Rafael Sabatini - The Blackmailer

"I am worth more to you alive!" cried the other, fighting desperately in the deadly trammels in which he was caught. "You know I am! You shall have your letters! What more can I do? What have you to fear from me, then?"

"I don't know. But I should have nothing to fear from you dead!"

"The letters would remain. They might be found."

"True," Boscawen admitted. "But I don't attach great importance to them if you are not at hand to use them!"

"Still, they will be very dangerous to you. Come, Mr. Boscawen," the fellow implored wildly. "I'm a married man. I have three children. You wouldn't have their lives ruined? You wouldn't have them thrown upon the world?"

"So! You have children?" said Boscawen sharply. "God help them! That is the greatest of all your crimes! And a wife! Poor, poor soul!" His tone changed abruptly. "Of course, you have not the letters on you?"

"Of course not. I―"

"Why, then―"

"But I can get them in a few minutes!" screamed the other, in abject terror now. "I have made arrangements in case you decided to buy them. If you'll send a messenger with a note from me, you shall have the letters at once. It isn't far."

Boscawen measured him with a contemptuous eye. He seemed to put aside his murderous project with the greatest reluctance.

"For your wife and children's sake, then!" he said slowly. "There! You'll find what you want at that desk. Write!" Loane obeyed, what time Boscawen stood over him, reading the fellow's message to his wife, bidding her deliver to bearer a letter-case which she would find in a drawer which he described, and of which he enclosed the key.

He handed the letter to Boscawen, who, unperceived by Loane, immediately touched the button of an electric bell. Almost instantly the door opened, and, to Loane's utter bewilderment, Smith, calm and correct, the perfect servant who, according to Boscawen's story had been dismissed a week ago, entered the room.

"Is the messenger-boy there?" inquired Boscawen.

"He is waiting, Sir," answered Smith, the suspicion of a grin lurking at the comers of his mouth.

"Let him take this letter to that address and await the answer." Smith received the letter from his master's hands, and turned to go. In that moment Loane woke from his stupefaction, and realised what was taking place.

With a strangled cry, he sprang after Smith. But as he moved Boscawen thrust out a leg, and the blackmailer pitched heavily forward. Boscawen knelt to pin him down. Smith turned and came to his master's aid with a pair of handcuffs. The business done, he withdrew. They heard his voice outside, and the boy's answer. A moment later the door of the flat closed with a slam on the departing messenger.

Loane, winded and pinioned, sat huddled in the great chair again, and again Boscawen faced him across the room.

"I regret to have to detain you, Loane, until the messenger returns," he said. "I trust I am not keeping you from any pressing engagement?"

A hideous smile writhed across the blackmailer's livid face. "Spoofed, by gad!" he swore. "Spoofed by a fool like you!"

"I'm afraid so!" said Boscawen, smiling.