the hotel ravenna

Once closeted together in the private room at Halfpenny and Farthing’s office, Mr. Halfpenny, who had seemed somewhat mystified by the happenings at the bank, looked inquiringly at Professor Cox-Raythwaite and snapped out one suggestive monosyllable:

“Well?”

“Very well indeed,” answered Cox-Raythwaite. “I consider we have done good work. We have found things out. That bank manager is a pompous ass; he’s a man of asinine, or possible bovine, mind! Of course, he ought to have revealed these things at both the inquest and the magisterial proceedings!—they’ll certainly have to be put in evidence at Barthorpe Herapath’s trial.”

“What things?” demanded the old lawyer, a little testily.

“Two things—facts,” replied the Professor, composedly. “First, that Jacob Herapath drew five thousand pounds in hundred pound notes at three o’clock on the day of his death. Second, that at some hour of that day he drew a cheque in favour of one Luigi Dimambro, which cheque was cashed as soon as the bank opened next morning.”

“Frankly,” observed Mr. Halfpenny, “frankly, candidly, Cox-Raythwaite, I do not see what these things—facts—prove.”

“Very likely,” said the Professor, imperturbable as ever, “but they’re remarkably suggestive to me. They establish for one thing the fact that, in all probability, Jacob Herapath had those notes on him when he was murdered.”

“Don’t see it,” retorted Mr. Halfpenny. “He got the fifty one-hundred-pound notes from the bank at three o’clock in the afternoon. He’s supposed to have been murdered at twelve—midnight. That’s nine hours. Plenty of time in which to pay those notes away—as he most likely did.”

“If you’ll let your mind go back to what came out in evidence at the inquest,” said the Professor, “you’ll remember that Jacob Herapath went to the House of Commons at half-past three that day and never left it until his coachman fetched him at a quarter-past eleven. It’s not very likely that he’d transact business at the House.”

“Plenty of time between three and half-past three,” objected Mr. Halfpenny.

“Quite so, but we haven’t heard of any transaction being carried out during that time. Make inquiry, and see if he did engage in any such transaction,” said the Professor. “If he didn’t, then my theory that he had the notes on him is correct. Moreover, Barthorpe has told Selwood that he picked up one note from the desk in his uncle’s private room.”

“One note!” exclaimed Mr. Halfpenny.

“One note—quite so,” agreed the Professor. “May it not have been—it’s all theory, of course—that Jacob had all the notes on the desk when he was murdered, that the murderer grabbed them afterwards, and in his haste, left one? Come, now!”

“Theory—theory!” said Mr. Halfpenny. “Still, I’ll make inquiries all around, to see if Jacob did pay five thousand away to anybody that afternoon. Well, and your other point?”

“I should like to know what the cheque for three thousand guineas was for,” answered the Professor. “It was paid out to one Luigi Dimambro, whose address was written down by himself in endorsing the cheque as Hotel Ravenna, Soho. He, presumably, is a foreigner, an Italian, or a Corsican, or a Sicilian, and the probability is that Jacob Herapath bought something from him that day, and that the transaction took place after banking hours.”

“How do you deduce that?” asked Mr. Halfpenny.

“Because Dimambro cashed his cheque as soon as the bank opened its doors next morning,” answered the Professor. “If he’d been given the cheque before four o’clock on November 12th, he’d have cashed it then.”

“The cheque may have been posted to him,” said Mr. Halfpenny.

“May be; the point is that it was drawn by Jacob on November 12th and cashed at the earliest possible hour next day,” replied the Professor. “Now, though it may have nothing to do with the case, I want to know what that cheque referred to. More than this, I have an idea. May not this man Dimambro be the man who called on Jacob Herapath at the House of Commons that night—the man whom Mountain saw, but did not recognize as one of his master’s usual friends or acquaintances? Do you see that point?”

Mr. Tertius and Selwood muttered expressions of acquiescence, but Mr. Halfpenny shook his head.

“Can’t see anything much in it,” he said. “If this foreign fellow, Dimambro, was the man who called at the House, I don’t see what that’s got to do with the murder. Jacob Herapath, of course, had business affairs with all sorts of queer people—Italians, Spaniards, Chinese—many a Tom, Dick, and Harry of ’em; he bought curios of all descriptions, and often sold them again as soon as bought.”

“Very good suggestion,” said Professor Cox-Raythwaite. “He may have bought something extremely valuable from this Dimambro that day, or that night, and—he may have had it on him when he was murdered. Clearly, we must see this Luigi Dimambro!”

“If he’s the man who called at the House, you forget that he’s been advertised for no end,” said Selwood.

“No, I don’t,” responded the Professor. “But he may be out of the country: may have come to it specially to see Jacob Herapath, and left it again. I repeat, we must see this man, if he’s to be found. We must make inquiries—cautious, guarded inquiries—at this hotel in Soho, which is probably a foreigners’ house of call, a mere restaurant. And the very person to make those inquiries,” he concluded, turning to Selwood and favouring him with a smack of the shoulder, “is—you!”

Selwood flinched, physically and mentally. He had no great love of the proposed rÔle—private detective work did not appeal to him. And he suggested that Professor Cox-Raythwaite had far better apply to Scotland Yard.

“By no means,” answered the Professor calmly. “You are the man to do the work. We don’t want any police interference. This Hotel Ravenna is probably some cafÉ, restaurant, or saloon in Soho, frequented by foreigners—a place where, perhaps, a man can get a room for a night or two. You must go quietly, unobtrusively, there; if it’s a restaurant, as it’s sure to be, or at any rate, a place to which a restaurant is attached, go in and get some sort of a meal, keep your eyes open, find out the proprietor, get into talk with him, see if he knows Luigi Dimambro. All you need is tact, caution, and readiness to adapt yourself to circumstances.”

Then, when they left Mr. Halfpenny’s office he took Selwood aside and gave him certain hints and instructions, and enlarged upon the advantages of finding Dimambro if he was to be found. The Professor himself was enthusiastic about these recent developments, and he succeeded in communicating some of his enthusiasm to Selwood. After all, thought Selwood, as he went to Portman Square to tell Peggie of the afternoon’s doings, whatever he did was being done for Peggie; moreover, he was by that time certain that however mean and base Barthorpe Herapath’s conduct had been about the will, he was certainly not the murderer of his uncle. If that murderer was to be tracked—why, there was a certain zest, an appealing excitement in the tracking of him that presented a sure fascination to youthful spirits.

That evening found Selwood, quietly and unassumingly attired, examining the purlieus of Soho. It was a district of which he knew little, and for half an hour he perambulated its streets, wondering at the distinctly foreign atmosphere. And suddenly he came across the Hotel Ravenna—there it was, confronting him, at the lower end of Dean Street. He drew back and looked it well over from the opposite pavement.

The Hotel Ravenna was rather more of a pretentious establishment than Selwood had expected it to be. It was typically Italian in outward aspect. There were the usual evergreen shrubs set in the usual green wood tubs at the entrance; the usual abundance of plate-glass and garish gilt; the usual glimpse, whenever the door opened, of the usual vista of white linen, red plush, and many mirrors; the waiter who occasionally showed himself at the door, napkin in hand, was of the type which Selwood had seen a thousand times under similar circumstances. But all this related to the restaurant—Selwood was more interested that the word “Hotel” appeared in gilt letters over a door at the side of the establishment and was repeated in the windows of the upper storeys. He was half-minded to enter the door at once, and to make a guarded inquiry for Mr. Luigi Dimambro; on reflection he walked across the street and boldly entered the restaurant.

It was half-past seven o’clock, and the place was full of customers. Selwood took most of them to be foreigners. He also concluded after a first glance around him that the majority had some connection, more or less close, with either the dramatic, or the musical, or the artistic professions. There was much laughter and long hair, marvellous neckties and wondrous costumes; everybody seemed to be talking without regard to question or answer; the artillery of the voices mingled with the rattling of plates and popping of corks. Clearly this was no easy place in which to seek for a man whom one had never seen!

Selwood allowed a waiter to conduct him to a vacant seat—a plush throne half-way along the restaurant. He ordered a modest dinner and a bottle of light wine, and following what seemed to be the custom, lighted a cigarette until his first course appeared. And while he waited he looked about him, noting everything that presented itself. Out of all the folk there, waiters and customers, the idle and the busy, he quickly decided that there was only one man who possessed particular interest for him. That man was the big, smiling, frock-coated, sleek-haired patron or proprietor, who strode up and down, beaming and nodding, sharp-eyed and courteous, and whom Selwood, from a glance at the emblazoned lettering of the bill-of-fare, took to rejoice in the name of Mr. Alessandro Bioni. This man, if he was landlord, or manager, of the Ravenna Hotel, was clearly the person to approach if one wanted information about the Luigi Dimambro who had given the place as his address as recently as November 12th.

While he ate and drank, Selwood wondered how to go about his business. It seemed to him that the best thing to do, now that he had seen the place and assured himself that it was a hotel evidently doing a proper and legitimate business, was to approach its management with a plain question—was Mr. Luigi Dimambro staying there, or was he known there? Since Dimambro, whoever he might be, had given that as his address, something must be known of him. And when the smiling patron presently came round, and, seeing a new customer, asked politely if he was being served to his satisfaction, Selwood determined to settle matters at once.

“The proprietor, I presume?” he asked.

“Manager, sir,” answered the other. “The proprietor, he is an old gentleman—practically retired.”

“Perhaps I can ask you a question,” Selwood. “Have you got a Mr. Luigi Dimambro staying at your hotel? He is, I believe”—here Selwood made a bold shot at a possibility—“a seller of curios, or art objects. I know he stops here sometimes.”

The manager rubbed his hands together and reflected.

“One moment, sir,” he said. “I get the register. The hotel guests, they come in here for meals, but always I do not recollect their names, and sometimes not know them. But the register——”

He sped down the room, through a side door, vanished; to return in a moment with a book which he carried to Selwood’s side.

“Dimambro?” he said. “Recently, then? We shall see.”

“About the beginning or middle of November,” answered Selwood.

The manager found the pages: suddenly he pointed to an entry.

“See, then!” he exclaimed dramatically. “You are right, sir. There—Luigi Dimambro—November 11th to—yes—13th. Two days only. Then he go—leave us, eh?”

“Oh, then, he’s not here now,” said Selwood, affecting disappointment. “That’s a pity. I wanted to see him. I wonder if he left any address?”

The manager showed more politeness in returning to the hotel office and making inquiry. He came back full of disappointment that he could not oblige his customer. No—no address—merely there for two nights—then gone—nobody knew where. Perhaps he would return—some day.

“Oh, it’s of no great consequence, thank you,” remarked Selwood. “I’m much obliged to you.”

He had found out, at any rate, that a man named Dimambro had certainly stayed at the Hotel Ravenna on the critical and important date. Presumably he was the man who had presented Jacob Herapath’s cheque at Bittleston’s Bank first thing on the morning after the murder. But whether this man had any connection with that murder, whether to discover his whereabouts would be to reveal something of use in establishing Barthorpe Herapath’s innocence, were questions which he must leave to Professor Cox-Raythwaite, to whom he was presently going with his news.

He had just finished his coffee, and was about to pay his bill when, looking up to summon the waiter, he suddenly saw a face appear behind the glass panel of the street door—the face of a man who had evidently stolen quietly into the entry between the evergreen shrubs and wished to take a surreptitious peep into the interior of the little restaurant. It was there, clearly seen through the glass, but for one fraction of a second—then it was withdrawn as swiftly as it had come and the panel of glass was blank again. But in that flash of time Selwood had recognized it.

Burchill!

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