The Flat at Doughty Court

Chapter one: The Flat at Doughty Court

The Flat in Doughty Court 

by Helen Lerewth

Based on the characters from the 'Four Just Men' series by Edgar Wallace (1875-1932): being a suggestion for an ending to Edgar Wallace's novel The Three Just Men (1924)

Dear Reader ... 

Edgar Wallace (1875-1932), writer of thrillers, detective fiction, humorous short stories and adventure, was one of the most popular English writers of the 1920s. He published the first of his stories about the 'Four Just Men' in 1906, and the book was such a best seller that he carried on writing about them. Two of these stories, the original book The Four Just Men and a novella called 'The Poisoners' were stories without an ending for which the reader had to supply the end of the story. His final full-length novel about the Four Just Men, called The Three Just Men (1924) has a final chapter, but the story is not complete. Why did Wallace tell us at the start of the story that the Three Just Men would be brought to the verge of dissolution - when nothing of the sort happened? The Flat at Doughty Court is an attempt to complete the novel and explain what happened after Leon rescued Mirabelle and drove away with her, leaving Raymond and George to walk home. 

In the final lines of The Three Just Men, Poiccart says, in a hushed voice:

'You don't believe that Leon is in love, do you?' 

Manfred considered for a moment. 

'Such things happen, even to just men,' he said, and Poiccart shook his head sadly. 

'I have never contemplated such an unhappy contingency,' he said, and Manfred was laughing to himself all the way back to town.

So, what happened next? This story is a very modest attempt to fill in the gap.

Helen Lerewth. September 2013 

helenlerewth@gmail.com

Rights 

Copyright on the characters from The Three Just Men rests with the estate of Edgar Wallace (1875-1932). Rights to the plot of this continuation (2013) and new characters are held by Helen Lerewth.

Chapter 1: The Flat in Doughty Court

The big Spanz car sped away from Dr Oberzohn's ruined fortress at New Cross, with Leon at the wheel, roaring through the dimly-lit streets of London towards Doughty Court. Mirabelle lay in the passenger seat at Leon's side, her eyes closed in utter exhaustion. It was barely ten minutes since that wonderful moment when Leon had burst into the snake room with Elijah Washington on his heels, to rescue her from Oberzohn's horrors. 'Thank heaven you're safe,' he cried, throwing himself at her feet to untie the straps with which Oberzohn had fastened her to the chair, and she - overcome with joy and relief - had all but fallen off the chair into Leon's arms. 

'These snakes aren't looking too good,' Elijah Washington remarked, looking round at the still forms on the floor, and kneeling down to survey them; 'there's a few of those fellers will need a doctor.' 

Mirabelle and Leon paid him no heed, all their attention being given to assuring each other that they were safe and well. Then they heard voices above; a deep voice called to Leon from outside the door; and with an exclamation of 'Oberzohn! I have something to give him,' Leon had set her gently back on to the chair and raced away. Mirabelle was left half laughing, half crying, as Elijah explained to her in all seriousness that she had never been in any real danger from these snakes: 'provided you kept still, young lady, they'd take no more notice of you than if you were a rock.' 

'It didn't feel like that,' Mirabelle gasped. Already Leon was back, his left hand in his pocket, his eyes full of laughter, cheerily replying to Elijah's observations about the snakes: 'Dr Oberzohn makes you a gift of them. He's a little cut up at the moment.' 

'Is he -' Mirabelle couldn't finish the sentence. 

'Dead? Yes - snake bite.' His eyes danced with amusement. 'Come along, Miss Leicester' - he put his arm about her - 'let's get you home.' 

He led her out through the confusion of police and soldiers. Men were running through the house, up and down the stairs, and there were the sounds of crashes and bangs overhead as the house was searched. The faces of the other two Just Men floated into her view, speaking to her out of the crowd - she heard Leon address them, but hardly heard his words and could not take in their reply. Then he led her out of that prison-house, all but carrying her across the battle-scarred ground. As they headed for the road beyond the railway viaduct, she became aware of the crowds of people waiting, staring towards them - a cordon was holding them back - Leon addressed them, saying he wanted to get her home. The crowds parted to reveal a big car parked under the railway viaduct; Leon led her towards it, and kindly hands helped her into the front seat and wished her well. She closed her eyes and leaned back on her seat - as the world seemed to go dark around her, she heard Leon get in beside her and start the engine. Voices around them shouted advice as he reversed the car: 'Careful of that wall, sir,' 'Mind out this side.' Then everything was blank as she fainted for a moment with exhaustion and the aftermath of terror, and next thing that she knew was that the car was carrying them both swiftly from Oberzohn's fortress, away to safety. Opening her eyes, she turned her head to smile at Leon, who - glancing in her direction as he drove - returned her smile. Then she leaned back on the seat and fell peacefully asleep. 

Leon drove with one eye on her. He reminded himself that twice in the last week he had been sure of her safety, but had turned out to be dreadfully mistaken: over the last few hours he had come face to face with the appalling realisation that he might never see her alive again. At length he had been forced to admit to himself that although he had had every opportunity to protect her, every time he had failed. Outside Oberzohn's fortress earlier that night, waiting in the dark for Elijah Washington to arrive and give the information he needed to ensure Mirabelle's safety in the snake room, he had sworn to himself that once he had her safe out of Oberzohn's clutches he would never let her out of his sight again. 

He let go of the wheel for a moment to put his free hand on the pocket of his jacket, to assure himself that what he had taken out of the dead Oberzohn's pocket was still there. 

Aunt Alma was waiting up at Doughty Court when they arrived, anxious for news. She had been alerted by a telephone call from Poiccart earlier in the evening that if the rescue attempt was successful, Mirabelle would be returning around 5am, and so she had stayed awake, sitting in the little living room of the flat drinking tea and bringing her press-cutting book up to date. When she heard the sound of the car turning into the Court and drawing to a halt she hurried to a window, but hardly recognised the battle-stained figures who emerged into the pale dawn light from its dark interior. She saw one figure stoop and bend to help the other - and then recognised with a shock that the smaller of the two figures was Mirabelle, while the taller figure was Mr Leon Gonsalez. With a cry, she ran to unfasten the door, just as the pair approached it, leaning on each other for support. 

'Mirabelle! My dear! Are you ill?' She clasped her niece to her bosom, and was relieved to feel her warmth against her, although the girl's clothes were soaked with moisture from the air of the snake room. 'What has that horrible man done to you?' 

'I'm all right, Alma,' murmured Mirabelle. 'Mr Gonsalez saved me - can we both come in?' 

'Of course - come in and have some tea - Mr Gonsalez, how can I thank you -' 

'It was no trouble.' Leon knew it was the greatest understatement of his life. 'I am always grateful for your hospitality, Miss Goddard.' 

Turning to usher them into the flat's small living room, Alma was too beside herself with anxiety to notice that Mirabelle fell back into Leon Gonsalez's arms the moment that she let go of her. She waved Mirabelle and their guest to be seated, and hurried into the kitchen to make tea - the maid always departed after lunch, and would not be back until 8am. Leon let Mirabelle down gently on to the sofa and sat down next to her, clasping her hands in his. The moment the kitchen door had closed safely behind Alma, he spoke in a low voice. 

'How are you feeling now?' His light blue eyes were serious, and his voice earnest. 

She managed a smile. 'I'm feeling pretty dreadful, but I'll live.' She looked him directly in the eye. 'You aren't looking so good yourself, Mr Gonsalez.' 

He was aching all over with the efforts of the last two days, but he gave her an amused smile. 'It's part of the challenge of my calling.' 

'Part of it?' she retorted. 'You were nearly killed trying to rescue me.' 

'And you saved my life. Thank you, Miss Leicester.' 

'Don't call me that. I think you've earned the right to call me Mirabelle,' she continued, 'you saved my life, too.' 

'So' - Leon hesitated, embarrassed. Never knowingly lost for words, he was now uncertain how best to express what he had always referred to dismissively as 'sentiment'. 'We are equally in each other's debt,' he said at last, smiling his boyish smile. 

Mirabelle's heart lurched. 'We're not! You told me - you told me that you don't ...' she couldn't bring herself to add: 'miss women's company.' 

'And you said I was very rude. Mirabelle,' - he bowed his head slightly as he spoke her name, in acknowledgement of her request, and she nodded her approval - 'will you accept my apology? I spoke out of turn.' 

She felt her cheeks redden. 'You mean - about your singleness not being a deprivation?' 

He nodded. 'I should have said that I never had felt it to be a deprivation, but you have compelled me to see matters differently.' 

He was blushing like a boy - what colour could her own face be? If it was as red as it felt, it must be burning scarlet. She managed to hold his gaze. 'I'm so delighted to hear you say so, Mr Gonsalez.' 

He shook his head at her. 'If you insist on my calling you Mirabelle -' 

'Leon.' My face really must be like a beetroot! she thought, not knowing that the hours in Oberzohn's underground prison and then in his upper room had left her pale as a sheet. 'I'm delighted that I've made you see reason.' 

'So much that I rifled your late host's pockets before leaving him just now.' He partly released her hands and pulled a document out of his pocket. She seized it. 'His special...!'  

Leon was laughing. 'His special licence to marry. Look' - he gently took it from her and unfolded it - 'he hasn't completed it. We can fill it out ourselves.' 

'We ...' she looked into his face, and saw in its lines and the dirt and sweat that still lay on it from the battles of the last few days, all his fear for her over the last week, the force that had gripped him and driven him to take greater risks than ever before, as his whole mind and purpose had become focussed on her rescue. She thought wildly of her own dreams, her hopes that had dawned amidst the terrors of those same dreadful days, hopes that were focussed on his boyish face and eager smile - he had hardly been out of her thoughts! She forced herself to speak calmly.  

'Do you propose,' she began severely, looking directly into his light blue eyes, 'that we should get married?' 

'Absolutely,' he replied. 'It's the only rational solution. Then I will no longer be compelled to race about the country, trying to ensure your safety.' 

'Don't think I'm going to live a quiet life to please you!' she joked, and then wished that she hadn't - but he took it as she meant it, and grinned. 

'Don't think you'll be able to. Listen, Mirabelle - there will be a great many details to work out. My friends will be delighted to welcome you, but they won't know how you should fit into our organisation. But it will all be arranged.' He bent and kissed her, and she raised her lips to his - and at that precise moment Aunt Alma walked into the living room carrying a tea tray laden with teapot, cups and hot crumpets, which she almost dropped on the floor in her shock at seeing her niece kissing one of the Four Just Men. 

Mirabelle, recovering immediately from the interruption, turned to her with her face a picture of joy. 'Alma, isn't it wonderful! Mr Gonsalez and I are going to be married!' 

Sleeping arrangements at the flat proved to be a problem. There were two bedrooms, one used by Alma and one which she had put in order for Mirabelle to use. Leon expressed himself happy to sleep on the sofa, but neither of the women would hear of it. At length Alma and Mirabelle retired to share Alma's bed, and Leon was given the bed intended for Mirabelle. Anxious about her health after her long ordeal, he was glad that Mirabelle would not be sleeping by herself, preferring to wait until she had had some sleep before subjecting her to a medical examination. 

The party was woken at 8am by the arrival of the housemaid. Alma, clad in dressing gown and slippers, stepped out into the living room to greet her and to caution her to be quiet: 'Miss Mirabelle is here, and a gentleman who is sleeping in the other bedroom.' 'Coo, Miss!' said the maid, 'have you seen the morning papers? They're all full of this Snake and how the Four Just Men done him in.' 'No doubt,' said Alma firmly, 'but now Miss Mirabelle needs to sleep. So please keep your voice down and don't make too much noise in the kitchen.' 'Right you are, Miss,' said the maid cheerfully, and went away to bang saucepans and crash cupboard doors in the kitchen. 

Alma had her bath, and then ran a bath for Mirabelle. But when she tapped on Mr Gonsalez's door to ask whether he would like a cup of early morning tea she found him already up, dressed in an old dressing gown that she had left for him the night before, and studying the to-and-fro of passers-by from the window; so she invited him to bathe first and allow Mirabelle to sleep in. It occurred to her to look at his clothes of the night before, which he had left hanging up, and then she saw that they were covered in mud, grit and blood from the battle - quite unsuitable to put back on again. 

'If you telephone to my friends in Curzon Street,' said Leon, 'they will send a man round with a case for me.' 

Alma was a little shocked at the prospect of asking for a man's clothes to be sent to her flat, but seeing the necessity went away to do so; while Leon found his way to the bathroom. 

At Curzon Street, the servants were a-buzz with excitement over the morning news: the destruction of the Snake, and the newspaper reports of the courage of the Four Just Men (the fact that there were only three was lost on the average newspaper reporter). They gathered around their breakfast table in the tiny servants' hall to read aloud the reports in the various journals and compare stories, agog at the accounts of the brave assault on the Snake's evil fortress, the terrifying ordeal of the brave Miss Leicester, and the final and sudden suicide of the Snake 'to evade arrest and the due punishment of the law', as one respectable news-organ put it. 

'Cor! I'd've liked ter be there,' said the lad who polished the boots, looking up from his morning tea, 'I'd've shown that Snake a thing or two.' 

'Get on with yer,' said the cook, 'and answer that bell - it's ringing fer you.' 

The lad, grumbling, went and answered the call from above, and came back to the table grinning. 

'That there chauffeur's been out all night,' he reported. 'The boss wants a case of 'is clothes sending round ter a flat in Bloomsbury.' 

'P'raps he crashed the car,' suggested one of the two maids.  

'Wouldn't be before time,' muttered the cook. 'It's against Providence, the way he drives that machine.' 

So the lad set out for Bloomsbury on his bicycle with a case of clothes perched on the pannier, and the other servants continued with their meal. Meanwhile, upstairs in the breakfast room, Manfred and Poiccart discussed the situation seriously. 

'My dear George,' said Poiccart, 'you must see the seriousness of the situation. If Leon is in love with Miss Leicester - what is to become of our society?' 

Manfred raised his coffee cup to his lips, with dancing eyes regarding Poiccart over the rim. 'What is the problem?' 

'You know the terms of our society. We took solemn oaths to forswear the company of women - and I for one have never broken that oath. For you there was the unfortunate incident of the Woman of Gratz -' 

'The young, misguided Maria. It's true that she loved me, but -' Manfred shook his head smilingly, 'I never loved her. I regarded her more from the standpoint of the affectionate uncle, attempting to direct a misguided niece.' 

Raymond Poiccart shook his dark head. 'I do not deny that Miss Leicester is a charming young woman,' he went on seriously, 'but is she a match for our Leon? He is a brilliant scientist of international reputation - she is an uneducated girl.' 

'She's passed her higher certificate in physics and inorganic chemistry,' Manfred reminded him. 'If you remember, that was the basis on which Oberzohn originally attempted to inveigle her into his employment. Her successful defence of Heavytree Farm proves that she has courage and resourcefulness. She was only trapped by Oberzohn because Miss Joan lured her out of the house with an appeal for help, and even our Leon can't resist such an appeal for assistance.' 

Poiccart nodded, thoughtfully. This dark, saturnine man with the tender heart was clearly deeply troubled. 'That is true,' he said sadly. 'And yet, George, I'm worried about Leon. Does he intend to marry Miss Leicester?' 

'I'd be more worried about him if he didn't,' said Manfred briskly. Then, when Poiccart raised eyes to him in astonishment, he went on: 'My dear Raymond! Haven't you noticed our Leon over the last few days - his deep sighs, his pensive brow, lost in thought? Didn't you notice his increasing desperation over Miss Leicester's situation - his repeated denials that she was in danger, while he constantly redoubled his efforts for her safety? He's head over heels in love with the girl.' 

'Do you think it will blow over?' asked Poiccart gravely. 

'I doubt it. It's like Leon to have crazes - he's always rushing off over his latest fad - but he's never had a fad like this before. I saw him when he heard that Oberzohn intended to marry Miss Leicester: he nearly fainted. No, this is true love, and we, Raymond - we will have to find some way to work with it. Because I don't intend to dissolve our society, simply because Leon has brought a new member into it.' 

'A woman!' said Poiccart, in hushed solemnity. 

'A woman. We're in the twentieth century now, Raymond: women work, women go on to the battlefield, women are journalists, they fly aeroplanes and drive cars. They take the place of men, and with their help the Three Just Men may become the Four Just Men once again.' 

The lad from Curzon Street swung his bicycle into Doughty Court and looked around for the big Spanz that the chauffeur drove. Seeing it next to the lamp post, he leaned his vehicle against it and headed for the flat. So the chauffeur had stopped here for the night! He was hoping to exchange some gossip with whichever servant might come to the door, but was disappointed when someone who was obviously the owner opened it on his approach. 

'Clothes for Mr Lightning,' he announced. Leon was invariably known by this title in Curzon Street, due to his habit of driving the car far over the speed limit. 

Alma forced herself to keep a straight face. She had seen Leon's driving the night he arrived at Heavytree Farm too late to save Mirabelle from abduction by Oberzohn's forces. 

'That will do, young man,' she said firmly. 'Thank you for your help.' She took the suitcase into her left hand and passed him a shilling with her right. 

The boy stood on the step for a moment, gazing at the generous coin, then gave her a big grin, touched his forehead with a smart 'Thank you, ma'am!,' and hurried off to return the way he had come. Alma watched him depart, then withdrew into the flat and shut the door firmly behind her.  

When Mirabelle Leicester awoke from her sleep at last, she lay for a while in bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to remember where she was. She was not at home at Heavytree Farm; letting her mind wander back over what it could remember of the last few days she remembered with great relief that she was no longer a prisoner in Oberzohn's underground prison. At last, looking around the room, she realised that she was in the bedroom at the Doughty Court flat, and that she had been sleeping in the same bed as Alma. Wondering why that should be, she tried to sit up - and then heard a tap at the bedroom door. 

'Come in,' she called. 

A familiar, yet not familiar grey mop of hair appeared, atop a thin, pale priest's face, which stared anxiously at her out of light blue eyes. She recognised Leon Gonsalez, and felt her face redden in pleasure and embarrassment. 

'Have you slept well? May I come in?' he asked. 

'I'm not stopping you,' Mirabelle assured him. 

He entered the room. She saw that he was bathed, shaved and dressed - no longer the muddy, bloodied warrior who had rescued her last night from Oberzohn's fortress, but restored to his slim, well-dressed self. Aware that she herself was still dishevelled from her adventures, she managed a welcoming smile. 

'You're looking well,' he assured her, kneeling at the side of her bed. 'Do you mind if I give you a medical check-up? I didn't have the opportunity last night.' Without waiting for her reply (she had already learned that he rarely did wait for permission before acting), he took her left wrist in his and checked her pulse. Nodding, and releasing her wrist, he laid the back of his hand against her forehead, then laid his head against her chest to check her breathing. He looked up with a boyish smile into her face: 'You're fine,' he said, and rose to his feet in one smooth bound. 'I'll let you get up.' 

'Don't wait breakfast,' she urged him, but he shook his head. 'Alma insists that we wait for you. She's been showing me her cuttings!' 

'I'll hurry,' she promised, and he slid noiselessly out of her room and left her to make her toilette. 

When Mirabelle joined her aunt and rescuer half an hour later, they were seated at the breakfast table discussing the morning newspapers. Leon was assuring Alma that she would be perfectly safe to stay in London, now that the Snake was dead. 

'But what was it all about?' demanded Mirabelle, sitting down at the table. 'Joan told me some tale about my being an heiress, but I couldn't understand where she got the idea.' 

'You are an heiress,' Leon assured her. 'A very considerable heiress - I'll explain it to you,' and at that Alma called the maid to serve breakfast. 

Over breakfast, Leon explained to Mirabelle and Alma about the Mont d'Or at Biskara in Angola, and of how her father had won the concession from the Portuguese government, so that he could study the starry skies of Angola in peace. 'The lease was due for renewal today, so I stole some notepaper that you had already signed from your desk at Heavytree Farm and applied for the renewal in your name. Elijah Washington - you met him last night, Mirabelle - carried the form to Lisbon. Manfred heard last night that the lease has been extended.' His slender hands moved expressively. 'You're a very rich woman, Mirabelle!' 

'You mean we can afford to keep the farm?' cried Mirabelle. 

Leon shrugged. 'If you wish. I think you have a cousin - Mark? You could install him as manager. After all,' he added, with his delightful boyish smile, 'we agreed last night to pay a visit to the Greenwich registrar this morning.' 

'Alma, are you coming with us?' demanded Mirabelle, but Alma demurred. 

'Before you marry my niece,' she said firmly to Leon, 'it's my duty to ask you a few questions about your financial standing.' 

'Alma! Don't be so old fashioned!' cried Mirabelle, but Alma was firm. 

'You're right to ask,' said Leon gravely. 'My wealth is in my family estates in Spain, but I also have property in North and South America and in Britain. The newspapers will tell you that my wealth is numbered in millions - so don't worry that I'm marrying you for your money!' 

Alma shook her head. 'I've heard that there's political unrest in Spain,' she said. 'What if there's a revolution there, as there was in Russia? What would be left of your fortune then?' 

'I would still have my property in America and my interests in Britain, so don't worry,' Leon assured her. 'And if the worst came to the worst, I can always earn my living as a doctor or chemist.' 

'So don't worry, darling,' Mirabelle assured her aunt. 'When should we go?' she demanded of Leon, 'and do I need to change?' 

'You're perfect just as you are,' he assured her. 'I'll go down and get the car started.' 

Alma saw her niece off to her wedding with a hug and a few tears, but refused to accompany her - it was better, she said, that she wait behind for any visitors that might come to the flat. She was in fact expecting the police to call to make enquiries after the events of the previous evening, and she was not entirely easy in her mind about Mirabelle's marital intentions - although she knew it was no use trying to stand in her way. 

'He's old enough to be her father,' she muttered to herself as she set about updating her book of cuttings - which was probably true. 

Leon drove with unusual care through the thronging streets of London, happy to have the woman he loved at his side. His eager eyes as ever strayed from side to side as he drove, looking at the people they passed on the road, gathering information. Suddenly he uttered an exclamation. 

'That's the woman!' He swung the car to the kerb, nearly running over a fruit and vegetable barrow, and leapt out of the car in pursuit of a middle-aged woman - who, hearing his shout, had given one glance in his direction and taken to her heels. Mirabelle was left alone in the car, puzzled and anxious, unsure of whether to remain in the vehicle or to go in pursuit of her lover - but a moment later Leon returned, chagrined and dusty, confessing that he had lost sight of her in the crowd. 

'We'd better get on,' he said, pressing the starter with his foot, looking over his shoulder and guiding the car out into the traffic again, 'and then we'll go back to Curzon Street and report.' 

'But who was she?' cried Mirabelle. 

'She was at the theatre when Monty Newton was killed - she took Joan away,' was the ominous reply. 

'You mean she's still at large?' 

'I mean yes, she's slipped through the hands of the police. It's inevitable that some of the gang are still at large - they weren't all at the house in New Cross, and we don't even know the identity of all of them.' Leon's face was grim as he drove. 

'Leon! You mean we could be attacked again?' 

'There's little point in their attacking us, darling,' he told her - and she flushed red at the endearment, the first time he had used it - 'or at least, not after we're married. That's why we have to arrange that first, and then we'll go back to George and Raymond and let them know what we've seen. In the meantime' - he took one hand off the wheel to pat his trouser pocket - 'I can defend us both if necessary.' 

'You could give that to me and keep driving,' she told him. 

'If they start shooting at us, I will,' he assured her. 

In the event, however, they arrived safely at Greenwich. Leon drew the car up outside the Registry office. As he helped Mirabelle out of the car, a man who had been leaning on the wall near the doorway approached them and doffed his cap. 

'Some of Oberzohn's gang came past this morning, Mr Gonsalez,' he reported, 'but they didn't stay.' 

Leon nodded. 'I thought they might,' he said. 'We'd better get inside. Dennis, can you act the part of a witness?' 

'Of course, sir,' said the other. 'What for?' 

'Miss Leicester and I are getting married' - and Leon produced the special licence he had stolen from Oberzohn's pocket, and unfolded it. 

Mirabelle and the man Dennis looked at it. Mirabelle was sure that when she had last looked at the piece of paper, Oberzohn's details had been filled in; but these had mysteriously vanished, and had been replaced with her own and Leon Gonsalez's. Before breakfast that morning, Leon had coaxed the maid into allowing him to use some of the cleaning chemicals in her possession to delete certain items from the document, and had then made appropriate additions. 

Taking her hand, Leon led her into the building, followed by Mr Dennis. Mirabelle wondered what they would do for a second witness, but it turned out that the registrar's clerk would normally fulfil this role. The whole procedure was over in just a few minutes, and they were out in the street again, getting into the big car. 

'You'd better come back with us, Dennis,' Leon said to his agent, 'we'll report to Curzon Street.' 

'Can we go back to Aunt Alma first?' asked Mirabelle. 'I want to show her my ring.' Leon had given her one of the rings from his own fingers - it was an old family heirloom, he said. 

'Yes - in fact, she should come to Curzon Street. We'll arrange the legal side of this gold mine of yours.' Checking that she was seated comfortably beside him and that Mr Dennis was ensconced on the back seat, Leon swung the car out into the traffic. 

He drove quickly through the busy streets - more quickly than he had driven down to Greenwich, thought Mirabelle. She wondered whether the sight of 'that woman' and the news from Dennis that Oberzohn's men were still at large had alarmed him, although he seemed to treat it all as a joke. They swung into Doughty Court on two wheels, and Leon jumped out of the car, to be met by Aunt Alma running down the steps from the door to the flat. Mirabelle saw at once that something was wrong. 

'What's happened?' she cried. Alma ran into her outstretched arms - tears were standing in her eyes. 

'It's Mark!' she cried. 'Mark's disappeared!' 

2: The House in Curzon Street 

Leon was the first to react to the news. 'Into the car,' he instructed the women, 'we must tell George and Raymond.' 

Mirabelle helped her aunt into the back seat of the car, where Mr Dennis greeted her respectfully and helped make her comfortable. Leon ran up the stairs to the door of the flat and locked it securely before running back down to the car. Leaping into the driver's seat, he pressed the starter and swung the car round hard, out of Doughty Court and back into London's busy streets. 

As they hurtled along, Mirabelle wondered wildly what could have happened to her cousin. Mark lived in Gloucester, where he was a clerk in a legal practice. He had long wanted to purchase the farm from her, but had no financial resources - not even a small annuity such as Aunt Alma and herself possessed. He was hoping to take his barrister's exams, but had never had the financial means to advance in his chosen profession. She had told Joan that there was nothing to be gained by kidnapping her - but there was even less to be gained by kidnapping Mark. 

As they approached a junction, Leon noticed that the policeman on point control had signalled to the traffic on their road to stop, and began to slow down. As he did so, Mr Dennis shouted from the back seat of the car: 'There's one of them, sir! Oberzohn's gang!' 

Leon and Mirabelle turned their heads to look, just as a bullet whizzed past Mirabelle's head. She gasped and cowered back into her seat - Leon took a hand from the wheel to pull his Browning from his pocket, but she grabbed it from him and jerked down the safety catch. 

'Let me!' She had seen the gunman now, standing on the street corner that they were approaching. How dare he shoot at them, in broad daylight? she raged inwardly. The policeman on point duty had spotted their assailant and was running towards him, but the man was already raising his gun to shoot a second time. 

Bang! Mirabelle fired a shot, aimed above his head. The man ducked and ran. The policeman ran after him, blowing his whistle frantically to summon help - the traffic moved on, and Leon and his passengers with it. 

'Hold on to that gun,' he said to his wife, 'you may need to use it again.' 

Mirabelle found that she was sweating with the excitement and fright of the moment. She shifted the weapon from one hand to another, wiping the sweat off her hands on the cool leather of the car seat beneath her. Then she steadied the gun, aiming it ahead and to one side of the car - like a gangster in an American movie, she told herself. How exciting! 

The car was tearing down Park Lane now, heading for Curzon Street, and their journey should have been almost at its end, when Leon shouted something, and spun the wheel hard. The car shot across the road and back the way it had come - and Mirabelle found herself facing a second gunman. 

She didn't hesitate a moment- she fired. The gun jerked up and the shot missed, but their would-be assailant was already running away across Hyde Park. Leon swung the car around again and drove it on in the direction they had been headed, turning into Curzon Street with a squeal of brakes. He stopped the car outside number 233, and leapt out to usher his passengers to the door. Mirabelle scrambled out, still clutching the Browning in her hand - she was still holding it as Poiccart and Manfred came out of the house and descended the steps to meet her. Alma and Mr Dennis stood behind her as Leon stepped forward to greet his friends. 

'George, Raymond - may I introduce my wife? Mirabelle, may I introduce my friends, George Manfred and Raymond Poiccart.' 

Mirabelle took a step forward to shake their hands, shifting the Browning to her left hand as she did so, but Poiccart gently took it from her, slipped the safety catch back on, gently blew on the end and handed the weapon to Leon. He then bowed to Mirabelle and shook her hand warmly. 

'Delighted,' he said, smilingly. 'We have met before: we discussed onion-growing.' 

'I remember,' answered Mirabelle, laughing; that had been a happy day, although followed by many terrifying ones. 

Leon held out the weapon in front of him, turning it from side to side as if to check it. 'As I was driving here we were fired upon by Oberzohn's gang,' he remarked. 'Mirabelle returned fire and almost got her man,' and he smiled as if in amusement at a game. 

Poiccart appeared troubled at this information, but George Manfred smiled kindly and stepped forward to shake Mirabelle's hand. 'I welcome you to Curzon Street, Miss Leicester,' he said, 'as the Fourth Just Man.' 

Mirabelle glowed with joy at the appellation, but Alma frowned. She didn't approve of her niece being associated with this band of desperadoes, as one of her newspaper cuttings had described them, but she realised that Mirabelle was in no mood to listen to her strictures. Besides that, she herself wanted to consult the Just Men regarding Mark's disappearance. She stepped forward at Leon's beckoning to shake hands with Manfred and Poiccart. 'How good to meet you again, Miss Goddard,' said George Manfred, smiling in welcome. 'Or may I call you Aunt Alma? I trust you are feeling recovered since we last met?' 

'Yes, thank you,' answered Alma, 'I'm extremely grateful to you for rescuing Mirabelle from those terrible kidnappers - but this morning I've received further bad news. Mirabelle's cousin Mark has disappeared. 

Poiccart and Manfred exchanged troubled glances. 'Come inside,' said Manfred, 'we shouldn't stand gossiping on the doorstep. The neighbours will complain.' 

In the first floor reception room, Manfred urged the two women to sit down on the long settee. Two of the Just Men and Dennis found chairs - Leon sat on the edge of the desk, fiddling with a cigarette he had taken from the box on the desk, but hadn't lit. Manfred was about to ask Alma to explain about Mark, when Dennis said: 'May I give my report, sir? It may be relevant.' 

Manfred nodded. 'Yes, do carry on.' 

Dennis leaned forward in his chair. 'As you know, sir, I've been watching Greenwich registrar's office for the last few days by order of Mr Gonsalez. No one came until this morning, when two of Oberzohn's toughs turned up. They went into the office, and I was wondering whether to call you, when I saw a policeman on the other side of the street, so I hailed him and told him that there were two troublemakers in the Registry. He went in and brought them out - and that's the last that I saw of them. But I guess they were there to stop Miss Leicester marrying anyone other than Oberzohn.' 

Leon nodded. 'On our way to Greenwich this morning I saw the woman who took Joan Murphy away after Monty Newton was murdered,' he told his friends. 'I went after her, but she gave me the slip in the crowd.' 

'Where is Joan?' Mirabelle remembered that the girl had been badly injured in the battle. 

'In hospital,' said her husband. 'We should go and visit her - she may be able to tell us who that woman is.' 

'You mean you don't know?' Poiccart teased him. 

'Yes, I'd never seen her before she took Joan into her tender care! If I'd known she was one of Oberzohn's minions, I'd never have let her leave.' 

'We need to find out what happened to the two who were arrested this morning,' said Manfred. 'I'll call Scotland Yard.' 

At that moment, however, the telephone shrilled. Poiccart answered it, spoke formally into the receiver, then handed it to Manfred. 'It's Meadows,' he said. 

Manfred apologised to his guests with a smile and took the instrument in his right hand. 'Good morning, Inspector Meadows. Yes, we are all very well this morning - well, except for Leon; he just got married.' He gave Leon a smile; Leon gave him a mock scowl in return, then turned to smile at Mirabelle, who was laughing lovingly at him. 

'Yes, you may: Miss Mirabelle Leicester. Yes, I'm sure she'll be delighted to accept your congratulations in person. Would you like to come round now? And we have a little conundrum for you - Miss Leicester's cousin Mark has disappeared.' He listened a little, then said, 'Fine. Goodbye for now, Inspector,' and hung up. 

'Well,' he said, turning to Mirabelle with a gentle smile, 'you have caused our constabulary some anxiety! When they went in search of you this morning they found only a domestic at your flat, who said she had no knowledge of your whereabouts. Fortunately good Inspector Meadows deduced that you'd be here.' 

'Honestly, that girl!' exclaimed Alma. 'I told her where I was going.' 

'Meadows will be here shortly,' Manfred continued. 'Aunt Alma, before he arrives, could you explain to us how you came to discover Mark's disappearance?' 

'I called him on the telephone this morning to tell him about Mirabelle's marriage,' she replied. 'I was going to tell him about the gold mine, and that Mirabelle wants him to run the farm for us. But when his landlady answered the phone she told me that Mark had been called away early this morning by a young lady from London, who came to tell him that Mirabelle was sick in hospital and was asking for him.' 

'A young lady?' prompted Poiccart. 'Did she describe this young lady?' 

'She introduced herself as Lisa, and said she was a friend of Mirabelle's. Now, I don't know anyone named Lisa - do you?' - this last to her niece. 

'No,' replied Mirabelle, 'But we do,' Leon put in, 'she is one of the late Monty Newton's assistants - her speciality is luring honest young men to their doom in one of Mr Newton's gambling dens.' 

Alma paled at the thought. 'What can have become of Mark?' she cried. 'He hasn't come to the flat.' 

'Did his landlady say what time he left?' asked Leon. 

'Yes - around six o'clock this morning.' Alma was clearly very distressed. 'Wherever can he be?' 

Poiccart was looking at his watch. 'It's unlikely that Lisa or her chauffeur drives as fast as our Leon,' he observed, 'so it may be that they are still on the road.' 

Manfred reached for the telephone, but Leon jumped to his feet. 'I'll take the car,' he said, 'Come on, Mirabelle' - and, grasping her hand in his, he rushed from the room. 

'Don't worry, Aunt Alma,' said Manfred gently to that bewildered lady, 'our Leon usually gets his man. Can we offer you some refreshment? Tea? Coffee?' 

'I'd love a cup of tea,' said Alma faintly, and Poiccart rose gravely from his place to fetch it. 

Leon hurtled out of the door, took the stairs three at a time, all but hurled his wife into the car (Mirabelle jumped in with amazing grace and settled herself in the passenger seat), started the car with the starter pedal - the engine was still warm - swung it around and set off westwards at a speed well above the urban speed limit. 

'Where are we going?' shouted Mirabelle above the rush of air about them. 

'The Great West Road,' Leon answered. 'They'll probably come that way - that's the way they brought you.' 

'What are we going to do if we find them?' 

'We'll decide that when we see them,' replied Leon, his eye on the road - but he stretched out his left hand to her, and she seized it and clung on as they hurtled through London's West End and out towards the suburbs. 

'Of course they may not come into the City,' she said aloud. 'Where did Oberzohn have his hideaways?' 

'I burned down his offices in City Road,' said Leon, 'and his fortress is out of repair. Oberzohn had plenty of warehousing, but all on the river - the quickest way there is through the City.' 

'Perhaps they're going to Chester Square?' 

Leon nodded, smiling grimly to himself at the thought of Oberzohn's minions trying the same trick with Mirabelle's cousin as they had tried with Mirabelle. Were Oberzohn's 'Old Guard' capable of learning new tricks? 'I hope George has already sent the police there,' he said. 

Mirabelle looked ahead, over the long bonnet of the big car. She wondered where they were: as she normally came to London on the train, she had only a hazy idea of the street plan of west London. They were already travelling through suburbs, and would soon be in open country. Would they find Mark before the Snake's gang could hide him away? Her chest tightened with fear. She had never been particularly close to her cousin, but was fond of him in a big-sisterly way. 

Leon glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, and exerted himself to amuse her. 'One of the interesting things about criminals,' he observed, 'is their lack of imagination. A criminal does not have the spark of originality which marks the truly social human being, the true member of human society. Having once found a method of achieving his goals, he sticks to it even when it's clear to every normal person that the police have discovered his methods of operation. That's why the police keep records of every criminal's modus operandi - they know that the criminal mind is incapable of changing track.' 

Mirabelle listened with interest - unlike Leon's usual audience of Manfred and Poiccart, she had never heard any of this before. 'Is that how you guessed what Dr Oberzohn was up to?' she asked, 'because he'd done it before?' 

'Yes, I've been studying him and his methods for many months,' Leon agreed. 'We were interested in him because of his illegal business - he was an international arms dealer, he dealt in white slavery, his 'Old Guard' acted like a private army, he employed criminals who preyed on women - do you want to hear any more?' he added, giving Mirabelle a quick glance to see how she was taking this sordid list of crimes. 

Mirabelle nodded briskly. 'I want to know the worst. Didn't Mr Manfred call me the Fourth Just Man? I'm sure Dr Oberzohn was no worse than the other criminals you've dealt with.' 

Leon smiled. 'No, he wasn't! I'm afraid you'll meet some very unsavoury characters, Mirabella carina.' 

They both laughed merrily, then Mirabelle pointed ahead and cried, 'Is that driver trying to make us stop?' 

Leon looked ahead. They were now through the suburbs and on the open road, and for the moment they were the only car in sight except for one on the opposite side ahead, parked up on the grass verge. There were passengers in the car, and a man - presumably the driver - standing by a front wheel, and gesturing to them to stop. 

'They've broken down,' said Leon, and slowed the car. The other driver gestured more frantically, and Leon swung the Spanz across the road and brought it to rest facing away from London, in front of the broken-down car, which appeared to have suffered a flat tyre. Mirabelle looked at the driver, who looked slightly familiar. She glanced at her husband, who nodded, and then bent to the glove compartment, pulled out an object and handed it to her. 'Stay in the car,' he said quietly, and got out of the car himself. Mirabelle looked at the small pistol he had handed her, and gently released the safety catch; then she sat back in her seat, straightening her hair under her hat, and waited as demurely as a young woman who has just married an international crime-fighter can wait. 

Leon walked towards the other car, his right hand in his trouser pocket. 'Can we help you?' he called. 

'We've got a puncture,' said the other man. 'Can you come and look?' He stepped back from the car and gestured to Leon to come forward. 

Mirabelle suddenly remembered what had happened to Digby at Heavytree Farm - he had gone to help men who had apparently broken down, and they had hit him with a spanner. She was about to cry out to Leon to be careful, when there was a 'click', and Leon was holding a gun in his hand, pointing at the driver of the other car. 

'I don't think so,' he said. 'But do let us take your passengers.' He gestured with the Browning, and the man slowly raised his hands into the air above his head. 

'Is this a hold up?' he asked. 

'No, it's a pick up. Tell your passengers to get out of the car.' Then, as the other hesitated: 'and quickly! I'm in a hurry to get home for lunch.' 

Mirabelle stifled a giggle. The other driver glanced at the car and said something in a low voice. There was a long pause, and then a woman got out of the car, followed by a man just behind her. The man was asking anxious questions - and then he looked up and saw Mirabelle, at the instant that she also saw his face. 

'Mark!' 

'Mirabelle!' 

Bang! Leon's shot went over the other driver's head, but the other driver took to his heels in any case. Leon swung to meet the woman, who would have turned and run, but Mark had already grabbed her hand. 'You told me that Mirabelle was sick!' 

She screamed, spun round and punched him full in the face. Mark reeled back at the blow, letting go of her hand, and she turned and ran. Leon sent a shot over her head, but he hated to shoot a woman - although long ago he and his friends had asphyxiated Madame Despard, a white slaver. In a moment, Lisa and her driver had gone. Leon put his Browning away and went to shake Mark's hand. 

'You must be Mark Leicester,' he said. 'My name is Leon Gonsalez. I believe you know my wife Mirabelle?'(Mirabelle laughed loudly at that.) 'Mirabelle's aunt received a message from your landlady that you wanted a lift to town, so we've come to pick you up.' 

Mark stared from him to Mirabelle and back. 'Yes,' he said. Clearly he was bewildered as to what was going on. 'I'd heard that Mirabelle had been kidnapped, and this morning that woman - Lisa - came to tell me that she'd been found and was in hospital.' 

'You shouldn't believe young women who come to knock you up first thing in the morning,' said Mirabelle severely. 'That was my mistake. Now get into the car and we'll take you back to London. You can come and meet my new in-laws.' 

As Mark got into the back seat of the Spanz, Leon checked the interior of the other car. He had recognised it at once as one of the cars used by Monty Newton; clearly the kidnapping of Mark had been organised by one of Oberzohn's captains. He found a gun, which he slipped into his inner jacket pocket. He also found a road map, with the route from London to Mark's home in Gloucester marked in pencil; he took this. He then raised the car's bonnet and made a few adjustments, so that the car would be immobilised until the police could come and examine it. At last he walked back to the Spanz, handed the map to Mark ('this might be useful to you some time!') and turned the car for the journey back to London. 

'Should we take Mark to the police?' asked Mirabelle. 'They need to know that Oberzohn's men are still at large.' 

'I'd prefer to look into this by myself for the moment,' answered Leon. 'The gang will go to ground if they know that the police are after them. They have a personal vendetta towards myself and my friends, and they are still hoping to get your gold mine. I hope that if I set a trap for them they'll walk into it.' 

'What sort of trap?' wondered Mirabelle, but her husband smiled mysteriously and shook his head. 

'Aren't we going rather fast?' asked Mark, from the back seat. 

'No,' answered Leon, putting his foot on the accelerator, 'but now we are!' -and the Spanz shot forward and flew the rest of the way back to London. 

Coming back past Hyde Park, Mirabelle kept her eyes open for suspicious-looking passers-by. Would she notice the gunmen of that morning, or even see that middle-aged woman again? But apart from a few workmen at a junction she saw no one out of the ordinary, and they returned to Curzon Street without incident. 

Manfred and Poiccart were out - the maid who opened the door informed Leon curtly that they had gone out to see a lawyer. 'Probably about your speeding fines,' she added tartly. 

'Is our guest of this morning still here?' asked Leon. 

'She's in Master's office. Master said to serve her lunch at one.' 

'You can serve us lunch at one, too,' said Leon, and darted up the stairs before she could find a suitable rejoinder. Mirabelle and Mark followed him, leaving the maid standing perplexed at the foot of the stairs, wondering why the chauffeur was bringing his friends into the Master's house through the front door. 

Alma was reading through a selection of the morning's newspapers, exclaiming over the horrors which they revealed of Mirabelle's sufferings. She rose as they entered and then ran to welcome Mark with a cry of joy: 'Thank God you're safe! Did they hurt you, dear?' 

'I'm fine,' Mark confessed. 'I still don't understand what's going on.' 

A babble of voices - Mirabelle and Alma - answered him. Leon, alerted by sounds downstairs in the street, went to look out of the window, and then turned back into the room. 'George and Raymond are back, with Meadows,' he announced. 'They will endeavour to explain everything to you.' 

'You'll have to move the car,' said George Manfred, coming into the room, 'it's blocking the street. Good afternoon, ladies' (acknowledging Mirabelle and Alma with a bow) 'has this irresponsible young man been entertaining you? Mr Mark, I presume?' (turning to that young man and holding out his right hand). He gestured Leon out, and Leon went, shrugging his indifference at the slight. A moment later Mirabelle heard the roar of the Spanz as he moved it down the road towards the garage. 

'Miss Mirabelle Leicester?' said the third gentleman who had entered the room. 'I'm Inspector Meadows, and I have some questions to ask you.' 

A head appeared around the door into the office. 'Excuse me, sirs,' said the maid, 'but lunch is served.' 

It was a while before Leon returned. Lunch was half over before he strolled into the dining room, seated himself next to Mirabelle and tucked into the salad which formed the heart of the meal. Alma was shocked at his rudeness, and Mark had given up wondering about this youthful-looking slim man who seemed to treat everything so casually; but Mirabelle smiled to herself. She had noticed that Leon had mud on the knees of his trousers, and guessed that he had been conducting his own investigations during his absence. 

Over lunch, Inspector Meadows had asked her a few questions about her imprisonment, and about what she remembered of the men and women she had seen. He questioned her closely about Monty Newton (whose death would come before the coroner tomorrow) and Joan Alice Murphy, a.k.a. Joan Newton, a.k.a. Flash Jane Smith, who was currently in a secure London hospital ward under the watchful eye of nurses and a police guard. 

'May I go and see her?' asked Mirabelle. 'I feel responsible for some of what happened to her.' 

'It would be truer to say that she was responsible for what happened to you,' said Meadows, 'but I'd be glad if you could talk to her. She isn't answering any of our questions at present.' 

He also asked Mirabelle about the man's body that had been found in the underground room at Oberzohn's ruined factory in New Cross - she described how Gurther had come down into the room, how Joan had attacked him in revenge for Monty's murder, and had broken the snake's box, and how the snake had bitten Gurther and he had died. Finally, he asked whether she knew anything about a man called Villa. 

'No, I've never heard that name before,' said Mirabelle. 

'No one mentioned the name in your hearing?' 

'No one.' 

'Because,' Meadows went on, 'Villa was due to board the coast steamer at Liverpool yesterday, but he didn't board. We're wondering whether he doubled back to London.' 

'But who is he?' asked Mirabelle. 

'Oberzohn's agent in south Africa. He brought Oberzohn the information about your father's gold mine.' 

It was at this point that Leon Gonsalez joined them. After waiting for a few minutes to allow Leon to say something - an opportunity Leon failed to grasp - Meadows continued his questioning. 

'Did you ever tell anyone of Oberzohn's gang about Mark?' 

'No. I told him about the farm and Aunt Alma, but I never mentioned Mark.' 

'Not even to Miss Joan?' 

'No.' Mirabelle looked thoughtful. 'I don't think she was particularly interested. She kept insisting that I was rich, and wouldn't believe that I only had a poor little farm that was losing money.' 

'Newton had told her about the gold mine, I expect,' said Meadows. 

'Inspector,' Manfred interrupted him, 'it isn't often that I am forced to rebuke you for lack of manners, but I suggest that you allow the young lady to finish her meal in peace.' 

Meadows gave him an amused glance. 'If you hadn't allowed her to rush off this morning before I arrived, I could have questioned her earlier.' 

'She rushed off to rescue Mark, who can now explain how he came to be travelling with a young lady of dubious reputation of the name of Lisa Marthon,' said Manfred, looking at Mirabelle's cousin. 

Mark was embarrassed, and showed it by becoming irritable. 'She told me that Mirabelle had been found and was in hospital. She told me Mirabelle was asking for me. What was I supposed to do?' 

'Phone me in Doughty Court,' answered Alma, but Manfred shook his head. 

'In the circumstances, it's hardly surprising that you believed her. We should have warned you of your danger, but we've been occupied in rescuing Miss Leicester.' 

'So how did you rescue our young visitor?' Poiccart asked Leon. 

Leon met his question with a smile. 'I recognised the car,' he said. 'It had broken down, and the driver was attempting to flag down assistance. I simply stopped and offered them a lift. They had some idea of taking the Spanz and leaving me behind, but my Browning quickly persuaded them otherwise.' 

'You were quick on the draw,' said Mark, admiringly. 

Leon shrugged. 'A simple trick,' he said, 'achieved by misdirection - similar to a conjuring trick. The opponent is drawn in one direction - and I move in the other. He expected me to walk towards him,' he explained, 'and instead I drew a gun on him.' 

'What became of the driver?' asked Manfred. 

'He and the divine Lisa ran away,' answered Leon. 'The car is still standing by the side of the Great West Road,' he added to Meadows, 'perhaps you would arrange for your people to pick it up.' 

'Perhaps I will,' said Meadows. 'Is there anything else you would like to tell me about your activities this morning?' 

Leon shook his head. 'No,' he said thoughtfully, 'I don't think there is anything else you need to know at this point. But I would like to join Mirabelle in visiting Joan Murphy in hospital.' 

After lunch, Meadows escorted Mark and Alma to the nearest police station so that Mark could make a statement to the police, and Leon took Mirabelle out of the house by the back entrance, into the mews. 'I want to show you something,' he said. 

'Something' involved running down the mews, cutting through back streets and climbing a fire escape to high level, where they found a place where it was possible to see the entrance to Curzon Street. Here they found indications that someone had been standing there for some time, smoking a brand of cigarettes normally found in South Africa. 

'One of the "Old Guard" has been here recently,' said Leon. 'Probably last night. He must have been waiting to see us return to Curzon Street - we would have come in from this direction.' 

'But we went back to Doughty Court,' said Mirabelle, 'so he missed us.' They turned to go down the fire escape again. 'How did you get the mud on your trousers?' she asked. 

'I was watching the watcher - I hid over there.' He gestured vaguely. 'He came back this morning and was here when Meadows and my two colleagues came in, but when they were all inside the house he left.' 

'But he didn't see you?' 

'No, I don't think so. And as they aren't watching the back of the house, they won't know we've gone out. I think we now go for a walk to Chester Square and see whether any of our friends are there.' 

They walked hand in hand through the London streets, Leon chattering amusingly and inconsequently about a variety of entertaining topics. Mirabelle listened, laughed and was entertained. They appeared to any onlooker to be what they were; a happy couple in love, out for an afternoon stroll. 

As they turned off the main street towards Chester Square, Leon adjusted the cap he was wearing - a part of his 'chauffeur' role - and hunched his shoulders for a moment, shifting the position of his jacket. Mirabelle blinked: for a moment she didn't recognise him. 

'How do you do that?' she asked, fascinated by his ability to appear to be someone else. 

He was amused at her wonder. 'I simply slip on another role. So often people see only what they expect to see - so I walk a little differently, wear my clothes a little awkwardly, and adopt another mode of speech and they assume I belong to whatever class I choose to mimic.' 

'You were the chauffeur when I first went to Oberzohn's, and then I saw you at lunch at the Ritz-Carlton,' Mirabelle remembered. 

'Yes, and you looked so closely at me I was afraid that you had recognised me.' 

'I did - but I couldn't understand how you could be the same man.' 

Leon was clearly delighted with her approval, but tried not to show it. 'So tell me who I am now,' he challenged her. 

She looked him critically up and down. 'You're a workman - not a manual worker, but a man who works. Not in an office. Do you have a shop? Or a warehouse? Perhaps you are a tradesman.' Mirabelle found that she was laughing. 'How do you do it?' 

'One day I'll show you, but for the moment I'm a tradesman. I supply cleaning materials for domestic use.' Leon was clearly very pleased with himself. 'Poiccart and I have our own laboratory, at the top of our house in Curzon Street, and I hit on this means of making contact with the shop keepers of London - or anywhere else, for that matter - who keep general stores.' 

'You're developing chemicals for cleaning houses?' asked Mirabelle. 

'Yes! They're very efficient, too. I must demonstrate them to your maid at Doughty Court.' 

Mirabelle couldn't believe her ears - but of course, she told herself, she knew from her aunt's newspaper cuttings about the Four Just Men that Poiccart and Gonsalez were chemists. 

'Here we are,' and Leon led her by the hand towards a small newsagents at the end of the mews which approached the back of the house in Chester Square. 

'How are we going to explain me?' wondered Mirabelle. 

'With the truth, of course. You're my wife. We're just married. And of course it was my skills at cleaning up dirt that attracted you to me.' Leon's solemn gaze met Mirabelle's, and they both burst out laughing. 

'Soberly, now,' Leon chided his wife, 'we mustn't let our happiness overwhelm a possible customer,' and he led her into the little shop. 

Mirabelle quickly realised that Leon had not been joking. He really was known here as 'Mr Brown', who acted as agent for some very effective cleaning products. Alongside the newspapers and magazines, books and other stationery, cigarettes, cigars and confectionary, the vendor also sold simple medication and basic cleaning products, and other useful items such as handkerchiefs, string and wool. It was a small but tidy shop, clearly catering mainly for the servants in the large houses hereabouts, and the man standing behind the counter welcomed Leon warmly. Leon introduced him to 'my wife', and explained, 'we were married this morning!' and Mirabelle blushed as the vendor congratulated them. Then the two men began to chat about anything and everything, and Mirabelle listened, fascinated by Leon's ability to enter completely into an invented character. The vendor told Leon in hushed breath about the death of Mr Monty Newton, that the police had been 'all over' his house and had taken Fred, the footman, away for questioning. Other members of the gambling team - the croupier, Joan Murphy and Lisa Marthon - hadn't been around since Mr Newton's murder, and he assumed that the business would start up again somewhere else. 

'There's going to be an inquest tomorrow,' he remarked. 'That would be worth going along to. There's a few things I could say about Monty Newton.' 

As the men chatted Mirabelle walked down to the door of the shop and looked out on the street. She was listening with both ears, but her legs were restless; she didn't have Leon's unending patience in discovering information. Then she noticed two figures walking down the street towards them - large men, slightly familiar. Had they been at the Arts Ball the night she attended with Joan? 

'Darling,' she called her husband, 'I think two of your friends are coming.' Would he take the hint? 

Leon was at her side at a moment, shot a glance down the street and turned back to the vendor. 'Dissatisfied customers coming this way,' he said. 'Shall we slip into your parlour?' 

'Be my guest.' His friend gestured towards the door behind the counter. Leon seized Mirabelle's hand and led her through into a tiny room stuffed with furniture, overlooking a yard behind the house where a few flowers grew, lovingly tended. 

'What do we do now?' asked Mirabelle, very quietly. 

'Wait,' said Leon softly. He held a finger to his lips, and stood by the door - which Mirabelle saw was just barely ajar. She stood still, hardly daring to breathe - Leon's grim face looked as if he had been turned to stone. 

They both heard two men come into the shop and address the proprietor, who replied. There was a pause, then Mirabelle heard a thud and a groan. She stifled a gasp - but Leon was through the door, and at the same moment she heard the 'click' of his gun's safety catch and his voice: 'Hands up!' 

There were sounds of a scramble outside, voices raised, and two shots fired. The outer door crashed open and swung closed with another crash, and then there was silence. Mirabelle went up to the parlour door and looked around it very cautiously. 

The proprietor was lying on the floor near to the parlour door, groaning - she hurried out to help him. On the other side of the counter, Leon was bent over a body. 

Mirabelle wiped the proprietor's forehead and helped him sit up, then hurried to Leon's side. 'Is he dead?' she asked. 

'No,' he replied cheerfully, 'but he won't be going anywhere for a while. We can take him with us when we go.' He was going carefully through the man's pockets, pulling out a gun - which he slipped into his own jacket pocket - and a cosh, which went the way of the gun. 'Now,' he said at last, holding the muzzle of his gun to his victim's head, 'who sent you?' 

The other merely groaned. 

'My friend,' said Leon coldly, 'I know that my bullet has done little more than wind you. You could speak well enough before I shot you. Answer my question, if you ever want to speak again.' 

'You can only kill me,' the other retorted. 

'I can shoot you through the throat. I can shoot you in the stomach, so that you take days to die a very painful death. Or there are other ways to die slowly and painfully. So I ask you again: who sent you?' 

'Villa,' said the other. 

'I hope for your sake that you're telling the truth,' said Leon. He turned to Mirabelle. 'Go to the door, darling, and see whether there's a policeman about.' 

Mirabelle had to run down the street to find the nearest policeman on the beat, and brought him back. They entered the shop to find the proprietor with a bandage around his head, the gunman tied up, and Leon looking innocent. Leon spun a tale of this intruder having tried to rob the shop, and being overcome by the proprietor and himself. The policeman took notes and took the prisoner away. Leon stayed and chatted some more. Mirabelle went in search of tea, and eventually returned with a tray with teapot and the other essentials. They finally left the shop late in the afternoon. 

'I'm not complaining,' Mirabelle assured Leon, 'but does investigating always take that long?' 

'You weren't listening to everything he said,' answered Leon. 'It's evident that the Old Guard are still in town, and that Villa has taken over leadership. He wants that gold mine of yours. We'll go back to Curzon Street via my lawyers - I mean, the Triangle's lawyers.' The Triangle was the symbol of the Three Just Men, which hung on the wall outside the house in Curzon Street. 

'Won't they be closed by this time?' asked Mirabelle. 

'They'll be expecting us,' Leon assured her. 

He was right; the lawyers had been expecting them all afternoon. There were documents for Mirabelle to sign, and arrangements to be explained, and it was into the evening before they set off to walk back to the house in Curzon Street. 

'Aren't we late for dinner?' asked Mirabelle. 

'They will have gone out to dine,' Leon explained. 'I want to check whether any of my people have come back to report.' 

They entered by the back door, and found Mr Digby waiting in Manfred's office on the first floor. There was also a note from Manfred, which Leon read and crumpled up in his hands. 

'What does it say?' 

Leon smiled grimly. 'They've gone out and left us to our own devices.' 

Mirabelle made a dive for the crumpled note, but he held it out of her reach. 'It's not important,' her husband assured her. 'Just a joke between friends.' 

She scowled at him. 'You could let me judge that for myself!' 

'I'll let you see it later.' Leon put it in his pocket. 'Now, Digby - what have you found out?' 

Digby's head was still swathed in bandages from his adventures a few days earlier, but he was full of news. 'That Portuguese agent of Oberzohn's is back in town,' he said. 'He came back last night, as soon as he heard that Oberzohn was in trouble. He says that if Oberzohn isn't going to have the mine, he'll have it himself, and the lady too - begging your pardon, miss,' he added apologetically to Mirabelle. 

'Granted,' said that lady. 

'He doesn't know about the snake trick,' Digby went on. 'His men say he only knows how to shoot. They're not very happy,' he added. 'They don't see why he should get the mine, when they've been working here for Oberzohn for years. They want their share.' 

'And they're absolutely right,' Leon agreed. 'They have as much right to it as he does. Which is nothing,' he added for Mirabelle's benefit. 

The girl nodded. She felt suddenly cold. All day she had bathed in the warm glow of her own happiness and Leon's love, and now she felt as if a dark cloud had come across her. 

'I don't even know what this man Villa looks like,' she said. 'How would I recognise him if I saw him?' 

'He's got fair hair, miss, and he's quite good looking,' Digby informed her. 'Not as tall and good looking as Mr Manfred, but he thinks the ladies all approve of him.' 

'So how is he expecting to get me and the mine?' 

'I expect he's thinking of kidnap, miss,' said Digby apologetically. 

'I refuse to be kidnapped again!' She turned to Leon. 'What shall we do?' 

Leon was thoughtful. 'We don't want him to know that we're on our guard,' he said, 'so I suggest we go and do some hospital visiting.' 

'Isn't it a bit late in the evening for that?' 

'It's never too late to go visiting,' Leon assured her. He turned to Digby. 'Do you know where Mr Poiccart and Mr Manfred took Miss Murphy the other night?' Digby nodded, 'The Middlesex, sir.' Leon nodded. 'Miss Mirabelle and I will be back later. Tell my colleagues when they return that we've gone to pay a late night call.' 

There is nothing quite like walking through the streets of London on a warm summer's evening with the one you love. Although Mirabelle was rather scared and a little excited at the thought of whatever might happen next, she relaxed as she sauntered down the London streets hand in hand with the slim youthful-looking man she loved. Leon chattered inconsequentially and amusingly, making her laugh aloud, and no one who saw them walking together could imagine that they were on a mission of life or death. 

Middlesex Hospital was, as Mirabelle had expected, closed to visitors, but Leon took Mirabelle round the back to the tradesman's entrance and spoke to the night porter, naming himself as a doctor (in fact he gave a genuine name, Mirabelle later discovered, under which he was licensed to practice as a doctor in England), and saying that he and Nurse Leicester needed to come into the hospital to consult one of the surgeons, whom he named. He spun out a complicated story which Mirabelle couldn't follow, but which seemed to keep the night porter's attention - Leon loved stories. At last the night porter agreed to let them in, the door was opened, and they entered. 

Through the corridors, up lifts and stairways they went, and at last they came to a door where a prison warder sat outside. Leon went up to him and greeted him, and the warder recognised him. 

'I didn't expect to see you here at this time of night, Mr Gonsalez,' he said. 

'I preferred not to come in daylight,' Leon replied. 'Do you know Miss Leicester? She was with Miss Murphy when her accident happened.' 

The warder and Mirabelle exchanged polite greetings. 'I think it will be all right for you to see Miss Murphy,' said the warder, 'if she's awake. I'll just check,' and he slipped through the doors into the ward where Joan was being held. Mirabelle and Leon heard some whispered conversation, and then he returned. 'That'll be fine,' the warder said, 'go on in.' 

Mirabelle led the way in. Joan was the only patient in the room, but there was a nurse sitting by the bed, reading. She looked up as Mirabelle entered, and Mirabelle recognised her as the woman who had accompanied her back to Heavytree farm after the disastrous Arts Ball. 'Miss Leicester! How good to see you looking so well. Mr Gonsalez! Have you come to see my sad patient?' 

'How is she?' asked Mirabelle, and the nurse indicated the figure on the bed. 'Sadly bruised, I'm sorry to say.' 

'Joan?' Mirabelle approached the bed. 'How are you feeling?' 

'Mirabelle?' The figure's voice was plaintive and weak. Mirabelle found herself looking into two bruised eyes in a white, bruised face. In fact, it seemed that Joan Murphy was one big bruise - what parts of her which were not covered by bandages. 'You escaped?' Joan whispered, and Mirabelle realised that the girl could not speak more loudly - her throat and jaw were so battered and swollen that she could hardly speak at all. 

'The Three Just Men rescued me,' she explained. 

'What about Oberzohn? What happened to the Snake?' 

'Oberzohn's dead. Gunther's dead too - when you smashed the case, the snakes got out and killed him.' 

'Thank God,' whispered the figure on the bed. 

'You were really brave,' Mirabelle added, trying to think of something to say that would raise the battered spirits of the crushed woman, 'you saved me from Gurther. You killed him!' 

'He killed Monty,' whispered Joan. 'I'm glad I avenged Monty.' She stifled a sob, and Mirabelle saw the tears flowing down the girl's face. 

'Miss Murphy,' said Leon, bending over her, 'I'm trying to capture the rest of the men who destroyed your Monty. Who was the woman who took you away from the theatre?' 

Joan sniffed and tried to stem her tears. 'I don't know her. She's one of Oberzohn's people. I think she's called Phipps - I think Monty called her Antonia? But it isn't her real name.' 

Leon nodded. 'Thank you, Miss Murphy,' he said gravely, and looking at him Mirabelle saw genuine pity and sadness in his face. He really cares about the people who suffer, she thought, and he really wants to get justice for them. 

She looked down at Joan again. 'We'll get them for you,' she promised, and stretching out her right hand, squeezed Joan's right hand warmly. 

Joan's tears flowed again. 'It won't bring Monty back,' she whispered. 

'We'll come and see you again when we've got them,' promised Mirabelle, and then she and Leon made their goodbyes and left her. 

'I feel awful about her,' Mirabelle confessed as they went down the corridor, away from Joan's room. 'I know she betrayed me, but she saved me from Gurther too.' 

'The best we can do for her now is to catch Villa before he catches up with her,' said Leon. 'She has such a fine head,' he added, as if inconsequentially, 'it is such a waste.' 

'Physiognomy is your expertise, isn't it?' said Mirabelle. 'You've written books about it.' 

'I've written several books, and I'm invited to speak at international meetings on crime and the reform of the delinquent offender. The people who invite me hope that I'll be able to tell them how to turn people with criminal heads into law-abiding citizens.' He waved his long slender hands. 'And when I tell them that it can't be done, they are indignant and argue with me, so then I tell them that they themselves have stubborn heads and that I wouldn't expect any other reaction.' He laughed shortly. 'It's amusing, but I've given up expecting any serious response.' 

'But is there anything anyone can do about it? Mirabelle persisted. They were descending a flight of stairs now, returning to the back entrance where they had come in. 'No one can change the shape of their head, can they?' 

Leon smiled, and shook his head. 'It's possible to amend behaviour, and to train the mind. I have argued that even the shape of the hair or the hat that is habitually worn may affect habitual behaviour. But in the end a man's character must be dictated by his skull.' 

'And a woman's?' she asked. 

'Far be it from me to claim that anything might restrict your fair sex,' he retorted, 'but yes - a woman's too.' 

They came to the exit door, and the night porter waved them out; they departed with thanks and farewells. 

Mirabelle picked up their conversation again as they walked down the street. 'You can keep your old chivalry to yourself, Leon Gonsalez,' she teased him. 'I don't need you to flatter my sex.' 

'I'm not flattering you,' he retorted. 'I'm speaking the truth to you - O maiden with the beautiful eyes and mathematical head.' She spun round to face him, and he laughed at her. 'Why do you look so indignant when I tell you the truth, senorinetta?' 

'Oh, you terrible tease! Can we go and find something to eat now? I'm famished, and we haven't had anything to eat since lunch.' 

'Let's go back to Curzon Street,' he said. 'It's late, and neither of us have had much sleep recently.' 

And probably not much tonight either, she thought, but decided not to say it. She simply turned her smiling face up to his, and he bent and kissed her. 

A taxi driver driving his vehicle slowly down the street with the 'for hire' symbol out saw a young couple embracing in the light of a street lamp and brought his vehicle slowly towards them. He was within ten feet of them when the man suddenly spun round, and the driver slammed on the brakes sharply. 

'Taxi, sir?' he asked, leaning out of his cab window to address the man. 

'Go back to your master,' said the other, 'and tell him that Leon Gonsalez will come and pay him a visit tomorrow. Meanwhile, good night.' 

The driver looked at Gonsalez's hand, and what was in it. Then he turned his taxi around and drove away. 

'Was that another one of them?' asked Mirabelle, as Leon put his Browning away. 

'One of the Old Guard. His name is Defson. He was at the Arts Ball the night that you were nearly killed by Gurther.' Leon took Mirabelle's arm in his and led her on down the street, heading for Curzon Street. 

'What was Gurther going to do to me? I felt so ill afterwards.' 

'He drugged you, and then he was going to take your body away in a fake police car and dump it in the river.' He felt her stiffen and was sorry to have frightened her - he forgot that she was still a novice in crime-fighting. He drew her close and put an arm around her. 

'But I'd already found out what he was intending to do,' he explained. 'I'd been selling my cleaning products to his caretakers in City Road, and I was friendly with one of his clerks; and I listened at doors and under windows, and my agents tapped his telephones - all our usual methods.' 

'Digby told me you have a lot of people working for you.' 

'Yes, we have a register of men we employ, and some women too. But it's dangerous work for women.' 

'Women can do dangerous work too,' she bridled, and he explained: 'I don't like to send a woman into danger.' 

'It's your romantic Spanish blood,' she teased him. 'You need to lose that sentimental view of women,' and Leon, who had always prided himself on his cold-blooded detachment, was temporarily rendered speechless. 

They arrived back at Curzon Street sometime after everyone in the house had gone to bed, and Leon let them into the back door with his latch key. Having made sure that the door was securely locked and bolted, he led Mirabelle to the kitchen, where they ate crumpets and drank hot chocolate, chatted together and laughed over inconsequentials. Mirabelle wondered where her aunt and Mark had gone, but Leon suggested that they would have gone back to the Doughty Court flat. When they had finished their supper they went upstairs to Manfred's office, where Leon scribbled a few notes to his agents, for sending out early on the morrow. He also found a note on the table, signed by Poiccart, which he read, laughed at and handed to Mirabelle. It read: 

'My dear Leon, 

I hope that you and your lady wife will have enjoyed a most entertaining evening. Miss Goddard and Mr Leicester have returned to Doughty Court. Your bed is in the usual place. I trust that you both will sleep well.' 

And it was signed with a simple 'R' for Raymond. 

'Raymond is expecting me to sleep on the settee,' said Leon, with a wry smile. 'He doesn't believe that man and wife should share a bed.' 

Mirabelle was shocked. 'How very old-fashioned! And he's such a dear.' 

Leon put his arm around her. 'The two aspects of character go together. Shall I show you how small a room a chauffeur is allowed to call his own in this house?' 

'I'd be delighted if you would.' 

'Come along, then.' He pocketed Poiccart's note, and led the way out, turning out the electric light behind them. 

Poiccart, who had been lying awake waiting for the errant third member of the Triangle to come in, heard two sets of feet mount the stairs past his room and up to the top floor. He heard the bedroom door close, and then a lot of giggling, more or less muffled. He rolled over and determined to go to sleep. 

3: The Kentish Queen 

Mirabelle woke in the morning to the sound of birdsong. She opened her eyes and saw sunlight shining on the ceiling of the room. The ceiling was painted pale blue - the curtains were an unfamiliar patterned blue cotton. For a few moments she wondered where she could be, and then she heard water splashing and sat up in bed. Leon put his head around the door, holding a towel around his shoulders. 

'Do you want a shower bath before breakfast?' he asked. 

'That would be lovely! But what am I going to wear? I haven't brought any clothes.' She looked ruefully at the chair where lay the clothes she had worn the previous day - they were now in need of a good wash and some repair. 

'I'll send the boy over to Doughty Court to fetch you something,' said Leon. 

So the boy, drinking tea and listening to the cook and the maids reading over the morning newspapers, was again summoned from the servants' breakfast table to bicycle over to Doughty Court, this time to bring back a case of woman's clothes. He set off into the morning sunshine, wondering why the master put up with a chauffeur who couldn't be trusted to come back at nights and brought strange women home. 

The strange woman, however, once bathed and dressed in her hastily-fetched clothes, was welcomed to the breakfast table at Curzon Street. She sat demurely facing her husband across the breakfast table, replied in the affirmative to polite questions from Manfred and Poiccart as to whether she had slept well and the bed had been comfortable, and tucked into a boiled egg and toast. 

Manfred had the newspapers, and was commenting on that morning's news. There was no report on the kidnapping of Mark, but there was one column inch in one of the papers on the attack on the shop keeper near Chester Square. There was also a letter in the Times commenting on the events of the previous few days and demanding why the police depended on 'supra-legal organisations such as the Four Just Men.' 

'Who was the Fourth Just Man?' asked Mirabelle. 'I mean the original fourth, not the man who died when you killed the minister in London.' 

'Clarice Merrell,' said Manfred. 'He was shot dead by the police in Bordeaux.' 

Mirabelle noticed that all three of the Just Men became solemn at the mention of the name; an air of sadness swept over the room. 

'I'm sorry,' she said, 'I shouldn't have asked.' 

'No, it's good that he should be remembered,' said Leon. 'We treat his name as sacred - he died for our cause. But only we three remember him now.' 

'It was more than twenty years ago,' explained Manfred. 'Each year we visit his grave and do him honour, but he has no other memorial.' 

'He had no living family,' said Poiccart, in answer to Mirabelle's unspoken question. 'None of us have living family. We give up all family ties, so that we can work completely independently, without any hindrance from other obligations.' 

'But you have obligations to each other,' suggested Mirabelle. 'You would die for each other, wouldn't you? I've read Alma's press-cuttings - when you were arrested,' - she looked at Manfred, who nodded assent - 'you worked day and night to rescue him' - she looked at Poiccart and Gonsalez. Poiccart nodded, but Gonsalez was as cynical as always. 

'George set us a puzzle,' he said, 'which we couldn't honourably decline.' 

'A puzzle?' 

'How to rescue a man who can't possibly be rescued.' 

Mirabelle almost laughed, but her husband was regarding her with such seriousness that she stifled the urge. 'And you rescued him,' she concluded, 'so you got full marks! And then you went away across the sea - how long after that did you return to England?' 

The three Just Men looked at each other. 

'I was in Cordova for a while, and then London,' said Manfred. 'Leon and Raymond moved around.' 

'We came back to England and worked for your government during the Great War,' said Poiccart. 'We worked under pseudonyms, of course.' 

'When our identity was revealed we were granted a pardon,' explained Leon. 'But you know that already from your aunt's press-cuttings! How excellent a woman is Aunt Alma - her records so orderly, so meticulously kept. There is a whole history of our society in those files of hers.' 

Mirabelle smiled mischievously. 'I could publish it!' she suggested. 

'I suggest you leave that for your grandchildren,' said Manfred gently. 'Now, children, our first duty this morning is to attend the inquest on Mr Monty Newton; and then we have to seek out Mr Villa, who I understand is still in town.' 

Mr Newton's inquest was something of a non-event, as is so often the case when the police investigation is still proceeding. Evidence was presented by eye-witnesses, such as the theatre manager and the doctor who had examined the body, but Leon - who had been first on the scene after Monty's death - was not called, and Inspector Meadows gave evidence to the effect that a key witness was still desperately ill in hospital, and unfit to stand up in court. She had, however, made a statement early that morning, which he read out. This was simply to the effect that Monty Newton had died when the lights went out on stage, and that she believed 'the Snake' was to blame. 

The jury returned the verdict that the cause of death was murder by person or persons unknown, and the case was concluded. But as Leon's friend the shopkeeper (his head still tightly bandaged after the blow of the previous day) remarked to Leon and Mirabelle on the way out, any fool could have seen that it was murder, the question was just who had done it. 

George and Poiccart went away to find lunch at a nearby restaurant, while Leon took Mirabelle for a walk to Doughty Court. His excuse was that she needed to pick up the rest of her things, but also he wanted to ask Aunt Alma a favour. 

'I know it will be dangerous,' he told her, 'but I don't think that danger worries you, any more than it does Mirabelle.' 

'Mirabelle is an irresponsible young tearaway,' said Alma, 'but I'd be delighted to assist you, Mr Gonsalez.' 

Over a lunch of salad and cold pie, the four at Doughty Court discussed their moves. Leon was expecting his agents to be in position already, and was just waiting for a message from Digby, who duly turned up at the flat at 2pm. He was greeted warmly by Aunt Alma, and treated to a cup of tea and a piece of cake while he made his report. 

'You're right about Chester Square, sir,' Digby told Leon. 'The back route you've used before should do it. But I can't get a handle on the woman at all. None of us can. She's disappeared, as if she'd been swallowed up into the bowels of the earth.' 

Leon's long, sensitive fingers twitched as he frowned in thought - he was clearly thinking hard. But Aunt Alma spoke up. 

'I wouldn't expect you to be able to find her,' she said. 'Didn't you say she was a middle-aged woman, well-dressed? She'll need new clothes now, and perhaps to get her hair done if she wants to get out of London unrecognised.' She looked meaningfully at Digby. 'Where would she go to do that?' 

Digby shook his head helplessly - he had no idea where women went in such circumstances. But Mirabelle uttered a cry of delight. 

'Joan told me! When we were in Oberzohn's prison - when she wasn't talking about Monty, she was telling me about the best places to shop for clothes and for hairdressing. I know exactly where Miss Phipps will be.' She turned to Leon. 'I'm sorry, darling, but you can't come with me - you'd stand out a mile.' 

'I'll come with you,' Alma said, but Mirabelle shook her head. 

'No, dear, you have to go to Chester Square - just as Leon told you. I'll go to the hairdresser.' She smiled reassuringly at her aunt. 'I'll be fine - Leon can lend me his gun.' 

Leon's expression was both alarmed and amused. 'Where will you put it?' he asked. 

'I've got a handbag it will fit into. Don't worry, I'll be fine. They've no reason to harm me - and I can offer them a route out of trouble!' 

Leon set out with Mirabelle despite her determination to go alone. He said firmly that he wanted to know where she was going, so if anything did go wrong he knew whom he was going to kill. Mirabelle, temporarily startled by his cold-heartedness, realised that it was a measure of his deep affection (that affection he had always claimed not to possess), and gave him a warm kiss. 

'Very well, darling,' she said, 'you may walk with me to the corner of the street.' 

So they parted on a street corner, with a fond kiss like any happily married couple; Mirabelle went on to the hairdressers, while Leon vanished down a side alley. He had told her that he was going straight back to Chester Square, but he found that he couldn't leave until he saw Mirabelle come out of the hairdressers with two woman accompanying her. They walked up the street and into a tearoom. Leon nodded, and walked back towards Chester Square, nodding to a man who was leaning carelessly against a lamp-post nearby. He was certainly not going to leave Mirabelle without one of his agents within call. 

Mirabelle was having a lovely time. When she walked into the hairdressers she had immediately seen Lisa Marthon, whom she had last seen running away from a car on the Great West Road; and in the next chair to hers was a smartly-dressed middle aged woman. The two were talking together in low voices. Mirabelle nodded to herself, and then turned to speak to the assistant who came up to greet her. 

'A trim, madam? Of course. Do be seated.' Mirabelle went to join the two ladies, who glanced up at her as she approached, and then both gasped and stared. 

'Good afternoon,' said Mirabelle, sitting down next to them. 'How convenient that you should both be here! I've been wanting to speak to you.' 

'What do you want?' demanded Lisa, sotto voce. 

'I understand that you may both be in need of some assistance,' said Mirabelle. 'I don't see why you should have to suffer for other men's crimes, and I have a score to settle with Miss Joan Murphy. So I was going to offer you a favour for a favour.' 

'What do you mean?' - thus Lisa again. 

'There's an ocean liner leaving Southampton for New York tomorrow evening. I want to be on it, and I'm taking a boat from Tower Bridge Wharf to Southampton this evening. The Three Just Men fixed it up for me,' she explained modestly, 'to get me out of the way, so they can settle with Villa. It's safer than the train - Villa can't get at a boat, once it's at sea.' 

She saw both women stiffen at the mention of Oberzohn's Portuguese agent. 'I'd very much like to be on that boat,' said the woman that Monty Newton called Antonia Phipps. 'That Villa gives me the creeps.' 

'I think I can get you on board,' said Mirabelle. 'Are you interested?' 

'Oh, very much, darling,' said Lisa loudly, as one of the assistants came down the shop towards them. 'Why don't we pop around the corner for a cup of tea after Mario has finished with us, and discuss it?' 

While Mirabelle was practising making friends and influencing people, Alma had made her way to Chester Square with Digby. Digby pointed out the alternative ways out of the Chester Square house, and then left her to walk up to the door and ring the bell. 

The door was opened by the late Monty Newton's valet Fred, who stared at her blankly. 

'Is Mr Villa in?' asked Alma. 

'What? Who are you?' demanded Fred. 

'My name is Alma Goddard,' said Alma. 'I'm the aunt of Mirabelle Leicester, whom I believe Mr Villa is anxious to meet.' 

'Yes - no - I mean, how did you find out -?' Fred was floundering. 

'Who is it, Fred?' demanded a voice from an inner room, and Fred turned away from the door and walked back into the house. 

'It's a woman, sir,' he began. 'She says she's from Miss Leicester.' 

'I didn't say I was from Miss Leicester,' Alma contradicted him, and Fred spun round in indignation to find Alma standing directly behind him. 'You left the door open, so I came straight in,' she said. 

'Who the hell are you?' demanded the man in the room behind Fred. Alma stepped around the servant to address a tall, handsome man with fair hair, whose darkened skin proclaimed that he had only recently arrived from Angola. 

'I'm Miss Alma Goddard,' she repeated. 'Mirabelle Leicester is my niece. I believe you are very anxious to meet her.' 

'I am indeed,' said the other. 'But why are you telling me this?' 

'My niece is intending to leave the country this evening,' Alma told him. 'She is boarding a boat from Tower Quay and sailing to Southampton, where she'll catch a liner to New York. And with her goes a gold mine and my entire livelihood. I'll be left penniless, Mr Villa; penniless, and that feckless child couldn't give a fig. She's so tied up with those Three Just Men of hers -' Alma let her voice rise hysterically. 

'Yes, yes, Miss Goddard, you make yourself clear.' Villa was soothing. 'So what are you proposing?' 

'For a suitable consideration, Mr Villa, I'm prepared to assist you in encountering my niece on that boat,' said Alma. 'What you do then is up to you. But I require a suitable consideration for my services.' 

'Well, well.' Villa nodded thoughtfully. 'But now that you've told me about your niece's movements - I don't need your assistance.' 

'Oh, but you do. Because my niece is expecting me back this afternoon. If I don't return, she'll become suspicious, and she'll go to the police. She probably won't go to catch her boat. So you have to let me go back - with that consideration in my pocket.' 

'And if you double-cross me?' 

'You mean - if I take your money and don't produce the girl?' Alma sniffed, as if in disgust he should even suggest such a thing. 'And supposing you follow me back to the flat and try to seize my niece? It won't work, Mr Villa. Those Just Men of hers are looking after her, until she gets on the boat. But she trusts me.' 

'You haven't answered my first question. How do I know I can trust you?' 

Alma had thought of saying, 'You can't,' but decided that this was taking bravado a little too far. 

'Because I'm desperate, Mr Villa. If that girl leaves the country, I've got nothing. She's a heartless hussy who doesn't give a ha'penny for anyone except herself. I'm hoping you'll put some sense into her head.' 

Villa considered her for a few minutes. 'Very well, Miss Goddard. I'll take you up on your offer. But you won't go back to your niece. You'll phone her from here and tell her that you'll be back to collect her just before she's due to sail. Then my men will give you a lift to the flat and take you both down to the boat. All nice and friendly. Then, as you say, we can put some sense into her head.' 

Alma smiled, as if triumphantly. 'That sounds very good, Mr Villa.' 

She told herself to keep her chin up. The success of the plan depended on her! Mr Gonsalez and the other two Just Men had discovered that the man who had ordered Mark's kidnapping was concealed here, in the house in Chester Square; the local shopkeeper knew everything from the servants who dropped in to the shop at all hours. But Mr Gonsalez could not entice Mr Villa out to be captured. That was her task, to play the angry, selfish woman with a grudge against her niece, who would do anything to ensure her own wellbeing, even at the expense of her niece's happiness. 

She made the phone call to Mirabelle, and heard her niece gasp. 'Take care, Alma,' said Mirabelle, and Alma felt her own heart tremble as she hung up. Would she make a slip now, and destroy the whole plan? 

She told herself that all she had to do was to keep playing the role for the next few hours, and after that everything would be all right. And to do that convincingly she must go on to the attack. She turned back to her host. 

'Well, that's done,' she said brightly. 'Now, as you are keeping me here for the next few hours, I think we should have a cup of tea. And perhaps we should have a game of cards. Do you play rummy?' 

Mr Villa thought this was a great laugh. He ordered the tea and fetched the cards, and they sat down to play. 

Alma was quite good at rummy. She suspected that Mr Villa was very good indeed at certain card games, but she reckoned that he was probably less practised at rummy. She hoped that he was not, because there were still three hours before that boat was due to sail. 

Back at the flat, Mirabelle put down the phone and turned to Mark with a look of horror on her face. 'Alma's been captured by that horrible man! She has to stay there until it's time for the car to come and fetch me.' 

'But you weren't going down to the wharf with Alma, were you?' asked Mark. 

'I have to fetch Antonia and Lisa! I can't wait here for Alma!' 

'I know!' said Mark brightly. He stood up and faced Mirabelle. 'We're a similar height,' he said. 'Could I be you?' 

'What? Mark, they'll never believe that you're me!' 

'Have they ever seen you close up? And you'll be wearing a hat and coat.' 

Mirabelle looked at him thoughtfully. She grasped his arm and pulled him alongside her, so that they were standing side by side in front of the mirror over the telephone table in the flat's little living room. 

'You don't have a beard,' she said, 'and your hair is the same colour as mine.' 

'I can pull a hat well down over my head, and put a scarf round my neck.' 

'I can lend you a coat. Are your legs hairy?' 

They both looked down at his trousers. 'I can shave,' said Mark. 'I can shave my arms too.' 

'Your hands are bigger than mine - and your fingernails are a mess!' 

'I'll tidy them up. We've got a few hours. And I'll wear gloves. Go on, Miri! It'll be great fun. And I want to get back at that gang.' 

'All right,' said Mirabelle. 'You'll have to be careful,' she said. 'Don't say anything. Whisper - tell them you've got a cold.' 

The only risk, she knew, would be Alma; if Alma recognised him and exclaimed. But she was afraid that Alma would not be there. Villa was holding Alma as a hostage for her appearance that evening, and then he would pounce. 

But he would not succeed, because Leon would be there, and he would save her; he and the other two Just Men. 

That afternoon, a fire broke out on the wharf just up river from Tower Wharf. The smoke billowed along the embankment, making visibility difficult. The fire brigade battled the fire and got it under control, but the material that was burning continued to throw out huge quantities of smoke. The weather had been calm and sunny for the last few days, with no wind, so the smoke hung over the embankment like a pall, a disruption to shipping. 

The little Kentish Queen, however, made preparations to embark despite the unfavourable conditions. This little coaster had not been seen in the Thames for many years, and the port inspector eyed her with disfavour, saying that he doubted the boat was fit to go to sea. The captain of the vessel produced documents testifying to his vessel's fitness, and the preparations continued - despite the smoke. The captain expressed his intention to sail with the tide, at six o'clock. 

At five o'clock the fire flared up again, and thick black coils of smoke billowed down the wharf, reducing visibility to a few yards. Out in the river, however, the air was clear. 

Villa arrived at 5pm in Oberzohn's Rolls. He had Alma Goddard with him. They were chatting amicably, but anyone watching them would notice that Villa never took his eye off Alma. They boarded the little Kentish Queen and went below to await the arrival of the other passengers. 

Mirabelle had left Mark dressed up in her dress, stockings, coat and hat, and with her suitcase. The case was packed with Mirabelle's old clothes, in case Villa's men checked it. Mark was wearing a pair of Alma's shoes - his feet were too big to fit into Mirabelle's shoes - and Alma's gloves; and Mirabelle had put a little lipstick and rouge on his face to add verisimilitude. The result did not look much like Mirabelle, but would pass for a woman to the casual eye. Mirabelle had also passed Mark the gun that Leon had taken from Lisa's car the previous day, just in case Mark's disguise didn't convince the men who came to collect him. 

Mirabelle herself then set out to meet Antonia and Lisa. She had arranged to meet them outside a tea shop on Oxford Street, and was surprised to meet Poiccart on her way to the meeting point. 

'How lovely to see you! I didn't expect you to be here,' she admitted. 

'Is everything going as arranged?' Poiccart asked her, gravely. Mirabelle shook her head. 

'Alma's being held by Villa - he's taken her down to the boat early, and he's sending a car to pick me up. But I have to collect Lisa and Antonia, so Mark's dressed up as me and he'll go down to the boat and wait.' She looked into Poiccart's worried face and added, 'I've left him a gun.' 

'And are you armed, Miss Leicester?' asked Poiccart. 

'Yes' - she patted her handbag. 'Don't worry!' Then, seeing his anxious expression, she patted his arm and repeated, 'I'll be fine. Don't worry, it will work.' 

All at once, he smiled at her - a sad smile. 'I once had a daughter,' he said wistfully, 'I hope she would have turned out like you, Miss Leicester.' Then he bowed, and left her quickly. 

Mirabelle was left stunned - both by his admission of fatherhood, and by his admiration of her. Whatever had happened in Raymond Poiccart's life, so that he now no longer had daughter or wife or even country he could call his own? What tragedy lay in his past? 

She told herself that she must pull herself together - this was no time for sentiment. She must get on with the job in hand. She squared her shoulders and walked on to the rendez-vous point. 

The taxi carrying Mirabelle, Antonia and Lisa arrived at the wharf just after the car carrying Mark and Villa's gunmen. The billowing smoke made it very difficult to see where the boat was, and the taxi driver indicated that he wasn't at all anxious to hang around. 'You never know what's in these wharfside fires,' he said. 'There could be anything in there - poisonous chemicals or explosives or anything.' He stopped well clear of the wharf, and told the three women to alight, 'and good luck to yer.' Mirabelle hastily paid him, and he spun his vehicle around and drove away.  

'At least no one can see us in this smoke,' said Mirabelle. 'Come on,' and she led her two companions forward. The other two women were clearly uneasy, but Mirabelle seemed so certain that they went after her, down the wharf towards the gangway. 

'Three for the Kentish Queen,' said Mirabelle, as they came up to the gangway and the sailor standing by its entrance. He was wearing a mask over his nose and mouth - she guessed, because of the smoke. 

'Tickets?' said the sailor, and Mirabelle recognised Mr Dennis's voice. She rifled in her bag and produced some paper, which she thrust at him and he pretended to read. 

'That's fine. On you go, ladies. Hurry down below - this smoke isn't good to breathe.' 

Mirabelle led them up the gangway. So far, so good, she thought. Everyone is now on board the boat, but Alma is a prisoner and Villa's henchmen are on board. What happens now? 

The smoke prevented the two men with Mark from noticing that they were being followed by the three women. As they stepped off the gangway on to the ship's deck they were greeted by another member of the crew who was wearing a mask against the smoke, and they demanded to be taken to 'Miss Leicester's cabin'. The crew member led them to a small cabin, and left them there, advising them to 'stay inside - keep out of the smoke. We'll be underway shortly.' He departed, leaving the two members of the Old Guard to wonder where Mr Villa had got to. One stayed with Mark, who refused to take off his coat, saying in a husky voice 'It's cold in here,' while the other went in search of Villa. As he walked around the boat, he heard a hurried consultation among the crew, and a masked crewman hurried past him, a pale and indistinct figure; and then another came up to him and said, 'Do you mind going below, sir? We've just been told that the fire has got into some containers of chemicals, and the smoke may be damaging to health. We're going to set to sea immediately.' 

The member of the 'Old Guard' hesitated. He was about to draw his gun, when a hand like steel grasped his arm and a voice said in his ear, 'Move and you're dead.' 

He felt the cold steel of a gun barrel against his neck, and raised his hands above his head.  

'Tea, sir, madam?' A crewman put his head around the door into Mark's cabin. The gunman with Mark scowled, but Mark said in his husky voice, 'Yes, please.' The crewman smiled and withdrew. 

'Where's Stubbs?' asked the gunman, more to himself than to Mark. He walked to the door of the cabin and looked out, then stepped out into the smoke. Mark promptly jumped to his feet, pushed the door closed and locked it. 

At last he could breathe freely. He loosened the scarf from round his neck and unfastened his coat - he was boiling in it, but dare not take it off because he knew that Mirabelle's dress was far too tight on his waist to fool anyone. He went to the window, and wondered what was going on outside. It was far too smoky to see - then he felt the boat's motion change subtly, and realised that they were underway, floating down the river. 

'Where the hell is that girl?' demanded Villa, pacing up and down the lower cabin where the polite sailor had escorted himself and Alma an hour before. 'Why isn't she here?' 

'I don't know,' exclaimed Alma. 'She ought to have been here by now. I told her that I would meet her here.' 

Her fear and growing panic were clearly genuine. Villa decided that it was time for action. 

His plan had been simple enough: the girl would arrive on board and would come down to meet her aunt, and he would overpower her: easy. The aunt could then be disposed of, and he would take the girl back to Africa with him, and claim the goldmine for himself. 

He had the aunt, but where was the girl? How could he have been tricked? The aunt seemed genuine - Fred had listened in to the phone call and reported that it was Mirabelle Leicester at the other end of the wire - he had met the girl and knew her voice. He'd checked that the boat was here, that Mirabelle was booked on board and was going to Southampton. He checked that she was booked on to tomorrow's sailing to New York. Why wasn't the girl here? 

He flung open the door to the cabin to shout for help - and stopped short at the sight of a slight, youthful-looking figure with grey hair and a thin, sharp-featured face, standing outside. He wore a smart suit and his hands were in his pockets. He looked Villa in the eye. 

'Who the hell are you?' demanded Villa. 

'I am Leon Gonsalez,' said the other. 'May I come in?' He stepped towards Villa, who instinctively stepped back - and a moment later they were both in the cabin with Alma. 

'How did you get here? Where's Miss Leicester?' 

'Miss Leicester is on board,' said his visitor. 'As are two of the Old Guard, both now safely under the control of my crew.' 

'Your crew? Whose ship is this?' 

'For the time being, it's mine,' said Leon simply. 'You forgot to check that, Mr Villa - an unpardonable offence. As we stand here, the remainder of the Old Guard are being rounded up by my friends. While you were talking to Miss Alma this afternoon I broke into your study and went through your records.' 

Villa put his hand to his pocket, but Leon was quicker - his hand went into his pocket, pulled out his gun and aimed it at Villa's heart, all in one fluid movement. 

'Do I shoot you for the torture of Barberton?' he asked. 'Or for instigating the murder of Miss Leicester's father?' Or for running guns into Angola - arming rebels, plotting to bring down governments - which of your crimes receives the death penalty?' 

'You've no right to do this, Gonsalez,' growled Villa, and he moved to grab Alma and to use her as a human shield - but Alma dodged, and ran out of the cabin, leaving Leon facing Villa. She put her fingers in her ears to muffle the shot that followed; Leon followed her up the ladder which led to the upper deck. 

'Where's Mirabelle?' she asked, as she arrived panting on deck. They were out into the middle of the Thames now; the air was clear and the boat was moving rapidly downstream. 

'She's entertaining her two guests in the front cabin. And Mark is amid-ships - let's go and find him.' Leon offered her his arm. 

'What's Mark doing here?' asked Alma, taking the arm. 

'Mark is a hero,' Leon told her. 'He disguised himself as Mirabelle - don't laugh when you see him!' 

Mark was very reluctant to unlock the door of the cabin at Leon's knock, and only did so when his aunt called his name. Then he took a moment to turn the key, his fingers trembling with delayed shock and wet with the sweat which comes with fear. At last the door swung open and he faced his anxious aunt and the amused face of Leon. 

'¡ Qué mujer tan hermosa!' Leon mused, as Alma cried: 'Mark! What a hero!' and hugged him. 

'Thanks, Alma,' he murmured. 'It wasn't anything really.' 

'You could have been murdered!' 

'Mirabelle lent me a gun,' Mark said, pulling it out of the bag. 

'Oh, Mark! That one only has blanks in it - I checked this morning.' 

Mark didn't question what his aunt had been doing, playing with guns - he blanched white and stammered, 'Good thing I didn't need it, then.' 

Aunt Alma looked him up and down, surveying his attempt to dress like Mirabelle. 'Not a bad job,' she said. 'with your coat done up' - she grasped the collar of his coat and held it tightly against his neck - 'yes, it was quite convincing. Don't you think so, Mr Gonsalez?' But Leon was laughing too much to answer. 

'I think the smoke helped,' Mark said. 'It was dark in the car, and when we got to the quayside it was too smoky to see.' 

'Yes,' said Leon, 'it cost me a small fortune to arrange the fire, but I think it was worth it.' 

'I might have known it was you,' Alma said accusingly. 'Vandals and ruffians, you Four Just Men are!' 

'Three Just Men and one Woman,' said Leon, and dodged the slap she aimed in his direction for cheek. 

Mirabelle was in the front cabin on the little boat, talking to Lisa and Antonia. The two women were talking about what they would do when they were safely overseas. They were confident that once out of the country they could elude the law and start new lives in their old careers - both had long experience in persuading men to part with their money in various ways. 

Mirabelle listened to them and occasionally joined in, not sure whether to be shocked at their plans or sorry for them, for what was going to happen to them. Lisa had been party to many a fraud on young men who were too easily parted from their money; Antonia was certainly an accessory after the fact to Monty Newton's murder. The police would be glad to see both of them behind bars. 

But how far could either woman be regarded as blameworthy? What other life had they known? Was it possible to reform such women and make them law-abiding citizens, or would they laugh at any such suggestion and regard law-abiding folk as soft in the head, gullible fools, easily led astray? After all, both Lisa and Joan Murphy would argue, if young men didn't want to lose their money in a gambling den, they shouldn't go there. 

She was still wondering about this when there was a knock at the door, and a steward stepped in with a tray. 'Tea, ladies?' he asked, and set the tray down on the table: teapot, cups, milk and sugar, and a plate of cakes. 

'Oh, lovely, thank you.' Lisa was all delightful charm. The steward set out the cups and poured the tea 'Milk? Sugar?' Mirabelle was interested to see that he did not put in sugar into the cup he handed her, even though she had asked for it: then her eyes met his light blue ones, and she understood. 

'Lovely tea,' said Lisa, sipping it as the steward departed, 'just what I needed.' 

'I haven't eaten all day,' said Antonia, 'it's the worry, you know.' 

'Oh, I know,' echoed Lisa. 

'Eat up,' said Mirabelle, passing them the cakes, 'we'll be a few hours yet, and you need to keep your strength up.' Lisa and Antonia took the two nicest-looking cakes; Mirabelle reckoned she would probably be safe on a scone. 

When her two companions had fallen asleep, Mirabelle went in search of Leon. She found him in the cabin amidships, having dinner with Alma and Mark. Mark was still dressed in her old clothes, and looked as if he had stepped out of a pantomime. She stepped into the cabin, saying: 'May I join you?' 

Leon rose at once, took her hand and kissed her cheek, and Alma pushed a chair into place for her. Mark got up and shook her hand across the table. 'Good work,' he said. 

'Thanks. And thanks a million yourself. You look great. Did they suspect anything?' 

'I pretended I had a sore throat, and I talked husky. And I kept my coat done up.' 

'You were a hero!' 

'Thanks,' said Mark, blushing, 'but I hope I never have to do it again.' 

'Oh, I don't know - she looked mischievously at her husband - 'can we add Mark's name to your ledger of potential assistants?' 

'Mark's going back home to look after the farm,' her aunt reproved her. 'Now, have something to eat, Mirabelle - you need to keep your strength up.' 

Mirabelle picked up the serving spoons and began to serve herself from the dish of chicken in the centre of the table, then halted and looked at Leon. 

'Can I be sure that you haven't doctored this?' she demanded. 

'It's been doctored with joy and success,' he retorted. 'You haven't asked how Alma got on.' 

'I was just going to. How did you get on, dear?' 

Her aunt shook her head ruefully. 'It was very difficult, dear. I had to keep telling him how awful you are, how selfish and self-centred you are, and how I was going to be left penniless when you went to America.' 

Mirabelle gurgled with joy. 'And he believed you?' 

'Yes, eventually. He sent his man off to check everything he could.' 

'And you managed to keep him talking?' 

'He was very happy to tell me how wonderful he was. He told me all about his great deeds in Africa. He even claimed responsibility for your father's death, dear. He seemed to think it would impress me.' 

'Or scare you.' Mirabelle shivered, and her face grew pale. 'Go on. What happened?' 

'When we got to the boat, we went down below at once to get out of the smoke, and we waited for you. When you didn't come, he began to get very restless, and of course I had no idea where you were, so I couldn't help him. At last he went out to look for you, and met Mr Gonsalez.' 

'Where is he now?' asked Mirabelle. 

Leon considered carefully. 'I really couldn't say,' he said. 'I expect his body will wash ashore in a day or two.' 

Mirabelle looked severely at her aunt. 'And if you say it was murder, dear, I'll be very cross with you!' 

'Not at all, dear,' said Alma firmly. 'It was justice. He murdered your father.' 

The boat came ashore at Gravesend, where the police were waiting for them - Leon having telegraphed ahead to let them know that they were coming - and a very sleepy Antonia and Lisa were led off the boat and into custody. Mirabelle kept out of the way until the two women had been taken away, and then the rest of the party caught the train back to London. 

'What will you do with the boat?' Mirabelle asked Leon. 

'I'll keep it and the crew in employment for a while. It's useful to be able to call on a vessel for work at sea.' 

'But only so long as the criminals don't know that it belongs to you.' 

He shrugged. 'That depends what I use her for.' 

Back in London, the party parted: Aunt Alma and Mark went back to the Doughty Court Flat, where Mark would stay overnight before setting off back to Gloucester the following morning. Leon and Mirabelle went back to Curzon Street. Once again, they went in through the back entrance, and found the house in darkness. Leon led the way up to the first floor office, where they found a fresh note awaiting them on the table. 

'It's from George,' said Leon, and opened it. Mirabelle watched his thin face frown and his slender hands twitch nervously, and said: 'What's happened?' 

'Our next case,' he said, and handed the letter to her. Mirabelle read: 

'My dear Leon, 

I hear from Meadows that Miss Leicester and yourself have rounded up the last of the Oberzohn gang satisfactorily. Raymond and I are on our way to Bristol as arranged. Don't forget the carpenter. 

Yours ever, 

George.' 

'What does he mean about the carpenter?' she asked. Leon shrugged. 'It's a joke - he means I'll have to call a carpenter to partition my bedroom, so that we can both have a good night's sleep.' 

'Why should we want to do that?' Mirabelle wondered, and Leon smiled. 

'Shall we go and experiment?' he asked. 

'I'm longing to find out,' she assured him, and ran ahead of him upstairs to bed. 

The End 

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