Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces

by Charles Felix

  CHAPTER XXIX

  The promise was so vague, so mystifying, indeed, so seemingly absurd,that the Major did not allow himself to dwell upon it. As a matter offact, it passed completely out of his mind; nor did it again findlodgment there until it was forced back upon his memory in a mostunusual manner.

  Whatsoever had been the result of what Cleek had called his "nightprowling," he took nobody into his confidence when he and the Major andthe Major's son and Senorita Rosario met at breakfast the next day(Zuilika, true to her training and the traditions of her people, neverbroke morning bread save in the seclusion of her own bed-chamber, andthen on her knees with her face towards the east) nor did he allude toit at any period throughout the day.

  He seemed, indeed, purposely, to avoid the Major, and to devote himselfto the Spanish woman with an ardour that was positively heartless,considering that as they two sang and flirted and played several sets ofsingles on the tennis court, Zuilika, like a spirit of misery, keptwalking, walking, walking through the halls and the rooms of the house,her woeful eyes fixed on the carpet, her henna-stained fingersconstantly locking and unlocking, and moans of desolation coming now andagain from behind her yashmak as her swaying body moved restlessly toand fro. For to-day was memorable. Five weeks ago this coming nightfallUlchester had flung himself out of this house in a fury of wrath, andthis time of bitter regret and ceaseless mourning had begun.

  "She will go out of her mind, poor creature, if something cannot be doneto keep her from dwelling on her misery like this," commented thehousekeeper, coming upon that restless figure pacing the darkened hall,moaning, moaning--seeing nothing, hearing nothing, doing nothing butwalk and sorrow, sorrow and walk, hour in and hour out. "It's enough totear a body's heart to hear her, poor dear. And that good-for-nothingSpanish piece racing and shrieking round the tennis court like a shetom-cat, the heartless hussy. Her and that simpering silly that'strotting round after her had ought to be put in a bag and shaken up,that they ought. It's downright scandalous to be carrying on like thatat such a time."

  And so both the Major and his son thought too, and tried their best tosolace the lonely mourner and to persuade her to sit down and rest.

  "Zuilika, you will wear yourself out, child, if you go on walking likethis," said the Major solicitously. "Do rest and be at peace for alittle time at least."

  "I can never have peace in this land--I can never forget the day!" sheanswered drearily. "Oh, my beloved! Oh, my lord, it was I who sent theeto it--it was I, it was I! Give me my own country--give me the gods ofmy people; here there is only memory and pain, and no rest, no restever!"

  She could not be persuaded to sit down and rest until Anita herself tookthe matter into her own hands and insisted that she should. That was attea-time. Anita, showing some little trace of feeling now that Cleek hadgone to wash his hands and was no longer there to occupy her thoughts,placed a deep, soft chair near the window, and would not yield until theviolet-clad figure of the mourner sank down into the depths of it andleaned back with its shrouded face drooping in silent melancholy.

  And it was while she was so sitting that Cleek came into the room anddid a most unusual, a most ungentlemanly thing, in the eyes of the Majorand his son.

  Without hesitating, he walked to within a yard or two of where she wassitting, and then, in the silliest of silly tones, blurted out suddenly:"I say, don't you know, I've had a jolly rum experience. You know thatblessed room at the angle just opposite the library--the one with thelocked door?"

  The drooping, violet figure straightened abruptly, and the Major feltfor the moment as if he could have kicked Cleek with pleasure. Of coursethey knew the room. It was there that the two mummy cases were kept,sacred from the profaning presence of any but this stricken woman. Nowonder that she bent forward, full of eagerness, full of the dreadfulfear that Frankish feet had crossed the threshold, Frankish eyes lookedwithin the sacred shrine.

  "Well, don't you know," went on Cleek, without taking the slightestnotice of anything, "just as I was going past that door I picked up amost remarkable thing. Wonder if it's yours, madam?" glancing atZuilika. "Just have a look at it, will you? Here, catch!" And not untilhe saw a piece of gold spin through the air and fall into Zuilika's lapdid the Major remember that promise of last night.

  "Oh, come, I say, St. Aubyn, that's rather thick!" sang out youngBurnham-Seaforth indignantly, as Zuilika caught the coin in her lap."Blest if I know what you call manners, but to throw things at a lady isa new way of passing them in this part of the world, I can assure you."

  "Awfully sorry, old chap, no offence, I assure you," said Cleek, moreasinine than ever, as Zuilika, having picked up the piece and looked atit, disclaimed all knowledge of it, and laid it on the edge of the tablewithout any further interest in it or him. "Just to show, you know, thatI--er--couldn't have meant anything disrespectful, why--er--you allknow, don't you know, how jolly much I respect Senorita Rosario, byJove! and so--Here, senorita, you catch, too, and see if the blessedthing's yours." And, picking up the coin, tossed it into her lap just ashe had done with Zuilika.

  She, too, caught it and examined it, and laughingly shook her head.

  "No--not mine!" she said. "I have not seen him before. To the findershall be the keep. Come, sit here. Will you have the tea?"

  "Yes, thanks," said Cleek; then dropped down on the sofa beside her, andtook tea as serenely as though there were no such things in the world asmurder and swindling and puzzling police-riddles to solve.

  And the Major, staring at him, was as amazed as ever. He had said, lastnight, that when the coin fell the answer would be given--and yet it hadfallen, and nothing had happened, and he was laughing and flirting withSenorita Rosario as composedly and as persistently as ever. More thanthat; after he had finished his second cup of tea, and immediatelyfollowing the sound of someone just beyond the verandah rail whistlingthe lively, lilting measures of "There's a Girl Wanted There"--the"silly ass" seemed to become a thousand times sillier than ever; for heforthwith set down his cup, and, turning to Anita, said with an inanesort of giggle, "I say, you know, here's a lark. Let's have a game of'Slap Hand,' you and I--what? Know it, don't you? You try to slap myhands, and I try to slap yours, and whichever succeeds in doing it firstgets a prize. Awful fun, don't you know. Come on--start her up."

  And, Anita agreeing, they fell forthwith to slapping away at the backsof each other's hands with great gusto, until, all of a sudden, thewhistler outside gave one loud, shrill note, and--there was a great andmighty change.

  Those who were watching saw Anita's two hands suddenly caught, heard asharp, metallic "click," and saw them as suddenly dropped again to theaccompaniment of a shrill little scream from her ashen lips, and thenext moment Cleek had risen and jumped away from her side--clear acrossto where Zuilika was; and those who were watching saw Anita jump up witha pair of steel handcuffs on her wrists, just as Dollops vaulted up overthe verandah rail and appeared at one window, whilst Petrie appeared atanother, Hammond poked his body through a third, and the opening doorgave entrance to Superintendent Narkom.

  "The police!" shrilled out Anita in a panic of fright. "_Madre de Dios_,the police!"

  The Major and his son were on their feet like a shot; Zuilika, with afaint, startled cry, bounded bolt upright, like an imp shot through atrap-door; but before the little henna-stained hands could do more thansimply move, Cleek's arms went round her from behind, tight and fast asa steel clamp, there was another metallic "click," another shrill cry,and another pair of wrists were in gyves.

  "Come in, Mr. Narkom; come in, constables," said Cleek, with the utmostcomposure. "Here are your promised prisoners--nicely trussed, you see,so that they can't get at the little popguns they carry--and a worsepair of rogues never went into the hands of Jack Ketch!"

  "And Jack Ketch will get them, Cleek, if I know anything about it. Yourhazard was right. I've examined the caliph's mummy-case; the mummyitself has been removed--destroyed--done away with utterly--and the poorcreature's body is there!"<
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  And here the poor, dumfounded, utterly bewildered Major found voice tospeak at last.

  "Mummy-case! Body! Dear God in heaven, Mr. Cleek, what are you hintingat?" he gasped. "You--you don't mean that she--that Zuilika--killedhim?"

  "No, Major, I don't," he made reply. "I simply mean that he killed her!The body in the mummy-case is the body of Zuilika, the caliph'sdaughter! This is the creature you have been wasting your pity on--see!"

  With that he laid an intense grip on the concealing yashmak, tore itaway, and so revealed the close-shaven, ghastly-hued countenance of thecornered criminal.

  "My God!--Ulchester--Ulchester himself!" said the Major in a voice offright and surprise.

  "Yes, Ulchester himself, Major. In a few more days he'd have withdrawnthe money, and got out of the country, body and all, if he hadn't beennabbed, the rascal. There'd have been no tracing the crime then; and heand the Senorita here would have been in clover for the rest of theirnatural lives. But there's always that bright little bit of Bobby Burnsto be reckoned with. You know: 'The best laid schemes of mice and men,'_et cetera_--that bit. But the Yard's got them, and--they'll never leavethe country now. Take them, Mr. Narkom, they're yours!"

  * * * * *

  "How did I guess it?" said Cleek, replying to the Major's query, as theysat late that night discussing the affair. "Well, I think the firstfaint inkling of it came when I arrived here yesterday, and smelt theoverpowering odour of the incenses. There was so much of it, and it wasused so frequently--twice a day--that it seemed to suggest an attempt tohide other odours of a less pleasant kind. When I left you last night,Dollops and I went down to the mummy-chamber, and a skeleton key soonlet us in. The unpleasant odour was rather pronounced in there. But eventhat didn't give me the cue, until I happened to find in the fireplace aconsiderable heap of fine ashes, and in the midst of them small lumps ofgummy substance, which I knew to result from the burning of myrrh. Isuspected from that and from the nature of the ashes that a mummy hadbeen burnt, and as there was only one mummy in the affair, the inferencewas obvious. I laid hands on the two cases and tilted them. One wasquite empty. The weight of the other told me that it contained somethinga little heavier than any mummy ought to be. I came to the conclusionthat there was a body in it, injected full of arsenic, no doubt, toprevent as much as possible the processes of decay, the odour of whichthe incense was concealing. I didn't attempt to open the thing; I leftthat until the arrival of the men from The Yard, for whom I sent Dollopsthis afternoon. I had a vague notion that it would not turn out to beUlchester's, and I had also a distinct recollection of what you saidabout his being able to mimic a Gaiety chorus-girl and all that sort ofthing, and the more I thought over it, the more I realized what anexcellent thing to cover a bearded face a yashmak is. Still, it was allhazard. I wasn't sure--indeed, I never was sure--until tea-time, when Icaught this supposed 'Zuilika' sitting at last, and gave the spadeguinea its chance to decide it."

  "But, Mr. Cleek, how could it have decided it? That's the thing whichamazes me most of all. How could the tossing of that coin have decidedthe sex of the wearer of those garments?"

  "My dear Major, it is an infallible test. Did you ever notice that ifyou throw anything for a man to catch in his lap, he pulls his kneestogether to _make_ a lap in order to catch it; whereas a woman--used towearing skirts and, thereby, having a lap already prepared--immediatelybroadens that lap by the exactly opposite movement, knowing thatwhatever is thrown has no chance of slipping through and falling to thefloor. When I tossed the coin to Ulchester, he instinctively jerked hisknees together. That settled it, of course. And now, if you won't mindmy saying it, I'm a bit sleepy and it is about time I took myself off tohome and bed."

  "But not at this late hour, surely? You will never catch a train."

  "I shan't need one, Major. They are holding a horse and trap ready forme at the stables of the 'Coach and Horses.' Mr. Narkom promised to lookout for that, and--I beg pardon? No, I can't stop over night. Thank youfor the invitation, but Dollops would raise half London if I didn't turnup after promising to do so."

  "I should have thought you might have simplified matters and obviatedthat by keeping the boy when you had him here," said the Major. "Wecould easily have found a place to put him up for the night."

  "Thanks very much, but I wouldn't interrupt the course of his studiesfor the world," replied Cleek. "I've found an old chap--anex-schoolmaster, down on his luck and glad for the chance to turn anhonest penny--who takes him on every night from eight to ten; and theyoung monkey is so eager and is absorbing knowledge at such a rate thathe positively amazes me. But now, really, it must be good-night. The boywill be waiting and I must hear his lessons before I go to bed."

  "Not surely when you are so tired as you say?"

  "Never too tired for that, Major. It makes me sleep better and sounderto know that the lad's getting on and that I've cheated the Devil injust one more instance. Good-night and good luck to you. It's a bullyold world after all, isn't it, Major?" Then laughed and shook hands withhim and fared forth into the starlight, whistling.