CHAPTER XI
"Er, er,--oh, this is terrible! Billie Budd stole 'em, not me. He cameinto my room early Monday morning, while I was dressing, and showed methe pair of cuff-buttons he said he had stolen during Sunday night,and gave me one to keep for him until he had a good chance to disposeof it. Then, right after I returned from calling on you to inform youof their loss, which was about half-past ten, he and I went out to thestables and he gave the other one to Olaf here to hide for him. Here'sthe one I have been keeping, Mr. Holmes," stammered Thorneycroft, ashe took the second sparkling cuff-button out of his vest-pocket andlaid it on the table beside the one recovered from Olaf. "When thevillage constables came up here to search us, I simply slipped thething into the upper edge of my shoe until they had gone, and I'vebeen carrying it here in my vest-pocket ever since."
And Eustace paused as he drew out his handkerchief and mopped hisperspiring face.
"Then you had it right with you when you burst into my office in BakerStreet to tell me of the loss, and your nervous excitement at the timewas a fake,--you big stiff?" Holmes asked, blowing out a cloud ofcigarette-smoke.
"Yes. I acknowledge with shame that I did. But it was that scoundrelBudd that burglarized His Lordship's room and stole the jewelsoriginally, and the coachman and myself are both simply receivers ofstolen goods, not robbers. O Your Lordship, this is awful," Eustaceadded, turning to the Earl. "I am a graduate and an honor man ofOxford University, as you know, and I surely must have beenintoxicated when I let Budd entice me into his damnable scheme! Thereason he took the jewels was because he had been losing heavily atcards in London recently, as he told me, and wanted to sell them torecoup his losses. I'll swear I didn't have a thing to do with thedisappearance of the other nine cuff-buttons, because if I did, I'dtell you. That's all."
The Earl looked at Holmes sitting there puffing out smoke in a very_degage_ attitude, with the smile of triumph still on his eagle-likeface, in spite of his absurd disguise, then he looked at the confusedand embarrassed Thorneycroft standing at one side of the table,anxiously rubbing his hands, then he looked at the red-faced Olafstanding near him, and finally he looked at me sitting in anotherchair, furnishing the calm and sober background for all thissensationalism,--as usual.
"Well, by Jove, I hardly know _what_ to say, and that's the truth,Holmes," he remarked at length; "but the fact that my recreantsecretary has just now voluntarily coughed up the second cuff-buttonwithout trying to hide it again in his shoe, as he might have done,inclines me to let him live this time. So I'll forgive you, Eustace,but don't you ever let it happen again, or I might forget myself sofar as to have you blackballed from all of the London clubs you belongto," added the Earl, shaking his finger at Eustace.
"Thank you, Your Lordship, thank you!" cried the latter profusely, "Ishall endeavor to deserve your consideration by doing my best to helpyou find the other cuff-buttons still missing."
"Keep the change, Eustace," said the Earl dryly. "Now, Holmes, what'llwe do with this little stiff over here?"
And he pointed to the still trembling coachman, who stood fumbling hiscap in his hands.
"Why, he looks harmless enough," commented Holmes; "I knew he didn'thave brains sufficient to plan the robbery, but was merely BillieBudd's tool. So I think you might as well forgive him, too, YourLordship, and thus get all the states' evidence they can turn for us.Thorneycroft," he added, turning to the secretary, "you accused LuigiVermicelli, the Earl's valet, of having stolen the cuff-buttons, andyou there, Olaf, accused your stable-partner, Carol Linescu, of thetheft. I shall give your statements due consideration, and lay for theaccused parties accordingly. Now, Watson, we'll get busy and see if wecan't recover some more of the cuff-buttons before luncheon. It's onlya little after nine now," looking at his watch, "and we have nearlythree hours left. And, by the way, I believe I made a bet of fivepounds with Billie Budd yesterday morning that I would find some ofthe cuff-buttons that same day. He won the bet, since I didn't findthe heirlooms until to-day, but inasmuch as the aforesaid Budd is afugitive from justice, I'll just confiscate the stakes and call myselfthe winner! Doc, hand over those ten pounds you've been keepingthere."
I did so at once, glad to be relieved of the responsibility, and oldHemlock Holmes was about twenty-five dollars ahead by Budd'sdisappearance, although still nine diamond cuff-buttons behind!
"You may go back to the stables now, Olaf," said the Earl to thecoachman; who beat it immediately, glad to get out of any furtherarraignment. "And you, Eustace, can get busy again with these darnedbills we were auditing when Holmes came in with his news."
He took up the two glittering baubles, put them in his pocket, anddrew up his chair again to the table, while Eustace resumed his formerseat.
"Oh, say! I nearly forgot. We must celebrate a little on this!" theEarl suddenly cried, as he pounded his fist on the table.
"Harrigan," he called out, "bring up a bottle of my very bestBurgundy, and set 'em up to Mr. Holmes and Doctor Watson, in honor ofthe glad return of my ancestor's historic cuff-buttons!"
The jovial butler seemed always to be within earshot whenever the Earlwanted him, and in a moment entered the library and ventured:
"The best Burgundy you have is the 1874 Beaune, Your Lordship. Shall Ibring that?"
"Sure! P. D. Q.! I'm feeling a little dry again, anyhow," said theEarl, as he winked at us, while the still somewhat embarrassedThorneycroft looked out of the window at the birds singing theirspring songs among the trees.
Harrigan left the room, and in a few minutes returned from the cellarwith a long dark bottle that seemed to hold the ruby-red sparkles ofthe sunset on the hills of eastern France imprisoned in its depths. Heuncorked it, and deftly poured out three glasses of the ancient wine,one of which the Earl took up in his hand while Holmes and I each tookone of the remaining two.
"Eustace, I'll have to cut you out of this, I'm sorry to say. Holmes,I drink to your swift and happy recovery of the other ninecuff-buttons. Prosit!"
At the welcome word of cheer we each put ourselves outside of thefinest fermented grape-juice that had ever tickled my throat.
"Thanks. Now we'll get down to business again," said Holmes, full ofrenewed "pep," as he set down his glass on the table and turned to me."Doc, let's go up to our room while I get this horrible suit ofclothes off of me, and wash the red grease-paint off my face. Ta, ta,Your Lordship; see you later, with some more cuff-buttons, I expect."
And we both left the library and went upstairs, where Holmes rapidlychanged his clothes and washed off the make-up in the lavatory nearby.When he stood before me again in civilized habiliments, he began:
"Doc, I'm going to jump onto this man Vermicelli, the valet. Mydeductions lead me to believe that he has another one of the jewelsstowed away somewhere, and it's up to me to find it."
So we left our room and went down the stairway, hot on the trail ofthe slippery valet from Venice. As we rounded the foot of the stairwayat the second floor, halfway down to the main scene of operations,Holmes's quick ear detected the sound of voices in a room nearby,though my slower ears couldn't hear a thing.
He put his finger to his lips, took me by the arm, and quietly stolealong the corridor with me to the half-open door whence the subduedvoices proceeded. Arriving there, we halted, while Holmes cautiouslylistened a moment, then put his head in at the door and coughed. Hepushed the door open immediately and walked in, with me at his heels,determined not to miss any of it, whatever it was.
Seated in a rocking-chair by the window was the elderly figure of theCountess's bachelor uncle, J. Edmund Tooter, the retired tea and spicemerchant from Hyderabad, India, holding his niece's Spanish maid,Teresa Olivano, on his lap. As we entered so unceremoniously the twoof them ceased their billing and cooing, hastily relaxed thehalf-Nelson grip they had on each other, and faced us withconsiderable resentment showing in their faces, though Teresa didn'tget off Tooter's lap, as I thought she would.
"Well, what do you mean by this impudent intrusion,
Holmes?" demandedTooter angrily. "I guess a man can hold his affianced wife in his lapif he feels like it, without having a cheeky detective walk in onhim."
"Your what?" asked Holmes, with surprise.
"My affianced wife, I said. And it's none of your business, either,any more than it is my niece's, or the Earl's. We had planned to elopeand get married in London this afternoon, but I suppose now you'll runaround and tell everybody in sight what you know."
Tooter whispered something to Teresa, whereupon she gave him a partingkiss, flounced off his lap, and passed out of the room, with her headhigh in the air, her black eyes snapping, and saying something thatsounded like: "Impertinent loafers!" as she passed us.
Uncle Tooter arose from the rocker and stood by the window, where heseemed to be trying to slide something from his left hand into hisleft trousers-pocket, his right side being turned to us.
Holmes noticed the act, as did I, but said nothing of it for themoment.
"Well, Tooter, by George, I'm surprised at you," he commentedsarcastically; "to think that at your advanced age,--and youmust be pretty well up in the fifties,--you'd fall for thesweet-love-in-the-springtime stuff that gets the younger people,and that you'd engage yourself in marriage with a servant, too,and one who had previously refused you a couple of times. Ofcourse, as you say, it's none of my business, but I'm used tohaving people tell me that; and furthermore, it comes within theline of my duty to intrude my nose into other people's businesswhenever I judge it to be warranted by the circumstances. Teresahas been accused by Natalie, the first chambermaid, of havingstolen the diamond cuff-buttons----"
"Which is an infernal lie, and I can prove it!" shouted Tooter.
"And you have been accused inferentially by the Earl of possible guiltin connection with the theft also, owing to your occasional lapsesfrom sobriety, which is rather a polite way of putting it," went onthe unperturbed Holmes. "By the way, I'll just trouble you for thatlittle package you slid into your left trousers-pocket there."
Tooter flushed with embarrassment, and refused point-blank.
"Watson, lock the door, and put the key in your pocket!" yelledHolmes.
The Adventures of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons Page 11
