“When he got into the library, Rupert was standing frowningly regarding the safe. Your cousin appeared to have been engaged in the writing of a letter which still lay on the table across the room. He turned to Venson. ‘Venson, give me those pliers — ’ he began, ‘because — well for God’s sake man, what in hell happened to your face? Did you have a fight with a flapper?’ Venson sheepishly told him about the cat. Your cousin, nodding, took the pliers. ‘I want to make one final experiment,’ he explained, ‘on this damned load of tricks. The noses won’t push in; they won’t bend. So I’m wondering if by any chance they’d twist.’ He stooped down and placing the hem of his silk handkerchief in the jaws of the pliers seized with it the lower-left gargoyle nose, which he twisted or attempted to twist to left and right with the tool.
“Venson was intrigued. That Chinese safe had always intrigued him. Many was the time he had seen Rupert deposit papers and bonds and money in it, and yet a few minutes later, when it would be reopened for something, Venson would see only an empty interior. He knew that some secret repository, accessible only after one got inside, existed in it, but that’s all he did know. Only that afternoon he had helped Rupert tally and check up the coupons on 25,000 dollars in gold liberty bonds of the 1st, 2nd and 5th issues, bought by your cousin back in the days when if one were not in the trenches, one had to buy till it hurt, as the saying went. Venson had seen them go back into the wooden vault, and after Rupert, his head and shoulders inside the safe, had pottered about therein for a moment or two the door had been closed and the bonds had not come out again. Strange, Venson wondered, where they went, for they were always accessible yet never in sight.
“So, bewitched with a fascination equal to that other unanalysable fascination that had drawn him, a poverty-ridden descendant of Captain Josiah Quarlbush, to the service of a wealthy descendant of Captain Kidd, he watched your cousin try to twist in turn both of the lower gargoyle noses, then the right-hand upper one and then, still stooping just a bit to watch his own efforts, the left-hand upper one. What happened then happened in a twinkling. With a shot, a cry, Rupert stiffened up and fell over backwards and Venson, rubbing his eyes, saw not only that the green jade eye of the left upper gargoyle had become transformed into a gaping black hole, but that a stream of smoke was pouring forth from that hole.
“He leaped forward, and kneeling down gazed at the powder-smeared forehead, the bleeding wound in Rupert’s head. He listened for Rupert’s heartbeat, but could detect none. That Rupert had been the victim of some sort of weird automatic gun-trap was evident; but it was not given to Venson to know fully just what, until to-day. However, as he stood there the idea came to him: had Rupert been only grazed by the bullet? If so, then a doctor could help. With which reflection Venson hastened from the library and across the narrow hallway outside its threshold into the bathroom on that floor, took from a hook a washcloth and turning on the hot-water faucet long enough for the water to run hot, he soaked the cloth and wrung it partly out.
“Now the threshold of the second-floor bathroom in that house lies on a direct line with the window of the upstairs library, and as Venson went to step forth from the darkness of that bathroom, washcloth in hand, he was astounded to see a man in the tree outside the library. The man could not see him, Venson, because Venson was in the dark. Nor could Venson see the man’s face, for the latter had one arm up, holding on to a limb of the tree, and the arm cut off all but the forehead and eyes. All Venson could note was red hair, bright red, showing from beneath a hat tilted back; the collar of a grey overcoat, open; a dark suit perhaps blue or perhaps black beneath that, and a white collar. That was all — that and a pair of horror-stricken blue eyes.
“We know now that the horror-stricken blue eyes peering in from that tree were the eyes of Archibald Chalmers himself, who was getting the shock of his life. The very first idea, however, that flashed across Venson’s mind is better phrased by his own later testimony to-day. Said he: ‘I was sure it was one of that drinkin’, carousin’ outfit up at Lake Forest where young Mr. van Slyke had jumped the show the last minute, come down to make trouble or get revenge: if it wasn’t that, it might be a brother of one of the many girls Mr. van Slyke was always foolin’ around, spying on him.’
“Venson hastened across the floor of the library, and peered out of the dark window. But the man was gone. He had slid, clambered down, and had disappeared in a hurry. With which Venson kneeled down and wiped the blood away from Rupert’s forehead, the operation incidentally obliterating the powder-stains also. No hope! It was no flesh wound. There was a blue hole directly to the right of the middle of the forehead. So Venson prepared to call the police.
“But he was still mystified about exactly what had happened here to-night. And thus it was that Venson went over the table where that unfinished letter, with the fountain pen nearby, lay. He picked it gingerly up. And — but here,” Crosby added, “is a copy of the letter itself.” He took from his pocket a typed sheet of paper from which he read off the following uncompleted missive:
International Curio Company,
London, E.C.4, England.
GENTLEMEN,
Some nine years ago I sent an announcement in multiplicate to all the curio and antique companies and independent agents throughout the world, including yourselves, that in view of the fact that I was the only living descendant of Captain William Kidd, the mariner and alleged pirate, I was in the market for Kidd mementoes of all sorts for my contemplated collection.
You were kind enough to put me in touch with various authentic objects appertaining to Captain Kidd, but one item in particular has proved to be of no value for my collection. I refer to the Cheng safe, or strong-box, which some two years later you wrote me had come into the hands of your agents in Canton from an old Chinese family living on the outskirts. I purchased it for 1,000 dollars and had it shipped to Chicago.
I have long ago concluded, however, that it is not a legitimate Kidd relic. As dealers yourselves, you will recall that the mark of Crown and Boot was used by various people associated with Kidd as well as by Kidd. Therefore I would like to re-offer the safe through you to such collectors as may be specializing in — say — Chinese antiques, at a price sufficient to cover only my original investment plus your commission. Say 1,125 dollars?
The Cheng safe, I should like to add incidentally, is of practical utility, so far as keeping valuables. It contains a secret recess which I have no hesitation in saying would defy the most astute professional lock-picker and safe-prowler living, a recess copious enough to serve the fiscal needs of any business house. It took me three years of patient endeavour to find the exact combinations of locations and pressings that revealed the secret compartment in the base, and this recess which I use myself unhesitatingly for my own valuables, is the thing which makes a practical utility of the antique. As for the top block, I have never been able to uncover anything of interest. Pressing inlays accomplishes nothing. Pressing or exerting lateral force on the gargoyle-like noses, pressing the gargoyle-eyes, likewise avails nothing. It is possible that — say — twisting or turning one of the noses might —
“And there the letter stopped?” asked Leslie van Slyke sadly, as Crosby silently handed the copy to him and he glanced at its bottom line. “I suppose no sooner had the idea come to Rupert in writing it than he — ”
“Put the idea into execution,” Crosby nodded. “At least as soon as Venson got upstairs with the pliers. The man who burned that crown and boot on the underside of that safe surely laid a decoy for the family of Kidd.”
“And was that his intention? “asked Leslie van Slyke.
“No,” was Crosby’s reply. “It was Kidd — Captain Kidd — he was after — not Kidd’s great-great-great-grandson many times removed!” The lawyer now went into his vest pocket and withdrew another paper. “While we are on the subject of Captain Kidd and his associates and — well — assistants, it might be of interest to show you this copy made of the old parchment roll fo
und in the compartment back of that left upper gargoyle.” He now handed over to van Slyke a typewritten sheet of foolscap which read:
this strongebox was made in the yeare of our Lorde 1699 in the heathenyshe provynce of Hung Sang Yin out of Canton by me, Josiah Quarlbush, once apprentice watchemaker at the Blue Anchor of the Lower Walk of the New Exchange, London, againe able seaman, still againe late master an parte owner of the barke Sea Swallow, an now by the Grace of God the respekt’d agent at Canton for the greate companie call’d The Governor and the Companie of Merchants of London Trading in the East Indies. in the making of whiche I was aided by my friend Cheng Le Tsang of Canton, once worker in woodes an jades, now mandaryn. which strongebox god willing will yet wype out that monster Willyum Kidd, whom it is meete that he be despatch’d, when he it is who hath despoiled me and robb’d me of my goode legge an right hande
for did Willyum Kidd set greate store by me whilst I in his fowle servyce was impresst, an did he once aprivatlie relate to me over many a beaker of goode bomboo astrenthen’d with Jamaic rum, he deepe in his cuppes an noisome an asinging that I was his jollie bonnie friend ho, the following strange tale, the whole of which he did say he had never relat’d to no man, to-wit, that in the yeare 1697 he did capchure a Porchugeser shippe ill layd’n, of 175 tons burthen, whiche did carrie onlie 30 bales calikos silks an muslins, 20 tons refin’d sugar, 17 tons salt petre, 5 tons of iron in shorte junks, 1 ton spices, and in the shipmaster’s coffers but 120 pieces-of-eight; pityingly for suche povertie he did sette the shippe an crewe back upon the sea to go; yet — holde — did he take therefrom a Chinese mandaryn to be a lingoister in his fowle profession, the better to decoy into his graspe the riche Chinese junks a-crossing the Indian Ocean: but the Chinese mandaryn a-being strange to the Physick of the whyte man did die aboard Kidds good shippe Ye advenchure and before he did die did he tell Kidd that the poore Porchugeser vessel had carry’d the noble forchune of 10,000 coynes of Arabian gold a-pack’d in the hollow toppe of an ancient Chinese strongebox in the captains cabbin, whiche to gaine access must man twyste the draggons nose on the lefte syde of the toppe the whiche when he heard from the dying mandaryn did Kidd curse his own stupydity and the clever tricke that had been a-play’d upon him
oh ye damn Kidd that I were able the seas to sail, to shoote a musket ball through thy damn’d foreheade. but my life in the heathen lande of China is peaceful and this is not to be
yet do I fashion by the aide of my friend Cheng, whose barque the Hing-Si was a-plunder’d by Kidd, one other Chinese strongebox fulle with the same trycks of sliding doors and many recesses the like of that whiche the mandaryn did descrybe to Kidd as on the trickie Porchugeser, and withal another four draggons with noses like to the gargoyles on Notre Dame in Paris, but with the nose of the lefte upper a-fixt to a leathern thong attach’d to the trustie trigger of a flintlocke an the flashpan a-prim’d with fuse immers’d in the harden’d mixture of cows-hoof an goode Chinese gunpowder whiche though a heathenysh mixture spoileth not with time bless God an the barrell containing one leaden ball a-ramm’d in tight with a pucker of chamois that it rattle not
an it shall be that this strongebox with silks a-laden I and Cheng shall despatch the India Ocean across by way of Bombay thence to Zanzibar thence by the grace of our many goode friends from Zanzibar back to Bombay, an then back, an thus ever to and fro, back and forth, by ship and barque, withal them as be slow an weake an easy of capchure
then doth for a surety Kidd who prowleth in the India Ocean like a greate spyder capchure the slow vessel for he feareth much our goode Kinge Willyum God bless him an will not sinke his prey but durst only take their goods on forge French passes the whyche captains will surrender unto him rather than exchange shots. thus doth Kidd when he capchureth the vessel on whiche shall be the trick strongebox heare from his men of the strange Chinese box that containeth only silks but will he avaryciously scorn the silks therein and order same to be a-brought to his cabin, for he being greedie and there being the law of the pyrates that every man aboard shall share in all spoil, will he not in secret therein examine the trickie recesses an a-finding them with an few or none pieces of eight will he not greedily the nose of the lefte upper draggon turn a-thinking nay a-hoping that here like on the Porchugeser is the hoarde the goode store of pieces of Arabian gold, the whiche instead there shall be no hoarde but from the eye of the draggon shall come forthe a pistol ball in the fowle brain of William Kidd
an having employ’d in the writing of this script a scrivener an being unable to attach to it my hande and seal do I attach, cunningly embalm’d by the heathen arts of the Chinese, my hande itself, to the trigger of the flintlocke
so ye who finde this knoweth that Captain Josiah Quarlbush, once master of the goode Sea Swallow now a-rock’d in Davy Jones’ Locker, hath end’d the career of the family Kidd
Wonder written on his face, Leslie van Slyke looked up from the foolscap copy of the old document. “Truly,” he commented, “that embalmed hand was the hand of a malign fate. But who was to guess that two hundred years or more after Kidd’s decease, a descendant of his was to send out far and wide over the world for mementoes appertaining to him, and bring in this thing that bore on its bottom the Crown and Boot, now a mark of Quarlbush as well as Kidd?” He paused. “And Venson — what about him?”
“Yes,” echoed Crosby. “Well, for one thing, his perusal of that letter and its reference by Rupert to the secret recess the latter had uncovered, brought to Venson’s attention for the first time a staggering fact; that he alone now knew that some 25,000 dollars in good, unregistered, negotiable liberty bonds lay inside that safe, at a spot which, to quote the letter, ‘would defy the most astute professional lock-picker and safe-prowler living.’ Except that when the truth of Rupert van Slyke’s peculiar death was revealed, the police, the coroner, the heirs, would drill into every portion of those two giant blocks to see where else lurking death and powder-impelled missiles might be. And such drilling must reveal the existence of the secret recess. And this letter!
“But why not hold back just the factors that threw the finger of suspicion on this old safe? Why not tell the police that he had come upstairs and had found Rupert lying dead on the floor? Let him be an unsolved murder. Put this significant letter out of sight! Let the police think somebody had murdered him from the window —
“Could he do it! Could he successfully stand a police questioning? Of course it wasn’t given to Venson at that moment to know that the exact time of that shot had been noted, and that the stupid Noonan would later be providing a neat alibi for him. And so he felt some qualms about concealing the truth. But would the police break him in his story? How many other suspects would there be to divert police attention from him? How many —
“Ah! The red-haired man! It came to Venson like a shaft of light from Heaven. Now Venson had his story — the story that would save him, Venson. He came up the stairs — he found Rupert lying dead on the floor — he saw a red-haired man, aristocratic-like, peering in at the window —
“He shook his head. No good. He was thinking clearer and more quickly to-night than ever in his life, for if he thought right he would be rich; by one swoop he would have taken back from the Kidd family a little fortune amounting to more than the loss of Captain Quarlbush’s share in the Sea Swallow — yes, the family tradition again which he knew only too well. But that last idea of his, it wasn’t sound. No credence would be attached to his statement. The usual figment of the imagination. And no co-ordinated efforts would be made to put forth the drag-net which Venson knew, if cast forth, would catch some unlucky red-haired devil who had some sort of a hostile motive for being here this night and who wouldn’t be able to render an alibi to save his life.
“There was the rub. The police must be convinced that there was a red-haired man in this affair — so convinced that they would put out a true police net over the entire width and length of Chicago and catch everybody with that hue of hair whom Rupert van Slyke
might know. One of these would be the man in the tree; he must break under the third-degree. And when he broke under the third-degree, Venson would be safe and sound. Therefore the thing to do was to change that prepared story — he didn’t see the red-haired man at the window — the man actually grappled with him in the hall — a real man — how could an imaginary man grapple? — Venson felt of his face — those swollen long cat scratches he had received this night would come in good stead — he could loosen his collar — could imaginary people claw a man’s face? — struggle with one? — ah, that was it. Here was the story that would definitely and surely put out a tremendous net for all red-haired men.
“Time was getting short. Venson gathered up the silk handkerchief, the pliers and the note. Dampening the handkerchief, he removed from the gargoyle-eye the traces of smoke. And — he rang the police. That’s all,” Crosby finished. “His testimony in the two trials completes the story for you.”
“And I suppose,” commented Leslie van Slyke, “that after he was called to the detective bureau next day to view Archibald Chalmers, he was only too glad to make Chalmers the red-haired man of his story, and identify him?”
“Exactly,” was Crosby’s reply. “Although now protected by a gorgeous alibi, he had to play the game through that he had started.”
“And he is the artist who plugged up the eye-hole in that gargoyle with a round bit of Chinese jade that didn’t match the other eye?” asked Leslie van Slyke curiously.
Crosby laughed. “With a marble, you mean, costing twelve for one cent — a marble such as boys use, driven in that socket with a sharp blow of a hammer, and done subsequently while the funeral of your cousin was going on in the parlour down below. That marble, it seems, ended for all time any questions about the integrity of the safe.”
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