The Second R. Austin Freeman Megapack

by R. Austin Freeman

  “Now,” I said, assuming a brisk, cheerful tone, “we must get to work. Mr. Polton will be here in half an hour and we must be ready to put his nose on the grindstone at once.”

  “Then your nose will have to go on first,” she replied with a smile, “and so will mine, with two raw apprentices to teach and an important job waiting to be done. But, dear me! what a lot of trouble I am giving!”

  “Nothing of the kind, Marion,” I exclaimed; “you are a public benefactor. Polton is delighted at the chance to come here and enlarge his experience, and as for me—”

  “Well? As for you?” She looked at me half-shyly, half-mischievously. “Go on. You’ve stopped at the most interesting point.”

  “I think I had better not,” said I. “We don’t want the forewoman to get too uppish.”

  She laughed softly, and when I had helped her out of her overcoat and rolled up the sleeve of her one serviceable arm, I went out to the lobby to stow away the bicycles and lock the outer door. When I returned, she had got out from the cupboard a large box of flaked gelatine and a massive spouted bucket which she was filling at the sink.

  “Hadn’t you better explain to me what we are going to do?” I asked.

  “Oh, explanations are of no use,” she replied. “You just do as I tell you and then you will know all about it. This isn’t a school; it’s a workshop. When we have got the gelatine in to soak, I will show you how to make a plaster case.”

  “It seems to me,” I retorted, “that my instructress has graduated in the academy of Squeers. “W-i-n-d-e-r, winder; now go and clean one. Isn’t that the method?”

  “Apprentices are not allowed to waste time in wrangling,” she rejoined severely. “Go and put on one of Daddy’s blouses and I will set you to work.”

  This practical method of instruction justified itself abundantly. The reasons for each process emerged at once as soon as the process was completed. And it was withal a pleasant method, for there is no comradeship so sympathetic as the comradeship of work, nor any which begets so wholesome and friendly an intimacy. But though there were playful and frivolous interludes—as when the forewoman’s working hand became encrusted with clay and had to be cleansed with a sponge by the apprentice—we worked to such purpose that by the time Mr. Polton was due, the plaster bust (of which a wax replica had to be made) was firmly fixed on the work-table on a clay foundation and surrounded by a carefully-levelled platform of clay, in which it was embedded to half its thickness. I had just finished smoothing the surface when there came a knock at the outer door; on which Marion started violently and clutched my arm. But she recovered in a moment and exclaimed in a tone of vexation:

  “How silly I am! Of course it is Mr. Polton.”

  It was. I found him on the threshold in rapt contemplation of the knocker and looking rather like an archdeacon on tour. He greeted me with a friendly crinkle, and I then conducted him into the studio and presented him to Marion, who shook his hand warmly and thanked him so profusely for coming to her aid that he was quite abashed. However, he did not waste time in compliments, but, producing an apron from his handbag, took off his coat, donned the apron, rolled up his sleeves and beamed inquiringly at the bust.

  “We are going to make a plaster case for the gelatine mould, Mr. Polton,” Marion explained, and proceeded to a few preliminary directions, to which the new apprentice listened with respectful attention. But she had hardly finished when he fell to work with a quiet, unhurried facility that filled me with envy. He seemed to know where to find everything. He discovered the waste paper with which to cover the model to prevent the clay from sticking to it, he pounced on the clay-bin at the first shot, and when he had built up the shape for the case, found the plaster-bin, mixing-bowl and spoon as if he had been born and bred in the workshop, stopping only for a moment to test the condition of the gelatine in the bucket.

  “Mr. Polton,” Marion said after watching him for a while, “you are an impostor—a dreadful impostor. You pretend to come here as an improver, but you really know all about gelatine moulding; now, don’t you?”

  Polton admitted apologetically that he “had done a little in that way. But,” he added, in extenuation, “I have never done any work in wax. And talking of wax, the doctor will be here presently.”

  “Dr. Thorndyke?” Marion asked.

  “Yes, miss. He had some business in Holloway, so he thought he would come on here to make your acquaintance and take a look at the premises.”

  “All the same,” Mr. Polton’ said I, “I don’t quite see the connexion between Dr. Thorndyke and wax.”

  He crinkled with a slightly embarrassed air and explained that he must have been thinking of something that the doctor had said to him; but his explanations were cut short by a knock at the door.

  “That is his knock,” said Polton; and he and I together proceeded to open the door, when I inducted the distinguished visitor into the studio and presented him to the presiding goddess. I noticed that each of them inspected the other with some curiosity and that the first impressions appeared to be mutually satisfactory, though Marion was at first a little overawed by Thorndyke’s impressive personality.

  “You mustn’t let me interrupt your work,” the latter said, when the preliminary politenesses had been exchanged. “I have just come to fill in Dr. Gray’s outline sketches with details of my own observing. I wanted to see you—to convert a name into an actual person, to see the studio for the same reason, and to get as precise a description as possible of the man whom we are trying to identify. Will it distress you to recall his appearance?”

  She had turned a little pale at the mention of her late assailant, but she answered stoutly enough: “Not at all; besides, it is necessary.”

  “Thank you,” said he; “then I will read out the description that I had from Dr. Gray and we will see if you can add anything to it.”

  He produced a notebook from which he read out the particulars that I had given him, at the conclusion of which he looked at her inquiringly.

  “I think that is all that I remember,” she said. “There was very little light and I really only glanced at him.”

  Thorndyke looked at her reflectively. “It is a fairly full description,” said he. “Perhaps the nose is a little sketchy. You speak of a hooked nose with a high bridge. Was it a curved nose of the Jewish type, or a squarer Roman nose?”

  “It was rather square in profile; a Wellington nose, but with a rather broad base. Like a vulture’s beak, and very large.”

  “Was it actually a hook-nose—I mean, had it a drooping tip?”

  “Yes; the tip projected downwards and it was rather sharp—not bulbous.”

  “And the chin? Should you call it a pronounced or a retreating chin?”

  “Oh, it was quite a projecting chin, rather of the Wellington type.”

  Thorndyke reflected once more, then, having jotted down the answers to his questions, he closed the book and returned it to his pocket.

  “It is a great thing to have a trained eye,” he remarked. “In your one glance you saw more than an ordinary person would have noted in a leisurely inspection in a good light. You have no doubt that you would know this man again if you should meet him?”

  “Not the slightest,” she replied with a shudder. “I can see him now, if I shut my eyes.”

  “Well,” he rejoined, with a smile, “I wouldn’t recall that unpleasant vision too often, if I were you. And now, may I, without disturbing you further, just take a look round the premises?”

  “But, of course. Dr. Thorndyke,” she replied. “Do exactly what you please.”

  With this permission he drew away and stood for some moments letting a very reflective eye travel round the interior; and meanwhile I watched him curiously and wondered what he had really come for. His first proceeding was to walk slowly round the studio and examine closely, one by one, all the casts which hung on pegs. Next, in the same systematic manner, he inspected all the shelves, mounting a chair to examine the upp
er ones. It was after scrutinizing one of the latter that he turned towards Marion and asked:

  “Have you moved these casts lately. Miss D’Arblay?”

  “No,” she replied, “so far as I know, they have not been touched for months.”

  “Someone has moved them within the last day or two,” said he. “Apparently the nocturnal explorer went over the shelves as well as the cupboard.”

  “I wonder why?” said Marion. “There were no moulds on the shelves.”

  Thorndyke made no rejoinder, but as he stood on the chair he once more ran his eye round the studio. Suddenly he stepped down from the chair, picked it up, carried it over to the tall cupboard and once more mounted it. His stature enabled him easily to look over the cornice on to the top of the cupboard and it was evident that something there had attracted his attention.

  “Here is a derelict of some sort,” he announced, “which certainly has not been moved for some months.” As he spoke, he reached over the cornice into the enclosed space and lifted out an excessively grimy plaster mask, from which he blew the thick coating of dust, and then stood for a while looking at it thoughtfully.

  “A striking face, this,” he remarked, “but not attractive. It rather suggests a Russian or Polish Jew. Do you recognize the person, Miss D’Arblay?”

  He stepped down from the chair and handed the mask to Marion, who had advanced to look at it and who now held it in her hand, regarding it with a frown of perplexity.

  “This is very curious,” she said. “I thought I knew all the casts that have been made here. But I have never seen this one before, and I don’t know the face. I wonder who he was. It doesn’t look like an English face, but I should hardly have taken it for the face of a Jew, with that rather small and nearly straight nose.”

  “The East-European Jews are not a very pure breed,” said Thorndyke. “You will see many a face of that type in Whitechapel High Street and the Jewish quarters hard by.”

  At this point, deserting the work-table, I came and looked over Marion’s shoulder at the mask which she was holding at arm’s length. And then I got a surprise of the most singular kind, for I recognized the face at a glance.

  “What is it, Gray?” asked Thorndyke, who had apparently observed my astonishment.

  “This is a most extraordinary coincidence!” I exclaimed. “Do you remember my speaking to you about a certain Mr. Morris?”

  “The dealer in antiques?” he queried.

  “Yes. Well, this is his face.”

  He regarded me for some moments with a strangely intent expression. Then he asked: “When you say that this is Morris’s face, do you mean that it resembles his face or that you identify it positively?”

  “I identify it positively. I can swear to the identity. It isn’t a face that one would forget. And if any doubt were possible, there is this hare-lip scar, which you can see quite plainly on the cast.”

  “Yes, I noticed that. And Morris has a hare-lip scar, has he?”

  “Yes; and in the same position and of the same character. I think you can take it as a fact that this cast was undoubtedly taken from Morris’s face.”

  “Which,” said Thorndyke, “is a really important fact and one that is worth looking into.”

  “In what way is it important?” I asked.

  “In this respect,” he answered. “This man, Morris, is unknown to Miss D’Arblay; but he was not unknown to her father. Here we have evidence that Mr. D’Arblay had dealings with people of whom his daughter had no knowledge. The circumstances of the murder made it clear that there must be such people; but here we have proof of their existence and we can give to one of them a local habitation and a name. And you will notice that this particular person is a dealer in curios and possibly in more questionable things. There is just a hint that he may have had some rather queer acquaintances.”

  “He seemed to have had rather a fancy for plaster masks,” I remarked. “I remember that he had one in his shop window.”

  “Did your father make many life or death-masks as commissions, Miss D’Arblay?” Thorndyke asked.

  “Only one or two, so far as I know,” she replied. “There is very little demand for portrait masks nowadays. Photography has superseded them.”

  “That is what I should have supposed,” said he. “This would be just a chance commission. However, as it establishes the fact that this man Morris was in some way connected with your father, I think I should like to have a record of his appearance. May I take this mask away with me to get a photograph of it made? I will take great care of it and let you have it back safely.”

  “Certainly,” replied Marion; “but why not keep it, if it is of any interest to you? I have no use for it.”

  “That is very good of you,” said he, “and if you will give me some rag and paper to wrap it in, I will take myself off and leave you to finish your work in peace.”

  Marion took the cast from him and, having procured some rag and paper, began very carefully to wrap it up. While she was thus engaged, Thorndyke stood letting his eye travel once more round the studio.

  “I see,” he remarked, “that you have quite a number of masks moulded from life or death. Do I understand that they were not commissions?”

  “Very few of them were,” Marion replied. “Most of them were taken from professional models, but some from acquaintances whom my father bribed with the gift of a duplicate mask.”

  “But why did he make them? They could not have been used for producing wax faces for the show figures, for you could hardly turn a shop-window into a waxwork exhibition with lifelike portraits of real persons.”

  “No,” Marion agreed; “that wouldn’t do at all. These masks were principally used for reference as to details of features when my father was modelling a head in clay. But he did sometimes make moulds for the wax from these masks, only he obliterated the likeness, so that the wax face was not a portrait.”

  “By working on the wax, I suppose?”

  “Yes; or more usually by altering the mask before making the mould. It is quite easy to alter a face. Let me show you.”

  She lifted one of the masks from its peg and laid it on the table.

  “You see,” she said, “that this is the face of a young girl-one of my father’s models. It is a round, smooth, smiling face with a very short, weak chin and a projecting upper lip. We can change all that in a moment.”

  She took up a lump of clay, and pinching off a pellet, laid it on the right cheekbone and spread it out. Having treated the other side in the same manner, she rolled an elongated pellet with which she built up the lower lip. Then, with a larger pellet, she enlarged the chin downwards and forwards, and having added a small touch to each of the eyebrows, she dipped a sponge in thick clay-water, or ‘slip,’ and dabbed the mask all over to bring it to a uniform colour.

  “There,” she said, “it is very rough, but you see what I mean.”

  The result was truly astonishing. The weak, chubby, girlish face had been changed by these few touches into the strong, coarse face of a middle—aged woman.

  “It really is amazing!” I exclaimed. “It is a perfectly different face. I wouldn’t have believed that such a thing was possible.”

  “It is a most striking and interesting demonstration,” said Thorndyke. “But yet I don’t know that we need be so surprised. If we consider that of all the millions of persons in this island alone, each one has a face which is different from any other and yet that all those faces are made up of the same anatomical parts, we realize that the differences which distinguish one face from another must be excessively subtle and minute.”

  “We do,” agreed Marion, “especially when we are modelling a portrait bust and the likeness won’t come, although every part appears to be correct and all the measurements seem to agree. A true likeness is an extraordinarily subtle and exact piece of work.”

  “So I have always thought,” said Thorndyke. “But I mustn’t delay you any longer. May I have my precious parcel?”


  Marion hastily put the finishing touches to the not very presentable bundle and handed it to him with a smile and a bow. He then took his leave of her and I escorted him to the door, where he paused for a moment as we shook hands.

  “You are bearing my advice in mind, I hope. Gray,” he said.

  “As to keeping clear of unfrequented places? Yes, I have been very careful in that respect, and I never go abroad without the pistol. It is in my hip-pocket now. But I have seen no sign of anything to justify so much caution. I doubt if our friend is even aware of my existence, and in any case, I don’t see that he has anything against me, excepting as Miss D’Arblay’s watch-dog.”

  “Don’t be too sure, Gray,” he rejoined earnestly. “There may be certain little matters that you have overlooked. At any rate, don’t relax your caution. Give all unfrequented places a wide berth and keep a bright lookout.”

  With this final warning, he turned away and strode off down the road, while I re-entered the studio just in time to see Polton mix the first bowl of plaster, as Marion, having washed the clay from the transformed mask, dried it and rehung it on its peg.

  CHAPTER XIII

  A NARROW ESCAPE

  The statement that I had made to Thorndyke was perfectly true in substance; but it was hardly as significant in fact as the words implied. I had, it is true, in my journeyings abroad, restricted myself to well-beaten thoroughfares. But then I had had no occasion to do otherwise. Until Polton’s arrival on the scene my time had been wholly taken up in keeping a watch on Marion; and so it would have continued if I had followed my own inclination. But at the end of the first day’s work she intervened resolutely.

  “I am perfectly ashamed,” she said, “to occupy the time of two men, both of whom have their own affairs to attend to, though I can’t tell you how grateful I am to you for sacrificing yourselves.”