Timeworn Town (Munsey's Magazine, 1923)/Part 4
Timeworn Town
THE STORY OF THE STRANGE MURDER MYSTERY IN HISTORIC HATHELSBOROUGH
By J. S. Fletcher
Author of “The Town of Crooked Ways,” “The Harvest Moon,” etc.
XXII
BRENT received Tansley's warning with a curious tightening of lips and setting of jaw which the solicitor, during their brief acquaintance, had come to know well enough. It meant that the young man's fighting spirit was roused.
Tansley laughed.
“You're the sort of fellow for a scrap, Brent,” he remarked. “I think you can move pretty fast, too; but you don't know this crew, or their resources. Whatever anybody may say, and whatever men like your late cousin, and Epplewhite, and any of the so-called progressives—I'm not one, myself, for it pays me to belong to neither party—whatever these folks may think or say, Simon Crood and his lot are top dogs in this little old town! Vested interests, my boy—an ancient tree, with roots firmly fixed in the piled-up soil, strata upon strata, of a thousand years! You're not going to pull up those roots, my lad!”
“How will Simon Crood smash me?” demanded Brent quietly.
“As to the exact how,” answered Tansley, “I can't say. Mole work—but he'll set the electors in the Castle Ward against you.”
“I have enough promises of support now to give me a majority,” retorted Brent.
“That for promises!” exclaimed Tansley, snapping his fingers. “You don't know Hathelsborough people. They'll promise you their support to your face, just to get rid of your presence on their doorstep—and vote against you when they reach the ballot box. I'll lay anything most of the people you've been to see have promised their support to both candidates.”
“Why should these people support such robbers as Crood and his gang?” demanded Brent.
“Because Crood and his crew represent the only God they worship,” said Tansley, with a cynical laugh. “Bran, as they call it! All that most Hathelsborough men think about is bran—money. Get money—where you can—never mind how, as long as you get it, and keep just within the law. Simon Crood represents the Hathelsborough principle of graft. Whatever you may think, he's the paramount influence in the town to-day.”
“He and his lot have only got the barest majority in the council,” remarked Brent.
“Maybe, but they've got all the really influential men behind 'em—the moneyed men,” said Tansley. “And they've distributed all the official posts—sinecures, most of 'em—among their friends. That town trustee business is the nut to crack here, Brent; and a nut that's been hardening for centuries isn't going to be cracked with an ordinary implement. Are you an extraordinary one?”
“I'll make a try at things, anyhow,” replied Brent. “I don't believe I shall lose that election, either.”
“You might have scraped in if you hadn't carried Simon Crood's niece away from under his very nose,” said Tansley; “but now that you've brought personal matters into the quarrel, the old chap will move every piece he has on the board to checkmate you. It wouldn't do to have you on the council, Brent! You're too much of an innovator. Now this town—the real town—doesn't want innovation. Innovation in an ancient borough like this is unsettling and uncomfortable—see?”
“This world doesn't stand still,” retorted Brent. “I'm going ahead!”
But he reflected, as he left the lawyer's office, that much of what Tansley had said was true. There was something baffling in the very atmosphere of Hathelsborough, and he felt like a man who fights the wind. Everything was elusive, ungraspable, evasive. He seemed to get no further forward.
If Tansley was right in affirming that Hathelsborough people made promises which they had no intention of redeeming, Brent's chances of getting a seat in the town council, and setting to work to rebuild his late cousin's schemes of reformation, were small indeed; but once more he set his jaw and nerved himself to endeavor. As the day of election was now close at hand, he plunged into the task of canvassing and persuading—wondering all the time, now that he had heard Tansley's cynical remarks, if the people to whom he talked, and most of whom were plausible and ingratiating in their reception of him, were in reality laughing at him for his pains.
He saw little of the efforts of the other side; but Peppermore agreed with Tansley that the opposition would leave no stone unturned in the task of beating him. The Monitor was all for Brent. Peppermore's proprietor was a Progressive—a tradesman who had bought up the Monitor for a mere song, and ran it as a business speculation which had so far turned out very satisfactorily. Consequently, at this period, Brent went much to the office of the local newspaper, and did things in concert with Peppermore, inspiring articles which, to say the least, were severely critical of the methods of the Crood régime.
On one of these visits Peppermore, in the middle of a discussion about one of these effusions, abruptly switched off the trend of his thought in another direction.
“I had a visit from Mrs. Saumarez this morning, Mr. Brent,” he said, eying his companion with a knowing look. “Pretty and accomplished woman, that, sir; but queer, Mr. Brent—queer!”
“What do you mean?” asked Brent.
“Odd ideas, sir—very odd!” replied Peppermore. “Wanted to find out from me, Mr. Brent, if, in case she's called up again at this inquest business, or if circumstances arise which necessitate police proceedings at which she might be a witness, her name couldn't be suppressed. Ever hear such a proposal, sir, to make to a journalist?
“'Impossible, my dear madam!' says I. 'Publicity, ma'am,' I says, 'is—well, it's the very salt of life, as you might term it,' I says. 'When gentlemen of our profession report public affairs, we keep nothing back,' I says—firmly, sir.
“'I very much object to my name figuring in these proceedings,' she says. 'I object very strongly indeed!'
“'Can't help it, ma'am,' says I. 'If the highest in the land was called into a witness box, and I reported the case,' I says, 'I should have to give the name. It's the glory of our profession, Mrs. Saumarez,' I says; 'just as it's that of the law that we don't countenance hole-and-corner business. The light of day, ma'am, the light of day—that's the idea, Mrs. Saumarez!' I says. 'Let the clear, unclouded radiance of high noon, ma'am, shine on!'
“You know what I mean, Mr. Brent,” Peppermore went on. “As I said to her, the publicity that's attendant on all this sort of thing in England is one of the very finest of our national institutions. Odd, sir, for a woman that's supposed. to be modern and progressive, but she didn't agree.
“'I don't want to see my name in the papers in connection with this affair, Mr. Peppermore,' she declared again. 'I thought, perhaps,' she says rather coaxingly, 'that you could suggest some way of keeping it out, if there are any further proceedings.'
“'Can't, ma'am,' says I. 'If such an eventuality comes to be, it 'll be my duty to record faithfully and fully in the Monitor whatever takes place.'
“'Oh!' says she. 'But it's not the Monitor that I so much object to—it's the London papers. I understand that you supply reports of local news to them, Mr. Peppermore.'
“Well, of course, as you know, Mr. Brent, I am district correspondent for two of the big London agencies, but I had to explain to her that in a sensational case like this the London papers generally sent down men of their own. There were, for instance, two or three London reporters present the other day. Yes, she said; so she'd heard, and she'd bought all the London papers to see if her name was mentioned, and had been relieved to find that it hadn't. There was nothing but summarized reports, and her name hadn't appeared anywhere but in the Monitor.
“'And what I wanted, Mr. Peppermore,' she says, more wheedlingly than ever, 'was that, if it lay in your power, and if occasion arises, you would do what you could to keep my name out of it. I don't want publicity.'
“Um!” concluded Peppermore. “Pretty woman, Mr. Brent, and with taking ways, but of course I had to be adamant, sir—firm, Mr. Brent, firm as St. Hathelswide's tower.
“'The press, Mrs. Saumarez,' I says, as I dismissed the matter—politely, of course—'the press, ma'am, has its duties. It can make no exception, Mrs. Saumarez, to wealth, or rank, or—beauty.' I made her a nice bow, Mr. Brent, as I spoke the last word, but she wasn't impressed. As I say, a queer woman! What does publicity matter to her, so long as she's no more than a witness?”
Brent was not particularly impressed by Peppermore's story. He saw nothing in it beyond the natural desire of a sensitive, high-strung woman to keep herself aloof from an unpleasant episode, and he said so.
“I don't see what good Hawthwaite hoped to get by ever calling Mrs. Saumarez before the coroner,” he added. “She told nothing that everybody didn't know. What did it all amount to?”
“Aye, but that's just it, in a town like this, Mr. Brent,” answered Peppermore, with a wink. “I can tell you why the police put the coroner up to calling Mrs. Saumarez as a witness. They had a theory that Wellesley killed your cousin in a fit of jealousy, of which she was the cause, and they hoped to substantiate it through her evidence. There's no doubt, sir, that there were love passages between Dr. Wellesley and this attractive lady, and between her and your cousin; but—shall I tell you, sir, something that's in my mind?”
“Yes—why not?” answered Brent. He was thinking of the thick pile of letters that he had returned to Mrs. Saumarez, and of the unmistakable love tokens that he had seen deposited with them in the casket wherein Wallingford had kept them. “What is it you're thinking of?”
Peppermore edged his chair closer to his visitor's, and lowered his voice.
“I am not unobservant, Mr. Brent,” he said. “Our profession, as you know, sir, leads us to the cultivation of that faculty. Now I've thought a good deal about this matter, and I'll tell you a conclusion I've come to. Do you remember that when Dr. Wellesley was being questioned, the other day, he was asked if there was jealousy between him and Mr. Wallingford about Mrs. Saumarez? To be sure! Now what did he answer? He answered frankly that there had been, but it no longer existed! Do you know what I deduced from that, Mr. Brent? This—that the little lady had had both those men as strings to her bow at the same time, being undecided as to which of 'em she'd finally choose, but that, not so long since, she'd given up both of 'em in favor of a third man!”
Brent started, and laughed.
“Ingenious, Peppermore—very ingenious!” he said. “Given 'em both the mitten, as they say? But—the third man?”
“Mrs. Saumarez was away on the continent most of the winter,” answered Peppermore. “The Riviera—Nice—Monte Carlo—that sort of thing. She may have met somebody there that she preferred to either Wellesley or Wallingford. Anyhow, Mr. Brent, what did the doctor mean when he frankly admitted that there had been jealousy between him and Wallingford, but that it no longer existed? He meant, I take it, that there was no reason for its further existence. That implies that another man had come into the arena!”
“Aye, but does it?” said Brent. “It might mean something else—that she'd finally accepted Wellesley. Eh?”
“No!” declared Peppermore. “She's not engaged to Wellesley. I'll lay anything she isn't, Mr. Brent. There's a third man, somewhere in the background; and it's my opinion that that's the reason why she doesn't want the publicity she came to me about.”
Brent fell into a new train of thought, more or less confused. Mrs. Saumarez's talk to him about Wallingford, and the letters, and the things in the casket, were all mixed up in it.
“Had you any opportunity of seeing Wellesley and Wallingford together during the last week or two before my cousin's death?” he asked presently.
“Several opportunities, Mr. Brent,” answered Peppermore. “I went to report the proceedings of two or three committees of the town council during the fortnight preceding that lamentable occurrence, sir, and I saw them at close quarters. I saw them frequently at the club of which I am a member. I should say, sir, from what I observed, that they were on very good terms with each other—more friendly than ever, Mr. Brent.”
“Um!” said Brent. “Well, there's a lot of queer stuff about this affair, Peppermore; but let's get back to the business of the moment. Look here, I've got a fine notion for your Monitor, and you'll just have time to get it out before my election day. Let's make a real, vigorous, uncompromising attack on the principle of the town trustee business. We'll not say one word about the present trustees—old Crood, Mallett, and Coppinger. We'll have no personalities, and we'll make no charges. We'll avoid all stuff of that sort. We'll just attack the thing on principle, taking the line that it's a bad principle that the finances of a borough should be intrusted to the sole control of three men responsible to nobody, and with the power, if one dies, to elect his successor. Let's argue it out on the principle. Then, later, we'll have another article on the argument that the finances of a town should be wholly controlled by the elected representatives of the people—see?”
“Your late cousin's theories, Mr. Brent,” said Peppermore. “Excellent notions, both, sir. You write the articles—I'll find the space. All on principle—no personalities. Plain and practical, Mr. Brent, let them be, so that everybody can understand; though, to be sure,” he added regretfully, “what our readers most like is personalities. If we dared to slate old Crood with all the abuse we could lay our pens to, the readers of the Monitor, sir, would hug themselves with pleasure; but libel, Mr. Brent—libel. Do you know, sir, that ever since I occupied the editorial chair of state I have always felt that the wet blanket of the law of libel sat at my banquet like the ghost in 'Macbeth,' letting its sword hang by a thread an inch from my cranium? A bit mixed in my metaphors, I fear, sir, but you know what I mean. Mustn't involve my respected proprietor in a libel suit, Mr. Brent; so stick to abstract principles, sir, and eschew those saucy personal touches which I regret—deeply regret—I can't print.”
Brent had no intention of indulging in personalities in his warfare with Simon Crood and the reactionaries; but as the day of the election approached he discovered that his adversaries were not at all particular about putting forth highly personal references to himself. Hathelsborough suddenly became flooded with handbills and posters, each bearing a few pithy words in enormous type. These effusions were for the most part in the form of questions, addressed to the recipients, and there was a cynical and sinister sneer in all of them:
Why support a stranger?
Who wants a carpetbagger?
Vote for the homemade article!
Let Hathelsborough men manage Hathelsborough matters!
Stand by the true and tried!These appeals to the free and enlightened burgesses whose suffrages he solicited met Brent on every side, and especially on the day of the election. He had gone in for nothing of this sort himself. His original election address, it seemed to him, contained everything that he had to say, and beyond posting it all over the town in great placards, and distributing it in the form of handbills to the electors of the Castle Ward, he had issued nothing in the shape of political literature.
He had stumped his desired constituency thoroughly, making speeches at every street corner and at every public meeting place, and he had a personal conviction, from his usual reception on these occasions, that the people were with him. He was still sure of victory when, at noon on the polling day, he chanced to meet Tansley.
“Going strong, as far as I can make out,” he answered, in response to the solicitor's inquiry. “I've been about all the morning, and from what I've seen, and what my committee tell me, I'm in!”
Tansley shook his head.
“Look here, my lad!” he said, drawing Brent aside, as they stood together in the Market Place. “Don't you build too high! They're working against you to-day, the Crood gang, as they never worked in their lives. They're bringing every influence they can get hold of against you; and—you haven't been overwise.”
“What have I done now?” demanded Brent.
“Those articles that are appearing in the Monitor,” replied Tansley. “Everybody knows they're yours. Do you think there's a soul in Hathelsborough who believes that Peppermore could write them? They're a mistake. They may be true—”
“They are true!” growled Brent.
“Granted; but however true they are, they're an attack on Hathelsborough,” said Tansley. “Now, of whatever political color they are, Hathelsborough folk are Hathelsborough folk; and they're prouder of this old town than you know. Look around you, my lad. There isn't a stone that you can see that wasn't just where it is now hundreds of years before you were born. Do you think these people like to hear you, a stranger, criticizing their old customs, their old privileges, as you are doing in those articles? Not a bit of it! They're asking who you are to come judging them. You'd have done a lot better, Brent, if you'd been more diplomatic. You should have left all politics and reforms out of it, and tried to win the seat simply on your relationship to Wallingford. You could have shown your cards when you'd got in. You've shown 'em too soon!”
“That be damned!” said Brent. “I've played the game straightforwardly, anyhow. I don't want any underhand business. There's enough of that in this rotten place now. I still think I shall be in!”
Before the summer evening had progressed far, Brent learned that the vested interests of an ancient English borough are stronger than he thought. He was hopelessly defeated. Not many more than a hundred voters marked their papers for him, and his opponent was returned by a big majority.
He got a new idea when he heard the result, and went straight off to Peppermore and the Monitor with it. They would go on with the articles, and make them of such a nature that the Local Government Board, in London, would find it absolutely necessary to give prompt and searching attention to Hathelsborough and its affairs.
XXIII
By business time next morning Brent had cast aside all thought of the previous day's proceedings, and of his defeat at the hands of the old gang, and had turned to affairs which were now of much greater importance.
He had three separate enterprises in hand. To be sure, they were all related, but each had a distinctive character of its own. He specified all three as he ate his breakfast at the Chancellor, where he was still located.
First, now that he had done with his electioneering—for the time being—he was going to work harder than ever at the task of discovering Wallingford's murderer.
Second, he was going to marry Queenie, and that speedily. Queenie and he had settled matters to their mutual satisfaction as soon as the row with Simon Crood was over, and they had already begun furnishing the house which Brent had bought in order to constitute himself a full-fledged burgess of Hathelsborough.
Third, he was going to put all he knew into the articles that he was writing for the Monitor—two of which had already appeared. He resolved to continue them until public opinion, gradually educated, became too strong for the reactionary forces which had beaten him yesterday, but which he would infallibly defeat to-morrow—or, if not to-morrow, the day after.
First, the murderer. Brent fetched Queenie from Mrs. Appleyard's that morning, and, utterly careless of the sly looks that were cast on him and her, marched her through the Market Place to the police station. To Hawthwaite, keenly interested, he detailed particulars of Queenie's discovery about the typewritten letter, and produced her proofs.
Hawthwaite took it all in, silently.
“You'll have to go into that, you know,” concluded Brent. “Now that I've got through with that election, I'm going to give more time to this business. We've got to find out who murdered my cousin, Hawthwaite, somehow. It's not going to rest. I won't leave a stone unturned; and there,” he added, pointing to the sheet on which Queenie had made specimens of the broken type of Simon's antiquated machine, “there is a stone which needs examining on all four sides!”
Hawthwaite picked up the sheet of paper, twisted it in his big fingers, and looked over it at the two young people, with a quizzical smile.
“I understand that you and Miss Queenie are contemplating matrimony, Mr. Brent,” he remarked. “That so, sir?”
“That's so,” replied Brent promptly. “As soon as we've got our house furnished, we shall be married.”
“Then I can speak freely and in confidence before Mrs. Brent that's to be,” responded Hawthwaite, with another smile. “Well, now, what you've just told me isn't exactly fresh news to me. I'll show you something.” He turned, drew out a drawer from a chest behind his chair, and, finding a paper in it, took out the document and handed it to his visitors. “Look at that, now,” he said. “You see what it is?”
Brent saw at once. It was a half sheet of note paper, on which were examples of faulty type, precisely similar to those on Queenie's bit of evidence.
“Hello!” exclaimed Brent. “Somebody else been at the same game, eh?”
“I'll tell you,” answered Hawthwaite, settling himself in his chair. “It's a few days ago—let me think, now—yes, it would be a day or two after that facsimile appeared in the Monitor that a young man came to me here one evening—a respectable artisan sort of chap. He told me that he was in the employ of a typewriter company at Clothford, which, as you know, is only a few miles away. He said that he'd come to tell me something in confidence. The previous day, he said, Mr. Crood, of Hathelsborough, had come to their place in Clothford, bringing with him an old-fashioned typewriter, which, he told them, he had bought when such things first came out. He wanted to know—the thing being, he said, an old favorite—if they couldn't do it up for him—go through its mechanism thoroughly—supply new letters, and so on. They said they could. He left it to be rebuilt, and it was handed over to this young man. Now this young man, my informant, has some relations here in Hathelsborough. A day or so before Simon Crood called with his machine, they sent him—the young man—a copy of the Monitor with this facsimile letter inclosed. Being concerned with such things in his trade, he was naturally interested in the facsimile, and, of course, as an expert, he noticed the broken letters. However, he didn't connect the facsimile with Crood's typewriter—not at first; but, happening to look at the machine more narrowly, to see exactly what had to be done to it, he ran off the keys, as he phrased it, on a sheet of paper. Then he saw at once that he had before him the identical machine on which the threatening letter to our late mayor had been typed; and so he came to me.”
“What have you done about it?” asked Brent.
Hawthwaite gave him a knowing. look.
“Well, I'll tell you that, too,” he answered. “I've got the machine. It's there—in that box, in the corner. The Clothford firm will make an excuse to Mr. Crood that they've had to send it away for repairs. Of course, I'm not going to let it out of my possession until—well, until we know more.”
“There's no doubt he wrote that threatening letter,” observed Brent.
“Oh, no doubt—no doubt whatever,” agreed Hawthwaite.
“What about that handkerchief, and the inquiry at the laundry?” asked Brent.
Hawthwaite accompanied his reply with a nod and a wink.
“That's being followed up,” he said. “Don't ask me any more just now. We're progressing, and, I believe, in the right direction, this time. Do you leave it to us, Mr. Brent—you'll be surprised before long, and so will some other folks. You go on with those articles you've started in the Monitor—it doesn't do for me to say much, being an official,” he added, with another wink, “but you'll do some good in that way—there's a lot under the surface in this old town, sir, that only needs exposing to the light of day to insure destruction! Public opinion, Mr. Brent, public opinion—you stir it up, and leave this matter to me. I may be slow, Mr. Brent, but I'll surely get there in the end!”
“Good—it's all I ask,” said Brent. “Only get there!”
de took Queenie away, but before they had gone many steps from the superintendent's office, Hawthwaite called Brent back, and leading him inside the room, closed the door on him.
“Your young lady 'll not mind waiting a minute or two,” he said, with a significant glance. “As she already knew about old Simon's typewriter, I didn't mind telling that I knew, d'ye see? But there's another little matter that I'd like to tell you about. It's between ourselves, and to go no further—you understand?”
“Just so,” agreed Brent.
“Well,” continued Hawthwaite, “there may be nothing in it; but nothing definite was got out of either Dr. Wellesley or Mrs. Saumarez about their—well, I won't say their love affairs, but their relations. That there was something mysterious about the sort of three-cornered relations between her and Wellesley and your cousin I'm as dead certain as that I see you. I have an idea, too, that somehow or other those relations have something to do with your cousin's murder. Now this is my point—you know, I dare say, that at the back of Mrs. Saumarez's garden, at the Abbey House, there's a quiet, narrow lane, little used?”
“I know it,” replied Brent. “Farthing Lane, I think it is.”
“Just so, and why so called none of our local antiquaries know,” said Hawthwaite. “Well, not so many nights ago, I had some business in that lane at a late hour. I was watching for somebody, as a matter of fact, though it came to nothing. I was in a secret place, just as it was getting nicely dark. Now, then, who should come along that lane but Krevin Crood?”
“Krevin Crood!” exclaimed Brent. “Aye?”
“Krevin Crood,” repeated Hawthwaite. “Thinks I to myself, 'What may you be doing here, my lad, at this hour of the night?' For, as you know that lane, Mr. Brent, you'll know that on one side of it there's nothing but the long wall of Mrs. Saumarez's garden and grounds, and on the other a belt of trees that shuts off Robinson's market garden and orchards. I was safe hidden among those trees. Well, Krevin came along—I recognized him well enough. He sort of loitered about, evidently waiting for somebody. Just as the parish church clock struck ten, I heard the click of a latch, the door in Mrs. Saumarez's back garden opened, and a woman came out. I knew her, too.”
“Not Mrs. Saumarez?” suggested Brent.
“No,” replied Hawthwaite, “not Mrs. Saumarez, but that companion of hers, Mrs. Elstrick. Tall, thin, very reserved woman. You may have noticed that she goes about the town very quietly—never talks to anybody.”
“I've scarcely noticed her except when she was here in court with Mrs. Saumarez,” replied Brent; “but I know the woman you mean. So it was she?”
“Just so—Mrs. Elstrick,” said Hawthwaite. “I saw, of course, that this was a put-up job, an arranged meeting between her and Krevin. They met, turned, and walked up and down the lane together for a good ten minutes, talking in whispers. They passed and repassed me several times, and I'd have given a good deal to hear what they were talking about; but I couldn't catch a word. They were on the opposite side of the lane, you see, close to the garden wall.”
“And eventually?” asked Brent.
“Oh, eventually they parted, of course,” replied Hawthwaite. “She slipped back into the garden, and he went off down the lane. Now—”
“They're both tending to elderliness, I think,” interrupted Brent, with a cynical laugh; “but one should never be surprised at anything, nowadays. Did you see any love-making?”
“Oh, Lord save us, no!” exclaimed Hawthwaite. “Nothing of that sort! They never even shook hands. Just talked—and very earnestly, too.”
Brent reflected for a while.
“Queer!” he said at last. “What did they want with each other?”
“Aye!” said Hawthwaite. “As I said just now, I'd have given a good deal to know. Krevin Crood is a deep, designing, secret sort of man, and that woman, whoever she may be, looks just the same.”
“Has she been with Mrs. Saumarez long?” asked Brent.
“Came with her when Mrs. Saumarez first took the Abbey House,” replied Hawthwaite. “Always been with her. Went away with her when Mrs. S. was in the south of France all last winter. Odd couple I call the two of 'em, Mr. Brent, between you and myself.”
“Why, exactly?” inquired Brent. “I've seen nothing particularly odd about Mrs. Saumarez, except that she's evidently a high-strung and perhaps a rather excitable sort of woman—all nerves, I should say, and possibly a bit emotional. Clever woman, I think, and pretty.”
“Pretty enough, and clever enough,” assented Hawthwaite dryly. “I dare say you're right about the rest; but I'll tell you why I called her odd. When she first came here, it was understood that she was the widow of a naval officer of high rank. Well, naturally, the big folk of the neighborhood called on her when she had settled down—she furnished and fitted her house from local shops, and it took her some time to get fixed up—expecting, of course, that she would return their calls. She never returned a single one—not one, sir!”
“That sounds odd,” admitted Brent.
“Aye, doesn't it?” said Hawthwaite. “You'd have thought that a young and stylish woman, coming to live here, as she did, would have been glad of society; but though some dozen or so ladies of the place called on her, she never, as I say, returned a single call. In fact, it very soon became evident that she didn't want any society of that sort. She used to go out bicycling a good deal by herself in those early days. That, I fancy, was how she got to know both Wellesley and your cousin. She was fond enough of their society, anyhow.”
“Always?” asked Brent. He was learning things that he had never heard of, and was already thinking deeply about them. “From the beginning?”
“Well, practically,” replied Hawthwaite. “First it was the doctor—then it was Wallingford; and,” he added, with a wink, “there are people in the town who declare that she carried on with both, playing one off against the other, till the very end. I don't know how that may be, but I do know that at one time she and Wellesley were very thick, and that afterward your cousin was always running after her. Naturally, there was talk, especially among those who had called on her, and whose calls she didn't return. To tell you the plain truth, they said things.”
“What sort of things?” inquired Brent.
“Oh, well!” said Hawthwaite, with a laugh. “If you had lived as long in this town as I have, and been in my position, you'd know that it, like all small towns, is a hotbed of scandal and gossip. The women, of course, seeing her partiality for men friends, said much and hinted more. Then the vicar's wife—parsons' ladies are great ones for talk—found something out, and made the most of it. I told you that when Mrs. Saumarez first came here, it was understood that she was the widow of an officer of high position in the Royal Navy. Well, our vicar's wife has a brother who's a big man in that profession, and she was curious to know about the newcomer's relation to it. She persisted in calling on Mrs. Saumarez, though her calls weren't returned. She could make excuses, you see, about parish matters, and charities, and what not. One day she asked Mrs. Saumarez point-blank what ship her late husband had last served on. Mrs. S., it seems, answered her very short. 'My late husband,' she says, 'was not in the British service.' Of course, that wasn't in her favor with the people whom she'd already snubbed.”
“H-m!” said Brent. “There were many things in this retailing of gossip that he wanted to think over at leisure. “Well,” he added, after a pause, “I dare say all sorts of small items help toward a solution, Hawthwaite; but you're already busy about it.”
“I'm not only busy, but actively so,” replied the superintendent. “And—again between you and me and nobody else—I'm expecting some very special professional and expert assistance within the next few days. Oh, you leave this to me, Mr. Brent! I'll run down your cousin's murderer yet! Go on with your articles. They're rousing public interest.”
Brent went away, and followed Hawthwaite's advice. His articles came out in the Monitor twice a week. Peppermore printed them in big type, leaded, and gave them the most prominent place in the paper. He himself was as proud of these uncompromising attacks on the municipal government of Hathelsborough as if he had written them himself. The proprietor of the Monitor was placidly agreeable about them, for the simple reason that after the first two had appeared the circulation of his journal doubled, and after the next three was at least four times what it had ever been before.
Everybody in the neighborhood read and discussed the articles. Extracts from them were given in the county papers, and some of the London dailies began to lift them. Eventually a local member of Parliament asked a question about them in the House of Commons; and one day Peppermore came rushing to Brent in a state of high excitement.
“The pen is mightier than the sword, Mr. Brent, sir—that's a fact!” he gasped, tumbling headlong into Brent's room. “Heard the news, sir? It's all through your articles!”
“Heard nothing,” replied Brent. “What is it?”
“I had it from the town clerk just now, so it's gospel truth,” replied Peppermore. “The Local Government Board, sir, is at last moved to action. It's going to send down an inspector—a real, full-fledged inspector! The town clerk is in a worse state of righteous indignation than I ever saw a man, and as for Mayor Simon Crood, I understand his anger is beyond belief. Mr. Brent, you've done it.”
But Brent was not so sure. He had had some experience of government officials, and of official methods, and knew more of red tape than Peppermore did.
As for Tansley, who came in soon after, he was cynically scornful.
“Local Government Board inspector!” he exclaimed scoffingly. “Some old fossil who'll come here—I'll tell you how! He'll ask for the responsible authorities—that's Simon Crood & Co. He'll hear all they've got to say. They'll say just what they like. He'll examine their documents, which will be all ready for him. Everything will be nice and proper and in strict order, and every man will say precisely what he's been ordered to say—and there you are! The inspector will issue his report, stating that he has carefully examined everything and found all correct, and the comedy will conclude with the farce of votes of thanks all around. That's the line, Brent!”
“Maybe it is,” said Brent; “but—only maybe!”
“You're in a pessimistic vein, Mr. Tansley, sir,” declared Peppermore. “Sir, we're going to clean out the Augean stable!”
“Or perish in the attempt, eh, Peppermore?” retorted Tansley good-humoredly. “All right, my lad; but it 'll take a lot more than Monitor articles and Local Government Board inquiries to uproot the ancient and time-honored customs of Hathelsborough. Semper eadem, Peppermore, semper eadem—that's the motto of this high-principled, respectably ruled borough. Always the same—and no change!”
“Except from bad to worse,” said Peppermore. “All right, sir; but something's going to happen this time!”
Something did happen immediately following on the official announcement of the Local Government Board inquiry, and it was Tansley who told Brent of it.
“I say,” he said, coming up to Brent in the street, “here's a queer business! I don't know if you've heard of it. Mrs. Mallett has run away from her husband—fact! She's cleared out, and she's let it be known, too. Mysteries are increasing, Brent. What do you make of it?”
Brent could make nothing of it. There might be many reasons why Mrs. Mallett should leave her husband; but had this sudden retreat anything to do with her evidence at the inquest?
He was speculating on this when he received a request from Hawthwaite to go around at once to his office. Brent responded immediately—to find the superintendent closeted with Dr. Wellesley.
XXIV
Before Brent dropped into the chair to which Hawthwaite silently pointed him, he knew that he was about to hear revelations. He was conscious of an atmosphere in that drab, somber little room. Hawthwaite's glance at him as he entered was that of a man who bids another to prepare himself for news. Wellesley looked unusually stern and perplexed.
“Dr. Wellesley asked me to send for you, Mr. Brent,” said the superintendent.
“He has something to tell which he thinks you, as next of kin to our late mayor, ought to know.”
Brent nodded, and turned, in silence, to Wellesley. The doctor, who had been staring moodily at the fireless grate, looked up, glancing from one man to the other.
“You understand, Mr. Brent, and you, Hawthwaite, that whatever I tell you is told in the very strictest confidence?” he said. “As you say, Hawthwaite, I think it's something that both of you ought to know. Can I speak in confidence?”
“To me—yes, you can,” answered Brent.
“It 'll not go beyond me, doctor,” said Hawthwaite, with a smile. “I'm used to this sort of job. I've heard more secrets and private communications in my time than I can remember, and I've clean forgotten most of 'em.”
“Very well,” agreed Wellesley. “This is strictly private, then—at present. Now, to begin with, I suppose you have heard—it's pretty well known through the town, I understand—that Mrs. Mallett has left her husband?”
“Aye,” replied Hawthwaite. “I've heard that.”
“Yes,” said Brent. “I, too.”
“I dare say you both gathered from the evidence—mine and Mrs. Mallett's—at the adjourned inquest, that there was some mystery underlying her visit to me?” continued Wellesley. “Some secret, eh?”
“Couldn't very well gather anything else, doctor,” replied Hawthwaite.
“The fact of the case is,” said Wellesley suddenly, “that wasn't the first visit Mrs. Mallett had paid to me—and to Wallingford—in that way. She had come twice before during that week. On the first occasion she only saw me. On the second, she and I saw Wallingford together, in the mayor's parlor. On the third—the one we gave evidence about—she went to see Wallingford alone; but, as she told you, she found he was engaged, so she came away.”
The three men looked at one another. Hawthwaite voiced what two of the three were thinking.
“Some business which concerned all three of you, then, doctor?” he suggested.
“Business which deeply concerned her, and on which she came to consult me and Wallingford,” replied Wellesley. “Now I'll tell you straight out what it was. Mrs. Mallett had found out that there was some sort of an intrigue between her husband and Mrs. Saumarez.”
For a moment a deep silence fell over the room. Brent felt his brows drawing together in a frown—the sort of frown that spreads over a man's face when he tries to think quickly over a problem unexpectedly presented to him. Hawthwaite folded his arms across his braided tunic, stared at the ceiling, and whistled softly. He was the first to speak.
“Indeed!” he said. “So that's—but she would have some good evidence, doctor, for an assertion of that sort—not mere guesswork?”
“I'm afraid there's no guesswork about it,” said Wellesley. “It's not a pleasant matter to discuss, but that's unavoidable now. I'll tell you what Mrs. Mallett told Wallingford and myself. As you know, she's a downright, plain-spoken woman, with strong views of her own, and just the sort to go through with a thing. Some little time ago she found, evidently through Mallett's carelessness, a receipt for a valuable diamond ring from a London jeweler—a lady's ring. This, of course, aroused her suspicions. Without saying anything to her husband, she determined to have his movements watched. She knew that Mallett was frequently going away for a day at a time, ostensibly on business connected with the bank; and she employed a private inquiry agent to watch him. This man followed Mallett from Hathelsborough to Clothford one morning, and from Clothford station to the Royal County Hotel. There, in the lounge, he was joined by Mrs. Saumarez, who had been previously pointed out to the agent here in Hathelsborough, and who had evidently cycled over to Clothford. She and Mallett lunched at the Royal County in a private room, and spent the greater part of the afternoon there. The same thing occurred on two other occasions. Then Mrs. Mallett came to me and to Wallingford.”
“Why to you?” demanded Brent.
“I think,” replied Wellesley, with a forced smile, “she may have had a womanish feeling of revenge, knowing that both Wallingford and myself had—well, we had paid a good deal of attention to Mrs. Saumarez. But there were other reasons. Mrs. Mallett has few friends in the town. I was her medical attendant, and she and Wallingford frequently met on one or two committees, for she took a good deal of interest in social affairs. Anyhow, she came and confided in us about this.”
“I supposed you and Wallingford discussed it?” suggested Brent.
“Yes,” replied Wellesley; “briefly—on the night before his death.”
“Was that the reason of your saying at the inquest that there was no jealousy between you, at the time of his death, as regards Mrs. Saumarez?”
“Just so! There couldn't be any jealousy, could there, after what we had heard?”
“You believed it, then?”
“We couldn't do anything else. The man whom Mrs. Mallett employed is a thoroughly dependable man.”
“And that's the reason for her sudden flight—if you call it so—is it, doctor?” asked Hawthwaite.
“That's the reason for it—yes,” replied Wellesley.
“What is she going to do?” inquired Hawthwaite. “Divorce?”
“She said something about a legal separation,” answered Wellesley. “I suppose it will come to the other thing.”
“And how do you think this is related to Wallingford's murder?” asked Hawthwaite, with sudden directness. “Let's be plain, doctor. Do you suspect Mallett?”
Wellesley showed signs of indecision.
“I don't like to say that I do,” he replied at last; “and yet I don't know. I've rather wondered if there had been any meeting between Mallett and Wallingford after Wallingford knew about this. I believe they did meet, on business, during the day. Now, to tell you the truth, Wallingford was much more—shall we say upset?—about this affair than I was. He was very much gone on Mrs. Saumarez. It has struck me that he may have threatened Mallett with exposure; and exposure, of course, would mean a great deal to a man in Mallett's position. And—but I really don't know what to think.”
“There's a thing I'd like to know,” said Brent. “What do you think about the woman in the case? You've had chances of knowing her.”
Wellesley gave his questioner a searching look.
“I would rather not say, Mr. Brent,” he replied. “Discoveries of this sort, fully substantiated, are—well, disconcerting. Besides, they tend to a revision of opinion. They're sidelights—unfortunate ones.”
“Look here!” said Brent. “Were you greatly surprised?”
“Well, looking back,” responded Wellesley thoughtfully, “perhaps not greatly. I think she's a bit of a mystery.”
Brent turned to Hawthwaite. Hawthwaite, however, looked at the doctor.
“Well, doctor,” he said, “I think you've done right to tell this. There's something in the suggestion that there may have been a fatal quarrel between Mallett and Wallingford; but—I don't want to go into this at present—I'm full up otherwise. Leave it until this Local Government Board inspection is over.”
“Why until then?” asked Wellesley.
“Why, because, for anything we know to the contrary, something may come out at that which will dovetail into this,” replied Hawthwaite. “The inspector is coming down at once. Why not let this go over till he's been here? Another thing—has Mrs. Mallett let this out to anybody but you?”
“No—I'm sure of that,” answered Wellesley. “It has been known in the town for some time—common knowledge—that she and Mallett weren't on good terms, but she assured me just before leaving that she hasn't mentioned the episodes I've detailed to any other person here than myself—and of course, Wallingford.”
“And he's gone, poor fellow!” said Hawthwaite. “Mr. Brent and myself will be secret as the grave he lies in. All right, doctor—just leave it to me!”
When Wellesley had gone away, Hawthwaite turned to Brent.
“I don't believe for one moment that Mallett murdered your cousin,” he said. “I'm not surprised about this other affair, but I don't think it has anything to do with what we're after. No—that's on a side track; but I'll tell you what, Mr. Brent—I shouldn't be astonished if I found out that Mallett knows who the murderer is.”
“I wish you'd tell me if you've any idea yourself who the murderer is!” exclaimed Brent. “I'm wearying to get at something concrete!”
“Well, if you must have it, I have an idea,” answered the superintendent. “It's—a strong idea, too. I'm working at it. To—tell you the truth, though nobody knows— it but one or two of my trusted men, I've had a very clever man down from New Scotland Yard for the past fortnight. He went away yesterday. He was of great assistance in unearthing certain facts. I'm only waiting now for some expert evidence—on a very important point, which I can't get until next week, in order to make a move. As soon as ever this Local Government Board inspection is over, I'll make that move. And how do you think that inspection will turn out, Mr. Brent?”
“Don't know—can't say—no idea,” replied Brent.
“Nor have I,” remarked Hawthwaite. “I never expect much from public inquiries. There's too much officialism about 'em. Still, every little helps.”
These conversations, and the revelations—which had transpired during their course, led Brent into a new train of thought. Ever since his coming to Hathelsborough, he had been aware of an atmosphere of intrigue and mystery; and every new development seemed to thicken it. Here, again, was more intrigue, centering in a domestic imbroglio.
There was nothing much to be wondered—at in it, he thought. Mallett was the sort of man to attract a certain type of woman, and, from all Brent had heard in the town, a man given to adventure. Mrs. Saumarez was clearly a woman fond of men's society. Mrs. Mallett, on the other hand, was a hard, strait-laced sort, given to social work, and to the furtherance of movements in which her husband took no interest at all.
The sequence of events seemed probable to Brent. First there had been Wellesley; then Wallingford, perhaps a cleverly contrived double affair with both. Recently there had been this affair with Mallett, which, from Wellesley's showing, had come to Wallingford's ears. Brent knew his cousin sufficiently well to know that the late mayor would develop an ugly frame of mind on finding that he had been deceived. All sorts of things might well have developed out of a sudden discovery.
But had all this anything to do with Wallingford's murder? To him, after all, that was the main point; and so far he saw no obvious connection. He felt like a man who is presented with a mass of tangled cord, from which protrude a dozen loose ends. He did not know, for the very life of him, which end he could pull out without making the tangle worse.
It puzzled him, being still a stranger to the habits and customs of these people, to see that life in Hathelsborough went on, amid all these alarms and excursions, very much as usual. He had already cultivated a habit of frequenting places of public resort, such as the smoking room of his hotel, the big barroom at Bull's, and the rooms of the Town Club, of which he had been elected a member on Tansley's nomination. At all these places he heard a great deal of gossip, but found no surprise shown at its subjects.
Within a day or two, everybody who frequented these places knew that there had been a domestic upheaval at Mallett's, and had at least some idea of the true reason of it; but nobody showed any astonishment. Everybody, indeed, seemed to take it as a matter of course.
Apparently it made no great difference to Mallett himself, who was seen about the town just as usual, in his accustomed haunts. And when Brent remarked on this seeming indifference to Epplewhite, with whom he sometimes conversed at the club, Epplewhite only laughed.
“If you knew this town and its people as well as I do, Mr. Brent,” he said, “you'd know that things of this sort are viewed in a light in which outsiders probably wouldn't view them. The underhand affairs and secret intrigues that exist here are multitudinous. Hathelsborough folk have a fixed standard—do what you like, as long as you don't get found out. Understand, sir?”
“But in this case the thing seems to have been found out,” remarked Brent.
“That, in the Hathelsborough mental economy, is the only mistake in it,” replied Epplewhite dryly. “It's the only thing that Mallett will be blamed for. Lord bless you, do you think he's the only man in the place who has had such an affair? Hathelsborough people—men and women—are past masters and mistresses at secrecy and deception. If you could take the top off this town, and look deep down under it—ah, there would be something to see! But, as I dare say you're beginning to find out, that's no easy job.”
“Will the top be lifted at this Local Government Board inspection?” asked Brent.
Epplewhite shook his head.
“I doubt it, sir,” he answered. “I doubt it very much. I've seen too much of officialism, Mr. Brent, to cherish any great hopes of it. I'll tell you what 'll probably happen when this inspector comes. To start with, he's bound to be more or less in the hands of the officials. We know who they are—the three town trustees and the staff under them. Do you think they won't prepare their books and documents in such a fashion as to insure getting a report in their favor? Of course! And what's to stop it? Who's to interfere?”
“I suppose he will hear both sides of the question,” suggested Brent.
“Who is there to put the other side of the question—except on broad lines, such as you've taken up in your Monitor articles?” asked Epplewhite. “True, the inspector can ask for information and for criticism, and for any facts bearing on the subject; but who'll come forward to give them? Can I? Can Wellesley? Can any of our party? Not one, in any satisfactory fashion. We've nothing but impressions and suspicions to go on. We haven't access to the books and papers. The only man who could have done something was your cousin, our late mayor, and he's gone. Talking about that, Mr. Brent, there's a matter that I've been thinking a good deal about lately, and I think it should be put to Hawthwaite. You know, of course, that your cousin and I were very friendly. That came out in my evidence when the inquest was first opened. Well, he used to tell me things about his investigation of the borough finances, and I happen to know that he kept his notes and figures about them in a certain memorandum book—a thickish one, with a stout red leather cover—which he always carried about with him. He would have it on him, or on his desk in the mayor's parlor, when he met his death, I'm certain. Now, then, where is that book?”
“That's highly important,” said Brent. “I never heard of the book. It certainly wasn't on him, and it wasn't on the desk, for I examined that myself, in company with the police.”
“Well, he had such a book, and search should be made for it,” remarked Epplewhite. “If it could have been produced at this inquiry, some good might have come of it; but as things are, I see little hope of any change. Vested interests and old customs aren't upset in a day, Mr. Brent.”
Brent was soon to discover that Tansley and Epplewhite were correct in their prophecies about the investigation which he himself had so strenuously advocated in his articles. The Local Government Board inspector came. He sat in the Moot Hall for two days, in public. He examined the ancient charters and deeds. He questioned the town trustees. He went through the books. He invited criticism and objections, and got nothing but a general statement of the policy of the reforming party from Epplewhite, as its leader. That party, said Epplewhite, objected to the old constitution as being outworn, and wished for a more modern arrangement.
Finally, the inspector, referring to the articles in the Monitor, which had led to the holding of the inquiry, expressed a wish to see and question their writer.
Brent stood up, in the midst of a crowded court, and confessed himself sole author of the articles in question.
“Why did you write them?” inquired the inspector.
“From a sense of public duty,” replied Brent.
“But I understand that you are a stranger, or a comparative stranger, to the town?” suggested the inspector.
“I am a burgess, a resident, and a property owner in the town. I took up this work—which I mean to see through—in succession to my cousin, John Wallingford, late mayor of this borough, who was murdered in this very hall,” said Brent. “There are men here who know that he was working day and night to bring about the financial reforms which I advocate.”
The inspector moved uneasily in his seat at the sound of the word which Brent emphasized in his reference to his cousin.
“I am sure I sympathize with you, Mr. Brent,” he said. “I have been much grieved to hear of the late mayor's sad fate. You say you have voluntarily taken up his work. Did he leave you any facts, figures, statistics, particulars, to work on?”
“If he had known that I was going to take up his work, he would doubtless have left me plenty,” replied Brent; “but he was murdered. He had such things—a certain notebook, filled with his discoveries.”
“Where is that book?” inquired the inspector. “Can it be produced?”
“It cannot,” said Brent. “It seems to have been stolen when my cousin was—killed.”
The inspector hesitated, shuffling his papers.
“Then you have no figures, facts, anything, Mr. Brent?” he said presently. “Nothing to support your newspaper articles?”
“Nothing of that sort,” answered Brent. “My articles refer wholly to the general principle of the thing.”
The inspector smiled.
“I'm afraid governments, national or municipal, aren't run on general principles, Mr. Brent,” he remarked.
“No!” said Brent. “They seem to be run on the lack of them!”
The official inquiry came to an end on that, amid good-humored laughter at Brent's retort. The inspector announced that he would issue his report in due course, and everybody knew what it would be. The good old ways, the time-honored customs, would have another lease of life. Once more Simon Crood had won.
As he was leaving the Moot Hall, Brent felt his arm touched, and turned to see Hawthwaite. The superintendent gave him a knowing look.
“To-morrow!” he whispered. “Be prepared! All's done—all's ready!”
XXV
Brent heard what the superintendent said, nodded a silent reply, and five minutes later had put that particular thing clean out of his mind.
During the progress of the Local Government Board inquiry he had learned something—that men like Tansley and Epplewhite knew a lot more about Hathelsborough and Hathelsborough folk than he knew, or than Wallingford had known, despite the murdered man's longer experience of town and people. Reform was not going to be carried out in a day in that timeworn borough, nor were its ancient customs, rotten and corrupt as they were, to be uprooted by newspaper articles. So far, Simon Crood and his gang had won all along the line.
Brent realized that most men in his position would have given up the contest and retired from the field in weariness and disgust; but he was not going to give up or to retire. He had a feeling, amounting to something near akin to a superstition, that it was his sacred duty to carry on his dead cousin's work, especially as Wallingford, by leaving him all his money, had provided him with the means of doing it. There in Hathelsborough he was, and in Hathelsborough he would stick, holding on like a bulldog to the enemy.
“I'm not counted out!” he said that evening, talking the proceedings of the day over with Queenie. “I'm up again and ready for the next round. Here I am, and here I stop! But—new tactics! Permeation—that's the ticket. Reckon I'll filtrate and percolate the waters of pure truth into these people in such a fashion that they'll come to see that what that old uncle of yours and his precious satellites have been giving 'em was nothing but a very muddy mixture. Permeation—that's the game in future!”
Queenie scarcely knew what he meant; but she gathered a sense of it from the set of his square jaw and the flash of his gray eyes. Being increasingly in love with him, it was incomprehensible to her that anybody could beat Brent at any game he took a hand in.
“The inquiry was a cut and dried business,” remarked Queenie. “Of course, the accounts and things would be cooked. Uncle Simon and Mallett and Coppinger would see to that. They'll have an extra bottle to-night over this victory; and if they could only hear to-morrow that you're going to clear out, their joy would be full.”
“Well, I'm not!” declared Brent. “Instead of clearing out, I'm going to dig in. I guess they'll find me intrenched more firmly than ever before long. We'll get at that to-morrow, now that this hollow inquiry's over.”
Queenie understood him perfectly that time. He and she were furnishing the house which Brent had purchased in order to get a proper legal footing in Hathelsborough. It was serious and fascinating work, necessitating much searching of the shops wherein antique furniture was stored, much consultation with decorators, much consideration of style and effect.
Brent quickly discovered that Queenie was a young woman of artistic taste, with a natural knowledge and appreciation of color schemes and values. Queenie found out that Brent had a positive horror of the merely modern. Consequently, this furnishing and decorating business took up all their spare time. Queenie eventually spent all hers at the house, superintending and arranging. Brent was there when he was not writing his Monitor articles or interviewing Hawthwaite.
The unproductive inquiry had broken into this domestic adventure, but Brent now proposed to go ahead with it until it was finished. Then he and Queenie would quietly get married and settle down. Hathelsborough, he remarked, might not want him, but there in Hathelsborough he had set up his tent, and the pegs were firmly driven in.
On the day succeeding the Local Government Board inquiry, Brent and Queenie had spent morning, afternoon, and the first part of the evening at the house, at the head of a small gang of workmen, and had reduced at least half of the chaos to order. As dusk grew near, Brent put on his coat and gave Queenie a look which signified that no answer was needed to what he was about to say.
“That's enough!” he said. “Dog tired! Now we'll go round to the Chancellor and get the best dinner they can give us. Put on your hat!”
Queenie obeyed readily enough. She was in that stage whereat a young woman finds obedience the most delightful thing in the world. Brent locked up the house, and they started toward the hotel.
In the old Market Square the lamps were just being lighted. As usual, there were groups of townsfolk gathered about High Cross and Low Cross, and the pavements were thronged with strolling pedestrians. Something suggested to Brent that these people were discussing some news of moment. He heard excited voices. Once or twice men glanced inquisitively at Queenie and himself as they walked toward the Chancellor. On the steps outside the hotel a knot of men, among them the landlord, were plainly in deep debate; but they became silent as Queenie and Brent passed in.
Brent, after ushering Queenie into the inner hall, turned back to them.
“Something new happened?” he asked.
The men looked at one another. The landlord, with a glance in Queenie's direction, replied, lowering his voice.
“Then you haven't heard, Mr. Brent?” he said. “I thought you'd have known. Hawthwaite has arrested Krevin Crood—for the murder.”
In spite of his usual self-possession, Brent started.
“What?” he exclaimed. “Krevin?”
“Krevin and Simon—both of them,” answered the landlord. “Got 'em at seven o'clock. They're in the police station—cells, of course. Nice business—the mayor of a town arrested for the murder of his predecessor!”
“As far as I can make out, Simon is charged with being accessory,” remarked one of the other men. “Krevin's the culprit in chief.”
“Well, there they both are, anyhow,” said the landlord. “If I know anything about the law, it's as serious a thing to be accessory to a murder as to be the principal. What do you say, Mr. Brent?”
Brent made no reply. He was thinking. So this was what Hawthwaite had meant when he said, the day before, that all was ready! He wished the superintendent had been a little more explicit. There was Queenie to consider.
Without further remark to the group of gossipers, he turned on his heel, went back to her, and took her into the coffee room, to the table which was always specially reserved for him. Not until Queenie had eaten her dinner did he tell her of what he had learned.
“So now there's going to be hell for a time, girly!” he said in conclusion. “No end of unpleasantness for me—and for you, considering that these men are your own people. All the more reason why you and I should stick together like leeches. Not all the Simons and the Krevins in the world are going to make any difference between you and me. We'll just go forward as if they didn't exist, whatever comes out. Come along, and I'll see you home to Mother Appleyard's. Then I'll drop in on Hawthwaite and learn all about it.”
“Do—do you think they did it?” asked Queenie, in a fearful whisper. “Actually?”
“God knows!” muttered Brent. “I'll be damned if I do—or if I know what to think; but Hawthwaite must have good grounds for this!”
He saw Queenie safely home to Mrs. Appleyard's, and hurried off to the police station, where he found the superintendent alone in his office.
“You've heard?” said Hawthwaite.
“I've heard,” replied Brent. “I wish you'd given me an idea—a hint!”
Hawthwaite shook his head. There was something peculiarly emphatic in the superintendent's gesture.
“Mr. Brent,” he said solemnly, “I wouldn't have given the king himself a hint! I had reasons—good reasons—for keeping the thing a profound secret until I could strike. As it is, I've been foiled. I've got Simon and Krevin Crood safely under lock and key, but I haven't got the other two.”
“What other two?” exclaimed Brent.
Hawthwaite smiled sourly.
“What other two?” he repeated. “Why, Mallett and Coppinger. They're off—though how the devil they got wind of what was going on I can't think. Leaked out somehow.”
“You suspect them, too?” asked Brent.
“Suspect them?” sneered Hawthwaite, “Lord! You wait till Simon and Krevin are brought up before the magistrates to-morrow morning! We've got the whole evidence so absolutely full and clear that we can go full steam ahead with the case to-morrow. Meeking will prosecute, and—I hope to get 'em committed before the afternoon's over.”
“Look here!” said Brent. “Tell me—what's the line? How does the thing stand?”
“Thus,” replied Hawthwaite. “We shall charge Krevin with the murder of your cousin, and Simon with being accessory to the fact.”
“Before or after?” asked Brent.
“Before.”
“How about the other two—Mallett and Coppinger?”
“Same charge as Simon.”
Brent took a turn about the room.
“That,” he remarked, pausing at last in front of Hawthwaite's desk, “means that there was a conspiracy?”
“To be sure!” assented Hawthwaite. “Got proof of it!”
“Then I wish you had laid hands on Mallett and Coppinger,” said Brent. “You've no idea of their whereabouts, I suppose?”
“None, so far,” replied Hawthwaite; “nor can I make out how or precisely when they slipped off. Oddly enough, Mrs. Mallett's back in the town. I saw and spoke to her an hour ago. Of course, she knows nothing about Mallett. She didn't come back to him. I don't know what she came back for. She's staying with friends, down in Waterdale.”
“What time will these men be brought up to-morrow morning?” asked Brent.
“At ten o'clock sharp,” answered Hawthwaite; “and I hope that before the end of the afternoon they'll have been committed to take their trial. As I said just now, we can go straight on. Careful preparation makes speedy achievement, Mr. Brent; and by the Lord Harry, we've done some preparing!”
“If only the whole thing is cleared at last!” said Brent quietly. “You think it will be?”
Hawthwaite smacked his hand on his plotting pad.
“Haven't the shadow of a doubt, Mr. Brent, that Krevin Crood murdered your cousin!” he asserted. “You'll hear for yourself to-morrow. Come early. A word of advice—”
“Yes?” prompted Brent.
“Leave your young lady at home,” said Hawthwaite. “No need for her feelings to be upset. They're her uncles, these two, after all, you know. Don't bring her.”
“No, of course,” assented Brent. “Never intended to.”
He went away to his hotel, sorely puzzled. Hawthwaite seemed positively confident that he had solved the problem at last; but was Hawthwaite right? Somehow Brent could scarcely think of Krevin Crood as a cold-blooded murderer, nor did it seem probable to him that calculating, scheming men like Simon Crood, Mallett, and Coppinger would calmly plot assassination, and thereby endanger their own safety.
One thing, anyhow, seemed certain—if Wallingford's knowledge of the financial iniquities of the town trustees was so deep as to lead them to commit murder as the only way of compelling his silence, then those iniquities must have been formidable indeed. The great and extraordinary wonder was that the rascals had been able to cloak them so thoroughly and successfully.
Brent was early in attendance at the court room of the Moot Hall next morning. For a particular reason of his own, he selected a seat in close proximity to the door. Long before the magistrates had filed upon the bench, the whole place was packed, and Hawthwaite, passing him, whispered that there were hundreds of people in the Market Square who could not get in.
Everybody of any note in Hathelsborough was on hand. Brent particularly observed the presence of Mrs. Mallett, who, heavily veiled, sat just beneath him. He looked in vain, however, for Mrs. Saumarez; but in a corner near one of the exits he saw her companion, Mrs. Elstrick, the woman whom Hawthwaite had seen in secret conversation with Krevin Crood in Farthing Lane.
Tansley caught sight of Brent, and, leaving the solicitors' table in the well of the court, went over to him.
“What are you doing perched out there?” he asked. “Come down with me. I'll find room for you.”
“No, thank you,” said Brent. “I'm all right here. I may have to leave. I'm not on in this affair. It's Hawthwaite's show. Is he right, this time?”
“God knows,” replied the lawyer. “Hawthwaite has something up his sleeve. Queerest business ever I knew! Simon Crood! If it had been Krevin alone, now—here, I'll sit by you. I'm not on, either—nobody's instructed me. You'll not notice it, but there's never been such a show of magistrates on that bench for many a year, if ever. Every magistrate in the place present—and the chief magistrate to be in the dock presently! That's dramatic effect, if you like!”
Brent was watching the dock. The prisoners came into it by a stairway at the back. Krevin came first. Cool, collected, calmly defiant—outwardly, he was less concerned than any spectator. Simon shambled heavily forward, his big, flabby face colored with angry resentment and shame. He beckoned to his solicitor, and began to talk eagerly to him over the separating partition. Evidently he was all nerves and eagerness; but Krevin, after a careful look around the court, during which he exchanged nods with several of his acquaintances, stood staring reflectively at Meeking, as if speculating on what the famous barrister was going to say in opening the case.
Meeking said little. The prisoners, he observed, addressing the bench in quiet, conversational tones, were charged, Krevin Crood with the actual murder of the late mayor, John Wallingford; Simon, with being accessory to the fact. If they had not absconded during the previous twenty-four hours, two other well known residents of the borough, Stephen Mallett and James Coppinger, would have stood in the dock with Simon Crood, similarly charged.
He would show their worships, he went on, by the evidence which he would produce, that patient and exhaustive investigation by the local police had brought to light as wicked a conspiracy as could well be imagined. There could be no doubt in the mind of any reasonable person, after hearing that evidence, that Simon Crood, Mallett, and Coppinger entered into a plot to rid themselves of a man who, had his investigations continued, would infallibly have exposed their nefarious practices to the community, nor that they employed Krevin Crood to carry out their designs.
He would show that the murder of Wallingford was deliberately plotted at Mallett's house, between the four men, on a certain particular date, and that Krevin Crood committed the actual murder on the following evening. Thanks to the particularly able and careful fashion in which Superintendent Hawthwaite had marshaled the damning body of evidence against these men, their worships would have no difficulty in deciding that there was a prima facie case against them, and that they must be committed to take their trial at the next assizes.
Hawthwaite, called first, gave evidence as to the arrest of the two prisoners. He arrested Krevin Crood in the passage leading from Bull's Snug, about half past six the previous evening, and Simon Crood at his own house, half an hour later. Krevin took the matter calmly, and merely remarked that he, Hawthwaite, was making the biggest mistake he had ever made in his life. Simon manifested great anger and indignation, and threatened an action for false imprisonment.
The superintendent stood down, and Meeking looked toward an inner door of the court. An attendant came forward at his nod, bearing a heavy package done up in canvas, and sealed.
At the same moment a smart-looking young man answered to the name of Samuel Owthwaite, and stepped alertly into the witness box.
XXVI
The tightly wedged mass of spectators watched, open-mouthed and quivering with anticipation, while the attendant, at Meeking's whispered bidding, broke the seals and cut the strings of the package that he had just carried in. Clearly, this was some piece of material evidence—but what?
A faint murmur of interest arose as the last wrappings fell aside and revealed a typewriter, somewhat the worse for wear. People glanced from it to the witness, Some of those present recognized him as a young mechanic, a native of Hathelsborough, who had gone, a few years previously, to work in the neighboring city of Clothford. They began to ask themselves what he could have to do with this case, and waited eagerly for his evidence.
Meeking, with the battered typewriter before him, kept the witness waiting. Turning to the bench, he put in the depositions taken at the coroner's inquest with respect to the threatening letter sent to Wallingford, and by him intrusted to Epplewhite. He also offered the letter itself, and the facsimile published as a supplement by the Monitor, with a brief explanation of his reasons for bringing them into evidence.
Then he addressed himself to his witness, and got the first facts from him. Samuel Owthwaite—mechanic—employed by Green & Polford, of Clothford, agents for all the leading firms of typewriter manufacturers.
“I believe you're a native of Hathelsborough, aren't you, Owthwaite?” began Meeking.
“I am, sir.”
“You keep up your interest in the old place, eh?”
“Have you any relations in the town?”
“Yes, sir—several.”
“Do they send you the Hathelsborough paper, the Monitor, every week?”
“Yes, sir, regularly.”
“Did they send you a copy of the Monitor in which there was a facsimile of the threatening letter addressed to the late mayor by some anonymous correspondent?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you look at the facsimile?”
“I did, sir.”
“Notice anything peculiar or distinctive about it?”
“Yes, sir—I noticed that some of the letters were broken, and some defective.”
“You noticed that as an expert mechanic, working at these things?”
“It was obvious to anybody, sir. The letters—some of them—were badly broken.”
“Look at the dock, Owthwaite. Do you know the prisoner, Simon Crood?”
“Well enough, sir!”
“How long have you known him?”
“Ever since I was a youngster, sir.”
“Have you ever seen Simon Crood at Green & Polford's, your employers?”
“I have, sir.”
“When was that?”
“He came in two days after I'd seen the facsimile, sir.”
“Bring anything with him?”
“Yes, sir—that typewriter before you.”
“Sure it was this particular machine?”
“Positive, sir. It's an old Semmingford machine, No. 32,587.”
“Did you hear the prisoner say anything about it?”
“I did, sir. He told our Mr. Jeaveson—manager, he is—that this was a machine he'd bought in London, many years ago; that the lettering seemed to be getting worn out, and that he wanted to know if we could supply new letters and do the machine up generally.”
“Yes—what then?”
“Mr. Jeaveson said we could do so, and the machine was handed over to me for repair.”
“Did you make any further discovery about it?”
“Yes, sir. That afternoon I just ran the lettering off, to see what defects there were. I found then that the broken and defective letters were identical with those in the facsimile letter that I'd seen in the Monitor two days before.”
“Just come down here, Owthwaite. Take this sheet of paper, and run the letters off again, so that their worships can compare the broken and defective letters with those in the threatening letter. Now,” continued Meeking, when the mechanic had complied with this suggestion and had gone back to the witness box, “what did you do on making this discovery?”
“I told Mr. Jeaveson about it, sir, and showed him what I meant. He discussed the matter with Mr. Polford, afterward, and it was decided that I should go over to Hathelsborough and see Mr. Hawthwaite, taking the machine with me.”
“Did you do that?”
“Yes, sir—next day, in the evening.”
“Did you tell Superintendent Hawthwaite of your discovery and hand the machine to him?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did he have the machine wrapped and sealed up, in your presence?”
“He did, sir.”
“This machine, now on the table?”
“That machine, sir.”
“And this is the machine that the prisoner, Simon Crood, brought to Green & Polford's?”
“That's the machine, sir.”
Meeking nodded to his witness, signifying that he had no more to ask; but before Owthwaite could leave the box, Stedman, the local solicitor with whom Simon Crood had held a whispered conversation on coming into court, rose and began to cross-examine him.
“Did you happen to be in Green & Polford's shop—the front shop, I mean—when Alderman Crood brought in that machine?” he asked.
“I was there at the time, sir,” replied Owthwaite.
“Did he come quite openly?”
“Yes, sir—in a cab, as a matter of fact. The cabman carried in the machine.”
“Did Alderman Crood say who he was?”
“Well, sir, to be exact, he saw me as soon as he came in, and recognized me. He said, 'Oh, a Hathelsborough lad, I see! You'll probably know me, young man!' Then he told Mr. Jeaveson and myself what he wanted.”
“The whole business was quite open and aboveboard, then?”
“Quite so, sir.”
“He drew your attention himself to the defects of the machine?”
“He did, sir.”
“And this was after—not before—that facsimile appeared in the Monitor?”
“After, sir.”
“Now I want a particularly careful answer, Owthwaite, to my next question. Did Alderman Crood ask you to get these repairs made immediately?”
“No, sir, he did not. He said he was in no hurry.”
“You were to take your own time about them, the machine remaining with you?”
“Just that, sir.”
Stedman sat down, as if satisfied, and Owthwaite left the witness box. At the calling of the next witness's name, Tansley nudged Brent.
“Now we may hear something lively!” he whispered. “This man has been the borough accountant for years, and I've often wondered if he doesn't know a good deal that he has kept to himself. If he does, will he let it out? Crood doesn't look overpleased to see him, anyhow!”
(To be continued in the December number of Munsey's Magazine)