The Return Of Bulldog Drummond

by Sapper

  “I ain’t seen no young man, sir,” answered the convict quietly. “They was given to me by the old woman in the ’ouse ’ere, and she told me they belonged to ’er son ’oo murdered a man in the room above thirty years ago.”

  He looked upwards and pointed, and the next instant every drop of colour had left his face.

  “’Oly ’Eaven, look at that!” he screamed. “It’s the mark of wot ’e did, and I ain’t noticed it before.”

  A circular crimson patch stained the white ceiling, and for a space they all stared at it – stared at it until, with a yell of terror, the convict made a dart for the door. For the patch was growing bigger.

  The three men hurled themselves on him, and he struggled like a maniac till another blow from Drummond’s fist knocked him half silly.

  “Lemme go,” he whimpered. “I can’t abear it. I’d sooner be copped, strite I would. It weren’t there when I came: I swear it weren’t. And I ’eard ’em, guv’nor: I ’eard the ghosts a-murdering one another. And now there’s ghost blood too. It ain’t real: Gawd! it cawn’t be real. It just comes every foggy night, like wot the old woman said, and then goes away again. Let’s get out of the ’ouse, guv’nor: it’s ’orrible.”

  The man was almost mad with fear, and Drummond watched him curiously. Then once again he looked at the ceiling. The patch had grown enormously, and now a dark central nucleus was visible, in which great drops formed sluggishly and fell to the floor.

  “Come here, Morris,” he said quietly. “Put out your hand: hold it there.”

  He seized the convict’s arm, and forced it into the line of falling drops.

  “Is that ghost blood?” he demanded.

  Like a crazy thing Morris stared at the palm of his hand: then at the three men.

  “I don’t understand,” he muttered helplessly. “This ’ere is real blood.”

  “It is,” said Drummond even more quietly. “Real blood. And now we’re all going upstairs, Morris, to see where that real blood is coming from.”

  But that was too much for the convict. He flung himself on his knees, and literally gibbered in his terror.

  “Not me, guv’nor: for pity’s sake, not me! I dursn’t do it – not if you was to let me off the rest of me sentence. There’s death in the ’ouse on foggy nights: the old woman said so. As you values yer life, she says to me, don’t go up them stairs. I cawn’t understand about this ’ere blood, but it’s ghosts, don’t yer see? – ghosts wot are upstairs. I ’eard ’em.”

  “And now you’re going to see them, Morris,” answered Drummond. “There’s no good protesting, my man: you’re coming upstairs with us. Get his arms, you two fellows, and bring him along. I’ve got a pretty shrewd notion what we are going to find. I’ll go first with the torch.”

  He led the way to the stairs, while Darrell and Jerningham forced the struggling convict to follow. Once or twice he almost threw them off in his frenzied endeavours to escape, but between them they half pushed, half carried him up the stairs.

  “Stop that damned noise,” snapped Drummond, when they reached the top, “or I’ll lay you out. I want to listen.”

  But no sound broke the silence, and save for his torch there was not a glimmer of light anywhere. And after a while he led the way along a passage, the end of which was barred by a green baize door.

  “Through here,” he said, “and it should be the first room on the left, if my bearings are correct. Ah!” He drew in his breath sharply. “It’s what I expected. Bring that man in here.”

  He had flung open the door of the room, and the others followed with the convict between them.

  “Stay there, Peter, till I see if this gas will light. And mind where you put your feet.”

  He had turned his torch on the gas bracket, so that the floor was in darkness. But a moment later the light flared up, and Darrell and Jerningham gave a simultaneous gasp. Sprawling on the boards was the body of a man, clad only in a shirt and underclothes. It was obvious at a glance that he was dead; his head had been battered in with inconceivable ferocity. But his face was just recognisable: the dead man was young Marton.

  “Now, Morris,” said Drummond quietly, “is that a ghost?”

  The convict was staring foolishly at the body: his mouth kept opening and shutting, though no sound came from it.

  “I don’t understand, guv’nor,” he said hoarsely after a while. “The old woman said as ’ow it was a ghost.”

  “Where is the old woman?” demanded Drummond.

  “I dunno, guv’nor. I ain’t see’d ’er since she give me these clothes.”

  “You realise, don’t you, Morris, that those clothes you are wearing belong to that man who has been murdered?”

  “Well, I didn’t know it, guv’nor: ’ow could I? She said as ’ow they were ’er son’s.”

  “Was there ever any old woman, Morris?” cried Drummond sternly.

  “In course there were, guv’nor: ain’t I been telling yer? It was she wot told me abaht the ghost.”

  And then suddenly the real significance of his position penetrated his slow brain.

  “Gawd! guv’nor,” he screamed, “yer don’t think I did it, do yer? Yer don’t think I croaked the young gent? I ain’t never seen ’im in my life: I swears it on me mother’s grave.”

  “How long have you been in this house?” demanded Drummond.

  “It struck eight, guv’nor, as I was standing in the ’all.”

  Drummond looked at his watch.

  “So you’ve been here two hours,” he remarked. “Did anyone see or hear you come in?”

  “I suppose the old woman must ’ave, sir. And then the door opened once in the room dahn below: opened and shut, it did. She said as ’ow queer things took place in this ’ere ’ouse.”

  “Was that before she gave you those clothes?”

  “Yus, guv’nor – afore that.”

  “And before you heard the ghosts fighting up here?”

  “That’s right, sir,” said the convict eagerly. “Yer do believe me, sir: yer don’t think as ’ow I done that bloke in?”

  “It doesn’t much matter what I think, Morris,” said Drummond gravely, “but you’re in a devilish serious position, and there’s no good pretending you’re not. We find you in this house alone with a murdered man, and wearing his clothes. And all you can say about it is that some old woman who can’t be found spun you a yarn about ghosts. It’s pretty thin, my lad, and you may find the police a little difficult to convince.”

  The convict was looking round him like a trapped animal. Why this thing had been done to him he didn’t know, but all too clearly did he realise the truth of this big man’s words. The whole affair had been a frame-up from beginning to end: what he had thought were ghosts had been nothing of the sort. The noise he had heard had been the actual murder of the man who lay on the floor with his head battered in.

  And suddenly his nerve broke completely. For the moment his three captors were not looking at him, and with a cry of terror he sprang through the door and banged it behind him. Then he rushed blindly along the passage to the top of the stairs. To get away from that dead man whose clothes he wore was the only thought in his brain as he blundered through the hall. And a moment later he had flung open a window and the fog had swallowed him up.

  “Excellent,” said Drummond thoughtfully. “Thank Heavens he decided to make a bolt for it! I was wondering what we were going to do with him. Hullo!” He paused, listening intently. “Some more people playing. This house is getting quite popular.”

  He opened the door, and the sound of angry voices came up from below. And then, followed by the other two, he strolled to the top of the stairs. A light had been lit in the hall, and two men were standing there who fell silent as soon as they saw them.

  “Say,” shouted one of them after
a while, “are you the damned ginks who have eaten our supper?”

  “Perish the thought, laddies,” remarked Drummond affably. “We dined on caviare and white wine before coming to call.”

  “Well, who is the guy who rushed through the hall and jumped out of a window a few moments ago just as we were coming in?”

  “He also came to call, but he didn’t seem to like the house. He got the willies about it and decided to leave.”

  “Look here,” said the other savagely, beginning to mount the stairs, “is this whole outfit bug house? What under the sun are you doing up there anyway?”

  He paused in front of Drummond, a great, powerful, raking man with a nasty look in his eyes.

  “We’ve been ghost-hunting, Percy,” said Drummond genially. “Very naughty of us, but we thought the house was empty. And instead of that we find a delightful escaped convict replete with your supper, and other things too numerous to mention.”

  “If you call me Percy again,” snarled the other, “you won’t speak for a few days.”

  “Is that so, Percy darling?” said Drummond lazily. “I always thought it was such a nice name.”

  The veins stood out on the other’s forehead, and he took a step forward with his fists clenched. And then the look in Drummond’s eyes made him pause, while his companion whispered something in his ear.

  “Well, the house isn’t empty,” he remarked sullenly. “So you can damned well clear out before I send for the police.”

  “But how inhospitable of you,” said Drummond mildly. “However, I fear that anyway you will have to communicate with that excellent body of men. You must do something about the dead man, mustn’t you?”

  The other stared at him.

  “The dead man,” he said at length. “What in fortune are you talking about?”

  “I told you we’d found a lot of other things,” remarked Drummond. “Come along, and you shall see for yourself.”

  They walked along the passage to the room where the body lay.

  “Holy Smoke!” cried the big man, pausing by the door. “Who’s done that?”

  “Who indeed,” murmured Drummond thoughtfully.

  “Where are his clothes?” asked the other.

  “Adorning Mr Morris, the escaped convict,” said Drummond: “the gentleman who left the house so rapidly.”

  For a while the other looked at him in a puzzled way.

  “This seems to me to be a mighty rum affair,” he remarked at length.

  “Mighty rum,” agreed Drummond.

  “Since you say the convict was wearing his clothes, it looks as if he had done it.”

  “It certainly does,” Drummond again agreed.

  “What a damnable crime! Jake! if we hadn’t gone out for a breather this would never have happened. I guess I’ll never forgive myself.”

  “It sure is tough on the poor young chap,” said his companion.

  “A young friend of ours, Mr… Mr…?”

  “Drummond is my name. Captain Drummond.”

  “Hardcastle is mine. And my pal is Jake Slingsby. To think that this poor young fellow should be murdered like that: I guess I can’t get over it.”

  “The strange thing is that he should have had a premonition of danger,” remarked Drummond. “I saw him this afternoon when he lost his way in the fog.”

  “He told us he had called in at the wrong house,” said Hardcastle.

  “A call is one way of describing his visit,” murmured Drummond. “I gathered his name was Marton.”

  “That’s so. Down on business about the house. Well, well! This is terrible: I don’t know how I shall break the news to his father.”

  “Nor do I,” said Drummond. “For, unless I am greatly mistaken, his father was killed last night through a gun accident.”

  “What’s that you say?” shouted Hardcastle, and his companion seemed equally perturbed. “Old Marton dead?”

  “According to the papers he is,” answered Drummond. “It must be a great shock to you, Mr Hardcastle, to have a firm with whom you are doing business dying off so rapidly.”

  The other looked at him suspiciously, but Drummond’s face was expressionless.

  “Well, I suppose we ought to ring up the police,” he went on after a pause.

  “That would seem to be the thing to do,” remarked Drummond. “And since they will probably take some time coming on a night like this, I think we might wait for them elsewhere, don’t you? You must be very fond of fresh air, Mr Hardcastle,” he continued as they left the room.

  “How do you make that out?” demanded the other.

  “To go for a stroll on a night like this,” said Drummond. “I should have thought that a book and a whisky and soda would have been preferable.”

  “Then why don’t you follow your own advice?”

  “Ah! it was different in our case. You see, it is only on foggy nights that the ghost is supposed to walk.”

  “What is all this rot about a ghost?” said Hardcastle contemptuously. “I reckon the ghost isn’t made yet that I shall ever see.”

  “Do not scoff, Mr Hardcastle, at things beyond your ken,” said Drummond reprovingly. “What would your housekeeper say if she heard you?”

  The other paused and stared at him.

  “Housekeeper!” he cried. “What fly has stung you this time? If there’s a housekeeper here it’s the first I’ve heard of it.”

  “Really: you surprise me.”

  Drummond stopped suddenly and began to sniff the air.

  “By the way, Ted,” he remarked, “which was the room you told me was haunted? The second from the top of the stairs, wasn’t it?”

  And before anyone realised what he was going to do, he flung the door open.

  “Most extraordinary,” he said blandly. “Do you use scent, Mr Hardcastle? Or is it Mr Slingsby? But I don’t see any ghost, Ted.”

  He let the light of his torch travel round the room, until it finally rested on the bed.

  “Oh!” he cried, covering his eyes with his hand, “is that your nightie, Mr Hardcastle? Or yours, Mr Slingsby? It makes me go all over goosey.”

  But by this time Hardcastle had recovered from his surprise, and there was murder in his eyes.

  “How dare you go butting into a lady’s bedroom,” he shouted furiously. “Get out of it, you damned meddling young swine.”

  He seized Drummond by the arms, and then for half a minute there ensued a struggle the more intense because neither man moved.

  It was just a trial of strength, and the others watched it breathlessly. For to all of them it seemed that far more depended on the result than what happened at the moment. It was the first clash between the two men: the outcome would be an omen for the future.

  Their breathing came faster: the sweat stood out on both their foreheads. And then, after what seemed an eternity, Drummond began to smile, and the other to curse. Slowly and inexorably Hardcastle was forced back, and then Drummond relaxed his hold.

  “Not this time, Percy,” he remarked quietly. “And I must really apologise for entering the lady’s bedroom. It’s this confounded ghost business that is responsible for it. By the way, where is she? Did you carelessly lose her in the fog?”

  “What the hell is that to do with you?” snarled Hardcastle.

  “My dear fellow!” Drummond lifted his hands in horror. “As the president of several watch committees, to say nothing of societies for moral uplift, the thought of the owner of that delicious garment wandering forlornly over Dartmoor distresses me beyond words!”

  The other looked at him sullenly: the type was a new one to him. Accustomed all his life to being top dog, either by physical strength or through sheer force of will, he found himself confronted by a man who was his match in both.


  “You needn’t worry yourself,” he muttered. “My daughter is in Plymouth.”

  “And a charming spot it is, too,” boomed Drummond genially. “I must give you the address of the Girls’ Home from Home there: or is it the Decayed Gentlewoman’s Aid Post? Well, well – to think of that now. The jolly old daughter in Plymouth of all places! Happy days we used to have there, didn’t we, Peter, prancing along the Hoe?”

  His torch, in apparently a haphazard way, was flashing about the room as he rambled on, and suddenly it picked up a box of cigarettes lying open on the dressing-table.

  “But how careless of her, Mr Hardcastle! he cried. “They will all get stale. I must really close it up.”

  He crossed the room and shut the box: then he calmly returned and strolled towards the top of the stairs.

  “Daughter or no daughter, duty calls us, Mr Hardcastle. We must ring up that fine body of men, the Devon constabulary.”

  “A thing that ought to have been done ten minutes ago, but for your infernal impertinence,” said the other furiously.

  He crossed the hall to the telephone, and rang up the exchange. He did it again: then a third time, and gradually a smile spread over Drummond’s face.

  “Most extraordinary!” he murmured. “I expect the telephone girl is in Plymouth too. Or can it be that you aren’t connected up, Mr Hardcastle?”

  “The damned line must be out of order,” grunted the other.

  And Drummond began to shake with laughter.

  “You sure are out of luck tonight, aren’t you?” he remarked. “A dead man in the house: a daughter painting Plymouth red: a telephone that doesn’t function: and last but not least, three interfering ghost-hunters. However, don’t be despondent: the darkest hour is always just before the dawn.”

  He paused for the fraction of a second, and only Darrell saw the look that flashed momentarily into his eyes. He had noticed something, but his voice as he went on was unchanged.

  “We’ll do the ringing up for you, Mr Hardcastle, from Merridale Hall, and tell the police all your maidenly secrets. And as your next-door neighbours, welcome to our smiling countryside. Which concludes the national programme for this evening: a depression over Iceland is shortly approaching us: good night. Good night.”