotland Yard⁠—I’ll give you the number⁠—and give the message to Mr. Macgillivray. He’s the head bummer of all the bobbies.”

“That sounds a bit of all right,” he said. “The old man ’e won’t be back for ’alf an hour, nor the sergeant neither. Let’s see your quid though.”

I laid a pound note on the form beside me. “It’s yours, mate, if you get through to Scotland Yard and speak the piece I’m goin’ to give you.”

He went over to the instrument. “What d’you want to say to the bloke with the long name?”

“Say that Richard Hannay is detained at the A.P.M.’s office in Claxton Street. Say he’s got important news⁠—say urgent and secret news⁠—and ask Mr. Macgillivray to do something about it at once.”

“But ’Annay ain’t the name you gave.”

“Lord bless you, no. Did you never hear of a man borrowin’ another name? Anyhow that’s the one I want you to give.”

“But if this Mac man comes round ’ere, they’ll know ’e’s bin rung up, and I’ll ’ave the old man down on me.”

It took ten minutes and a second pound note to get him past this hurdle. By and by he screwed up courage and rang up the number. I listened with some nervousness while he gave my message⁠—he had to repeat it twice⁠—and waited eagerly on the next words.

“No, sir,” I heard him say, “ ’e don’t want you to come round ’ere. ’E thinks as ’ow⁠—I mean to say, ’e wants⁠—”

I took a long stride and twitched the receiver from him.

“Macgillivray,” I said, “is that you? Richard Hannay! For the love of God come round here this instant and deliver me from the clutches of a tomfool A.P.M. I’ve got the most deadly news. There’s not a second to waste. For God’s sake come quick!” Then I added: “Just tell your fellows to gather Ivery in at once. You know his lairs.”

I hung up the receiver and faced a pale and indignant orderly. “It’s all right,” I said. “I promise you that you won’t get into any trouble on my account. And there’s your two quid.”

The door in the next room opened and shut. The A.P.M. had returned from lunch⁠ ⁠…

Ten minutes later the door opened again. I heard Macgillivray’s voice, and it was not pitched in dulcet tones. He had run up against minor officialdom and was making hay with it.

I was my own master once more, so I forsook the company of the orderly. I found a most rattled officer trying to save a few rags of his dignity and the formidable figure of Macgillivray instructing him in manners.

“Glad to see you, Dick,” he said. “This is General Hannay, sir. It may comfort you to know that your folly may have made just the difference between your country’s victory and defeat. I shall have a word to say to your superiors.”

It was hardly fair. I had to put in a word for the old fellow, whose red tabs seemed suddenly to have grown dingy.

“It was my blame wearing this kit. We’ll call it a misunderstanding and forget it. But I would suggest that civility is not wasted even on a poor devil of a defaulting private soldier.”

Once in Macgillivray’s car, I poured out my tale. “Tell me it’s a nightmare,” I cried. “Tell me that the three men we collected on the Ruff were shot long ago.”

“Two,” he replied, “but one escaped. Heaven knows how he managed it, but he disappeared clean out of the world.”

“The plump one who lisped in his speech?”

Macgillivray nodded.

“Well, we’re in for it this time. Have you issued instructions?”

“Yes. With luck we shall have our hands on him within an hour. We’ve our net round all his haunts.”

“But two hours’ start! It’s a big handicap, for you’re dealing with a genius.”

“Yet I think we can manage it. Where are you bound for?”

I told him my rooms in Westminster and then to my old flat in Park Lane. “The day of disguises is past. In half an hour I’ll