The Jade God by Alan Sullivan (snow like ashes series txt) 📕

“Does it happen to be the man you spoke of just now?”

“Yes.”

Again the odd smile, and the peddler handed back the image. “It’s a queer thing,” he said slowly, “but I’ve heard tell that the spirit of Buddha doesn’t like these things drifting about. It’s talk of the East, of course, and perhaps it isn’t worth much in England. But there’s something at work in those parts that gets hold of people without their knowing it. It isn’t so long ago that I was in a temple up country where there was something like this, and it just looked at me and dared me to steal it. I reckon I would have tried to if it hadn’t been guarded by about a hundred priests. It was the same size as this, and just as ugly, and carved out of jade, too.

“All round it there were the usual images, but arranged like rows of policemen. Next it was an empty stand, and I guessed that that was where another one just like it had been, but when I asked where it had got to there was a hell of an excitement, because the beggars thought perhaps I had it and had come after its mate. It took me all my time to get them quieted down. Queer sort of game, wasn’t it, sir?”

“Yes,” said Derrick, in a strained voice. “Anything else?”

“We had a lot of talk back and forth but didn’t get anywhere. They seemed to claim that the thing was a sort of link between what one saw and didn’t see, and in a way joined them up to make a kind of general picture. I didn’t take much stock in all that, for Indo-China is stuffed with temples where they palaver about such subjects year after year. So that, sir, is why I happen to be interested in the original of this, and if you could put me in the way of getting it I’d make it worth your while.”

Derrick glanced involuntarily at Martin. On the man’s face had settled a look of utter hopelessness. There was no sullenness now, nothing grim or repellent. His eyes, at times so furtive, held only despair. His figure was slack, the broad shoulders dropped, and the big hands hung inert by his side. As though conscious of his master’s scrutiny, he looked up and pulled himself spasmodically together.

“Well,” said Derrick, “I don’t know if the present owner puts any value on the thing, but I’ll find out.” He took back the wax impression and slipped it into his pocket. “I don’t suppose this model really interests you from what you tell me.”

The peddler shook his head. “The copy is dead,” he replied slowly, “but, from what I gathered in the East, the real thing may have a sort of life in it.”

“All right, I’ll see you both at six o’clock.”

The man touched his cap. Derrick strolled on through the white gates, and, turning to the right, took the road that led away from Bamberley. Following this a quarter of a mile, he left it abruptly, traversed a neighboring copse, and doubled back along a parallel lane. He walked fast and came to the village in a little more than half an hour. In the tiny police office sat Sergeant Burke. Derrick waved his hand, went in, and took the proffered chair. Burke’s face was full of sudden interest, but he asked no questions. Presently Derrick leaned forward.

“I think, sergeant, that an attempt at robbery will take place at Beech Lodge within the next hour or so.”

Burke sat up straighter than ever. “What’s that, sir?”

“I’ll explain in a minute, but first I want to make sure that, so far as the evidence went, no stranger was seen in the vicinity of the Lodge about the time of the murder.”

“No, sir. That seems to be without question.”

“No peddler or traveling tinker had been in Bamberley that week?”

“No, Mr. Derrick, these people are all licensed and registered, and we examine the license of everyone who comes along. They are under the head of itinerant vendors.”

“Well, there’s an itinerant vendor at the Lodge now, and he’s more keen on buying than selling. He doesn’t make any bones of the fact that he’d like to get hold of the original of this.”

Derrick put the model on the table, and Burke fingered it curiously.

“Neat sort of job you’ve made of it, sir. Weighs about the same, too, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, I put some shot inside the base and balanced it with the other. It’s the other that my peddler friend is coming to see at six o’clock. Martin will be there with him.”

“When did this fellow turn up?”

Derrick told him all that had happened, Burke’s face growing ever more tense, while he thrilled to the belief that the Millicent case was alive again.

“You haven’t missed much, sir,” he rambled presently. “Now what can I do?”

“At six o’clock those two men will be in the study. Blunt will be apparently in charge of Martin, whom I have made responsible for him, but actually I suspect it is the other way round. From what I can see, Martin is under Blunt’s thumb. Blunt will be asked if the room suggests anything to him in connection with the murder. He will probably pretend it does, and begin some kind of queer story, which may after all have something in it. I expect that he will in some way involve Martin, and that’s what Martin is in such fear of. At the same time, so far as Blunt is concerned, I can’t feel that Martin is so very important. It’s the image he’s after. Whether he can resist the impulse when he sees the real thing I can’t tell, but if he does not, that’s where you come in. The Millicent case will then start all over again with an attempted burglary, and I shall be in a position to testify that Martin lied to me about the burglar. And