by David Pirie
Suddenly there was a great cry from in front of me. I had not noticed the figure, for it was far ahead, at a point where the path curved away to take account of a further landslide, but it had seen me and was waving.
Moving quickly on, I recognised the solid outline of Dr Bulweather, his dog not far behind. However, much of his attention was centred on something below. Indeed he was standing in the teeth of the gale, which sent his black coat fluttering behind him like a bat and I was amazed the hat was still on that great head.
He turned as I came closer. ‘I am very glad to see you,’ he shouted into the wind, smiling. ‘I believe I have solved one of the mysteries, though only the smallest.’
He pointed with his stick directly below him. Soon I was beside him, and I will admit it was a fearful place to stand. If any more of the cliff gave way while we were in this spot there would be no hope for either of us. And the wind only had to go up a notch to sweep us over. I kept my balance on the back foot as I struggled to see what he had found.
At first I could make out nothing except the swooping seagulls and roaring waves. But then I steadied myself and leant forward. Following the line of his stick, I observed that ninety or so yards beneath and across from us was a rocky outcrop. A dark shape lay upon it. At first I could not be sure what this was. Then I made out the leg and a large head and ears. At once my mind raced back to Jefford’s room and that great stain of blood. So now it seemed the sceptics’ hopes of an innocent explanation for all that blood were utterly dashed.
For lying below me, perfectly intact though long dead, was a huge pig.
THE SNOW ON THE BEACH
I was shouting my confirmation of the sight when the wind suddenly whipped up and we lurched forward. Bulweather clapped a hand on my shoulder and, for a second, the weight of it might have caused me to lose my balance altogether but he got a firm hold and yanked me back and away from the edge, throwing his own weight backwards too.
‘My apologies,’ he said as we took a few more paces for additional safety until we reached his waiting dog. ‘I did not mean to manhandle you but I know the treacheries of this cliff in the wind as well as anyone and it was my fault for putting you at risk. Did you see it?’
‘Yes, it is the lost pig,’ I said, my heart still racing, for I knew how close we had come to calamity.
‘It must be.’ He nodded. ‘And we almost suffered the same fate. Well at least we can tell Dr Bell we have eliminated one theory about the blood in Jefford’s house.’
Together we walked back along the cliff, though we had learnt our lesson and kept well away from the edge. Naturally we talked of the case, and Bulweather said he was obeying Bell’s injunction to look for any guest or stranger in the houses he visited. It so happened he had been called out to the house of Inspector Langton whose leg was giving him trouble. ‘It was a wound he contracted in a fall in London and he is never quite free of it. There was somebody else in the house and he saw I was aware of it. He told me he had a friend from London staying a while, an old colleague.’
We had almost reached Dunwich now and, before we went down the path, we both took one last look at the majestic view. It was becoming colder and Bulweather pointed up with his stick to where a great ridge of white cloud had gathered to the east over the North Sea. ‘We are in for some weather,’ he said. ‘Well, that is the nature of the place.’
Of course, he insisted I return to his house for some refreshment. And soon we were by his fireside with hot tea and scones and had fallen to talking about medicine and my early experiences as a doctor. I can still see his eager face as he sat forward in his armchair, munching a buttered scone. He was intrigued to hear about my many initial difficulties in practice in Southsea, for he obviously loved nothing more than to talk about such things.
‘So was medicine always your vocation?’ he asked.
I hesitated and then I decided for once in my life I would be honest on this question, for — despite his own sadness — this man had ultimately been honest with us.
‘No it was not, in fact it was not even my idea,’ I said.
‘So it was your father’s?’ he replied. ‘That is not so unusual.’
‘No,’ I said doggedly. ‘It was not my father’s. My father has suffered from a long illness. It was a friend of the family who suggested it.’
I had never quite admitted this to anyone before. I had, of course, confided to Elsbeth about my father’s illness and done so in detail but I had not thought it necessary to tell her I owed my medical career to a man who was not even part of my family and whose influence over my mother I had come to distrust.
Bulweather, however, showed little surprise. ‘Well,’ said cheerfully, ‘we all come to medicine in a variety of ways, what matters is that we arrive there. And it is good you have. I am sorry, though, to hear of your father’s malady. There is nothing harder in the world than facing up to the illness of those we love. We have that in common.’
I wondered whether to tell him now we had more in common even than that, for my father’s malady was a nervous condition quite as crippling to the pursuit of a normal life as that which afflicted his wife’s sister. But I decided I would wait to talk of this another time. And we moved on to discuss more positive things.
The discussion in front of that comfortable fire proved so absorbing I suddenly realised with a start I must be getting back to the inn, for I had promised the Doctor I would be on hand. Bulweather urged me to bring Bell back to dine that night for he had Angus Hare and Sir Walter as guests, but I told him I could not be sure of the Doctor’s plans and must therefore decline.
Outside it was already starting to get dark and had become very cold. When I reached the inn, the landlord handed me an envelope marked urgent. It was for Bell but I tore it open.
Please come at once. Ellie has gone.
Leonora Marner
Fortunately, Bell arrived just as I was setting off, stepping down from his cab and smiling as he saw me. At once I thrust the note into his hand, explaining it had just arrived. He took one look at it and his smile vanished.
It was not yet dark, but the whole village seemed quite deserted and a few flakes of snow were starting to fall. As we made our way along the street and came to Leonora Marner’s house I told Bell of our discovery of the missing pig. And also the intelligence about Langton’s guest. But what might have interested him a day earlier now seemed minor, for all his attention was on the note in his hand. Mrs Marner came to the door almost at once, wrapped in an elegant shawl, looking extremely concerned.
‘Oh but I hope she is all right,’ she said as she led us through into the main room where the cat was in the corner, staring at us as we entered. ‘Her cat is back here at least, that gives me hope.’
‘Would you please tell us,’ said Bell, ‘when you found Ellie was gone?’ His tone was gentle but I could see great concern in his eyes.
‘Certainly,’ she answered. ‘I went out for my walk as usual at around two. I left her here. As a matter of fact, she was in this room, for she does her sewing here sometimes after lunch. I took quite a long walk up the hill and then I called on Miss Charlotte Jefford in the inn. I find her a sweet person and we have become fast friends. She too is bothered by these accusations.’
‘And you returned here when?’ said Bell.
‘It was after four. The house was entirely empty, Ellie’s sewing had been put away. The cat was back a little later.’
‘Had she taken anything?’ Bell’s eyes flitted around the room.
‘She wears her coat and boots, no personal things have gone.’
I saw a flicker of anxiety cross Bell’s face. ‘Tell me, Mrs Marner,’ he said, ‘how exactly had Ellie been acting today since we were here? How was her manner?’
‘She was still a little nervous but I thought she seemed slightly more at ease except—’ She broke off.
‘Yes?’ the Doctor pressed.
Well, she would pace about a little. She would walk to the win
dow and stare out then return to her chair. I wondered if she was frightened some ill-wisher was outside but there was nobody about.’
Bell turned to the window, which had a view of the street. ‘Do you mind if I look around your house, Mrs Marner? It may be important.’
Her permission was granted and Bell wasted no time. He went straight to the waste-paper basket and looked into it. He found nothing and went out to the hall. There he bent down before another waste receptacle and seemed to see something, a ball of paper.
He took it out and unwrapped it. In his hand was an envelope with handwriting upon it. One word only: Ellie.
The envelope was empty but Bell seemed very excited. ‘Mrs Marner,’ he said, ‘this may be very important. You have mentioned that Ellie walked out with Colin Harding. Have you any idea where?’
‘Well, I believe she went to the servants’ quarters at Greyfriars House.’
‘But anywhere else? I must urge you to think.’ She considered. ‘Why, I recall they sometimes walked along the beach.’
Bell turned to the door at once. ‘You will stay here, Mrs Marner, in case she reappears.’
In the street it was now bitterly cold and tiny flakes of snow were falling in the last of the light. They were not thick but seemed to add to our growing sense of apprehension. We made our way as quickly as possible down the little path and then turned out on to the beach. There was not a soul to be seen as the wind blew the snowflakes in our faces.
Bell scanned the narrow belt of shingle, swinging his silver-topped cane. On these pebbles it was hard to see anything but he detected what he thought were some imprints and we moved off.
Once the shingle gave way to sand, it became far easier, for here the footprints were quite clear. The feet were small but it was notable that no marks returned in the other direction.
We plunged on along the sand, jumping the black groynes leading down to the water, and I remember the grimness of the Doctor’s face in the light from the sea. The beach at Dunwich extends for miles to the north and very soon there is no sign of human habitation, not a human creature, just the sea on your right and the marshland on your left, but still the footprints stretched out before us. Indeed there was something quite horrible about the way they led on and on into such desolation.
Soon, we were running. I even called Ellie’s name but there was no response, not even the sound of a gull on that endless beach as the snow fell.
And then all of a sudden Bell stopped short, for he had seen, before I had, that the footprints veered off up the beach towards the marsh. We raced up the sand and had soon reached a watery waste where of course all obvious marks stopped. Was there hope I wondered. Had she somehow crossed this expanse and turned back towards the town? I was about to voice it when Bell gave a cry and pointed.
A grey shape lay on a reedy bank, not twenty yards away. It was bunched up oddly. A trench of shallow water ran between us and the place but we waded across this with ease.
Ellie Barnes was on the bank but she was not destined to tell us or anyone else what had led her there. She lay on her back, arms beside her, the snowflakes landing and melting on her open eyes. Her mouth was one great gaping bloody wound. And her tongue, neatly excised, lay beside her hand.
PART FOUR:
THE RUNE AND THE DEATHS
THE WRITING IN THE WATER
As Ellie Barnes was carried off the sands by a sombre, torchlit procession, I tried desperately to suppress a torrent of memories. For Elsbeth’s body had been found on a beach.
Bell himself was ashen grey, talking grimly to Langton, before he returned with me to resume his search of the site. There was no question that the business was now serious and it was likely, the Inspector thought, that a Scotland Yard man would join us some time the following day. As to the post-mortem, since foul play was certain, Bell would have to concede the body to the official pathologist in Lowestoft, though he had already established there was little to see other than the savage wound which had so obviously caused death.
‘But what possessed her to come out here in the first place?’ said Langton. ‘She knew nobody else beside Mrs Marner and Colin Harding who was dead.’
‘That may be so,’ said Bell as we approached the site. ‘Yet something did possess her. She came here, I am persuaded, because of her belief in it. If we could but find the letter that summoned her, yet it was not on her person. We can only suppose her murderer removed it.’
Once back at the spot in the marsh, the Doctor paid particular attention to the water around the bank where Ellie had been found. He had borrowed some waders and now stood knee-deep in freezing water as two men on the bank close by illuminated his way with lanterns.
Even in that cold miserable place, it was an unforgettable sight. The two shadowy figures with stick lanterns bent forward to send their beams of light down on this eagle-featured figure crouching above the water like some human heron, while the tiny snowflakes fell all around.
I imagine Bell was calculating whether the letter could have been in Ellie’s hand and dropped into the water as she was struck down. This was why he concentrated on a spot near to the corpse’s right hand and then worked his way on and round, constantly trawling his own hand in the depths for, despite the lanterns, he could see very little of the bottom.
It was so cold, the Doctor had to withdraw the hand frequently but, despite my protests, he would not let me join him. ‘If it is there other feet may stamp on it and destroy it completely. It is better you leave this to me,’ he replied, for all the world as if he were discussing some map he had laid out before the fire in his study rather than the waters of a muddy marsh at midnight on the easternmost tip of England.
He had come about halfway round the bank when his expression changed and he plunged his other hand in the water as well. There was a long delay and I could only guess how cold his fingers were becoming, but very slowly he drew out a sodden and folded piece of paper. There was clearly writing on it of a kind and once he had seen this he placed it carefully in a small dry bag he had brought for possible evidence. I could see his fingers were blue and I insisted he stopped now and let the men continue or waited till morning. After a time, he agreed.
Since Mrs Marner was being consoled by her sister, and Dr Bulweather had kindly gone to see they were all right, Bell and I returned to the inn to examine the paper. He unpacked it with enormous care in his room, remarking how fortunate we were that it had remained intact.
What Bell had pulled out of the marsh was a handwritten letter, although much of the writing was illegible where the ink had bled and faded. Indeed there were only about forty character we could decipher.
The Doctor showed real satisfaction. ‘We are very lucky,’ he said, ‘because the best line with pairs of letters comes in the middle, no doubt because the water was held off slightly by the fold in the paper. Indeed, it confirms what I suspected.’
But after a few moments, as he stared, his face fell. ‘So she had it,’ he said, ‘making me a fool for not pressing harder. I could have saved her life.’ He did not, however, elucidate. Instead a copy was made and he handed it to me to see what I could do. I still have it beside me now.
‘So, Doyle,’ he said after I had puzzled over this for a time, ‘what can you deduce?’
‘Certainly some words are easy enough,’ I agreed. ‘The second is “am”, the fourth “the”, the eighth “you”. The last line must begin “you” and end with it too. I suppose I could do better with more time but what I cannot understand is why the thing begins and ends with the same word. For the first must surely be the address “Ellie” and yet so it seems is the last. Is she writing letters to herself?’
He moved over from the fire he had asked to be made up in his room where he was thawing his hands and took it up again at once. ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘well that is not very likely but to be fair I am coming to it with assumptions which you lack. You see,’ he said, leaning forward again to pore over it, ‘there are two principal ways
of approaching a simple task such as this, which has none of the complexities of a cipher. The one most favoured is to rely on the commonest of words and phraseology which is exactly what you have done with your deductions. For example, that after the greeting the first two words are “I am”. That is indeed hardly a deduction at all in the sense there is nothing else in the world they could be. Assuming the writer is literate, no other letter in the English alphabet could be inserted here and fit.
‘However,’ he continued, ‘I believe we can assume literacy, given the general care of the characters. Therefore you moved swiftly to identify obvious words but you could have taken it far further. Let us look for example at the ten commonest verbs in English which are, in order: be, have, do, say, make, go, take, come, see, and get.
‘Now, can we see any of those here? Indeed we can at the start of line three there is an obvious “Come”. And considering two other lines have “You” with a capital, I think we can say definitively this is a letter largely of instruction, apart from the first line which is information about its writer.
‘Now,’ he went on, ‘it would be possible to apply the rules I have just outlined and solve it but it would take a few minutes. I had a far easier way than that, for I already knew something of this letter before I found it. It was obvious from all Ellie Barnes had told us that someone was manipulating her feelings in some way. Colin Harding was a strong possibility with all his talk of runes, but after he was found dead, I still received that distinct impression. This, rather than any fear of the superstitious townsfolk, was why I insisted she stayed inside the house. But then today Mrs Marner told us how Ellie kept watching the window. She was clearly waiting either for someone or more likely some communication. You saw me find the envelope in which it arrived and now we have the communication itself.
‘Therefore, at once I start to look for words that I associate with the girl and what is clearly preoccupying her, making the task no more difficult than the clues in a crossword puzzle. Immediately it seemed very likely the noun after “the” (which you identified in the first line) is “spell”. And on the second line, surely “frightened” is unmistakable as the fifth word, not only because I associate it strongly with her but also because only a tiny number of words in the language have ten letters beginning fr and the others, “frequented” for example, cannot be intelligible here.
