“Accepted, Vereker. I love a Romaunt,” replied Ricardo, and the door of Vereker’s little flat slammed noisily as he vanished.
Vereker donned the overall that Ricardo had flung over a chair and picked up his brushes. He stood for many minutes before his easel lost in a reverie over that scene at Bricklayers Arms. At the moment of conception the significance of the picture had been overwhelming, it carried more than its visual beauty of colour and light and mass and composition. Underneath lay the impersonal tragedy of modern industrial life binding together the whole in a forceful unity. But now! No, he was not in the mood. He flung palette and brushes listlessly down on his table and pulled a chair over to the glowing gas fire. His meeting with Ricardo had been an interlude, a sudden thrust of his normal life into his present absorbing work. He must now return with redoubled ardour into the atmosphere of the mystery of his missing friend—for the moment it must be the Bygrave case and nothing but the Bygrave case!
Chapter Eleven
For over an hour Vereker sat gazing into the orange glow of his gas fire, turning over in his mind the facts of the Bygrave case from the very beginning to the point reached by his recent discoveries at 10 Glendon Street. Those discoveries had finally convinced him that Lord Bygrave had disappeared of his own volition, whatever might be the motive for that disappearance. That Farnish and Winslade were secretly acquainted with the facts of the case was apparent from their clandestine visits to Glendon Street, in the hope that they might see Lord Bygrave on business known only to themselves. Certain facts swung as satellites to this central theory. They might be intimately connected, but at present they moved obscurely.
There was the strange behaviour of Mr. Smale, Lord Bygrave’s secretary who, whatever he knew, was discreet enough to refuse to disclose that knowledge. There was the mysterious Mrs. Cathcart, with her unknown history and her receipt of £10,000 worth of bearer bonds from Lord Bygrave. Still unexplained and refusing to fall into any scheme of things was the fact that a drawer had been forced by a screw-driver in Lord Bygrave’s study and some paper or papers extracted from one bundle of letters. These were probably significant facts, but the difficulty lay in discovering their orientation.
Lastly, who had impersonated Lord Bygrave at the White Bear Inn? Could it be Farnish? Vereker had thought deeply over this possibility. There were many facts in its favour. Farnish was about the same age and height; he assumed that aloof and reserved mien which his master wore by nature; he had access to his master’s clothes; he knew Lord Bygrave’s affairs and habits, he alone could have managed to secure the loan of Lord Bygrave’s ring for the purpose of creating the belief that Lord Bygrave had actually stayed at the White Bear. The egg breakfast and tobacco were a lapse in cunning, but a pardonable lapse with a man unacquainted with the clever criminal’s habit of avoiding glaring mistakes when removing his traces or creating fictitious ones. It was a possibility not to be lightly dismissed.
The underlying motive, however, of all this mystery floated beyond Vereker’s ken—that motive could only swim into his vision by the discovery of further facts. He rose suddenly from his chair and crossing over to the table on which lay the reconstructed envelope and luggage label examined them once more. The altered handwriting was pregnant, it was a very ordinary ruse to hide a clue to the writer’s identity. Vereker was obliged to smile when he thought of his friend, Henry, descending to these subterfuges. It pointed to the fact that the necessity was urgent, the consequence of discovery calamitous! In no other way could it be explained when taken in conjunction with Lord Bygrave’s known probity and upright, almost Puritanical character.
Vereker glanced again at the label. The name was not there, but the address, Mill House, Eyford, fell in with his previous deductions so neatly that the conclusion was inevitable—Winslade had called at Mill House on that memorable Friday night to see Lord Bygrave or had even taken him there from Fordingbridge Junction. In further corroboration Heather had practically proved that Lord Bygrave had not arrived at Hartwood by train. Vereker once more pulled out his ordnance survey map and glanced at the network of roads from Fordingbridge Junction down to Hartwood.
“It seems pretty definite to me now!” he exclaimed. In any case, I hope to prove it within the next few days.
A loud knock at his door startled Vereker from his reverie. Quietly picking up the label and envelope from his table, he walked over to a bureau and thrust them into a drawer containing some unfinished sketches, and then opened the door.
“Come in, Heather, come in!” he exclaimed, as he caught sight of his visitor. “I was just wondering where you had vanished to.”
“Oh, I’ve been poking about town, Mr. Vereker. I had an hour to spare and thought I’d look you up. I felt you’d be here.”
Vereker closed the door, ushered the inspector into a comfortable chair and produced whisky, soda and glasses.
Heather glanced inquisitively round the room, and his eyes finally alighted on the easel and canvas.
“Gone back to the old love, Mr. Vereker?” he asked, jerking a thumb in the direction of the sketch.
“No, not yet, Heather. I can only return when I’ve finished with the present job.”
“How are you getting on?”
“Still in a maze, Heather, and yourself?”
“Sure but slow,” remarked Heather quietly. “I had a rather startling piece of news this morning. You’ll be interested in it, I’m sure.”
“You’ve discovered Lord Bygrave’s whereabouts?” questioned Vereker, with sudden excitement and not a little misgiving that he had been beaten in the game.
“Not so rapidly as all that, Mr. Vereker. But we have discovered a rather important factor. Mr. Sidney Smale has suddenly left Bygrave Hall, and at present we’ve got no trace of him. It looks fishy.”
Vereker whistled.
“Farnish is still there?” he asked quickly.
“Oh, yes, Farnish is there. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with Farnish. But Mr. Smale’s quite another proposition. It won’t be long before we lay him by the heels. A man doesn’t fling up a comfortable, well-paid job without some very good reason. What do you say?”
“But I thought you had decided that the centre of gravity of the Bygrave case had unaccountably shifted to London!” asked Vereker, with a smile.
“So it has, Mr. Vereker.”
“Then this discovery about Smale is just a piquant bit of news solely intended for my edification or distraction, Heather?”
“You’ll grant it’s interesting, Mr. Vereker?”
“Oh, quite, but it points nowhere.”
“It may.”
“That’s possible, but off with the motley, Heather, what have you been discovering in London that’s really vital?”
“Ah, now you’re treading on forbidden ground. There are certain things we don’t disclose even to a promising amateur like yourself,” remarked Heather pompously.
“I think I can make a fair guess, Heather. Let me try just for the fun of the thing. Now when you came to the conclusion that Lord Bygrave had not stayed at the White Bear—”
“I didn’t come to any such conclusion,” interjected Heather, lighting his pipe.
“Well, you were driven to it by my brilliant deductions. I grant I had a big advantage over you because I was intimately acquainted with Lord Bygrave, but that is neither here nor there.” Vereker joined in Heather’s loud amusement.
“Well, proceed, Mr. Vereker,” continued the inspector.
“Having been driven to the conclusion that Lord Bygrave had never put up at the White Bear, you promptly decided to work on the assumption that he never left London.”
“Quite true: it’s a possibility if not a probability.”
“Agreed. Then you directed your inquiries again as to when he left his office, who was there when he left, where he went after he left. What train he caught to Hartwood, etc., if— But, no, in your opinion he never caught the train to Hartwood.”
&nbs
p; “He never arrived at Hartwood,” remarked Heather, emphasizing the words with a gesture of his pipe.
“I agree with you in that particular. However, you’ve searched the whole office, you’ve gone into his papers, you’ve tried to find out the relations existing between him and his subordinates, you’ve inquired about all callers prior to his disappearance—in fact, you have covered every inch of the ground that I as an unmethodical amateur have omitted to cover. But you’ve omitted to examine one very important particular.”
“What is that?” asked Heather, without displaying the vaguest emotion.
“Have you examined the waste paper furnace in the basement of the Ministry offices?”
“I’ve made a very careful examination of that furnace, Mr. Vereker.”
“Splendid, Heather, you are shaping uncommonly well for Scotland Yard. Do you know that that furnace would incinerate a body in a very short space of time.”
“What about the odour?” asked the inspector, looking up suspiciously.
“Who could detect that odour? The resident clerk lives on the top floor of the building; the night-watchman would not go down to the basement till ten o’clock at night. They are the only people in the building after six o’clock at the latest. It’s a closed furnace with a terrific draught and, after all, I should say roast humanity differs little from roast beef as far as odour is concerned. If the night-watchman on the ground floor detected it he would promptly ascribe it to the resident clerk’s kitchen efforts.”
“Quite so, and then—?”
“And then you come to the inevitable deadlock. There are Messrs. Grierson, Murray and Bliss—immediate subordinates of Lord Bygrave’s. Civil servants of many years standing and unquestionable probity. Now, if Lord Bygrave had been using an economy axe on the Government officials’ salaries there would have been reason, and ample reason, for their knocking him on the head and using the furnace as a crematorium; but he wielded no such provocative weapon. Who had any cause for removing his lordship?”
“There’s the rub, Mr. Vereker. Now, you have deftly outlined some of the investigations I’ve made, I’ll let you into a little secret. The nightwatchman is an ex-service man, who for over a year after the war was in a lunatic asylum. He was placed there for a violent and quite inexplicable assault on a complete stranger. Investigation into his case brought to light the fact that a shrapnel wound in the head had unhinged the poor fellow’s brain. He made a rapid recovery, however, and was then set at liberty. It is possible that the man may have had a recurrence of his homicidal mania. But there, I shan’t tell you any more. I’ve just given you sufficient information to pique your curiosity. If you’re wise you’ll inquire into the habits of that night-watchman. I must be going now.”
“Well, good night, Heather. You can keep your night-watchman with the homicidal mania. I’ve no more use for him than you have. He is not the kind of pet I keep. Let me know if you track down Mr. Smale; his sudden disappearance is rather more interesting to me than the propensities of a combative night-watchman. I have still got a niche for him in my mental museum of possible criminals.”
“Good night, Mr. Vereker,” laughed the inspector.
A few moments afterwards Vereker watched him walking along thoughtfully down the street until he vanished in the dusk. He then resumed his own seat by the fire.
“I wonder just how much Heather knows?” he soliloquized. “He’s as impenetrable as a bit of armour plate. Once upon a time I thought I could pull his leg with some grace and a suspicion of humour. Now he is too nimble for my grasp, and actually attempts to pull mine. His visit to this place to-night is probably only the result of his insatiable curiosity to know exactly what I’m doing. His methods are characterized by an amazing thoroughness and an appalling, almost destructive common sense. No flights of imagination for old Heather! To quote my friend Emerson, ‘Relation and connection are not somewhere and sometimes but everywhere and always; no miscellany, no exemption, no anomaly but method and an even web; and what comes out, that was put in.’ It’s the most reliable method after all, I suppose, but there are many ways of solving a problem. The answer’s the thing! Strangely enough, he never once mentioned Winslade’s name! And as for myself, my chief interest is centred in Winslade—he knows a lot, if not all. He is certainly deeply implicated. Heather has surely not left that line of inquiry untouched? But, then, he’s not going to tell me his greatest secrets—instead, he tries to fill me up with some bunkum about maniacal night-watchmen!”
Vereker could not restrain a hearty laugh. He glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece which Ricardo had evidently wound up and set right. It was late and early next day he must get away down to Farnaby to see Mrs. Cathcart. She might be able to throw some light on his darkness.
Vereker rose at six o’clock and, having bathed and shaved, consumed a simple breakfast of porridge and milk, toast and marmalade and tea, rushed off to Waterloo Station and caught the seven o’clock train southwards. He changed at Willow Tree Junction, where he had an hour to wait, and then embarked on the train running down the single line to Farnaby. On the way, his thoughts were unavoidably centred on Mrs. Cathcart. He found himself trying to imagine the type of woman she might be, and somehow or other he could not avoid picturing her as a faded widow, battered by a hard world, and shrivelled into the narrowness and cynicism that accompany ill-usage at the hands of circumstance.
“It’s only those who can feel their strength in their struggle with their fellow men who manage to retain the bloom of courageous youth,” he thought, and came to the conclusion that this was a feeble generalization. His thoughts got inextricably involved on the difference between moral and physical courage and the retention of youth, and then he suddenly remembered that he was quite unaware what age Mrs. Cathcart might be. Thence his musings flitted to the question of the relation in which she stood to Lord Bygrave. Was it a case of generous help offered on his part to a stranger after being convinced of her hard experience of life—or had she some closer and secret claim on him for pecuniary assistance? Well, he would soon know. His plan of campaign he had already settled. He was going to come straight to the point with regard to the payment to her of £10,000 in bearer bonds. It might be a private affair, but the secret must be divulged in the ordinary course of the solution of the mystery of Lord Bygrave’s disappearance. It would not be difficult, on her part, to prove that that payment had no connexion with subsequent events and once proved the matter could be promptly and discreetly dropped.
On arrival at Farnaby, he lunched at the village inn and somewhat early in the afternoon made his way to Bramblehurst, the location of which he had learnt very circumstantially from the landlord of the inn, who owned the cottage. As he came into view of the place he was struck by the peace and serenity of the surroundings. It was exceptionally warm for an October day, the sun beat down out of a cloudless and beautifully azure sky and a warm south wind came over the land like a passionate caress of the parting autumn. In the garden a riot of colour from dahlias and golden glow and chrysanthemums gladdened the eye and cheered the heart. It was a charming spot. Some one in the cottage was playing a piano. Vereker stopped and listened; it was Chopin’s Study in C major, and exquisitely played. His knock at the door put an end to the music, and was answered by a girl of some seventeen years of age, of distinctly prepossessing appearance.
“Is Mrs. Cathcart in?” asked Vereker.
“Yes, but I cannot say whether she will see anybody. I’m rather afraid she’s busy and doesn’t wish to be disturbed.”
“You might plead for me; I’ve come down from London on rather important business expressly to see her. I’m Lord Bygrave’s executor and trustee—my name is Vereker.”
“Oh!” said the girl, unable to conceal a start, and vanished. In a few minutes she returned and led Vereker into a tastefully furnished and cheerful little drawing-room.
“Mrs. Cathcart is sorry to keep you waiting, Mr. Vereker,” she said pleasantly, “but she will
be with you in a few minutes. Pardon my leaving you.”
Vereker hoped that this vision, so radiant in appearance and easy in her manner, might stop and beguile the few minutes of his waiting, but he was disappointed. He heard her light footstep on the gravel of the garden path outside and discreetly watched her progress down the garden until she vanished. A few seconds later he heard her footsteps once more now bounding along the path as if running for dear life. Glancing out of the window he caught a momentary, flashing glimpse of a lithe, muslin-clad figure running at top speed followed by a beautiful red setter leaping along delightedly at her flying heels.
“Talk about Atalanta’s race!” exclaimed Vereker to himself, and was still eagerly watching those vivid examples of youth and grace when the door opened and Mrs. Cathcart entered.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Vereker; you’re admiring my garden, I see,” she said diplomatically.
“Well, I had gone further than that, Mrs. Cathcart—I had begun to admire your beautiful Irish setter.”
“He is lovely, isn’t he? I suppose Lossa has taken him out for a run,” she replied.
Delightful name, thought Vereker; it seemed to fit its beautiful owner in the unaccountable way that names generally do. The faintest glimpse of merriment in Mrs. Cathcart’s eye told him that she had understood his appreciation of the red setter with that fiendish intuition which the majority of women possess when the admiration of their own sex is in the air. Vereker felt slightly uncomfortable; he disliked to be caught and turned inside out so deftly.
“I hope I’ve not disturbed you, Mrs. Cathcart,” he said, to ease matters for himself, “and I hope you’ll forgive my descending on you in this way, but my business is urgent.”
“Well, I had told Lossa I was not to be disturbed. You see, I’m busy writing up reminiscences of my chequered career in the hope that I may some day find a publisher. I’m afraid I’m not a practised literary artist and any interruption seems to dry up the fountain of memory—I was going to say inspiration, but that’ll hardly do with reminiscences.”
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