Serpents in Paradise

by Martin Edwards

  “Sheer good nature and kindliness, Mr. Sage,” he said. “He’s as gentle as a woman.”

  “I once knew a man,” remarked Malcolm Sage, “who said that in the annals of crime lay the master-key to the world’s mysteries, past, present and to come.”

  “A dreamer, Mr. Sage,” smiled the inspector. “We haven’t time for dreaming at the Yard,” he added good-temperedly, as he rose and shook himself like a Newfoundland dog.

  “I suppose it never struck you to look elsewhere than at the curate’s lodgings for the writer of the letters?” enquired Malcolm Sage quietly.

  “It never strikes me to look about for someone when I’m sitting on his chest,” laughed Inspector Murdy.

  “True,” said Malcolm Sage. “By the way,” he continued, without looking up, “in future can you let me see every letter as it is received? You might also keep careful record of how they are delivered.”

  “Certainly, Mr. Sage. Anything that will make you happy.”

  “Later I may get you to ask the vicar to seal up any subsequent anonymous letters that reach him without allowing anyone to see the contents. Do you think he would do that?”

  “Without doubt if I ask him,” said the inspector, surprise in his eyes as he looked down upon the cone of baldness beneath him, realising what a handicap it is to talk to a man who keeps his eyes averted.

  “He must then put the letters in a place where no one can possibly obtain access to them. One thing more,” continued Malcolm Sage, “will you ask Miss Crayne to write out the full story of the letters as far as she personally is acquainted with it?”

  “Very well, Mr. Sage,” said the inspector, with the air of one humouring a child. “Now I’ll be going.” He walked towards the door, then suddenly stopped and turned.

  “I suppose you think I’m wrong about the curate?”

  “I’ll tell you later,” was the reply.

  “When you find the master-key?” laughed the inspector, as he opened the door.

  “Yes, when I find the master-key,” said Malcolm Sage quietly and, as the door closed behind Inspector Murdy, he continued to finger the copper ash-tray as if that were the master-key.

  ***

  Malcolm Sage was seated at a small green-covered table playing solitaire. A velvet smoking-jacket and a pair of wine-coloured morocco slippers suggested that the day’s work was done.

  Patience, chess, and the cinema were his unfailing sources of inspiration when engaged upon a more than usually difficult case. He had once told Sir James Walton that they clarified his brain and co-ordinated his thoughts, the cinema in particular. The fact that in the surrounding darkness were hundreds of other brains, vital and active, appeared to stimulate his own imagination.

  Puffing steadily at a gigantic meerschaum, he moved the cards with a deliberation which suggested that his attention rather than his thoughts was absorbed in the game.

  Nearly a month had elapsed since he had agreed to take up the enquiry into the authorship of the series of anonymous letters with which Gylston and the neighbourhood had been flooded; yet still the matter remained a mystery.

  A celebrated writer of detective stories had interested himself in the affair, with the result that the Press throughout the country had “stunted” Gylston as if it had been a heavy-weight championship, or a train murder.

  For a fortnight Malcolm Sage had been on the Continent in connection with the theft of the Adair Diamonds. Two days previously, after having restored the famous jewels to Lady Adair, he had returned to London, to find that the Gylston affair had developed a new and dramatic phase. The curate had been arrested for an attempted assault upon Miss Crayne and, pleading “not guilty,” had been committed for trial.

  The incident that led up to this had taken place on the day that Malcolm Sage left London. Late that afternoon Miss Crayne had arrived at the vicarage in a state bordering on collapse. On becoming more collected, she stated that on returning from paying a call, and when half-way through a copse, known locally as “Gipsies Wood,” Blade had sprung out upon her and violently protested his passion. He had gripped hold of her wrists, the mark of his fingers was to be seen on the delicate skin, and threatened to kill her and himself. She had been terrified, thinking he meant to kill her. The approach of a farm labourer had saved her, and the curate had disappeared through the copse.

  This story was borne out by Joseph Higgins, the farm labourer in question. He had arrived to find Miss Crayne in a state of great alarm and agitation, and he had walked with her as far as the vicarage gate. He did not, however, actually see the curate.

  On the strength of this statement the police had applied for a warrant, and had subsequently arrested the curate. Later he appeared before the magistrates, had been remanded, and finally committed for trial, bail being allowed.

  Blade protested his innocence alike of the assault and the writing of the letters; but two handwriting experts had testified to the similarity of the handwriting of the anonymous letters with that of the curate. Furthermore, they were all written upon “Olympic Script,” the paper that Blade used for his sermons.

  Malcolm Sage had just started a new deal when the door opened, and Rogers showed in Robert Freynes. With a nod, Malcolm Sage indicated the chair opposite. His visitor dropped into it and, taking a pipe from his pocket, proceeded to fill and light it.

  Placing his meerschaum on the mantelpiece, Malcolm Sage produced a well-worn briar from his pocket, which, having got into commission, he proceeded once more with the game.

  “It’s looking pretty ugly for Blade,” remarked Freynes, recognising by the substitution of the briar for the meerschaum that Malcolm Sage was ready for conversation.

  “Tell me.”

  “It’s those damned handwriting experts,” growled Freynes. “They’re the greatest anomaly of our legal system. The judge always warns the jury of the danger of accepting their evidence; yet each side continues to produce them. It’s an insult to intelligence and justice.”

  “To hang a man because his ‘s’ resembles that of an implicating document,” remarked Malcolm Sage, as he placed a red queen on a black knave, “is about as sensible as to imprison him because he has the same accent as a footpad.”

  “Then there’s Blade’s astonishing apathy,” continued Freynes. “He seems quite indifferent to the gravity of his position. Refuses to say a word. Anyone might think he knew the real culprit and was trying to shield him,” and he sucked moodily at his pipe.

  “The handwriting expert,” continued Malcolm Sage imperturbably, “is too concerned with the crossing of a ‘t,’ the dotting of an ‘i,’ or the tail of a ‘g,’ to give time and thought to the way in which the writer uses, for instance, the compound tenses of verbs. Blade was no more capable of writing those letters than our friend Murdy is of transliterating the Rosetta Stone.”

  “Yes; but can we prove it?” asked Freynes gloomily, as with the blade of a penknife he loosened the tobacco in the bowl of his pipe. “Can we prove it?” he repeated and, snapping the knife to, he replaced it in his pocket.

  “Blade’s sermons,” Malcolm Sage continued, “and such letters of his as you have been able to collect, show that he adopted a very definite and precise system of punctuation. He frequently uses the colon and the semicolon, and always in the right place. In a parenthetical clause preceded by the conjunction ‘and,’ he uses a comma after the ‘and,’ not before it as most people do. Before such words as ‘yet’ and ‘but,’ he without exception uses a semicolon. The word ‘only,’ he always puts in its correct place. In short, he is so academic as to savour somewhat of the pomposity of the eighteenth century.”

  “Go on,” said Freynes, as Malcolm Sage paused, as if to give the other a chance of questioning his reasoning.

  “Turning to the anonymous letters,” continued Malcolm Sage, “it must be admitted that the handwriting is very similar; but there
all likeness to Blade’s sermons and correspondence ends. Murdy has shown me nearly all the anonymous letters, and in the whole series there is not one instance of the colon or the semicolon being used. The punctuation is of the vaguest, consisting largely of the dash, which after all is a literary evasion.

  “In these letters the word ‘but’ frequently appears without any punctuation mark before it. At other times it has a comma, a dash, or a full stop.”

  He paused and for the next two minutes devoted himself to the game before him. Then he continued:

  “Such phrases as ‘If only you knew,’ ‘I should have loved to have been,’ ‘different than,’ which appear in these letters, would have been absolutely impossible to a man of Blade’s meticulous literary temperament.

  As Malcolm Sage spoke, Robert Freynes’s brain had been working rapidly. Presently he brought his hand down with a smack upon his knee.

  “By heavens, Sage!” he cried, “This is a new pill for the handwriting expert. I’ll put you in the box. We’ve got a fighting chance after all.”

  “The most curious factor in the whole case,” continued Malcolm Sage, “is the way in which the letters were delivered. One was thrown into a fly on to Miss Crayne’s lap, she tells us, when she and her father were driving home after dining at the Hall. Another was discovered in the vicarage garden. A third was thrown through Miss Crayne’s bedroom window. A few of the earlier group were posted in the neighbouring town of Whitchurch, some on days that Blade was certainly not there.”

  “That was going to be one of my strongest points,” remarked Freynes.

  “The letters always imply that there is some obstacle existing between the writer and the girl he desires. What possible object could Blade have in writing letters to various people suggesting an intrigue between his vicar’s daughter and himself; yet these letters were clearly written by the same hand that addressed those to the girl, her father and her mother.”

  Freynes nodded his head comprehendingly.

  “If Blade were in love with the girl,” continued Malcolm Sage, “what was there to prevent him from pressing his suit along legitimate and accepted lines. Murdy frankly acknowledges that there has been nothing in Blade’s outward demeanour to suggest that Miss Crayne was to him anything more than the daughter of his vicar.”

  “What do you make of the story of the assault?”

  “As evidence it is worthless,” replied Malcolm Sage, “being without corroboration. The farm-hand did not actually see Blade.”

  Freynes nodded his agreement.

  “Having convinced myself that Blade had nothing to do with the writing of the letters, I next tried to discover if there were anything throwing suspicion on others in the neighbourhood, who were known to use “Olympic Script” as note-paper.

  “The schoolmaster, John Gray, was one. He is an admirer of Miss Crayne, according to local gossip; but it was obvious from the first that he had nothing to do with the affair. One by one I eliminated all the others, until I came back once more to Blade.

  “It was clear that the letters were written with a fountain-

  pen, and Blade always uses one. That, however, is not evidence, as millions of people use fountain-pens. By the way, what is your line of defence?” he enquired.

  “Smashing the handwriting experts,” was the reply. “I was calling four myself, on the principle that God is on the side of the big battalions; but now I shall depend entirely on your evidence.”

  “The assault?” queried Malcolm Sage.

  “There I’m done,” said Freynes, “for although Miss Crayne’s evidence is not proof, it will be sufficient for a jury. Besides, she’s a very pretty and charming girl. I suppose,” he added, “Blade must have made some sort of declaration, which she, in the light of the anonymous letters, entirely misunderstood.”

  “What does he say?”

  “Denies it absolutely, although he admits being in the neighbourhood of the ‘Gypsies Wood,’ and actually catching sight of Miss Crayne in the distance; but he says he did not speak to her.”

  “Is he going into the witness-box?”

  “Certainly,” then after a pause he added, “Kelton is prosecuting, and he’s as moral as a swan. He’ll appeal to the jury as fathers of daughters, and brothers of sisters.”

  Malcolm Sage made no comment; but continued smoking mechanically, his attention apparently absorbed in the cards before him.

  “If you can smash the handwriting experts,” continued the K.C., “I may be able to manage the girl’s testimony.”

  “It will not be necessary,” said Malcolm Sage, carefully placing a nine of clubs upon an eight of diamonds.

  “Not necessary?’

  “I have asked Murdy to come round,” continued Malcolm Sage, still intent upon his game. “I think that was his ring.”

  A minute later the door opened to admit the burly inspector, more blue-eyed and genial than ever, and obviously in the best of spirits.

  “Good evening, Mr. Sage,” he cried cheerfully. “Congratulations on the Adair business. Good evening, sir,” he added, as he shook hands with Freynes.

  He dropped heavily into a seat, and taking a cigar from the box on the table, which Malcolm Sage had indicated with a nod, he proceeded to light it. No man enjoyed a good cigar more than Inspector Murdy.

  “Well, what do you think of it?” he enquired, looking from Malcolm Sage to Freynes. “It’s a clear case now, I think.” He slightly stressed the word “now.”

  “You mean it’s Blade?’ enquired Malcolm Sage, as he proceeded to gather up the cards.

  “Who else?” enquired the inspector, through a cloud of smoke.

  “That is the question which involves your being here now, Murdy,” said Malcolm Sage dryly.

  “We’ve got three handwriting experts behind us,” said the inspector complacently.

  “That is precisely where they should be,” retorted Malcolm Sage quietly. “In the biblical sense,” he added.

  Freynes laughed, whilst Inspector Murdy looked from one to the other. He did not quite catch the allusion.

  “You have done as I suggested?” enquired Malcolm Sage, when he had placed the cards in their box and removed the card-table.

  “Here are all the letters received up to a fortnight ago,” said the inspector, holding out a bulky packet. “Those received since have each been sealed up separately by the vicar, who is keeping half of them, whilst I have the other half; but really, Mr. Sage, I don’t understand—”

  “Thank you, Murdy,” said Malcolm Sage, as he took the packet. “It is always a pleasure to work with Scotland Yard. It is so thorough.”

  The inspector beamed; for he knew the compliment was sincere.

  Without a word Malcolm Sage left the room, taking the packet with him.

  “A bit quaint at times, ain’t he, sir?” remarked Inspector Murdy to Freynes; “but one of the best. I’d trust him with anything.”

  Freynes nodded encouragingly.

  “There are some of them down at the Yard that don’t like him,” he continued. “They call him ‘Sage and Onions’; but most of us who have worked with him swear by Mr. Sage. He’s never out for the limelight himself, and he’s always willing to give another fellow a leg-up. After all, it’s our living,” he added, a little inconsequently.

  Freynes appreciated the inspector’s delicacy in refraining from any mention of the Gylston case during Malcolm Sage’s absence. After all, they represented respectively the prosecution and the defence. For nearly half an hour the two talked together upon unprofessional subjects. When Malcolm Sage returned, he found them discussing the prospects of Dempsey against Carpentier.

  Handing back the packet of letters to Inspector Murdy, Malcolm Sage resumed his seat, and proceeded to re-light his pipe.

  “Spotted the culprit, Mr. Sage?” enquired the inspector, with something that w
as very much like a wink in the direction of Freynes.

  “I think so,” was the quiet reply. “You might meet me at Gylston Vicarage to-morrow at three. I’ll telegraph to Blade to be there too. You had better bring the schoolmaster also.”

  “You mean—” began the inspector, rising.

  “Exactly,” said Malcolm Sage. “It’s past eleven, and we all require sleep.”

  ***

  The next afternoon the study of the vicar of Gylston presented a strange appearance.

  Seated at Mr. Crayne’s writing-table was Malcolm Sage, a small attaché-case at his side, whilst before him were several piles of sealed packets. Grouped about the room were Inspector Murdy, Robert Freynes, Mr. Gray, and the vicar.

  All had their eyes fixed upon Malcolm Sage; but with varying expressions. Those of the schoolmaster were frankly cynical. The inspector and Freynes looked as if they expected to see produced from the attaché-case a guinea-pig or a white rabbit, pink-eyed and kicking; whilst the vicar had obviously not yet recovered from his surprise at discovering that the stranger, who had shown such a remarkable knowledge of monumental brasses and Norman architecture, was none other than the famous investigator about whom he had read so much in the newspapers.

  With quiet deliberation Malcolm Sage opened the attaché-case and produced a spirit lamp, which he lighted. He then placed a metal plate upon a rest above the flame. On this he imposed a thicker plate of a similar metal that looked like steel; but it had a handle across the middle, rather resembling that of a tool used by plasterers.

  He then glanced up, apparently unconscious of the almost feverish interest with which his every movement was being watched.

  “I should like Miss Crayne to be present,” he said.

  As he spoke the door opened and the curate entered, his dark, handsome face lined and careworn. It was obvious that he had suffered. He bowed, and then looked about him, without any suggestion of embarrassment.

  Malcolm Sage rose and held out his hand, Freynes followed suit.

  “Ask Miss Muriel to come here,” said the vicar to the maid as she was closing the door.