Case with Ropes and Rings

by Bruce, Leo

  At all this Beef did no more than chuckle complacently.

  “Just shows,” he said, “doesn’t it?”

  “Shows what?” I asked angrily. “It shows you’ve succeeded in undermining the peace and progress of the school, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Ah, well,” said Beef. “They’re only young once,” and he proceeded himself to practise the double seven, a number on which he had often told me he was weak.

  Just then young Barricharan came into the Lodge, and challenged Beef to “Three hundred and one up, start and finish on a double, best two legs out of three.”

  “On,” said Beef. “You score, Townsend.”

  “You know perfectly well,” I told him, “that Barricharan ought to be in class.”

  “Oh, shut up,” said Barricharan, with an amiable smile. “It’s only Divinity,” and he began to fix the flights in his own set of heavy brass darts.

  Beef had whipped off the archaic coat of his uniform and rolled his shirtsleeves to the elbow.

  “Nearest the centre,” he shouted, and threw a dart into the circle of the bull.

  Wishing to show that I cannot be considered a spoil-sport, however low an opinion I have of the game, I picked up pencil and paper in preparation for my task of scoring. It was soon evident that Barricharan excelled in this as in other games, for he kept close on the Sergeant’s heels from the start, in spite of the other’s years of practice. Although Beef won the first leg, the Indian needed a double when the Sergeant finished, and I found myself anticipating the second leg not without interest.

  They had only just started this, however, when there was a sudden interruption. The door of the Porter’s Lodge was pushed open, and Herbert Jones, looking even more of a sick man now that his jaundiced face was framed by a mortar-board, came in. It was evident that he was surprised and shocked to find the Indian with us.

  “You . . . here!” he said, staring at Barricharan in bewilderment.

  I felt at once that this was very much more than a matter of school discipline, and that however these two had come into contact there was something strange between them. Beef said nothing, though I thought that he looked uncomfortable. There was a silence of perhaps three-quarters of a minute before Jones seemed to pull himself together and remember that whatever else he was he was a master at Penshurst.

  “You should be in class,” he snapped, “not wasting your time here. Please go to your class immediately.”

  “Very well, Sir,” said Barricharan, but I thought that there was contempt in his voice.

  When we were alone, Jones rounded on Beef.

  “This is disgraceful,” he said. “You are disrupting the whole organisation of the school. I shall report the matter to the Headmaster.”

  Beef had a foolish grin on his face, but he did not answer, and Jones stamped out of the Porter’s Lodge.

  I found that I had guiltily concealed the scoring-paper and pencil. It is strange how in such a situation one reverts to the reactions one would have felt in boyhood. I was about to reprove Beef for putting me in this absurd position, when we heard voices through the side window of the Porter’s Lodge.

  “It is monstrous, Headmaster,” said Herbert Jones. “I find boys in the Lodge at all times. There is no respect for the curriculum at all.”

  The Rev. Horatius Knox answered gently.

  “Yes, yes,” he said. “It’s a pity that Danvers is ill. Not always easy for a new porter . . .”

  “New porter!” shouted Jones. “This man ought never to have been allowed inside the school gates. A drunken, useless fellow, who teaches the boys taproom language and pastimes. Do you know, only five minutes ago I found one of the school prefects, who ought to have been in school, playing some public-house game in there? I feel I must protest, Headmaster.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Mr. Knox mildly. “Most unfortunate.”

  Through the lace curtain of Beef’s side window I could see him pulling nervously at his lapels.

  “However, as I say, it will not be for many days, Jones.”

  Jones turned on his heel and left the Headmaster. For a moment I was afraid that the latter would come in to reprimand Beef and I tried to make him understand by gestures that he should put on his coat again, but this he would not at once understand. It was therefore a relief when I saw Mr. Knox slowly walking away with his head bent, as if in deep thought.

  “You see what you’ve done,” I said to Beef.

  “Well, I don’t see anything wrong,” he replied truculently. “It’s as good a game as any of their fancy rackets and that. Besides, Herbert Jones isn’t, rightly speaking, all there. At least, I don’t think so. Well, I must get some practice in. We’ve got the second round of the championship to-night.”

  “Championship?”

  “Yes, you know, at the ‘White Horse’,” explained Beef.

  “Where your expenses are paid, I suppose,” I put in ironically, “by Lord Edenbridge?”

  “That’s right,” said Beef cheerfully.

  Just then a small boy dashed in breathlessly.

  “I say, Briggs,” he asked. “What’s the ruling on this? Two fellows are throwing for the centre to decide who starts. One puts his arrow about an inch from the centre; the second throws his arrow, which hits a wire and comes back. Does the second have another throw for the bull or not?”

  Appealed to in this way on a matter on which he considered himself an authority, Beef became extremely ponderous.

  “Strictly speaking,” he said, “he shouldn’t. A dart which fails to stick in during a game doesn’t give the thrower another shot, does it? So why should it when you’re throwing for the middle? But for some reason or other it usually does, the opponent giving the second thrower the courtesy of an extra dart.”

  “Thanks, Briggs,” said the small boy, and hurried off to carry this important decision to the quarters which were awaiting it.

  “All of which,” I said, “doesn’t seem to be going very far towards solving the mystery of Alan Foulkes’ death. It is for that, after all, that you are employed.”

  “Don’t you be too sure it doesn’t,” said Beef. “Once before, in the Sydenham business, as I told you afterwards, the key to the whole thing had to do with darts. You keep your eyes open and watch me.”

  12

  However, I felt it my duty to keep Beef’s attention on the case.

  “Have you interviewed everybody that you need to interview?” I asked him that afternoon.

  “Not quite,” he said. “There are still one or two on my list, and perhaps the most important of all is to come. I’ve been keeping him, though, till I’ve got some of the others out of the way. I’m hoping I shall really learn something from this.”

  “Another barmaid?” I asked sarcastically.

  “No,” said Beef. “It’s Mr. Danvers, the School Porter, whose place I’m taking.”

  “And what do you think he’ll be able to tell you?”

  “A great deal, I shouldn’t be surprised. You come along with me and we’ll see.”

  I had heard much about Danvers. He was an institution at Penshurst, and one of whom the school might be proud.

  He lived in a little bungalow near the Fives Courts, which had been built specially for him by the Governors (The Worshipful Company of Master Tinkers) five years before. It was called Parvum Penshurst, and the door was opened by a bright old person whom we supposed to be his wife. Her clothes were a model of neatness and cleanliness, like those of an old Dutch peasant woman on her way to church on Sunday. She seemed to have expected us, for she showed no surprise at the fact that Beef was wearing the uniform in which she was accustomed to see her husband. In answer to Beef’s enquiry as to whether he could see Mr. Danvers, she promptly invited us in.

  “Danny is sitting up to-day,” she said. “He’s been hoping you would be along to see him.”

  We were shown into a neat little room, the walls of which were crowded with signed photographs of Old Penshurstians, wh
ile the mantelpiece and shelves had a remarkable collection of trophies from the school past.

  The old man was sitting in an armchair, wearing a thick, fleecy dressing-gown, having two or three rugs tucked round his legs. He looked wasted and frail, and I imagined that his physique, tired by long years of arduous service, had succumbed all too easily to the bout of influenza which had laid him low. His white hair was carefully brushed, however, his thin cheeks well shaved, and his pale face clean and smiling.

  “Good afternoon, gentlemen,” he said, courteously waving his hand towards two chairs. “Mr. Knox was good enough to come over himself and tell me what you gentlemen were doing. I do hope you are able to clear up this terrible business.”

  Beef gave what I felt was intended to be an encouraging smile, and stretched out his hand to the invalid.

  “I’m glad to make your acquaintance, Mr. Danvers,” he said. “I’ve heard a lot about you. I hope you feel well enough to answer a few questions.”

  “Certainly, certainly,” said the old man. “If there’s anything I can do to clear up this business, well, you know I’ll be delighted. I knew Lord Alan’s father when he was at the school. I was a young fellow then. I remember how Lord Edenbridge played a clever trick on one of the prefects of his time.” He smiled fondly at the memory. “This prefect was only a little fellow, but, like so many short ones, he was inclined to be uppish, if you know what I mean. Nothing wrong, you understand, Sir, just a little officious perhaps. Well, Lord Edenbridge was a fine, big fellow, like his sons. He wasn’t going to put up with it. Not being a prefect himself, he couldn’t very well fight the other youngster, though he had cause enough to do so. He waited till it was Larkin’s turn—Larkin was the little prefect’s name—to read the First Lesson in Chapel. Then, what do you think? He slipped into Chapel before anyone had taken his place, and turned the great Bible upside down.”

  The old man’s eyes shone with happy reminiscence, and there was a broad smile on his face.

  “Of course you can imagine the scene that followed. Oh, yes, a regular devil was Lord Edenbridge in his time, and his sons took after him.”

  Beef did not seem to be impressed with the garrulity of Danvers, though I felt that the story might have distinct significance.

  “In what way was the son mischievous?” he asked. “Young Alan, I mean.”

  Danvers shook his head and smiled again, but I fancied that there was a queer glint in his eye, as though he viewed the matter not quite with the tolerance that his words suggested.

  “Oh, a regular devil was this one, Sir,” he said. “Of course, I’m getting along in years, and the boys are given to making fun of me a little now and then. Nothing to take exception to, you understand. Well, Lord Alan was the worst of the lot. Always coming into my Lodge with some story or other. But there you are, I’m used to that,” and he wagged his head complacently again.

  “Did you know that he used to break out at night?”

  “Bless you, yes. There wasn’t much that went on in the school that I didn’t know, though it wouldn’t do for me to repeat all I could about the young gentlemen. In this case, Lord Alan took me straight into his confidence. ‘Danny,’ he said. ‘If ever you should see me in the grounds at night you must keep your mouth shut,’ and, of course, I’m not going to pretend that he didn’t show his appreciation of that. His father was very generous with him, and it wouldn’t have been like him not to reward me.”

  “It’s very frank of you to tell us that,” said Beef. “What more do you know?”

  Thus encouraged, Danvers continued.

  “Well, I had been a little worried lately,” he said, “by stories of what Lord Alan was up to. I had heard that there was a young lady in the town, employed in one of the public-houses, I believe. I did venture to suggest to Lord Alan once that an association of this kind was not very desirable for a gentleman in his position, but he went his own way, as you can well imagine.”

  “Did you watch the boxing that evening?” asked Beef.

  “No. It’s the first time I’ve missed seeing the championship for seventeen years, but my wife insisted on my going to bed that night. I hadn’t been well for nearly a week then, and when she took my temperature and found it was over a hundred she wouldn’t let me go and see the fights.”

  “So when was the last time you saw Lord Alan?” asked Beef.

  “It must have been about five o’clock that afternoon. He came into my Lodge, his normal boisterous self, you know, Sir.” Once again I thought that I caught that curious flash in the old man’s eye. “‘Ah, Danny,’ he said, ‘boxing to-night,’ and he gave me one of his playful little knocks in the chest. I don’t suppose I should have noticed if at any other time, but feeling as I did that day it upset me rather. However, he went on to tell me that he meant to go out after the boxing, and that I mustn’t be surprised if I heard him coming in late. He generally used to warn me when he was slipping out, because one evening, when I hadn’t known of this, I called out, ‘Who’s there?’ from my bedroom window, and he had to come across and explain. As he said at the time, it might have got him caught, so since then I have always been prepared for his return.”

  “Did you hear it that evening?” asked Beef.

  The old man’s face grew very serious.

  “Yes,” he said. “I heard it, and there was something very strange about it, too.”

  “What was that?” asked Beef.

  “Well, as I say, I went to bed early that evening with a temperature, but I couldn’t sleep. I lay awake in my little bedroom, on the corner of the house there, long after my wife had gone to bed in the other room, and long after she was asleep. I was thinking of this and that, of old days here at the school, of so many fine young fellows who have passed on, and wondering when my time would come. I really must have been ill that evening, for I had such morbid thoughts you would hardly believe. Do you know, I was thinking of my funeral, Sir. That’s a funny thing to think about, isn’t it? I thought to myself, it might be only the School Porter they were burying, but it would be as big a turn-out as they’ve ever had, bigger than the year before last, when one of the junior masters died of pneumonia in the middle of the winter term. But then he’d only been at the school for a couple of years. So there I lay, twisting and turning, when at about eleven o’clock I heard the little iron gate creak, and I thought to myself: ‘That’s Lord Alan coming home. He’s early to-night.’ You see, he us’n’t generally to get in till midnight, what with having to see the young lady home, and she, working in a bar, wasn’t free till a quarter on an hour after closing time—that’s to say, not till a quarter to eleven in the summer. And besides, she lived right the other end of the town. I used to reckon round about midnight he’d get in, or within ten minutes of it one way or another. But I know this time that it was before eleven. I looked at my watch when I first heard it, and I heard the school clock strike just after he’d gone by.”

  “What was there strange about it besides that he was early?” asked Beef.

  Danvers frowned.

  “Well, I’ll tell you, Sir,” he said. “Every time I heard Lord Alan come in, he would come in walking as he always did, quick and sprightly, but that night there was something very different. He seemed to be dragging something along with him. He would take a step, and there would be a sort of scraping on the gravel, as though he had a sack so heavy that he could only pull it a yard at a time as he walked. It had a queer effect—one, scrape; one, scrape; one, scrape.”

  “Mmmm,” said Beef thoughtfully. “How do you know it was him?”

  “Well, he called out to me, Sir, like he often did if my light was still on.”

  “Sure it was his voice?” asked Beef.

  “No doubt about it, Sir. He didn’t just say ‘Good-night’.”

  “What did he say, then?”

  “Well, first of all he said, ‘Good-night, Danny,’ and then when he heard me answer him he asked if I’d heard the result of the fight. I told him I had, my w
ife having been out for the news for me. He said: ‘Shame, wasn’t it, winning it on a foul?’ and I called out, ‘Yes, Sir, hard luck. But I’m glad you won.’ He says, ‘See you in the morning,’ and off he goes.”

  “Still dragging whatever it was?” asked Beef.

  “Well, I could still hear the noise, Sir, and he went away ever so slowly.”

  “Yes, that is interesting,” admitted Beef. “I’m glad you told me all that. You didn’t hear him again that night?”

  “No, Sir, not a sound. I think I must have dropped asleep soon after that, and I knew nothing more till it was daylight and my wife was in the room.”

  “Well, thank you very much,” nodded Beef. “You may have helped me considerably.”

  “I hope so, indeed, Sir,” said Danvers. “How do you like the task, if I may venture to ask?”

  “The task?” repeated Beef. “Do you mean detection?”

  “Oh, no,” smiled the old man. “Something much more important. My job, which I understand you are doing.”

  “Oh, bells and that,” said Beef, almost contemptuously.

  “The bells are very important,” was Danvers’ comment. “You know, there’s one that rings in the range just beside me here, and I can follow the whole day right through. Once or twice you’ve been a bit late with them,” he added, with gentle reproof.

  “Well, there you are,” countered Beef.

  “If you knew the effect that had on me,” went on Danvers, “I’m sure you would manage to be punctual. My wife says it sends my temperature up if the bell’s late. You see, it’s so many years now that I’ve had to ring that bell that it’s become part of my life, you might say.”

  “You don’t want to get too taken up with anything like that,” said Beef.

  “Ah, but you will try to bear it in mind, won’t you?” pleaded the Porter. “Punctuality, that’s the thing. And I’m sure you’ll enjoy the job till I’m better.”

  Beef nodded, and held out his hand.

  “Well, good-bye, old chap,” said Beef gruffly.