The Victorian Mystery Megapack: 27 Classic Mystery Tales

by Charles Dickens

  A morning or two later, Persis looked out of her window as she was dressing her hair. She dressed it herself now, though she was an American heiress, and, therefore, of course, the laziest of her kind; for she had taken an unaccountable dislike, somehow, to that quiet girl Bertha. On this particular morning, however, when Persis looked out, she saw Bertha engaged in close, apparently very intimate, conversation with the Hampstead postman. This sight disturbed the unstable equilibrium of her equanimity not a little. Why should Bertha go to the door to the postman at all? Surely it was no part of the duty of Lady Maclure’s maid to take in the letters! And why should she want to go prying into the question of who wrote to Miss Remanet? For Persis, intensely conscious herself that a note from Sir Justin lay on top of the postman’s bundle—she recognized it at once, even at that distance below, by the peculiar shape of the broad rough envelope—jumped to the natural feminine conclusion that Bertha must needs be influenced by some abstruse motive of which she herself, Persis, was, to say the very least, a component element. ’Tis a human fallacy. We’re all of us prone to see everything from a personal standpoint; indeed, the one quality which makes a man or woman into a possible novelist, good, bad, or indifferent, is just that special power of throwing himself or herself into a great many people’s personalities alternately. And this is a power possessed on an average by not one in a thousand men or not one in ten thousand women.

  Persis rang the bell violently. Bertha came up all smiles: “Did you want anything, miss?” Persis could have choked her. “Yes,” she answered, plainly, taking the bull by the horns, “I want to know what you were doing down there, prying into other people’s letters with the postman?”

  Bertha looked up at her, ever bland; she answered at once, without a second’s hesitation: “The postman’s my young man, miss; and we hope before very long now to get married.”

  “Odious thing!” Persis thought. “A glib lie always ready on the tip of her tongue for every emergency.”

  But Bertha’s full heart was beating violently. Beating with love and hope and deferred anxiety.

  A little later in the day Persis mentioned the incident casually to Lady Maclure—mainly in order to satisfy herself that the girl had been lying. Lady Maclure, however, gave a qualified assent:—

  “I believe she’s engaged to the postman,” she said. “I think I’ve heard so; though I make it a rule, you see, my dear, to know as little as I can of these people’s love affairs. They’re so very uninteresting. But Bertha certainly told me she wouldn’t leave me to get married for an indefinite period. That was only ten days ago. She said her young man wasn’t just yet in a position to make a home for her.”

  “Perhaps,” Persis suggested grimly, “something has occurred meanwhile to better her position. Such strange things crop up. She may have come into a fortune!”

  “Perhaps so,” Lady Maclure replied languidly. The subject bored her. “Though, if so, it must really have been very sudden; for I think it was the morning before you lost your jewels she told me so.”

  Persis thought that odd, but she made no comment.

  Before dinner that evening she burst suddenly into Lady Maclure’s room for a minute. Bertha was dressing her lady’s hair. Friends were coming to dine—among them Sir Justin. “How do these pearls go with my complexion, Lady Maclure?” Persis asked rather anxiously; for she specially wished to look her best that evening, for one of the party.

  “Oh, charming!” her hostess answered, with her society smile. “Never saw anything suit you better, Persis.”

  “Except my poor rubies!” Persis cried rather ruefully, for coloured gewgaws are dear to the savage and the woman. “I wish I could get them back! I wonder that man Gregory hasn’t succeeded in finding them.”

  “Oh! my dear,” Lady Maclure drawled out, “you may be sure by this time they’re safe at Amsterdam. That’s the only place in Europe now to look for them.”

  “Why to Amsterdam, my lady?” Bertha interposed suddenly, with a quick side-glance at Persis.

  Lady Maclure threw her head back in surprise at so unwonted an intrusion. “What do you want to know that for, child?” she asked, somewhat curtly. “Why, to be cut, of course. All the diamond-cutters in the world are concentrated in Amsterdam; and the first thing a thief does when he steals big jewels is to send them across, and have them cut in new shapes so that they can’t be identified.”

  “I shouldn’t have thought,” Bertha put in, calmly, “they’d have known who to send them to.”

  Lady Maclure turned to her sharply. “Why, these things,” she said, with a calm air of knowledge, “are always done by experienced thieves, who know the ropes well, and are in league with receivers the whole world over. But Gregory has his eye on Amsterdam, I’m sure, and we’ll soon hear something.”

  “Yes, my lady,” Bertha answered, in her acquiescent tone, and relapsed into silence.

  VI

  Four days later, about nine at night, that hard-worked man, the posty on the beat, stood loitering outside Sir Everard Maclure’s house, openly defying the rules of the department, in close conference with Bertha.

  “Well, any news?” Bertha asked, trembling over with excitement, for she was a very different person outside with her lover from the demure and imperturbable model maid who waited on my lady.

  “Why, yes,” the posty answered, with a low laugh of triumph. “A letter from Amsterdam! And I think we’ve fixed it!”

  Bertha almost flung herself upon him. “Oh, Harry!” she cried, all eagerness, “this is too good to be true! Then in just one other month we can really get married!”

  There was a minute’s pause, inarticulately filled up by sounds unrepresentable through the art of the type-founder. Then Harry spoke again. “It’s an awful lot of money!” he said, musing. “A regular fortune! And what’s more, Bertha, if it hadn’t been for your cleverness we never should have got it!”

  Bertha pressed his hand affectionately. Even ladies’-maids are human.

  “Well, if I hadn’t been so much in love with you,” she answered frankly, “I don’t think I could ever have had the wit to manage it. But, oh! Harry, love makes one do or try anything!”

  If Persis had heard those singular words, she would have felt no doubt was any longer possible.

  VII

  Next morning, at ten o’clock, a policeman came round, post haste, to Sir Everard’s. He asked to see Miss Remanet. When Persis came down, in her morning wrap, he had but a brief message from head-quarters to give: “Your jewels are found, miss. Will you step round and identify them?”

  Persis drove back with him, all trembling. Lady Maclure accompanied her. At the police-station they left their cab, and entered the anteroom.

  A little group had assembled there. The first person Persis distinctly made out in it was Sir Justin. A great terror seized her. Gregory had so poisoned her mind by this time with suspicion of everybody and everything she came across, that she was afraid of her own shadow. But next moment she saw clearly he wasn’t there as prisoner, or even as witness; merely as spectator. She acknowledged him with a hasty bow, and cast her eye round again. The next person she definitely distinguished was Bertha, as calm and cool as ever, but in the very centre of the group, occupying as it were the place of honour which naturally belongs to the prisoner on all similar occasions. Persis was not surprised at that; she had known it all along; she glanced meaningly at Gregory, who stood a little behind, looking by no means triumphant. Persis found his dejection odd; but he was a proud detective, and perhaps some one else had effected the capture!

  “These are your jewels, I believe,” the inspector said, holding them up; and Persis admitted it.

  “This is a painful case,” the inspector went on. “A very painful case. We grieve to have discovered such a clue against one of our own men; but as he owns to it himself, and intends to throw himself on the mercy of the Court, it’s no use talking about it. He won’t attempt to defend it; indeed, with such evidence, I think
he’s doing what’s best and wisest.”

  Persis stood there, all dazed. “I—I don’t understand,” she cried, with a swimming brain. “Who on earth are you talking about?”

  The inspector pointed mutely with one hand at Gregory; and then for the first time Persis saw he was guarded. She clapped her hand to her head. In a moment it all broke in upon her. When she had called in the police, the rubies had never been stolen at all. It was Gregory who stole them!

  She understood it now, at once. The real facts came back to her. She had taken her necklet off at night, laid it carelessly down on the dressing—table (too full of Sir Justin), covered it accidentally with her lace pocket-handkerchief, and straightway forgotten all about it. Next day she missed it, and jumped at conclusions. When Gregory came, he spied the rubies askance under the corner of the handkerchief—of course, being a woman, she had naturally looked everywhere except in the place where she had laid them—and knowing it was a safe case he had quietly pocketed them before her very eyes, all unsuspected. He felt sure nobody could accuse him of a robbery which was committed before he came, and which he had himself been called in to investigate.

  “The worst of it is,” the inspector went on, “he had woven a very ingenious case against Sir Justin O’Byrne, whom we were on the very point of arresting today, if this young woman hadn’t come in at the eleventh hour, in the very nick of time, and earned the reward by giving us the clue that led to the discovery and recovery of the jewels. They were brought over this morning by an Amsterdam detective.”

  Persis looked hard at Bertha. Bertha answered her look. “My young man was the postman, miss,” she explained, quite simply; “and after what my lady said, I put him up to watch Mr. Gregory’s delivery for a letter from Amsterdam. I’d suspected him from the very first; and when the letter came, we had him arrested at once, and found out from it who were the people at Amsterdam who had the rubies.”

  Persis gasped with astonishment. Her brain was reeling. But Gregory in the background put in one last word—

  “Well, I was right, after all,” he said, with professional pride. “I told you the very last person you’d dream of suspecting was sure to be the one that actually did it.”

  Lady O’Byrne’s rubies were very much admired at Monte Carlo last season. Mr. Gregory has found permanent employment for the next seven years at Her Majesty’s quarries on the Isle of Portland. Bertha and her postman have retired to Canada with five hundred pounds to buy a farm. And everybody says Sir Justin O’Byrne has beaten the record, after all, even for Irish baronets, by making a marriage at once of money and affection.

  PROBLEM OF THE STOLEN RUBENS, by Jacques Futrelle

  Matthew Kale made fifty million dollars out of axle grease, after which he began to patronize the high arts. It was simple enough: he had the money, and Europe had the old masters. His method of buying was simplicity itself. There were five thousand square yards, more or less, in the huge gallery of his marble mansion which were to be covered, so he bought five thousand square yards, more or less, of art. Some of it was good, some of it fair, and much of it bad. The chief picture of the collection was a Rubens, which he had picked up in Rome for fifty thousand dollars.

  Soon after acquiring his collection, Kale decided to make certain alterations in the vast room where the pictures hung. They were all taken down and stored in the ball room, equally vast, with their faces toward the wall. Meanwhile Kale and his family took refuge in a nearby hotel.

  It was at this hotel that Kale met Jules de Lesseps. De Lesseps was distinctly French, the sort of Frenchman whose conversation resembles calisthenics. He was nervous, quick, and agile, and he told Kale in confidence that he was not only a painter himself, but was a connoisseur in the high arts. Pompous in the pride of possession, Kale went to a good deal of trouble to exhibit his private collection for de Lesseps’ delectation. It happened in the ball room, and the true artist’s delight shone in the Frenchman’s eyes as he handled the pieces which were good. Some of the others made him smile, but it was an inoffensive sort of smile.

  With his own hands Kale lifted the precious Rubens and held it before the Frenchman’s eyes. It was a “Madonna and Child,” one of those wonderful creations which have endured through the years with all the sparkle and color beauty of their pristine days. Kale seemed disappointed because de Lesseps was not particularly enthusiastic about this picture.

  “Why, it’s a Rubens!” he exclaimed.

  “Yes, I see,” replied de Lesseps.

  “It cost me fifty thousand dollars.”

  “It is perhaps worth more than that,” and the Frenchman shrugged his shoulders as he turned away.

  Kale looked at him in chagrin. Could it be that de Lesseps did not understand that it was a Rubens, and that Rubens was a painter? Or was it that he had failed to hear him say that it cost him fifty thousand dollars. Kale was accustomed to seeing people bob their heads and open their eyes when he said fifty thousand dollars; therefore, “Don’t you like it?” he asked.

  “Very much indeed,” replied de Lesseps; “but I have seen it before. I saw it in Rome just a week or so before you purchased it.”

  They rummaged on through the pictures, and at last a Whistler was turned up for their inspection. It was one of the famous Thames series, a water color. De Lesseps’ face radiated excitement, and several times he glanced from the water color to the Rubens as if mentally comparing the exquisitely penciled and colored modern work with the bold, masterly technic of the old.

  Kale misunderstood the silence. “I don’t think much of this one myself,” he explained apologetically. “It’s a Whistler, and all that, and it cost me five thousand dollars, and I sort of had to have it, but still it isn’t just the kind of thing that I like. What do you think of it?”

  “I think it is perfectly wonderful!” replied the Frenchman enthusiastically. “It is the essence, the superlative, of modern work. I wonder if it would be possible,” and he turned to face Kale, “for me to make a copy of that? I have some slight skill in painting myself, and dare say I could make a fairly creditable copy of it.”

  Kale was flattered. He was more and more impressed each moment with the picture. “Why, certainly,” he replied. “I will have it sent up to the hotel, and you can—”

  “No, no, no!” interrupted de Lesseps quickly. “I wouldn’t care to accept the responsibility of having the picture in my charge. There is always a danger of fire. But if you would give me permission to come here—this room is large and airy and light, and besides it is quiet—”

  “Just as you like,” said Kale magnanimously. “I merely thought the other way would be most convenient for you.”

  De Lesseps drew near, and laid one hand on the millionaire’s arm. “My dear friend,” he said earnestly, “if these pictures were my pictures, I shouldn’t try to accommodate anybody where they were concerned. I dare say the collection as it stands cost you—”

  “Six hundred and eighty-seven thousand dollars,” volunteered Kale proudly.

  “And surely they must be well protected here in your house during your absence?”

  “There are about twenty servants in the house while the workmen are making the alterations,” said Kale, “and three of them don’t do anything but watch this room. No one can go in or out except by the door we entered—the others are locked and barred—and then only with my permission, or a written order from me. No, sir, nobody can get away with anything in this room.”

  “Excellent—excellent!” said de Lesseps admiringly. He smiled a little bit. “I am afraid I did not give you credit for being the far-sighted business man that you are.” He turned and glanced over the collection of pictures abstractedly. “A clever thief, though,” he ventured, “might cut a valuable painting, for instance the Rubens, out of the frame, roll it up, conceal it under his coat, and escape.”

  Kale laughed pleasantly and shook his head.

  It was a couple of days later at the hotel that de Lesseps brought up the subje
ct of copying the Whistler. He was profuse in his thanks when Kale volunteered to accompany him to the mansion and witness the preliminary stages of the work. They paused at the ball room door.

  “Jennings,” said Kale to the liveried servant there, “this is Mr. de Lesseps. He is to come and go as he likes. He is going to do some work in the ball room here. See that he isn’t disturbed.”

  De Lesseps noticed the Rubens leaning carelessly against some other pictures, with the holy face of the Madonna toward them. “Really, Mr. Kale,” he protested, “that picture is too valuable to be left about like that. If you will let your servants bring me some canvas, I shall wrap it and place it up on the table here off the floor. Suppose there were mice here!”

  Kale thanked him. The necessary orders were given, and finally the picture was carefully wrapped and placed beyond harm’s reach, whereupon de Lesseps adjusted himself, paper, easel, stool, and all, and began his work of copying. There Kale left him.

  Three days later Kale just happened to drop in, and found the artist still at his labor.

  “I just dropped by,” he explained, “to see how the work in the gallery was getting along. It will be finished in another week. I hope I am not disturbing you?”

  “Not at all,” said de Lesseps; “I have nearly finished. See how I am getting along?” He turned the easel toward Kale.