Free The Complete Four Just Men by Edgar Wallace Page A

waiter.
    ‘Have you the last editions of the evening papers?’
    The waiter thought he could get them, and returned with two.
    Manfred scanned the pages carefully, then threw them aside.
    ‘Nothing in these,’ he said. ‘If Thery has gone to the police we must hide and use some other method to that agreed upon, or we could strike now. After all, Thery has told us all we want to know, but – ’
    ‘That would be unfair to Ramon.’ Poiccart finished the sentence in such a tone as summarily ended that possibility. ‘He has still two days, and must receive yet another, and last, warning.’
    ‘Then we must find Thery.’
    It was Manfred who spoke, and he rose, followed by Poiccart and Gonsalez.
    ‘If Thery has not gone to the police – where would he go?’
    The tone of Leon’s question suggested the answer.
    ‘To the office of the newspaper that published the Spanish advertisement,’ was Manfred’s reply, and instinctively the three men knew that this was the correct solution.
    ‘Your motor-car will be useful,’ said Manfred, and all three left the bar.
    * * *
    In the editor’s room Thery faced the two journalists.
    ‘Thery?’ repeated Welby; ‘I do not know that name. Where do you come from? What is your address?’
    ‘I come from Jerez in Andalusia, from the wine farm of Sienor.’
    ‘Not that,’ interrupted Welby; ‘where do you come from now – what part of London?’
    Thery raised his hands despairingly.
    ‘How should I know? There are houses and streets and people – and it is in London, and I was to kill a man, a Minister, because he had made a wicked law – they did not tell me – ’
    ‘They – who?’ asked the editor eagerly.
    ‘The other three.’
    ‘But their names?’
    Thery shot a suspicious glance at his questioner.
    ‘There is a reward,’ he said sullenly, ‘and a pardon. I want these before I tell – ’
    The editor stepped to his desk.
    ‘If you are one of the Four you shall have your reward – you shall have some of it now.’ He pressed a button and a messenger came to the door.
    ‘Go to the composing room and tell the printer not to allow his men to leave until I give orders.’
    Below, in the basement, the machines were thundering as they flung out the first numbers of the morning news.
    ‘Now – ’ the editor turned to Thery, who had stood, uneasily shifting from foot to foot whilst the order was being given – ‘now, tell me all you know.’
    Thery did not answer; his eyes were fixed on the floor.
    ‘There is a reward and a pardon,’ he muttered doggedly.
    ‘Hasten!’ cried Welby. ‘You will receive your reward and the pardon also. Tell us, who are the Four Just Men? Who are the other three? Where are they to be found?’
    ‘Here,’ said a clear voice behind him; and he turned as a stranger, closing the door as he entered, stood facing the three men – a stranger in evening dress, masked from brow to chin.
    There was a revolver in the hand that hung at his side.
    ‘I am one,’ repeated the stranger calmly; ‘there are two others waiting outside the building.’
    ‘How did you get here – what do you want?’ demanded the editor, and stretched his hand to an open drawer in his desk.
    ‘Take your hand away – ’ and the thin barrel of the revolver rose with a jerk. ‘How I came here your doorkeeper will explain, when he recovers consciousness. Why I am here is because I wish to save my life – not an unreasonable wish. If Thery speaks I may be a dead man – I am about to prevent him speaking. I have no quarrel with either of you gentlemen, but if you hinder me I shall kill you,’ he said simply. He spoke all the while in English, and Thery, with wide-stretched eyes and distended nostrils, shrank back against the wall, breathing quickly.
    ‘You,’ said the masked man, turning to the terror-stricken informer and speaking in Spanish, ‘would have betrayed your comrades – you would have thwarted a great purpose, therefore it is just that you