My companion, in a burst of lucidity which admittedly set me back, said happily, “Ah! A pleasure to see you again, Mr. Norwood. And how is Sir Alexander, your father?”
The newcomer stared at him. “For heaven’s sake, man! It has been thirty years since you set eyes on me in 1903. I was a child of five or six. I had expected to have to introduce myself, even to remind you of my father.”
Chuckling to himself, my companion motioned him to a seat. “Not at all, not at all. The details of the case upon which I worked for your admirable father are still quite clear in my mind. Quite clear. Always thought of it as…just a minute…the Riddle of Closton Manor. Eh? Riddle of Closton Manor. As for recognizing your features, I assure you, young man, you resemble your father. Spittin’ image, as the Americans say, eh? Isn’t that what the Americans say, Doctor? Damn bounders.”
“I wouldn’t know,” I said coolly. Actually, it was time for his bed and I disliked to see him aroused by company.
The retired detective lowered himself cautiously into his chair and reached for his pipe and tobacco, observing me slyly from the side of his eyes. He knew he wasn’t supposed to smoke this late at night. He chortled with satisfaction, I suspected at thwarting me, and said, “I assume, young man, you are here on matters of personal interest rather than on an errand for Sir Alexander, eh?”
The newcomer lifted his eyes to me.
My friend chuckled in what I can only name a puerile fashion and said, “The doctor is my valued assistant.” He introduced us, then lit his pipe, dropping the match on the floor, and said through the smoke, with a certain deprecation which irritated me. “His discretion is as great as my own. Eh? Great as my own.”
We nodded politely to each other and the young man began his story. “Sir, my father has a great deal of respect for you.”
“The feeling is reciprocated. Your father impressed me as a man of integrity and one with an unusual sense of duty and humanity, eh?” He chuckled again, and I suspected he was getting a childish pleasure at doing so well before me.
I felt, however, that Peter Norwood wasn’t overly pleased with these words from my friend. He hesitated, before saying. “Then you will be sorry to hear that there is evidence that his mind is beginning to slip.”
A shadow crossed the face of the former detective. “I am indeed. Your words distress me. But then, let me see. Sir Alexander must be in his late seventies.” To hear him, one would never have suspected his full decade of seniority, the old hypocrite.
Norwood nodded. “Seventy-eight.” He hesitated again. “You asked me whether my visit was personal or on behalf of my father. Actually, I am on his errand, but in fact I think it should be me you consider your client.
Ah?” my aged companion muttered. He made a steeple of his bent fingers as in days of old and I must admit there was a sparkle of intelligence behind watery eyes. Old his clay might be, but there was still in him the ancient bloodhound catching a distant whiff of a chase to come—were he able to rise to it.
Peter Norwood pushed out his plump lips in what was almost a pout. “I shall put it bluntly, sir. My father has only a few years to live and he is about to dispose frivolously of the greater part of his fortune.”
“You are his heir?” I asked.
Norwood nodded. “His sole heir. If in these last years of his life my father wastes away the family fortune, it is I who will suffer.”
My friend’s mouth worked several times, unhappily. “Frivolous waste? Doesn’t sound like your father, young man.”
“My father is contemplating leaving the greater part of his estate to a group of charlatans and, if I may resort to idiom, crackpots. The World Defense Society, they call themselves.” Peter Norwood could not control a sneer. He looked from one of us to the other. “You have heard of it, perhaps?”
We both shook our heads.
“Please elucidate,” I said.
“This group and my father, who is a charter member, are of the opinion that there are aliens in London.”
“Aliens?” I blurted. “But what could be more obvious? Of course there are aliens in London.”
Peter Norwood turned his eyes to me. “Aliens from space,” he said. “Extraterrestrials.” He threw up his hands in disgust. “Men from Mars. Spaceships, I suppose. All that sort of rot.”
Even my friend was surprised at this turn. “Eh? You say Sir Alexander supports this belief? Why?”
The young man’s rounded face reflected his disgust. “He has a fantastic collection of proof. He has devoted the past two years to the accumulation of it. Flying saucers, unidentified objects in the sky. The case of Kasper Hauser. That sort of thing. Stuff and nonsense, of course.”
The elderly detective leaned back and closed his eyes, and for a moment I thought he had gone to sleep, as can be his wont when he gets tired, or bored with the conversation. But he said, quite lucidly, “You say you are on an errand for your father?”
“Actually, it was I who planted the idea in his head,” Peter Norwood admitted. “As I have said, Father has a considerable respect for your methods, sir. I will not deny that he and I have had several heated discussions on his phobia. In the midst of the last one, I suggested that since he thinks so highly of you, that he hire your services to investigate the presence of these aliens. As a result of that argument, I am here, ostensibly to employ you in his behalf to seek out these…these little green men from Mars.”
My companion opened his rheumy eyes. “But you said I should consider you to be my actual client.”
Peter Norwood spread his hands. “I realize, sir, that you no longer practice, that you have long since retired. However, I implore you to take this assignment. To pretend you actually seek these so-called extraterrestrials, supposedly running wild about London, and then to report to my father that after a thorough search you can find no such aliens from space. Needless to say, I shall reward you amply.”
I thought I understood his point. “You wish to have drawn up a supposed report of an investigation and present it to your father in hopes his neurosis will be cured?”
The young man shook his head emphatically. “That would not be sufficient, Doctor. My father is not an easily deceived man. The investigation would have to be made, and seriously so, and reported possibly in a step-by-step manner. Otherwise, the old fool will realize he is being duped.”
The term old fool had slipped out, but in a manner I could sympathize with Peter Norwood.
My companion was in deep thought—or drowsing. I could not remember the adventure that he chose to think of as the Riddle of Closton Manor, but it was manifest that his regard for Sir Alexander must have been high indeed and that he was torn by this regard and by the young man’s—what seemed to me—understandable position.
He wasn’t asleep. He said slowly, “Aside from the fact that I have retired, this is not the sort of thing upon which I worked.” He seemed petulant.
“Of course not,” the other agreed, placatingly. “But then the fee—”
“It isn’t a matter of fee.”
Norwood blinked behind his lenses, but held his tongue.
The octogenarian puffed his pipe in irritation and squirmed in his chair. He muttered finally, “I assume your father wishes me to come to Closton Manor to discuss my employment on this project, eh?”
I snorted. The idea was ridiculous. The former sleuth seldom left our rooms except for a short stroll up and down the street for exercise.
“That was the purpose of my visit, supposedly. To bring you to him so that he might go over the matter with you. However, I can see that such a journey would—”
To my amazement, the aged detective slapped the arm of his chair and said, “Young man, expect me at your home tomorrow afternoon.”
Before I could protest, Peter Norwood came to his feet. He was manifestly pleased. “You shall not regret this, sir. I’ll see that your time—ah, financially, that is—is not wasted.”
The aged face of the other worked, but he sai
d nothing in reply to that. It was obvious that the young man assumed his interest was venial and that the former sleuth had lost caste by his decision.
I saw Norwood to the door in silence.
When I returned I stood over my aged friend and began, “Now look here—”
But he glowered up at me stubbornly and said in what I must describe as a blathering tone, “No reason I can’t take a trip into the country for a breath of air, Doctor. I don’t see why you think you’re more fit than I, eh? Practically the same age.”
I said, in an attempt to be biting, “Perhaps my fitness as compared to your own is based on the fact that as a young man stationed in the Near East I learned to make yogurt a daily item of diet, whilst at the same time you were wielding a hypodermic needle loaded with a certain crystalline alkaloid which shall remain nameless.”
“Yogurt, heh, heh,” he chortled in a manner which could but emphasize to me his caducity. He reached absently for his violin, probably having forgotten that two of the strings were broken.
* * * *
In spite of my protests, at ten in the morning we embarked on the train for Durwood, the nearest village to the ancestral home, Closton Manor, of the Norwood family. I had looked up the title in Burke’s Peerage and found the baronetcy an ancient and distinguished one originally granted on the field of battle by Richard the First in the Holy Land. More recently, bearers of the title had distinguished themselves in India and the Sudan.
We arrived in Durwood shortly after twelve and proceeded to Closton Manor by dog cart. A middle-aged, work bent servant had been awaiting the train. After introducing himself as Mullins and stating that Master Peter had sent him, he lapsed into silence which he maintained until we reached the manor.
We entered the extensive and rambling house by a side entrance where we were met by young Norwood himself and conducted by way of a narrow staircase to the rooms of Sir Alexander. I must admit that my retired detective friend was in uncommonly good condition, having slept the whole way from London. His most lucid moments, I believe, were invariably immediately after he had awakened.
Sir Alexander was seated in a small study which was well stocked with books, pamphlets and aged manuscripts. In fact, the only description would be to say it was overstocked. Great piles of tomes leaned against walls or balanced precariously without support. But in spite of the fact that manifestly considerable study was done in the room, the light was dim, as a result of rather heavily curtained windows.
Sir Alexander sat deep in an upholstered chair, wrapped in a steamer rug as though for warmth. His chin rested upon his chest and his sunken eyes looked at us from over his pince-nez. A thin mustache and beard, both gray, and a fringe of gray hair seen from under the skull cap he wore, ornamented his thin ascetic face, white within the darkness of his immediate environment.
“Ah, my friend,” he said in a cultured, well-modulated voice. “We meet again.” His eyes sparkled with a youth his body belied. He held out a hand to be shaken.
The retired sleuth, using his cane as though it was no more than an affectation, rose to the occasion. “A great pleasure to renew our acquaintanceship, Sir Alexander. May I present my friend?” He introduced us with a flare I hadn’t witnessed in him for years.
It was my turn to shake the proffered hand and I found it warm and firm. First impressions deceive. Sir Alexander was considerably further from his grave than his son had led us to believe.
Peter Norwood said, “Would you prefer I leave, Father, while you discuss your business with our visitors?”
The baronet gestured with a slight motion. “If you don’t mind, my boy. I shall see you at tea, if not before.”
Young Norwood bowed to us, winking whilst his back was to his father, and excused himself.
* * * *
When we were alone, Sir Alexander chuckled wryly. “Peter, I am afraid, is of the opinion that I am somewhat around the bend.”
The former sleuth had lowered himself gingerly into a chair and was now fumbling in his jacket pocket for pipe and tobacco. “Suppose you tell us this from the beginning, eh?”
The other cocked his head to one side and eyed him, frowning, and probably noticing for the first time how considerably my companion had aged since last they had met. However, he said, finally, “I am afraid I am working under a handicap. I have no doubt that your minds have already been somewhat prejudiced.”
I cleared my throat, if the truth be known, surprised at his approach. I had expected mental infirmity, but found no outward signs of it. Was it possible the man was pulling his son’s leg?
My companion, who was bringing his match in contact with the shag he had fumbled into his pipe, rose to the occasion again, his voice being quite firm as he said, “I consider myself without prejudice, Sir Alexander, as you have had cause to know in the past.”
A flush touched the other’s face. “Forgive me, my dear friend. Hadn’t it been for your toleration three decades ago, I would be dead today.” He looked away from us for the moment, as though seeking a starting point to his narrative.
“I suppose there is no beginning,” he said finally. “This matter has been coming to my attention, piece by piece, fragment by fragment, throughout my adult life. Only recently have I given it the attention it deserves.” He hesitated for a moment, then said to me, “Doctor, if you please, would you hand me that book on the top of the pile there to your left?”
I was able to reach the book and hand it to him without leaving my chair.
Sir Alexander said, “You gentlemen are both familiar with H. Spencer Jones, I assume?”
I said, “The Astronomer Royal, of course.”
The other lifted the book. “You are acquainted with his work, ‘Life on Other Worlds’?”
“Afraid not, eh,” the retired detective said. I shook my head.
“Let me read you a passage or two.” Our host thumbed quickly through the volume. “Here, for instance.”
He began reading. “With the universe constructed on so vast a scale, it would seem inherently improbable that our small earth can be the only home of life.” He skipped over some pages. “And here: ...It seems reasonable to suppose that whenever in the universe the proper conditions arise, life must inevitably come into existence. This is the view that is generally accepted by biologists.
He began to look for more passages.
“Never mind,” my friend wheezed. “I accept what you offer, eh. That is, I accept the possibility. Possibility, not probability. Other life forms might be present somewhere in the universe.” He chortled. “Let me say, Sir Alexander, that it is an extensive universe.”
The old gaffer was outdoing himself, I had to admit. I had expected him to be drowsing by this time.
Our host nodded agreeably. “It is indeed. However, please pass me that magazine to your right there, Doctor.”
He took up the magazine and thumbed through it. “Ah, here. This is an article by a young German chap, Willy Ley. A chap more than ordinarily interested in the prospects of man’s conquest of space. Here we are: “...We are justified in believing in life on Mars—hardy plant life. The color changes which we can see are explained most logically and most simply by assuming vegetation.” He skipped some lines, then went on. “Of terrestrial plants, lichen might survive transplanting to Mars and one may imagine that some of the desert flora of Tibet could be adapted. At any event, conditions are such that life as we know it would find the going tough, but not impossible.”
Sir Alexander broke off and looked at us questioningly.
I said, “I submit, Sir Alexander, that the presence on Mars of lichens, and the possible presence on some far distant star of even intelligent life, does not mean that alien life forms are scampering about the streets of London!”
The other was visibly becoming animated by the discussion. He leaned forward. “Ah, my dear Doctor, do you not see the point? When you grant the existence of life elsewhere than on Earth, you must admit the possible corollary.”
<
br /> I scowled at him and said, “Perhaps I have missed something.”
Sir Alexander said quickly, “Don’t you see? If there is life elsewhere in the universe, we must suppose one of three things. It is either less advanced than we, equally advanced, or it is more advanced than we.”
My former detective friend chortled again. “That about covers everything, eh, Sir Alexander?”
“Of course. However, now please understand that already here on Earth man is beginning to reach for the stars. The Willy Ley I quoted from is an example of the thousands of young men who see tomorrow’s exploration of the moon, and, in the comparatively near future, of the solar system. And they dream of eventual travel to the stars.” He leaned forward again to stress his earnestness. “If we grant the possibility of intelligent life elsewhere, then we must grant the possibility that it is further along the path toward conquest of space. Our race, gentlemen, is a young one. Our fellow intelligent life forms might have several millions of years of growth behind them.”
Neither of us had an answer to this. In my own case, there was just too much to assimilate. And I suspected my friend had lost the thread of thought.
Sir Alexander pointed a thin finger at us for emphasis. “If man is already laying plans for exploration beyond his own planet, why should not our neighbors in space have already taken such steps?”
I said, barely keeping irritation suppressed, “You have made a theoretical case for the possibility of alien life forms, and their desire to reach beyond their own worlds. But you have said nothing definite, thus far. Thus far, it is all in the realm of hypothesis. You have some concrete proof, Sir Alexander?”
Our host tossed the magazine to a cluttered desk and pursed his lips. He said, “I have never shaken the hand of an extraterrestrial, my friend.”
My companion chortled, “Heh, jolly good, eh?” Evidently, he had been following the conversation after all.
But Sir Alexander raised his gray eyebrows at me. “Perhaps one day I shall, Doctor. Who knows?” He turned back to my companion. “For literally centuries men have been sighting strange flying objects. Long before the Wright brothers, unidentified flying objects, saucer-shaped, cigar-shaped, ball-shaped, have been seen by reputable witnesses. Literally hundreds of such sightings have been recorded by Charles Fort, the American.”
The Second Mack Reynolds Megapack Page 19
