The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK ™: 20 Modern and Classic Tales of Female Detectives

by Catherine Louisa Pirkis

  ‘There shall be none,’ I answered.

  The Urbane Old Gentleman leant back in his easy chair, and began dictating from his notes with tantalising deliberateness. This was the last will and testament of him, Marmaduke Courtney Ashurst. Its verbiage wearied me. I was eager for him to come to the point about Harold. Instead of that, he did what it seems is usual in such cases—set out with a number of unimportant legacies to old family servants and other hangers-on among ‘our poorer brethren.’ I fumed and fretted inwardly. Next came a series of quaint bequests of a quite novel character. ‘I give and bequeath to James Walsh and Sons, of 720 High Holborn, London, the sum of Five Hundred Pounds, in consideration of the benefit they have conferred upon humanity by the invention of a sugar-spoon or silver sugar-sifter, by means of which it is possible to dust sugar upon a tart or pudding without letting the whole or the greater part of the material run through the apertures uselessly in transit. You must have observed, Miss Cayley—with your usual perspicacity—that most sugar-sifters allow the sugar to fall through them on to the table prematurely.’

  ‘I have noticed it,’ I answered, trembling with anxiety.

  ‘James Walsh and Sons, acting on a hint from me, have succeeded in inventing a form of spoon which does not possess that regrettable drawback. “Run through the apertures uselessly in transit,” I think I said last. Yes, thank you. Very good. We will now continue. And I give and bequeath the like sum of Five Hundred Pounds—did I say, free of legacy duty? No? Then please add it to James Walsh’s clause. Five Hundred Pounds, free of legacy duty, to Thomas Webster Jones, of Wheeler Street, Soho, for his admirable invention of a pair of braces which will not slip down on the wearer’s shoulders after half an hour’s use. Most braces, you must have observed, Miss Cayley——’

  ‘My acquaintance with braces is limited, not to say abstract,’ I interposed, smiling.

  He gazed at me, and twirled his fat thumbs.

  ‘Of course,’ he murmured. ‘Of course. But most braces, you may not be aware, slip down unpleasantly on the shoulder-blade, and so lead to an awkward habit of hitching them up by the sleeve-hole of the waistcoat at frequent intervals. Such a habit must be felt to be ungraceful. Thomas Webster Jones, to whom I pointed out this error of manufacture, has invented a brace the two halves of which diverge at a higher angle than usual, and fasten further towards the centre of the body in front—pardon these details—so as to obviate that difficulty. He has given me satisfaction, and he deserves to be rewarded.’

  I heard through it all the voice of Lady Georgina observing, tartly, ‘Why the idiots can’t make braces to fit one at first passes my comprehension. But, there, my dear; the people who manufacture them are a set of born fools, and what can you expect from an imbecile?’ Mr. Ashurst was Lady Georgina, veneered with a thin layer of ingratiating urbanity. Lady Georgina was clever, and therefore acrimonious. Mr. Ashurst was astute, and therefore obsequious.

  He went on with legacies to the inventor of a sauce-bottle which did not let the last drop dribble down so as to spot the table-cloth; of a shoe-horn the handle of which did not come undone; and of a pair of sleeve-links which you could put off and on without injury to the temper. ‘A real benefactor, Miss Cayley; a real benefactor to the link-wearing classes; for he has sensibly diminished the average annual output of profane swearing.’

  When he left Five Hundred Pounds to his faithful servant Frederic Higginson, courier, I was tempted to interpose; but I refrained in time, and I was glad of it afterwards.

  At last, after many divagations, my Urbane Old Gentleman arrived at the central point—‘and I give and bequeath to my nephew, Harold Ashurst Tillington, Younger of Gledcliffe, Dumfriesshire, attaché to Her Majesty’s Embassy at Rome——’

  I waited, breathless.

  He was annoyingly dilatory. ‘My house and estate of Ashurst Court, in the County of Gloucester, and my town house at 24 Park Lane North, in London, together with the residue of all my estate, real or personal——’ and so forth.

  I breathed again. At least, I had not been called upon to disinherit Harold.

  ‘Provided always——’ he went on, in the same voice.

  I wondered what was coming.

  ‘Provided always that the said Harold Ashurst Tillington does not marry——leave a blank there, Miss Cayley. I will find out the name of the young person I desire to exclude, and fill it in afterward. I don’t recollect it at this moment, but Higginson, no doubt, will be able to supply the deficiency. In fact, I don’t think I ever heard it; though Higginson has told me all about the woman.’

  ‘Higginson?’ I inquired. ‘Is he here?’

  ‘Oh, dear, yes. You heard of him, I suppose, from Georgina. Georgina is prejudiced. He has come back to me, I am glad to say. An excellent servant, Higginson, though a trifle too omniscient. All men are equal in the eyes of their Maker, of course; but we must have due subordination. A courier ought not to be better informed than his master—or ought at least to conceal the fact dexterously. Well, Higginson knows this young person’s name; my sister wrote to me about her disgraceful conduct when she first went to Schlangenbad. An adventuress, it seems; an adventuress; quite a shocking creature. Foisted herself upon Lady Georgina in Kensington Gardens—unintroduced, if you can believe such a thing—with the most astonishing effrontery; and Georgina, who will forgive anything on earth, for the sake of what she calls originality—another name for impudence, as I am sure you must know—took the young woman with her as her maid to Germany. There, this minx tried to set her cap at my nephew Harold, who can be caught at once by a pretty face; and Harold was bowled over—almost got engaged to her. Georgina took a fancy to the girl later, having a taste for dubious people (I cannot say I approve of Georgina’s friends), and wrote again to say her first suspicions were unfounded: the young woman was in reality a paragon of virtue. But I know better than that. Georgina has no judgment. I regret to be obliged to confess it, but cleverness, I fear, is the only thing in the world my excellent sister cares for. The hussy, it seems, was certainly clever. Higginson has told me about her. He says her bare appearance would suffice to condemn her—a bold, fast, shameless, brazen-faced creature. But you will forgive me, I am sure, my dear young lady: I ought not to discuss such painted Jezebels before you. We will leave this person’s name blank. I will not sully your pen—I mean, your typewriter—by asking you to transcribe it.’

  I made up my mind at once. ‘Mr. Ashurst,’ I said, looking up from my keyboard, ‘I can give you this girl’s name; and then you can insert the proviso immediately.’

  ‘You can? My dear young lady, what a wonderful person you are! You seem to know everybody, and everything. But perhaps she was at Schlangenbad with Lady Georgina, and you were there also?’

  ‘She was,’ I answered, deliberately. ‘The name you want is—Lois Cayley!’

  He let his notes drop in his astonishment.

  I went on with my typewriting, unmoved. ‘Provided always that the said Harold Ashurst Tillington does not marry Lois Cayley; in which case I will and desire that the said estate shall pass to——whom shall I put in, Mr. Ashurst?’

  He leant forward with his fat hands on his ample knees. ‘It was really you?’ he inquired, open-mouthed.

  I nodded. ‘There is no use in denying the truth. Mr. Tillington did ask me to be his wife, and I refused him.’

  ‘But, my dear Miss Cayley——’

  ‘The difference in station?’ I said; ‘the difference, still greater, in this world’s goods? Yes, I know. I admit all that. So I declined his offer. I did not wish to ruin his prospects.’

  The Urbane Old Gentleman eyed me with a sudden tenderness in his glance. ‘Young men are lucky,’ he said, slowly, after a short pause; ‘—and— Higginson is an idiot. I say it deliberately—an idiot! How could one dream of trusting the judgment of a flunkey about a lady? My dear, excuse t
he familiarity from one who may consider himself in a certain sense a contingent uncle—suppose we amend the last clause by the omission of the word not. It strikes me as superfluous. “Provided always the said Harold Ashurst Tillington consents to marry”—I think that sounds better!’

  He looked at me with such fatherly regard that it pricked my heart ever to have poked fun at his Interpretation of Prophecy on Stock Exchange principles. I think I flushed crimson. ‘No, no,’ I answered, firmly. ‘That will not do either, please. That’s worse than the other way. You must not put it, Mr. Ashurst. I could not consent to be willed away to anybody.’

  He leant forward, with real earnestness. ‘My dear,’ he said, ‘that’s not the point. Pardon my reminding you that you are here in your capacity as my amanuensis. I am drawing up my will, and if you will allow me to say so, I cannot admit that anyone has a claim to influence me in the disposition of my Property.’

  ‘Please!’ I cried, pleadingly.

  He looked at me and paused. ‘Well,’ he went on at last, after a long interval; ‘since you insist upon it, I will leave the bequest to stand without condition.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I murmured, bending low over my machine.’

  ‘If I did as I like, though,’ he went on, ‘I should say, Unless he marries Miss Lois Cayley (who is a deal too good for him) the estate shall revert to Kynaston’s eldest son, a confounded jackass. I do not usually indulge in intemperate language; but I desire to assure you, with the utmost calmness, that Kynaston’s eldest son, Lord Southminster, is a con-founded jackass.’

  I rose and took his hand in my own spontaneously. ‘Mr. Ashurst,’ I said, ‘you may interpret prophecy as long as ever you like, but you are a dear kind old gentleman. I am truly grateful to you for your good opinion.

  ‘And you will marry Harold?’

  ‘Never,’ I answered; ‘while he is rich. I have said as much to him.’

  ‘That’s hard,’ he went on, slowly. ‘For…I should like to be your uncle.’

  I trembled all over. Elsie saved the situation by bursting in abruptly.

  I will only add that when Mr. Ashurst left, I copied the will out neatly, without erasures. The rough original I threw (somewhat carelessly) into the waste-paper basket.

  That afternoon, somebody called to fetch the fair copy for Mr. Ashurst. I went out into the front office to see him. To my surprise, it was Higginson—in his guise as courier.

  He was as astonished as myself. ‘What, you here!’ he cried. ‘You dog me!’

  ‘I was thinking the same thing of you, M. le Comte,’ I answered, curtsying.

  He made no attempt at an excuse. ‘Well, I have been sent for the will,’ he broke out, curtly.

  ‘And you were sent for the jewel-case,’ I retorted. ‘No, no, Dr. Fortescue-Langley; I am in charge of the will, and I will take it myself to Mr. Ashurst.’

  ‘I will be even with you yet,’ he snapped out. ‘I have gone back to my old trade, and am trying to lead an honest life; but you won’t let me.’

  ‘On the contrary,’ I answered, smiling a polite smile. ‘I rejoice to hear it. If you say nothing more against me to your employer, I will not disclose to him what I know about you. But if you slander me, I will. So now we understand one another.’

  And I kept the will till I could give it myself into Mr Ashurst’s own hands in his rooms that evening.

  7. THE ADVENTURE OF THE UNOBTRUSIVE OASIS

  I will not attempt to describe to you the minor episodes of our next twelve months—the manuscripts we type-wrote and the Manitous we sold. ‘Tis one of my aims in a world so rich in bores to avoid being tedious. I will merely say, therefore, that we spent the greater part of the year in Florence, where we were building up a connection, but rode back for the summer months to Switzerland, as being a livelier place for the trade in bicycles. The net result was not only that we covered our expenses, but that, as chancellor of the exchequer, I found myself with a surplus in hand at the end of the season.

  When we returned to Florence for the winter, however, I confess I began to chafe. ‘This is slow work, Elsie!’ I said. ‘I started out to go round the world; it has taken me eighteen months to travel no further than Italy! At this rate, I shall reach New York a gray-haired old lady, in a nice lace cap, and totter back into London a venerable crone on the verge of ninety.’

  However, those invaluable doctors came to my rescue unexpectedly. I do love doctors; they are always sending you off at a moment’s notice to delightful places you never dreamt of. Elsie was better, but still far from strong. I took it upon me to consult our medical attendant; and his verdict was decisive. He did just what a doctor ought to do. ‘She is getting on very well in Florence,’ he said; ‘but if you want to restore her health completely, I should advise you to take her for a winter to Egypt. After six months of the dry, warm desert air, I don’t doubt she might return to her work in London.’

  That last point I used as a lever with Elsie. She positively revels in teaching mathematics. At first, to be sure, she objected that we had only just money enough to pay our way to Cairo, and that when we got there we might starve—her favourite programme. I have not this extraordinary taste for starving; my idea is, to go where you like, and find something decent to eat when you get there. However, to humour her, I began to cast about me for a source of income. There is no absolute harm in seeing your way clear before you for a twelvemonth, though of course it deprives you of the plot-interest of poverty.

  ‘Elsie,’ I said, in my best didactic style—I excel in didactics—‘you do not learn from the lessons that life sets before you. Look at the stage, for example; the stage is universally acknowledged at the present day to be a great teacher of morals. Does not Irving say so?—and he ought to know. There is that splendid model for imitation, for instance, the Clown in the pantomime. How does Clown regulate his life? Does he take heed for the morrow? Not a bit of it! “I wish I had a goose,” he says, at some critical juncture; and just as he says it—pat—a super strolls upon the stage with a property goose on a wooden tray; and Clown cries, “Oh, look here, Joey; here’s a goose!” and proceeds to appropriate it. Then he puts his fingers in his mouth and observes, “I wish I had a few apples to make the sauce with”; and as the words escape him—pat again—a small boy with a very squeaky voice runs on, carrying a basket of apples. Clown trips him up, and bolts with the basket. There’s a model for imitation! The stage sets these great moral lessons before you regularly every Christmas; yet you fail to profit by them. Govern your life on the principles exemplified by Clown; expect to find that whatever you want will turn up with punctuality and dispatch at the proper moment. Be adventurous and you will be happy. Take that as a new maxim to put in your copy-book!’

  ‘I wish I could think so, dear,’ Elsie answered. ‘But your confidence staggers me.’

  That evening at our table-d’hôte, however, it was amply justified. A smooth-faced young man of ample girth and most prosperous exterior happened to sit next us. He had his wife with him, so I judged it safe to launch on conversation. We soon found out he was the millionaire editor-proprietor of a great London daily, with many more strings to his journalistic bow; his honoured name was Elworthy. I mentioned casually that we thought of going for the winter to Egypt. He pricked his ears up. But at the time he said nothing. After dinner, we adjourned to the cosy salon. I talked to him and his wife; and somehow, that evening, the devil entered into me. I am subject to devils. I hasten to add, they are mild ones. I had one of my reckless moods just then, however, and I reeled off rattling stories of our various adventures. Mr. Elworthy believed in youth and audacity; I could see I interested him. The more he was amused, the more reckless I became. ‘That’s bright,’ he said at last, when I told him the tale of our amateur exploits in the sale of Manitous. ‘That would make a good article!’

  ‘Yes,’ I answered, with bravado, de
termined to strike while the iron was hot. ‘What the Daily Telephone lacks is just one enlivening touch of feminine brightness.’

  He smiled. ‘What is your forte?’ he inquired.

  ‘My forte,’ I answered, ‘is—to go where I choose, and write what I like about it.’

  He smiled again. ‘And a very good new departure in journalism, too! A roving commission! Have you ever tried your hand at writing?’

  Had I ever tried! It was the ambition of my life to see myself in print; though, hitherto, it had been ineffectual. ‘I have written a few sketches,’ I answered, with becoming modesty. As a matter of fact, our office bulged with my unpublished manuscripts.

  ‘Could you let me see them?’ he asked.

  I assented, with inner joy, but outer reluctance. ‘If you wish it,’ I murmured; ‘but—you must be very lenient!’

  Though I had not told Elsie, the truth of the matter was, I had just then conceived an idea for a novel—my magnum opus—the setting of which compelled Egyptian local colour; and I was therefore dying to get to Egypt, if chance so willed it. I submitted a few of my picked manuscripts accordingly to Mr. Elworthy, in fear and trembling. He read them, cruel man, before my very eyes; I sat and waited, twiddling my thumbs, demure but apprehensive.

  When he had finished, he laid them down.

  ‘Racy!’ he said. ‘Racy! You’re quite right, Miss Cayley. That’s just what we want on the Daily Telephone. I should like to print these three,’ selecting them out, ‘at our usual rate of pay per thousand.’

  ‘You are very kind.’ But the room reeled with me.

  ‘Not at all. I am a man of business. And these are good copy. Now, about this Egypt. I will put the matter in the shape of a business proposition. Will you undertake, if I pay your passage, and your friend’s, with all travelling expenses, to let me have three descriptive articles a week, on Cairo, the Nile, Syria, and India, running to about two thousand words apiece, at three guineas a thousand?’