Part 60

He at once travelled thither and took lodgings in the Central district. Mabuse saw him arrive at the railway-station, and an hour later he knew where he was staying. At last he had him within reach, in the place where he desired to accomplish his scheme of revenge and towards which he had been working, for Mabuse in reality had never left Berlin. In all the towns to which Wenk had travelled in search of the gambler, Mabuse had doubles, persons of his own gang, instructed by him. Munich was too small for the scheme Mabuse had in hand. The abysses of Berlin would be a safer hunting-ground, and the hunt began on the very next day.

* * * * *

That day Wenk had been describing to a junior colleague in the Berlin police his course of action in “the Mabuse case.” They had talked about it together, discussing a plan of operation, but the only conclusion they had come to was that the gambler should be allowed to show his own hand first. To aim at him in the dark would be likely to reveal to him prematurely the whereabouts of his pursuers.

In the evening, when Wenk had taken a meal in the “Traube” restaurant, he visited a café, and then, tired out by his long discussion, he sought his lodgings. There a man accosted him, standing in a doorway removed from the light.

“If you please, sir ...” said he.

“What do you want?” asked Wenk reluctantly.

“Would some cocaine be useful to you, sir?”

Wenk went on without vouchsafing a reply, and he noticed that the man followed him, but when he came to the busy Friedrichstrasse he lost sight of him.

Wenk soon took himself to task for having let the man escape him thus. He ought to have got into touch with this pedlar of illicit wares, for he belonged to the same stock as Mabuse. He was half inclined to go back, but the feeling of weariness was too strong for him and he went home.

The next night he took the same way home from the restaurant, but the man was not there. Wenk lingered here and there, and then, as he approached his lodgings near the Police Market, a man came out of an entry towards him, saying in a whisper, “Do you want to see some nude dances?”

Wenk stopped still, saying, “You have come just at the right time. I don’t belong to Berlin, and I should like to see the real night-life of this city just for once. Where are your dancers? Go ahead!”

“Follow me, then. I’ll go in front, and when you see me go in somewhere, you come quick, guv’nor, ’cos of the peelers!”

Wenk promised to follow his lead. The man went round the corner, listened to see if he were following, and then went on again. Suddenly he disappeared. Wenk went a few steps straight on. The man must have gone into one of the entries near, and he walked slowly, expecting to find him, and looking round about. Suddenly he heard the man’s voice behind him, speaking low and reproachfully: “I don’t call that quick, guv’nor. You’ll have the bobbies after you if you can’t be more spry. Come on here, then!” and the man pulled him into a house standing far back. The door opened on to a dark corridor, and silently and unawares it closed behind him, while the corridor was lighted up in the same instant. This corridor led into a little living-room, and that again into a hall crowded with people. Two gentlemen sitting near the door made room for Wenk beside them. His guide had disappeared.

What Wenk saw was a simple performance, deriving its interest only from the secrecy with which it was performed.

He heard the conversation of the two men at his table. One of them said, “The only thing that interests me is how this entertainer manages to get a hundred or more persons here, year in and year out, without the police finding it out. Now, as an expert, you just tell me that!”

The other answered in German that sounded unfamiliar, “Well, you can’t really tell whether it is known to the police or not. There are such places winked at by the police because they are traps for criminals--yes, really traps set for them. Now in Budapest....”

Wenk listened eagerly. The gentlemen went on talking, drawing him naturally into their conversation. They disclosed their calling, and then gave their names. One of the gentlemen was, as Wenk had conjectured, a highly placed police official. They frequently met each other. The Hungarian told of various interesting and complicated cases occurring during the practice of his profession. He described the Budapest haunts of crime, touched on the many secret gaming-houses which had sprung up so quickly everywhere since the war, and waxed eloquent against the ever-increasing boldness displayed by criminals and the mob generally.

Wenk, with a certain unconfessed distrust, talked very warily, saying that he was only on leave in Berlin, for the scene of his activities lay in Munich. But Berlin, as the hotbed of crime, afforded a good field of study for a Munich criminal prosecutor. He touched lightly on the existence of Mabuse, though without naming him, and related some of his bold and shameless crimes.

“Just lately,” said the man from Budapest, interrupting him, “we took into custody a similar adventurer, and we did it by curious and not exactly legal methods, but we got no further in any other way. With us in Hungary, as it is with you here, the assistance of hypnotism in the detection of crime is forbidden. We had the man of whom we were almost certain--but, my dear sir, you won’t betray me, I am sure, for the professional interest you feel in putting an end to such aberrations is just as strong in me--well, we were practically certain that he was the leader of a gang which had several murders to their account. He was in prison, as I have told you. He made himself out a deaf mute, and we could glean nothing from his papers. No one knew him, yet we felt almost sure of our man, and that kind of thing is almost unbearable to an expert, isn’t it?--for when he appeared before their worships, there was the risk of his being acquitted for lack of sufficient evidence. That was a most disagreeable idea to me, for I had spent about six months in tracking him down, and if he were discharged the mistake would be due to me. I therefore took a very bold step. A friend of mine had hypnotic powers. He was a barrister, and had often displayed these gifts of his in private. I wanted him to go to the jail with me, but he said, ‘I can operate on him from outside,’ and, indeed, a quarter of an hour later I knew that we had the leader of the gang at last, and various disclosures were made which shortly after sent him to the gallows.”

While the Hungarian was telling this story Wenk experienced an aversion to him. He had a sensation of profound mental resistance to the man, although he could not explain what had caused such a reversal of feeling.

“Are you also interested in persons who possess this gift of suggestion?” asked the police superintendent.

“Uncommonly so!” answered Wenk.

“Perhaps you would like to meet my friend, and see something of his gifts?”

“Is he in Berlin, then? Yes, that I certainly should!”

“Yes, he’s here now. He has given up practising law, and now exercises his gifts openly. He has very quickly become celebrated. You must have heard the name of Weltmann?”

Wenk did not like to say No, so he answered with a subdued “Certainly!”

“Well, he is the celebrated Weltmann. You know he is noticeable on account of his having only one hand. He lost the other in the Carpathians in 1915. Well, we’ll arrange a meeting, then. I will see him in the morning. Are you on the telephone by any chance?”

Wenk mentioned his telephone number. Both the gentlemen then left, to go to a house where ether, cocaine and opium were procurable, and other more obvious vices were pandered to.