The Lost Mr. Linthwaite/Chapter 3
CHAPTER III
THE WHITE FACE
Brixey, before following his guide into the old tavern, took a quick He had already seen that Selchester was a very small town, divided into four segments by two main streets, one of which ran due south and north, the other due east and west; he was aware from an old map which hung in his bedroom at the "Mitre" that it was enclosed by an ancient wall, running round it in an almost perfect circle.
To one of the gates of this wall, the North Bar, he and Crabbe had now come; the "Lame Hussar" stood just within it; to the right a narrow lane led away in the direction of what appeared to he a belt of woodland, wherein Brixey made out the lines of a high gateway. To this he drew. his companion's attention.
"What's that place?" he asked.
"Entrance to the old Priory grounds, sir," replied Crabbe. "There are ruins, and things in there—sort of show-place, you understand. As far as I could gather, it must have been there that your uncle was making for—and if what I hear is correct he seems to have turned in here. But we'll soon know that."
He led the way into the tavern, and down a sanded passage towards a parlour in the rear. From its open doorway a tall, elderly woman looked out, and at sight of Crabbe beckoned him to come forward. Crabbe ushered Brixey within, and closed the door behind them.
"Evening, Mrs. Crosse," he said. "I got your message, so I thought I'd walk up myself. This gentleman's the nephew of the gentleman that's missing. He's come down from London to find him. Now, what can you tell?"
The landlady, who had silently motioned her callers to seat themselves, shook her head.
"Why, not much, Mr. Crabbe," she answered. "But, of course, it might lead to something. I've no doubt that the gentleman who came in here is the one that your man told me was missing. A stranger to me, anyway, and I know most Selchester folks."
"Describe him," suggested Brixey.
"A tall, well-made gentleman, sixty or thereabouts, I should say; clean-shaved—a sort of professional look on him," answered Mrs. Crosse promptly. "Dressed in a smart grey tweed, and carrying a gold-mounted umbrella. I put him down as one of these tourists that we see so many of in summer. He came into my front room there—the one with the bow-window—about eleven on Tuesday morning, and asked for a glass of my best bitter ale.
"I invited him in here, but he said he'd rather be where he could look down the street. I took the ale in to him, and he stood in the bow-window while he drank it, and talked, casual-like. And then something happened that I've thought of since, though not until your man came in to-night to make inquiries, Mr. Crabbe."
"Well?" asked Crabbe. "And what was it, Mrs. Crosse?"
"Why, this," replied the landlady. "As he stood there in the window, looking out, Mrs. Byfield came round the corner"
"Mrs. Byfield!" exclaimed Crabbe.
"Mrs. Byfield of the Minories," assented Mrs. Crosse, "She came round the corner there out of North Street, and turned down towards them Priory gates. Now, it wasn't no fancy on my part Mr. Crabbe; I saw the gentleman start at the sight of her. He did start. There was no mistaking it. He'd his glass in his hand at the time, and he set it down and looked at me.
"'Who's that lady, walking there the other side of the lane?' he says. 'Mrs. Byfield, of the Minories, sir,' says I. 'And who's Mrs. Byfield?' says he. 'Mr. Byfield's dead, sir—some time I says. 'He was a retired gentleman.'
"'Ah!' he says, sort of careless-like, but still watching her. 'Fine woman!' 'Has been a very handsome one, sir I says. 'I remember her when she first came to the town, just after Mr. Byfield married her—which they were married in some foreign place, where they met.' 'Aye?' he says, 'And how long since is that, ma'am?’
"So I thought a bit, 'Well, sir,' I says, 'it’ll be getting on over two-and-twenty years since.' 'A long time, ma’am,' he says, with a laugh. 'We were all younger then.' And he then drank off his ale and bade me good day, and he went out. And, of course, Mr. Crabbe, I’ve never seen him since."
"Which way did he go when he left your house?" asked Brixey.
"Well, I can speak positive as to that, sir," replied the landlady, "for I watched him. He went straight into the Priory grounds—same as Mrs. Byfield had done, a minute or two sooner."
"On her heels, in fact?" suggested Brixey, with a glance at Crabbe.
"On her heels, as you might say, sir," assented Mrs. Crosse. "She’d gone in there, as I’ve often seen her doing of a morning, and he wouldn’t be a couple of minutes after her."
Brixey signed to the inspector and rose. But on his way to the door he looked significantly at the landlady.
"You’re the sort of woman that can keep things to yourself," he said. "Keep this to yourself—you understand?"
Mrs. Crosse nodded silently, and her two visitors went out into the right. Brixey pulled out his watch.
"Not yet ten," he said. "Well, Inspector, there’s one thing we can do at once. Where does this Mrs. Byfield live?"
"Within a few minutes’ walk, sir," replied Crabbe, "You’d like to go there?"
"Just to ask her if she saw my uncle in the Priory grounds that morning," replied Brixey. "No more at present."
"This way, then," said Crabbe. He crossed the lane, took his companion a little way down North Street, and turned into a narrow thoroughfare which presently debouched on a wide space flanked by big, old-fashioned houses.
Crabbe stopped before a big house, the wide front of which was covered with ivy. He glanced at the lower windows, saw lights in them, and rang the bell. A moment later he and Brixey found themselves in a dimly-lighted parlour just within a square hall, waiting. Presently the door opened, and a woman came in—a tall, still handsome woman, whose abundant dark hair was only slightly shot with grey, whose dark eyes were still alert and vivacious.
Brixey was quick to watch those eyes, and he saw a guarded expression come sharply into them, he saw, too, a whitening of the cheeks beneath them, and noticed a sudden, uncontrollable movement of a hand lifted upward.
"Sorry to disturb you at this hour, Mrs. Byfield," began Crabhe apologetically, "The fact is, a gentleman, who was staying at the 'Mitre,' has been missing since Tuesday morning. He was last seen entering the Priory grounds, and we hear that you were in there that morning, about the same time that he went in, so we thought perhaps you could tell us something. This gentleman is the missing gentleman’s nephew, and he’s very anxious about him."
Brixey spoke, steadily regarding Mrs. Byfield.
"My uncle, who is missing—unaccountably," he said, "is Mr. John Linthwaite, who until a year or two ago was a well-known London solicitor, practising in Lincoln's Inn Fields, There is no reason whatever why he should have made his disappearance, and I am beginning to suspect foul play. I'll tell you precisely what his movements were that morning.
"Now," he added, when he had told her the pertinent facts without repeating Mrs. Crosse's suggestion about the recognition, "may I ask if you saw anything of him in the Priory grounds about that time?"
He was sure of what the answer would be. His observant eyes had seen that Mrs. Byfield had regained full command over herself as Crabbe and he explained their presence and that the colour had come back to her cheeks, and he was quite prepared for the assured and steady voice.
"No!" she said, looking from him to Crabbe. "I was certainly in the Priory grounds at eleven o’clock, or thereabouts, on Tuesday morning, but it was only for a few minutes. I don't remember seeing the gentleman you mention at all. Perhaps he wasn’t in the part I was in. I only went there to give a message to the caretaker. The grounds are very extensive," she concluded, glancing meaningly at Crabbe. "Perhaps this gentleman doesn’t know them."
"I shall know them better to-morrow," remarked Brixey. He said no more, and presently he and Crabbe were back in North Street, and walking towards the centre of the town.
"Now, Inspector," he said, as they drew near a building which Brixey had previously noted as being the police station, "I don’t think we can do more to-night. But listen, there’s going to be no expense spared about finding my uncle. To-morrow morning, first thing, I'm going to have a poster out, offering a reward for news of him. And you and your people must do all you can.
"You must have that sheet of water that I’ve heard of thoroughly searched, and all the old places of the town examined, too. And if, during the night, or early in the morning, you hear anything, let me know at once. As I said just now, expense matters nothing. My uncle’s got to be found, dead or alive!"
He turned away with a curt farewell, and went back to the "Mitre," an unlighted cigar between his teeth, his hands plunged deep in his trousers pockets, his whole attitude that of intense, thought. Inside the shadowy hall he met Miss Byfield, who, candle in hand, was just about to mount the stairs. She paused, looking at him, and Brixey, going close to her, blurted out what was in his mind.
"Who’s that Mrs. Byfield of the Minories?" he asked. "Same name as yours. Any relation?"
"My aunt by marriage," she answered, watching him closely.
"Are you friends?" demanded Brixey, his eves still on her.
"No!" she replied.
"Some mystery about it?" he suggested.
Miss Byfield looked up and down the stairs and the hall.
"Something of the sort," she admitted. "I'll tell you afterwards, but"
The door of the bar parlour opened, and old Brackett, pipe in hand, looked out.
"Any news, sir?" he asked. "Thought I heard your voice."
Brixey nodded to, Miss Byfield, and turned in to the landlord. Over a whisky-and-soda and a cigar he talked non-committally for half an hour. But when he was alone in his bedroom, later, he indulged in his habit of muttering.
"As sure as I'm what I am," he, growled, "that Mrs. Byfield was lying! She knows something. It's in her that the mystery of the old boy’s disappearance lies. Brixey, my lad, here’s a stick! Which end of it are you going to lay hands on first?"
He was asking himself that question again when he woke in the grey dawn; he had asked it a dozen times when heavy footsteps came along the corridor outside and a gentle knock sounded on the panels of his door. To his demand as to the identity of his disturber came a reply that hurried him out of bed.
"Inspector Crabbe has some news for you, sir—will you go round to the police station at once?"