"Shaken and badly shocked but he will recover," I said.
He shook his head.
"No thanks to LaFontaine. It is easy enough to reconstruct what happened. He probably arrived at the museum in his ordinary clothes, carrying his disguise in an attaché case. Once in the museum he could change into his attendant's uniform in the gentlemen's lavatory. He struck down the real attendant but was then surprised by the arrival of Professor Sanders. When he realized his man was blind, he chloroformed and gagged him and secured him behind the paneling in the next gallery. He must have been lightning swift, for adjacent galleries are empty for only a few minutes at a time."
Solar Pons lit his pipe, the flame making little stipples of light on his cunning features.
"He quickly returned to the gallery housing the Baku idols, smashed the glass with Sanders' stick and made off with one of the gold effigies, carefully placing it in the tissue to make it look as though it had been accidentally dropped."
"How do you deduce that, Pons?"
"Because LaFontaine, for all his villainy, is a connoisseur and lover of beautiful things, Parker. He could not bring himself, even while staging this elaborate red herring, to break something so rare and valuable."
I stood looking at Pons in bafflement and admiration, mixed in equal measure.
"But how can you be so sure of this sequence of events, and that you are correct in your supposition that the danger to the Baku idols is merely a feint?"
"I cannot be certain. Something here tells me."
Pons stabbed the air with the stem of his pipe, indicating the region of his temples.
"My antennae, Parker. They are up and bristling and all my instincts and reasoning power tell me that the facts are so."
"Why could not the professor have been struck down first?" Pons shook his head.
"Use your reasoning powers. If he had first attacked the professor it would have meant some noise and the attendant would instantly have entered. I have ascertained that for a quarter of an hour the one attendant was left in charge of two galleries, while the other went for a cup of tea. The fact that the attendant was first struck down is further indicated by the fact that when LaFontaine smashed in the glass case the attendant had already partly regained consciousness. This is a clear and undeniable pointer to the fact that he was struck down first. If things had occurred otherwise there would have been no time to chloroform the professor and assume his identity." "You are undoubtedly right," I said.
"That is so," he said gently. "I have already discovered the bogus attendant's uniform, rolled up under one of the beams yonder, together with the cotton wool pad and the small bottle of chloroform that was used to induce unconsciousness in Sanders. It is my belief that he originally intended to use it on the attendant."
"He is a bold and dangerous fellow."
Solar Pons nodded reflectively.
"Ah, here is Superintendent Heathfield and unless I mistake not, Colonel Loder some yards behind him. It is time we called a council of war and planned out our strategy."
6
"Well, I will go along with you, Mr. Pons. But woe betide us if anything goes wrong."
Superintendent Heathfield looked grave. We three, together with Colonel Loder, sat in the curator's office. It was eight o'clock in the evening and the museum had long been closed.
The discussion had been lengthy, sometimes acrid, the superintendent and curator often not seeing eye to eye, and the room was blue with smoke. It was dark now and the reflection of the floodlighting outside in the courtyard surrounding the handsome stone buildings of the Mentmore, gave a bloom to the night.
"As I understand it, Mr. Pons, you are convinced that the attempt on the Baku idols was a feint and that this man's main attempt will be elsewhere."
Solar Pons made an impatient movement in his chair.
"I thought I had made that plain long ago, Colonel Loder." The colonel spread out his hands on his desk expressively. "You forget that I am accountable to the public purse, Mr. Pons."
"I am not asking anything exceptional," Solar Pons went on. "I appreciate that the Superintendent's main effort must be concentrated on the idols. It is possible that I may be wrong. But if Parker and I follow our own road it will not weaken your defenses. And if I am right…"
He broke off, driving a plume of smoke to join the whirling eddies near the ceiling.
"But the idea is ridiculous, Mr. Pons!" Loder objected. "Even if this man did succeed in stealing the Hsui-Ching ceramics, he would find it impossible to sell them."
My companion looked gravely at the curator and Heathfield, who sat opposite us on the other side of the desk.
"I am not saying I am right, Colonel. Only that I feel I am right. I never go against my instincts. The attempts on the Baku artifacts are too bungling and amateur to be genuine, though carried out with coolness and daring. In my experience LaFontaine never bungles. He goes straight to the heart of the matter and almost always has escaped cleanly with extremely valuable booty."
Loder frowned at Pons:
"It is a great responsibility, Mr. Pons. I am of two minds what to do. I have the reports from the other continental museums, of course. There is much in what you say. What do you suggest?"
"Well, if friend Parker has no objection I would like to stay here tonight."
"You do not expect him to come back again!"
Loder's face was a mingled picture of anger and dismay. Solar Pons chuckled.
"My little brush with him this morning would not put such a bold fellow off. I expect him to be here now."
"But how, Mr. Pons?"
"Tut, Colonel, there is no great difficulty about that. He would have had hours before the museum closed to return here as an ordinary visitor, probably disguised once again. There must be hundreds of places in such a museum where a daring criminal could secrete himself until closing time."
Loder looked across at Heathfield.
"Well, subject to the Superintendent's having no objection, I am in your hands, Mr. Pons."
Solar Pons gave Heathfield a steady glance. He cleared his throat, his features grave and somber.
"Like the curator, Mr. Pons, I am also accountable to the government. I must naturally concentrate My efforts on the sector which most appears to be-threatened, in this instance the Baku idols. But there is much in what you say and — I will fall in with your wishes so far as they are compatible with our requirements. What do you wish us to do?"
"Carry on with your own preparations," said Solar Pons calmly. "Let me have two young, strong attendants, Colonel. We will make our own dispositions and between us I am convinced we shall foil this fellow's intentions."
"Let us hope you are right, Mr. Pons," said the colonel slowly. "I have arranged for food and hot coffee to be available for us all during the night. You seem so certain that something will happen that I will stay here also. I must just go round and make final preparations."
Our conference then broke up and Pons and I were shown to — a small annex where refreshments had been placed on a table. When we had eaten, Heathfield excused himself and went off to make his own arrangements. Pons sat smoking quietly and I busied myself by catching up on the day's news with the Sunday paper which was lying on the table with the refreshment tray. I had not been reading for more than ten minutes when a short item arrested my interest.
"I see that Count Ferzetti is in London, Pons. I recall that you had some dealings with him in that case of the Italian fresco frauds."