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1  Our Library / Dame Agatha Christie - Dumb Witness (1937) / 3: The Accident on: Today at 07:55:21 am
IT was Tuesday afternoon. The side door to the garden was open. Miss Arundell stood on the threshold and threw Bob’s ball the length of the garden path. The terrier rushed after it.

“Just once more, Bob,” said Emily Arundell. “A good one.”

Once again the ball sped along the ground with Bob racing at full speed in pursuit.

Miss Arundell stooped down, picked up the ball from where Bob laid it at her feet and went into the house. Bob followed her closely. She shut the side door, went into the drawing room. Bob still at her heels, and put the ball away in the drawer.

She glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. It was half past six.

“A little rest before dinner, I think, Bob.”

She ascended the stairs to her bedroom. Bob accompanied her. Lying on the big chintz-covered couch with Bob at her feet. Miss Arundell sighed. She was glad that it was Tuesday and that her guests would be going tomorrow. It was not that this weekend had disclosed anything to her that she had not known before. It was more the fact that it had not permitted her to forget her own knowledge.

She said to herself: “I’m getting old, I suppose . . .” And then, with a little shock of surprise: “I am old. . . .”

She lay with her eyes closed for half an hour, then the elderly house-parlourmaid, Ellen, brought hot water and she rose and prepared for dinner.

Dr. Donaldson was to dine with them that night. Emily Arundell wished to have an opportunity of studying him at close quarters. It still seemed to her a little incredible that the exotic Theresa should want to marry this rather stiff and pedantic young man. It also seemed a little odd that this stiff and pedantic young man should want to marry Theresa.

She did not feel as the evening progressed that she was getting to know Dr. Donaldson any better. He was very polite, very formal and, to her mind, intensely boring. In her own mind she agreed with Miss Peabody’s judgement. The thought flashed across her brain, “Better stuff in our young days.”

Dr. Donaldson did not stay late. He rose to go at ten o’clock. After he had taken his departure Emily Arundell herself announced that she was going to bed. She went upstairs and her young relations went up also. They all seemed somewhat subdued tonight. Miss Lawson remained downstairs performing her final duties, letting Bob out for his run, poking down the fire, putting the guard up and rolling back the hearth rug in case of fire.

She arrived rather breathless in her employer’s room about five minutes later.

“I think I’ve got everything,” she said, putting down wool, workbag, and a library book. “I do hope the book will be all right. She hadn’t got any of the ones on your list but she said she was sure you’d like this one.”

“That girl’s a fool,” said Emily Arundell. “Her taste in books is the worst I’ve ever come across.”

“Oh, dear. I’m so sorry---Perhaps I ought----”

“Nonsense, it’s not your fault.” Emily Arundell added kindly. “I hope you enjoyed yourself this afternoon.”

Miss Lawson’s face lighted up. She looked eager and almost youthful.

“Oh, yes, thank you very much. So kind of you to spare me. I had the most interesting time. We had the Planchette and really---it wrote the most interesting things. There were several messages . . . Of course its not quite the same thing as the sittings . . . Julia Tripp has been having a lot of success with the automatic writing. Several messages from Those who have Passed Over. It---it really makes one feel so grateful---that such things should be permitted. . . .”

Miss Arundell said with a slight smile: “Better not let the vicar hear you.”

“Oh, but indeed, dear Miss Arundell, I am convinced---quite convinced---there can be nothing wrong about it. I only wish dear Mr. Lonsdale would examine the subject. It seems to me so narrow-minded to condemn a thing that you have not even investigated. Both Julia and Isabel Tripp are such truly spiritual women.”

“Almost too spiritual to be alive,” said Miss Arundell.

She did not care much for Julia and Isabel Tripp. She thought their clothes ridiculous, their vegetarian and uncooked fruit meals absurd, and their manner affected. They were women of no traditions, no roots---in fact---no breeding! But she got a certain amount of amusement out of their earnestness and she was at bottom kindhearted enough not to grudge the pleasure that their friendship obviously gave to poor Minnie.

Poor Minnie! Emily Arundell looked at her companion with mingled affection and contempt. She had had so many of these foolish, middle-aged women to minister to her---all much the same, kind, fussy, subservient and almost entirely mindless.

Really poor Minnie was looking quite excited tonight. Her eyes were shining. She fussed about the room vaguely touching things here and there without the least idea of what she was doing, her eyes all bright and shining.

She stammered out rather nervously: “I---I do wish you’d been there . . . I feel, you know, that you’re not quite a believer yet. But tonight there was a message---for E.A., the initials came quite definitely. It was from a man who had passed over many years ago---a very good-looking military man---Isabel saw him quite distinctly. It must have been dear General Arundell. Such a beautiful message, so full of love
and comfort, and how through patience all could be attained.”

“Those sentiments sound very unlike papa,” said Miss Arundell.

“Oh, but our Dear Ones change so---on the other side. Everything is love and understanding. And then the Planchette spelt out something about a key---I think it was the key of the Boule cabinet---could that be it?”

“The key of the Boule cabinet?” Emily Arundell’s voice sounded sharp and interested.

“I think that was it. I thought perhaps it might be important papers---something of the kind. There was a well-authenticated case where a message came to look in a certain piece of furniture and actually a will was discovered there.”

“There wasn’t a will in the Boule cabinet,” said Miss Arundell. She added abruptly: “Go to bed, Minnie. You’re tired. So am I. We’ll ask the Tripps in for an evening soon.”

“Oh, that will be nice! Good night, dear. Sure you’ve got everything? I hope you haven’t been tired with so many people here. I must tell Ellen to air the drawing room very well tomorrow, and shake out the curtains---all this smoking leaves such a smell. I must say I think it’s very good of you to let them all smoke in the drawing room!”

“I must make some concessions to modernity,” said Emily Arundell. “Good night, Minnie.”

As the other woman left the room, Emily Arundell wondered if this spiritualistic business was really good for Minnie. Her eyes had been popping out of her head, and she had looked so restless and excited.

Odd about the Boule cabinet, thought Emily Arundell as she got into bed. She smiled grimly as she remembered the scene of long ago. The key that had come to light after papa’s death, and the cascade of empty brandy bottles that had tumbled out when the cabinet had been unlocked! It was little things like that, things that surely neither Minnie Lawson nor Isabel and Julia Tripp could possibly know, which made one wonder whether, after all, there wasn’t something in this spiritualistic business. . . .

She felt wakeful lying on her big four-poster bed. Nowadays she found it increasingly difficult to sleep. But she scorned Dr. Grainger’s tentative suggestion of a sleeping draught. Sleeping draughts were for weaklings, for people who couldn’t bear a finger ache, or a little toothache, or the tedium of a sleepless night.

Often she would get up and wander noiselessly round the house, picking up a book, fingering an ornament, rearranging a vase of flowers, writing a letter or two. In those midnight hours she had a feeling of the equal liveliness of the house through which she wandered. They were not disagreeable, those nocturnal wanderings. It was as though ghosts walked beside her, the ghosts of her sisters, Arabella, Matilda and Agnes, the ghost of her brother Thomas, the dear fellow as he was before That Woman got hold of him! Even the ghost of General Charles Laverton Arundell, that domestic tyrant with the charming manners who shouted and bullied his daughters but who nevertheless was an object of pride to them with his experiences in the Indian Mutiny and his knowledge of the world. What if there were days when he was “not quite so well” as his daughters put it evasively?

Her mind reverting to her niece’s fiancé. Miss Arundell thought, “I don’t suppose he’ll ever take to drink! Calls himself a man and drank barley water this evening! Barley water! And I opened papa’s special port.”

Charles had done justice to the port all right. Oh! if only Charles were to be trusted. If only one didn’t know that with him----

Her thoughts broke off . . . Her mind ranged over the events of the weekend. . . .

Everything seemed vaguely disquieting. . . .

She tried to put worrying thoughts out of her mind.

It was no good.

She raised herself on her elbow and by the light of the night-light that always burned in a little saucer she looked at the time.

One o’clock and she had never felt less like sleep.

She got out of bed and put on her slippers and her warm dressing gown. She would go downstairs and just check over the weekly books ready for the paying of them the following morning.

Like a shadow she slipped from her room and along the corridor where one small electric bulb was allowed to burn all night.

She came to the head of the stairs, stretched out one hand to the baluster rail and then, unaccountably, she stumbled, tried to recover her balance, failed and went headlong down the stairs.

The sound of her fall, the cry she gave, stirred the sleeping house to wakefulness. Doors opened, lights flashed on.

Miss Lawson popped out of her room at the head of the staircase.

Uttering little cries of distress she pattered down the stairs. One by one the others arrived---Charles, yawning, in a resplendent dressing gown. Theresa, wrapped in dark silk. Bella in a navy-blue kimono, her hair bristling with combs to “set the wave.”

Dazed and confused Emily Arundell lay in a crushed heap. Her shoulder hurt her and her ankle---her whole body was a confused mass of pain. She was conscious of people standing over her, of that fool Minnie Lawson crying and making ineffectual gestures with her hands, of Theresa with a startled look in her dark eyes, of Bella standing with her mouth open looking expectant, of the voice of Charles saying from somewhere---very far away so it seemed----

“It’s that damned dog’s ball! He must have left it here and she tripped over it. See? Here it is!”

And then she was conscious of authority, putting the others aside, kneeling beside her, touching her with hands that did not fumble but knew.

A feeling of relief swept over her. It would be all right now.

Dr. Tanios was saying in firm, reassuring tones: “No, it’s all right. No bones broken . . . Just badly shaken and bruised---and of course she’s had a bad shock. But she’s been very lucky that it’s no worse.”

Then he cleared the others off a little and picked her up quite easily and carried her up to her bedroom, where he had held her wrist for a minute, counting, then nodded his head, sent Minnie (who was still crying and being generally a nuisance) out of the room to fetch brandy and to heat water for a hot bottle.

Confused, shaken, and racked with pain, she felt acutely grateful to Jacob Tanios in that moment. The relief of feeling oneself in capable hands. He gave you just that feeling of assurance---of confidence---that a doctor ought to give.

There was something---something she couldn’t quite get hold of---something vaguely disquieting---but she wouldn’t think of it now. She would drink this and go to sleep as they told her.

But surely there was something missing---someone.

Oh well, she wouldn’t think . . . Her shoulder hurt her---She drank down
what she was given.

She heard Dr. Tanios say---and in what a comfortable assured voice---“She’ll be all right, now.”

She closed her eyes.

She awoke to a sound that she knew---a soft, muffled bark.

She was wide awake in a minute.

Bob---naughty Bob! He was barking outside the front door---his own particular “out all night very ashamed of himself” bark, pitched in a subdued key but repeated hopefully.

Miss Arundell strained her ears. Ah, yes, that was all right. She could hear Minnie going down to let him in. She heard the creak of the opening front door, a confused low murmur---Minnie’s futile reproaches—“Oh, you naughty little doggie---a very naughty little Bobsie----” She heard the pantry
door open. Bob’s bed was under the pantry table.

And at that moment Emily realized what it was she had subconsciously missed at the moment of her accident. It was Bob. All that commotion---her fall, people running---normally Bob would have responded by a crescendo of barking from inside the pantry.

So that was what had been worrying her at the back of her mind. But it was explained now---Bob, when he had been let out last night, had shamelessly and deliberately gone off on pleasure bent. From time to time he had these lapses from virtue---though his apologies afterwards were always all that could be desired.

So that was all right. But was it? What else was there worrying her, nagging at the back of her head. Her accident---something to do with her accident.

Ah, yes, somebody had said---Charles---that she had slipped on Bob’s ball which he had left on the top of the stairs. . . .

The ball had been there---he had held it up in his hand. . . .

Emily Arundell’s head ached. Her shoulder throbbed. Her bruised body suffered. . . .

But in the midst of her suffering her mind was clear and lucid. She was no longer confused by shock. Her memory was perfectly clear.

She went over in her mind all the events from six o’clock yesterday evening . . . She retraced every step . . . till she came to the moment when she arrived at the stairhead and started to descend the stairs. . . .

A thrill of incredulous horror shot through her. . . .

Surely---surely, she must be mistaken . . . One often had queer fancies after an event had happened. She tried---earnestly she tried---to recall the slippery roundness of Bob’s ball under her foot. . . .

But she could recall nothing of the kind.

Instead----

“Sheer nerves,” said Emily Arundell. “Ridiculous fancies.”

But her sensible, shrewd, Victorian mind would not admit that for a moment. There was no foolish optimism about the Victorians. They could believe the worst with the utmost ease.

Emily Arundell believed the worst.

2  Our Library / Dame Agatha Christie - Dumb Witness (1937) / 2: The Relations on: Today at 07:05:44 am
CHARLES ran lightly up the stairs and tapped on his sister’s door. Her answering “Come in” came promptly and he entered.

Theresa was sitting up in bed yawning.

Charles took a seat on the bed.

“What a decorative female you are, Theresa,” he remarked appreciatively.

Theresa said sharply: “What’s the matter?”

Charles grinned. “Sharp, aren’t you? Well, I stole a march on you, my girl! Thought I’d make my touch before you got to work.”

“Well?”

Charles spread his hands downwards in negation.

“Nothing doing! Aunt Emily ticked me off good and proper. She intimated that she was under no illusions as to why her affectionate family had gathered round her! And she also intimated that the said affectionate family would be disappointed. Nothing being handed out but affection---and not so much of that.”

“You might have waited a bit,” said Theresa drily.

Charles grinned again. “I was afraid you or Tanios might get in ahead of me. I’m sadly afraid, Theresa my sweet, that there’ll be nothing doing this time. Old Emily is by no means a fool.”

“I never thought she was.”

“I even tried to put the wind up her.”

“What d’you mean?” asked his sister sharply.

“Told her she was going about it the right way to get bumped off. After all she can’t take the dibs to heaven with her. Why not loosen up a bit?”

“Charles, you are a fool!”

“No, I’m not. I’m a bit of a psychologist in my way. It’s never a bit of good sucking up to the old girl. She much prefers you to stand up to her. And after all, I was only talking sense. We get the money when she dies---she might just as well part with a little beforehand! Otherwise the temptation to help her out of the way might become overwhelming.”

“Did she see your point?” asked Theresa, her delicate mouth curling up scornfully.

“I’m not sure. She didn’t admit it. Just thanked me rather nastily for my advice and said she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself. ‘Well,’ I said, T’ve warned you.’ ‘I’ll remember it,’ she said.”

Theresa said angrily: “Really, Charles, you are an utter fool.”

“Damn it all, Theresa, I was a bit ratty myself! The old girl’s rolling---simply rolling. I bet she doesn’t spend a tenth part of her income---what has she got to spend it on, anyway? And here we are---young, able to enjoy life---and to spite us she’s capable of living to a hundred. . . . I want my fun now. . . . So do you. . . .”

Theresa nodded.

She said in a low, breathless voice: “They don’t understand---old people don’t. . . . they can’t. . . . They don’t know what it is to live!”

Brother and sister were silent for some minutes.

Charles got up. “Well, my love, I wish you better success than I’ve had. But I rather doubt it.”

Theresa said: “I’m rather counting on Rex to do the trick. If I can make old Emily realize how brilliant he is, and how it matters terrifically that he should have his chance and not have to sink into a rut as a general practitioner . . . Oh, Charles, a few thousand of capital just at this minute would make all the difference in the world to our lives!”

“Hope you get it, but I don’t think you will. You’ve got through a bit too much capital in riotous living in your time. I say, Theresa, you don’t think the dreary Bella or the dubious Tanios will get anything, do you?”

“I don’t see that money would be any good to Bella. She goes about looking like a ragbag and her tastes are purely domestic.”

“Oh, well,” said Charles, vaguely. “I expect she wants things for those unprepossessing children of hers, schools, and plates for their front teeth and music lessons. And anyway it isn’t Bella---it’s Tanios. I bet he’s got a nose for money all right! Trust a Greek for that. You know he’s got through most of Bella’s? Speculated with it and lost it all.”

“Do you think he’ll get something out of old Emily?”

“He won’t if I can prevent him,” said Charles, grimly.

He left the room and wandered downstairs. Bob was in the hall. He fussed up to Charles agreeably. Dogs liked Charles.

He ran towards the drawing room door and looked back at Charles.

“What’s the matter?” said Charles, strolling after him.

Bob hurried into the drawing room and sat down expectantly by a small bureau.

Charles strolled over to him.

“What’s it all about?”

Bob wagged his tail, looked hard at the drawers of the bureau and uttered an appealing squeak.

“Want something that’s in here?”

Charles pulled open the top drawer. His eyebrows rose.

“Dear, dear,” he said.

At one side of the drawer was a little pile of treasury notes.

Charles picked up the bundle and counted them. With a grin he removed three one pound notes and two ten shilling ones and put them in his pocket. He replaced the rest of the notes carefully in the drawer where he had found them.

“That was a good idea, Bob,” he said. “Your Uncle Charles will be able at any rate to cover expenses. A little ready cash always comes in handy.”

Bob uttered a faint reproachful bark as Charles shut the drawer.

“Sorry old man,” Charles apologized. He opened the next drawer. Bob’s ball was in the corner of it. He took it out.

“Here you are. Enjoy yourself with it.” Bob caught the ball, trotted out of the room and presently bump, bump, bump, was heard down the stairs.

Charles strolled out into the garden. It was a fine sunny morning with a scent of lilac.

Miss Arundell had Dr. Tanios by her side. He was speaking of the advantage of an English education---a good education---for children and how deeply he regretted that he could not afford such a luxury for his own children.

Charles smiled with satisfied malice. He joined in the conversation in a lighthearted manner, turning it adroitly into entirely different channels.

Emily Arundell smiled at him quite amiably. He even fancied that she was amused by his tactics and was subtly encouraging them.

Charles’ spirits rose. Perhaps, after all, before he left----

Charles was an incurable optimist.

Dr. Donaldson called for Theresa in his car that afternoon and drove her to Worthem Abbey, one of the local beauty spots. They wandered away from the Abbey itself into the woods.

There Rex Donaldson told Theresa at length about his theories and some of his recent experiments. She understood very little but listened in a spellbound manner, thinking to herself: “How clever Rex is---and how absolutely adorable!”

Her fiancé paused once and said rather doubtfully: “I’m afraid this is dull stuff for you, Theresa.”

“Darling, it’s too thrilling,” said Theresa, firmly. “Go on. You take some of the blood of the infected rabbit---?”

Presently Theresa said with a sigh:

“Your work means a terrible lot to you, my sweet.”

“Naturally,” said Dr. Donaldson.

It did not seem at all natural to Theresa. Very few of her friends did any work at all, and if they did they made extremely heavy weather about it. She thought as she had thought once or twice before, how singularly unsuitable it was that she should have fallen in love with Rex Donaldson. Why did these things, these ludicrous and amazing madnesses, happen to one? A profitless question. This had happened to her.

She frowned, wondered at herself. Her crowd had been so gay---so cynical. Love affairs were necessary to life, of course, but why take them seriously? One loved and passed on.

But this feeling of hers for Rex Donaldson was different, it went deeper. She felt instinctively that here there would be no passing on . . . Her need of him was simple and profound. Everything about him fascinated her. His calmness and detachment, so different from her own hectic, grasping life, the clear, logical coldness of his scientific mind, and something else, imperfectly understood, a secret force in the man masked by his unassuming slightly pedantic manner, but which she nevertheless felt and sensed instinctively.

In Rex Donaldson there was genius---and the fact that his profession was the main preoccupation of his life and that she was only a part---though a necessary part---of existence to him only heightened his attraction for her. She found herself for the first time in her selfish pleasure-loving life content to take second place. The prospect fascinated her. For Rex she would do anything---anything!

“What a damned nuisance money is,” she said, petulantly. “If only Aunt Emily were to die we could get married at once, and you could come to London and have a laboratory full of test tubes and guinea pigs, and never bother any more about children with mumps and old ladies with livers.”

Donaldson said: “There’s no reason why your aunt shouldn’t live for many years to come---if she’s careful.”

Theresa said despondently: “I know that. . . .”

In the big double-bedded room with the old-fashioned oak furniture. Dr. Tanios said to his wife: “I think that I have prepared the ground sufficiently. It is now your turn, my dear.”

He was pouring water from the old-fashioned copper can into the rose-patterned china basin.

Bella Tanios sat in front of the dressing table wondering why, when she combed her hair as Theresa did, it should not look like Theresa’s!

There was a moment before she replied. Then she said: “I don’t think I want---to ask Aunt Emily for money.”

“It’s not for yourself, Bella, it’s for the sake of the children. Our investments have been so unlucky.”

His back was turned, he did not see the swift glance she gave him---a furtive, shrinking glance.

She said with mild obstinacy: “All the same, I think I’d rather not . . . Aunt Emily is rather difficult. She can be generous but she doesn’t like being asked.”

Drying his hands, Tanios came across from the washstand. “Really, Bella, it isn’t like you to be so obstinate. After all, what have we come down here for?”

She murmured: “I didn’t---I never meant---it wasn’t to ask for money . . . .”

“Yet you agreed that the only hope if we are to educate the children properly is for your aunt to come to the rescue.”

Bella Tanios did not answer. She moved uneasily. But her face bore the mild mulish look that many clever husbands of stupid wives know to their cost.

She said: “Perhaps Aunt Emily herself may suggest----”

“It is possible, but I’ve seen no signs of it so far.”

Bella said: “If we could have brought the children with us. Aunt Emily couldn’t have helped loving Mary. And Edward is so intelligent.”

Tanios said, drily: “I don’t think your aunt is a great child lover. It is probably just as well the children aren’t here.”

“Oh, Jacob, but----”

“Yes, yes, my dear. I know your feelings. But these desiccated English spinsters---bah, they are not human. We want to do the best we can, do we not, for our Mary and our Edward? To help us a little would involve no hardship to Miss Arundell.”

Mrs. Tanios turned, there was a flush in her cheeks. “Oh, please, please, Jacob, not this time. I’m sure it would be unwise. I would so very very much rather not.”

Tanios stood close behind her, his arm encircled her shoulders. She trembled a little and then was still---almost rigid.

He said and his voice was still pleasant: “All the same, Bella, I think---I think you will do what I ask . . . You usually do, you know---in the end . . . Yes, I think you will do what I say. . . .”

3  Our Library / Dame Agatha Christie - Dumb Witness (1937) / 1: The Mistress of Littlegreen House on: Today at 06:14:47 am
MISS Arundell died on May 1st. Though her illness was short her death did not occasion much surprise in the little country town of Market Basing where she had lived since she was a girl of sixteen. For Emily Arundell was well over seventy, the last of a family of five, and she had been known to be in delicate health for many years and had indeed nearly died of a similar attack to the one that killed her some eighteen months before.

But though Miss Arundell’s death surprised no one, something else did. The provisions of her will gave rise to varying emotions, astonishment, pleasurable excitement, deep condemnation, fury, despair, anger and general gossip. For weeks and even months Market Basing was to talk of nothing else! Everyone had their own contribution to make to the subject, from Mr. Jones the grocer, who held that “blood was thicker than water,” to Mrs. Lamphrey at the post office, who repeated ad nauseam that “there’s something behind it, depend upon it! You mark my words.”

What added zest to the speculations on the subject was the fact that the will had been made as lately as April 21st. Add to this the further fact that Emily Arundell’s near relations had been staying with her just before that date over Easter Bank Holiday and it will be realized that the most scandalous theories could be propounded, pleasurably relieving the monotony of everyday life in Market Basing.

There was one person who was shrewdly suspected of knowing more about the matter than she was willing to admit. That was Miss Wilhelmina Lawson, Miss Arundell’s companion. Miss Lawson, however, professed herself just as much in the dark as everyone else. She, too, she declared, had been dumbfounded when the will was read out.

A lot of people, of course, did not believe this. Nevertheless, whether Miss Lawson was or was not as ignorant as she declared herself to be, only one person really knew the true facts. That person was the dead woman herself. Emily Arundell had kept her own counsel as she was in the habit of doing. Even to her lawyer she had said nothing of the motives underlying her action. She was content with making her wishes clear.

In that reticence could be found the keynote of Emily Arundell’s character. She was, in every respect, a typical product of her generation.

She had both its virtues and its vices. She was autocratic and often overbearing, but she was also intensely warmhearted. Her tongue was sharp but her actions were kind. She was outwardly sentimental but inwardly shrewd. She had a succession of companions whom she bullied unmercifully, but treated with great generosity. She had a great sense of family obligation. On the Friday before Easter Emily Arundell was standing in the hall of Littlegreen House giving various directions to Miss Lawson.

Emily Arundell had been a handsome girl and she was now a well-preserved handsome old lady with a straight back and a brisk manner. A faint yellowness in her skin was a warning that she could not eat rich food with impunity.

Miss Arundell was saying: “Now then, Minnie, where have you put them all?”

“Well, I thought---I hope I’ve done right---Dr. and Mrs. Tanios in the Oak room and Theresa in the Blue room and Mr. Charles in the Old Nursery----"

Miss Arundell interrupted: “Theresa can have the Old Nursery and Charles will have the Blue room.”

“Oh, yes---I’m sorry---I thought the Old Nursery being rather more inconvenient----”

“It will do very nicely for Theresa.”

In Miss Arundell’s day, women took second place. Men were the important members of society.

“I’m so sorry the dear little children aren’t coming,” murmured Miss Lawson, sentimentally.

She loved children and was quite incapable of managing them.

“Four visitors will be quite enough,” said Miss Arundell. “In any case Bella spoils her children abominably. They never dream of doing what they are told.”

Minnie Lawson murmured: “Mrs. Tanios is a very devoted mother.”

Miss Arundell said with grave approval: “Bella is a good woman.”

Miss Lawson sighed and said: “It must be very hard for her sometimes---living in an outlandish place
like Smyrna.”

Emily Arundell replied: “She has made her bed and she must lie on it.”

And having uttered this final Victorian pronouncement she went on: “I am going to the village now to speak about the orders for the weekend.”

“Oh, Miss Arundell, do let me. I mean----”

“Nonsense. I prefer to go myself. Rogers needs a sharp word. The trouble with you is, Minnie, that you’re not emphatic enough. Bob! Bob! Where is the dog?”

A wirehaired terrier came tearing down the stairs. He circled round and round his mistress uttering short staccato barks of delight and expectation.

Together mistress and dog passed out of the front door and down the short path to the gate.

Miss Lawson stood in the doorway smiling rather foolishly after them, her mouth a little open. Behind her a voice said tartly: “Them pillowcases you gave me, miss, isn’t a pair.”

“What? How stupid of me. . . .”

Minnie Lawson plunged once more into household routine.

Emily Arundell, attended by Bob, made a royal progress down the main street of Market Basing.

It was very much of a royal progress. In each shop she entered the proprietor always hurried forward to attend to her.

She was Miss Arundell of Littlegreen House. She was “one of our oldest customers.” She was “one of the old school. Not many about like her nowadays.”

“Good morning, miss. What can I have the pleasure of doing for you---Not tender? Well, I’m sorry to hear that. I thought myself it was as nice a little saddle---Yes, of course. Miss Arundell. If you say so, it is so---No, indeed I wouldn’t think of sending Canterbury to you, Miss Arundell---Yes, I’ll see to it myself. Miss Arundell.”

Bob and Spot, the butcher’s dog, circled slowly round each other, hackles raised, growling gently. Spot was a stout dog of nondescript breed.

He knew that he must not fight with customers’ dogs, but he permitted himself to tell them, by subtle indication, just exactly what mincemeat he would make of them were he free to do so.

Bob, a dog of spirit, replied in kind.

Emily Arundell said “Bob!” sharply and passed on.

In the greengrocer’s there was a meeting of heavenly bodies. Another old lady, spherical in outline, but equally distinguished by that air of royalty, said: “Mornin’, Emily.”

“Good morning, Caroline.”

Caroline Peabody said: “Expecting any of your young people down?”

“Yes, all of them. Theresa, Charles and Bella.”

“So Bella’s home, is she? Husband too?”

“Yes.”

It was a simple monosyllable, but underlying it was knowledge common to both ladies.

For Bella Biggs, Emily Arundell’s niece, had married a Greek. And Emily Arundell’s people, who were what is known as “all service people,” simply did not marry Greeks.

By way of being obscurely comforting (for of course such a matter could not be referred to openly) Miss Peabody said: “Bella’s husband’s got brains. And charming manners!”

“His manners are delightful,” agreed Miss Arundell.

Moving out into the street Miss Peabody asked: “What’s this about Theresa being engaged to young Donaldson?”

Miss Arundell shrugged her shoulders. “Young people are so casual nowadays. I’m afraid it will have to be a rather long engagement---that is, if anything comes of it. He has no money.”

“Of course Theresa has her own money,” said Miss Peabody.

Miss Arundell said stiffly: “A man could not possibly wish to live on his wife’s money.”

Miss Peabody gave a rich, throaty chuckle. “They don’t seem to mind doing it, nowadays. You and I are out of date, Emily. What I can’t understand is what the child sees in him. Of all the namby-pamby young men!”

“He’s a clever doctor, I believe.”

“Those pince-nez---and that stiff way of talking! In my young days we’d have called him a poor stick!”

There was a pause while Miss Peabody’s memory, diving into the past, conjured up visions of dashing, bewhiskered young men. . . .

She said with a sigh: “Send that young dog Charles along to see me---if he’ll come.”

“Of course. I’ll tell him.”

The two ladies parted.

They had known each other for considerably over fifty years. Miss Peabody knew of certain regrettable lapses in the life of General Arundell, Emily’s father. She knew just precisely what a shock Thomas Arundell’s marriage had been to his sisters. She had a very shrewd idea of certain troubles connected with the younger generation.

But no word had ever passed between the two ladies on any of these subjects. They were both upholders of family dignity, family solidarity, and complete reticence on family matters.

Miss Arundell walked home. Bob trotting sedately at her heels. To herself, Emily Arundell admitted what she would never have admitted to another human being, her dissatisfaction with the younger generation of her family.

Theresa, for instance. She had no control over Theresa since the latter had come into her own money at the age of twenty-one. Since then the girl had achieved a certain notoriety. Her picture was often in the papers. She belonged to a young, bright, go-ahead set in London---a set that had freak parties and occasionally ended up in the police courts. It was not the kind of notoriety that Emily Arundell approved of for an Arundell. In fact, she disapproved very much of Theresa’s way of living. As regards the girl’s
engagement, her feelings were slightly confused. On the one hand she did not consider an upstart Dr. Donaldson good enough for an Arundell. On the other she was uneasily conscious that Theresa was a most unsuitable wife for a quiet country doctor.

With a sigh her thoughts passed on to Bella. There was no fault to find with Bella. She was a good woman---a devoted wife and mother, quite exemplary in behaviour---and extremely dull! But even Bella could not be regarded with complete approval. For Bella had married a foreigner---and not only a foreigner---but a Greek. In Miss Arundell’s prejudiced mind a Greek was almost as bad as an Argentine or a Turk. The fact that Dr. Tanios had a charming manner and was said to be extremely able to his profession only prejudiced the old lady slightly more against him. She distrusted charm and easy compliments. For this reason, too, she found it difficult to be fond of the two children. They had both taken after their father in looks---there was really nothing English about them.

And then Charles. . . .

Yes, Charles. . . .

It was no use blinding one’s eyes to facts. Charles, charming though he was, was not to be trusted. . . .

Emily Arundell sighed. She felt suddenly tired, old, depressed. . . .

She supposed that she couldn’t last much longer. . . .

Her mind reverted to the will she had made some years ago.

Legacies to the servants---to charities---and the main bulk of her considerable fortune to be divided equally between these, her three surviving relations. . . .

It still seemed to her that she had done the right and equitable thing. It just crossed her mind to wonder whether there might not be some way of securing Bella’s share of the money so that her husband could not touch it. . . . She must ask Mr. Purvis.

She turned in at the gate of Littlegreen House.

Charles and Theresa Arundell arrived by car---the Tanioses, by train.

The brother and sister arrived first. Charles, tall and good-looking, with his slightly mocking manner, said: “Hullo, Aunt Emily, how’s the girl? You look fine.”

And he kissed her.

Theresa put an indifferent young cheek against her withered one.

“How are you. Aunt Emily?”

Theresa, her aunt thought, was looking far from well. Her face, beneath its plentiful makeup, was slightly haggard and there were lines round her eyes.

They had tea in the drawing room. Bella Tanios, her hair inclined to straggle in wisps from below the fashionable hat that she wore at the wrong angle, stared at her cousin Theresa with a pathetic eagerness to assimilate and memorize her clothes. It was poor Bella’s fate in life to be passionately fond of clothes without having any clothes sense. Theresa’s clothes were expensive, slightly bizarre, and she herself had an exquisite figure.

Bella, when she arrived in England from Smyrna, had tried earnestly to copy Theresa’s elegance at an inferior price and cut.

Dr. Tanios, who was a big-bearded jolly-looking man, was talking to Miss Arundell. His voice was warm and full---an attractive voice that charmed a listener almost against his or her will. Almost in spite of herself, it charmed Miss Arundell.

Miss Lawson was fidgeting a good deal. She jumped up and down, handing plates, fussing over the tea table. Charles, whose manners were excellent, rose more than once to help her, but she expressed no gratitude.

When, after tea, the party went out to make a tour of the garden Charles murmured to his sister: “Lawson doesn’t like me. Odd, isn’t it?”

Theresa said, mockingly: “Very odd. So there is one person who can withstand your fatal
fascination?”

Charles grinned---an engaging grin---and said: “Lucky it’s only Lawson. . . .”

In the garden Miss Lawson walked with Mrs. Tanios and asked her questions about the children. Bella Tanios’ rather drab face lighted up. She forgot to watch Theresa. She talked eagerly and animatedly. Mary had said such a quaint thing on the boat. . . .

She found Minnie Lawson a most sympathetic listener.

Presently a fair-haired young man with a solemn face and pince-nez was shown into the garden from the house. He looked rather embarrassed. Miss Arundell greeted him politely.

Theresa said: “Hullo, Rex!”

She slipped an arm through his. They wandered away.

Charles made a face. He slipped away to have a word with the gardener, an ally of his from old days.

When Miss Arundell reentered the house Charles was playing with Bob. The dog stood at the top of the stairs, his ball in his mouth, his tail gently wagging.

“Come on, old man,” said Charles.

Bob sank down on his haunches, nosed his ball slowly and slowly nearer the edge. As he finally bunted it over he sprang to his feet in great excitement. The ball bumped slowly down the stairs. Charles caught it and tossed it up to him. Bob caught it neatly in his mouth. The performance was repeated.

“Regular game of his,” said Charles.

Emily Arundell smiled. “He’ll go on for hours,” she said.

She turned into the drawing room and Charles followed her. Bob gave a disappointed bark.

Glancing through the window Charles said: “Look at Theresa and her young man. They are an odd couple!”

“You think Theresa is really serious over this?”

“Oh, she’s crazy about him!” said Charles with confidence. “Odd taste, but there it is. I think it must be the way he looks at her as though she were a scientific specimen and not a live woman. That’s rather a novelty for Theresa. Pity the fellow’s so poor. Theresa’s got expensive tastes.”

Miss Arundell said drily: “I’ve no doubt she can change her way of living---if she wants to! And after all she has her own income.”

“Eh? Oh yes, yes, of course.” Charles shot an almost guilty look at her.

That evening, as the others were assembled in the drawing room waiting to go in to dinner, there was a scurry and a burst of profanity on the stairs. Charles entered with his face rather red.

“Sorry, Aunt Emily, am I late? That dog of yours nearly made me take the most frightful toss. He’d left that ball of his on the top of the stairs.”

“Careless little doggie,” cried Miss Lawson, bending down to Bob.

Bob looked at her contemptuously and turned his head away.

“I know,” said Miss Arundell. “It’s most dangerous. Minnie, fetch the ball and put it away.”

Miss Lawson hurried out.

Dr. Tanios monopolized the conversation at the dinner table most of the time. He told amusing stories of his life in Smyrna.

The party went to bed early. Miss Lawson carrying wool, spectacles, a large velvet bag and a book accompanied her employer to her bedroom chattering happily.

“Really most amusing. Dr. Tanios. He is such good company! Not that I should care for that kind of life myself. . . . One would have to boil the water, I expect. . . . And goat’s milk, perhaps---such a disagreeable taste----”

Miss Arundell snapped: “Don’t be a fool, Minnie. You told Ellen to call me at half past six?”

“Oh, yes, Miss Arundell. I said no tea, but don’t you think it might be wiser---You know, the vicar at Southbridge---a most conscientious man, told me distinctly that there was no obligation to come fasting----”

Once more Miss Arundell cut her short. “I’ve never yet taken anything before Early Service and I’m not going to begin now. You can do as you like.”

“Oh, no---I didn’t mean---I’m sure----”

Miss Lawson was flustered and upset.

“Take Bob’s collar off,” said Miss Arundell.

The slave hastened to obey. Still trying to please she said: “Such a pleasant evening. They all seem so pleased to be here.”

“Hmph,” said Emily Arundell. “All here for what they can get.”

“Oh, dear Miss Arundell----”

“My good Minnie, I’m not a fool whatever else I am! I just wonder which of them will open the subject first.”

She was not long left in doubt on that point. She and Miss Lawson returned from attending Early Service just after nine. Dr. and Mrs. Tanios were in the dining room, but there were no signs of the two Arundells. After breakfast, when the others had left. Miss Arundell sat on, entering up some accounts in a little book.

Charles entered the room about ten. “Sorry I’m late, Aunt Emily. But Theresa’s worse. She’s not unclosed
an eyelid yet.”

“At half past ten breakfast will be cleared away,” said Miss Arundell. “I know it is the fashion not to consider servants nowadays, but that is not the case in my house.”

“Good. That’s the true die-hard spirit!”

Charles helped himself to kidneys and sat down beside her.

His grin, as always, was very attractive. Emily Arundell soon found herself smiling indulgently at him. Emboldened by this sign of favour, Charles plunged.

“Look here, Aunt Emily, sorry to bother you, but I’m in the devil of a hole. Can you possibly help me out? A hundred would do it.”

His aunt’s face was not encouraging. A certain grimness showed itself in her expression.

Emily Arundell was not afraid of speaking her mind. She spoke it.

Miss Lawson hustling across the hall almost collided with Charles as he left the dining room. She glanced at him curiously. She entered the dining room to find Miss Arundell sitting very upright with a flushed face.

4  Our Library / Dame Agatha Christie - Dumb Witness (1937) / Title Matter on: Today at 05:54:33 am
Agatha Miller was born in Torquay in 1890. She left us sixty-six detective novels using the pen-name Christie, as well as a further six novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1921)
The Secret Adversary (1922)
The Murder on the Links (1923)
The Man in the Brown Suit (1924)
The Secret of Chimneys (1925)
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926)
The Big Four (1927)
The Mystery of the Blue Train (1928)
The Seven Dials Mystery (1929)
The Murder at the Vicarage (1930)
Giant's Bread (1930)
The Floating Admiral (1931)
The Sittaford Mystery (1931)
Peril at End House (1932)
Lord Edgware Dies (1933)
Murder on the Orient Express (1934)
Unfinished Portrait (1934)
Why Didn't They Ask Evans? (1934)
Three Act Tragedy (1935)
Death in the Clouds (1935)
The A.B.C. Murders (1936)
Murder in Mesopotamia (1936)
Cards on the Table (1936)
Dumb Witness (1937)
Death on the Nile (1937)
Appointment with Death (1938)
Hercule Poirot's Christmas (1938)
Murder Is Easy (1939)
And Then There Were None (1939)
Sad Cypress (1940)
One, Two, Buckle My Shoe (1940)
Evil Under the Sun (1941)
N or M? (1941)
The Body in the Library (1942)
Five Little Pigs (1942)
The Moving Finger (1943)
Towards Zero (1944)
Absent in the Spring (1944)
Death Comes as the End (1945)
Sparkling Cyanide (1945)
The Hollow (1946)
Taken at the Flood (1948)
The Rose and the Yew Tree (1948)
Crooked House (1949)
A Murder Is Announced (1950)
They Came to Baghdad (1951)
Mrs. McGinty's Dead (1952)
They Do It with Mirrors (1952)
A Daughter's a Daughter (1952)
After the Funeral (1953)
A Pocket Full of Rye (1953)
Destination Unknown (1954)
Hickory Dickory Dock (1955)
Dead Man's Folly (1956)
The Burden (1956)
4.50 from Paddington (1957)
Ordeal by Innocence (1958)
Cat Among the Pigeons (1959)
The Pale Horse (1961)
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side (1962)
The Clocks (1963)
A Caribbean Mystery (1964)
At Bertram's Hotel (1965)
Third Girl (1966)
Endless Night (1967)
By the Pricking of My Thumbs (1968)
Hallowe'en Party (1969)
Passenger to Frankfurt (1970)
Nemesis (1971)
Elephants Can Remember (1972)
Postern of Fate (1973)
Curtain (1975)

Her novel "Dumb Witness" appeared in 1937 and has thirty chapters:

1)    The Mistress of Littlegreen House
2)    The Relations
3)    The Accident
4)    Miss Arundell Writes a Letter
5)    Hercule Poirot Receives a Letter
6)    We Go to Littlegreen House
7)    Lunch at the George
8)    Interior of Littlegreen House
9)    Reconstruction of the Dog’s Ball Incident
10)  Visit to Miss Peabody
11)  Visit to the Misses Tripp
12)  Poirot Discusses the Case
13)  Theresa Arundell
14)  Charles Arundell
15)  Miss Lawson
16)  Mrs. Tanios
17)  Dr. Tanios
18)  “A Nigger in the Woodpile”
19)  Visit to Mr. Purvis
20)  Second Visit to Littlegreen House
21)  The Chemist; The Nurse; The Doctor
22)  The Woman on the Stairs
23)  Dr. Tanios Calls on Us
24)  Theresa’s Denial
25)  I Lie Back and Reflect
26)  Mrs. Tanios Refuses to Speak
27)  Visit of Dr. Donaldson
28)  Another Victim
29)  Inquest at Littlegreen House
30)  The Last Word

5  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 27: Steel Bracelets on: Today at 03:35:59 am
MR. ATHERTON came hurrying in---to pull himself up short at the sight of the surprised and expectant group awaiting him. A smile of high gratification stole over his spectacled face as he looked from one to the other.

“Well, well, well!” he exclaimed. “Chaney---Camberwell---Jalvane! Well, now I guess that there are no other three men in the world whose presence is so desirable at this present moment as yours is, all three! Talk of coincidence!---but, then, I don’t believe in what people call coincidence. I believe that all these things are the result of some unknown law which works----”

“What’s the trouble, Mr. Atherton?” interrupted Chaney. “Something wrong?”

Mr. Atherton took off his spectacles, polished them, put them on again, and dropped into a chair. He looked from one face to another, finally winding up with the Inspector.

“Guess you’re the officer in charge here?” he said. “Well, I came along to see you, to find out if you could get in immediate touch with friend Jalvane there, at headquarters in London, or with these two other gentlemen at their office. There are people who would assure you that this is a direct intervention of Providence! I refer to the fact that they are here at the very moment they’re wanted. Marvellous!”

“What are we wanted for, Mr. Atherton?” I asked.

“I’m going to tell you,” replied Mr. Atherton. He glanced at Chippendale and at Miss Pratt. “One may speak freely?”

“This young lady is our assistant, Mr. Atherton,” I said. “This is our clerk, Chippendale, whom I think you’ve met before. Say anything you please.”

“Very good,” he continued. “Well, now, I am at the Lord Warden Hotel in this town.”

“Yes, Mr. Atherton?”

“That man Stecke, the parson, is there also.”

“We’re aware of it, Mr. Atherton. That’s why we’re here.”

“I guessed that, five minutes ago. Well, now, I’m going to tell you. I arrived at the Lord Warden Hotel yesterday, from Paris, on my way to London. But never having seen Dover, except in coming and going across the Channel, I concluded to stay a day or two here and take a look round. Well, now, this afternoon there came into the hotel, from the Calais boat, a man whom I know very well indeed by sight, though I am happy to say he doesn’t know me by even as much as that. He is a man I used to see in New York, a man named Moskievitch, though he isn’t registered at the hotel in that name---he’s registered as Moscus, Mr. Alfred Moscus. Now I’ll tell you what I know of this man. As far as I am aware, he has not shown his face in New York for some six or seven years, and probably will never dare to do so again; I am not sure that the New York police wouldn’t be pleased to see him. When he was over there, he represented himself as an agent---an agent for buying and selling antiques, curiosities, pictures, old books, all that sort of thing. But what he was in strict reality was what you call a fence---anyway, he was convicted, to my knowledge, of being in possession of and of disposing of stolen goods. He got a lightish sentence, somehow, and then made himself very scarce. Well, as I say, this afternoon he walks into the Lord Warden Hotel here---and there he is---probably fast asleep in his bed.”

Mr. Atherton paused for a second or two; no one asking any question, he resumed his story.

“Well, I tell you this fellow Moscus, to call him by what he now calls himself, came in, registered, was given a room---near my own---and went up there with his baggage; this I saw, for I was walking about the entrance hall when he arrived. I saw him again, writing letters in the lounge, a little later on; I saw him again at dinner. Let me impress upon you, now, that this man does not know me---that is to say, I never met him personally. And of course he knew nothing of who I was when he saw me this afternoon or evening. If he’d examined the hotel register, he would have known, for my name is well known to everybody of his sort who has anything to offer. But my name was on a page preceding his, and no doubt he never turned back to see who might be there. And so things went on quite smoothly. But after dinner they began to get interesting. This way---after dinner I was sitting in a quiet corner of the lounge, alone, of course, smoking my cigar. This man Moscus, also smoking, sat in the centre of the lounge, in a position from which he could look right along the entrance hall. I, too, could see the length of that hall. And about half past eight I saw enter a man whom I perceived from his attire and collar to be a clergyman, and who had a quantity of luggage, light and heavy. I saw him busy at the reception office for a few minutes; then, after handing over his overcoat and hat to the hall-porter, he came along towards the lounge. And as he drew nearer, I recognized the Reverend Mr. Stecke!”

Mr. Atherton paused, to give this announcement its due effect. Everybody showing rapt attention, he proceeded.

“The Reverend Mr. Stecke!” he continued. “Well known to me, of course, through his association with the Linwood Church affair. Came along, I say, towards the lounge, large as life, hands in pockets, very self-assured. And a moment later I knew two things. Reverend Mr. Stecke had come there to meet Mr. Alfred Moscus; Mr. Alfred Moscus had come there to meet Reverend Mr. Stecke. Another half-minute and they were clasping hands like brethren.”

“Knew each other, sir, eh?” asked the local inspector.

“I should say, not until that particular moment,” replied Mr. Atherton. “But it needed but an inquiring glance and a shake of the hand, and they were as thick as thieves---a saying of yours, I believe, and probably particularly appropriate in this instance. Well, they sat down. Fortunately Reverend Mr. Stecke sat with his back to me. Mr. Moscus produced his cigar case; Mr. Stecke summoned a waiter. They smoked. They drank. And---they talked. Long and earnestly. And at last, rising together, they vanished in the direction of the elevator.”

“Went upstairs, eh?” asked Chaney.

“So I concluded,” assented Mr. Atherton. “However, before very long I had assurance of that. And now I am coming to possibly the most important point of my story. After these two had left the lounge perhaps a quarter of an hour, and it being then just on ten o’clock, I decided to go to bed; I am given to early hours, both for retiring and for rising. Now I mentioned that Moscus had been given a room very near my own; I had to pass his door. That door was very slightly open. And as I passed, I heard Stecke’s voice speaking certain words which made me think. Those words were these: Absolutely pre-Reformation work; probably fifteenth century.

“Ah!” exclaimed Chaney. “Just that?”

“Just that,” assented Mr. Atherton. “And no more; I heard no remark from Moscus. I passed on, wondering. What was pre-Reformation work? What was probably fifteenth century? Then I had an illumination. Looking back, I remembered that the Linwood Church chalice, stolen with the rest of the valuables, was still unrecovered, untraced. Was it possible---you see what I mean?”

“We see!” said Chaney. “Possible that it had come into the hands of Stecke, and that he was trying to sell it to----”

“That, gentlemen, is precisely what I thought,” said Mr. Atherton, “and the more I thought, the more I felt convinced that it might be so. I recalled all the events of the theft. The two old books I myself restored to Canon Effingham; the paten, found in Seward’s bag when he was killed, was handed back to the Canon, too---am I right?”

“Quite right, sir,” said Chaney. “It was.”

“But of the chalice nothing had ever been heard,” continued Mr. Atherton. “Well, it didn’t seem an improbable thing that it should have come into Stecke’s hands. And, after worrying a lot, I left my room again, went down, asked my way, and came here to see the authorities and to consult with them about phoning you three. And---here you are! And now what’s to be done?”

Jalvane and the local Inspector looked at each other with a meaning smile; the Inspector pulled out his watch.

“Ten minutes to eleven,” he remarked. “I suggest we go along.”

“Yes!” said Jalvane. “Better take one or two of your men, though. Not necessarily to go inside. But to be---handy.”

The local Inspector left the room; Jalvane turned to Mr. Atherton.

“I suppose you left those two upstairs?” he said. “Didn’t see anything of them when you came down?”

“I heard them still talking in Moscus’s room as I passed on my way out,” replied Mr. Atherton, “but by that time the door was closed. Oh, I guess they’re quite safely housed for the night. They never saw me at all, upstairs or downstairs.”

The Inspector came back with two men in plain clothes.

“Ready!” he announced. “Who else?” He turned and looked at Miss Pratt. “This young lady?” he continued, questioningly. “She ought to be in bed. There’s a quiet hotel close by----”

But Miss Pratt was on her feet and buttoning her coat.

“Thank you,” she said. “But after all I’ve done, I’m going to be in at the end. Don’t you bother about me---I’ll see to myself when we’ve finished the job. Chip and I are going on there, to see what happens.”

“We can’t all crowd into the hotel,” said the Inspector. “You’ll have to wait outside---if you must go.”

“That’ll do,” said Miss Pratt. “We’ll hang around and see what you bring out.”

So there was something like a procession along the deserted streets and wharves to the Lord Warden Hotel. But before we reached its portals, Jalvane and the Inspector had formed a plan of campaign. They, Atherton, Chaney, and I were to enter and go to Stecke’s room; the two plain-clothes men, with Chippendale and Miss Pratt, were to remain outside, close to the hotel, in case they were wanted. And here Chaney put in a word of warning.

“Don’t be surprised if Stecke puts up a fight!” he said. “From what I’ve seen of him, he’s the sort of fellow that may turn ugly. Not only that, but he may be armed.”

Jalvane and the Inspector whispered together for a moment. Then Jalvane touched the side-pocket of his overcoat---a garment which I had never seen him without, and from the pockets of which he produced all sorts of things---and I heard a faint, metallic click.

“All right---as long as you’re prepared,” said the Inspector. “Well, let’s get in. The night-porter knows me well enough.”

All the same, the night-porter, opening the door for us, showed his surprise, and it deepened when, glancing beyond us, he saw the four reserves hanging about on the pavement.

“Something afoot, Inspector?” he asked. “Want somebody?”

The Inspector motioned him to precede us into the inner hall. Everything was very quiet there; everybody, staff and guests, appeared to have gone to bed.

“We do want somebody!” whispered the Inspector. “And with as little noise and fuss as possible. You’ve got a parson here---youngish man?”

“Reverend Mr. Simpson, from London,” said the night-porter. “Number 271.”

“And a man named Moscus----”

“From Paris,” assented the night-porter. “Number 269.”

“We want to see them both,” continued the Inspector. “Mr. Simpson first. Now take us up there. We’ll avoid all the disturbance we can; whether there’s any noise, fuss, or bother depends on---him. The two rooms are close together, eh?”

“Close,” said the night-porter. “This gentleman,” pointing to Mr. Atherton, “has one near by. Well, keep things as quiet as you can, Inspector. This way.”

He led us round a corner to the lift; we all crowded into it. Presently we were all out of it and in a softly carpeted corridor. Everything was as quiet as could be; the only sound I heard was that of the sea in the harbour outside. The night-porter went a little way along the corridor and, pausing, pointed to a number.

“Here you are!” he whispered. “271.”

“Knock---and wait a minute,” said the Inspector.

The night-porter knocked---once, twice, again. At the third knock we heard Stecke’s voice.

“Who’s that?”

“Tell him you want to speak to him---say who you are,” ordered the Inspector.

“Night-porter, sir. Can I have a word with you?”

We heard a key turned, a bolt drawn back. Jalvane and the Inspector edged as close as they could get to the door. It opened—an inch—two inches. The next instant they were inside and we after them. And there was Stecke, in his pyjamas. . . .

At the first glimpse of his visitors Stecke made an acrobatic leap sideways and backwards towards the bed he had just left. But, quick as he was, Jalvane was quicker. Before I could realize what he was after, he had both arms round his man, and the next I saw was Stecke rolled on to the side of the bed with his wrists secured in a pair of shining handcuffs. He lay back, panting, glaring.

“This---this is an outrage!” he burst out. “You shall----”

Jalvane tossed a pillow aside and picked up a revolver. Holding it up for a second before the rest of us, he calmly dropped it into a pocket of his overcoat. Then he motioned me to shut the door. But, a sudden thought occurring to him, he opened it again and called to the night-porter, who until the door had been closed had watched our proceedings.

“Go down and outside,” he said. “Tell these two men---not the youngster nor the girl---to come in. Bring them up here quietly and post them outside Number 269 and bid them wait there.”

Then Jalvane closed the door again and took a silent look round. We were all silent---for a moment. Stecke lay where Jalvane had thrown him, glaring like a trapped beast; the rest of us watched him. We were waiting for Jalvane; Jalvane, somehow, had assumed command of the entire situation. Even Chaney kept silence, waiting, watching.

Jalvane turned from his inspection of the room to Stecke. There was a new note in his voice when he spoke; his tones were those of a man who is not going to be trifled with.

“Now, Stecke,” he said, “where is the Linwood chalice?”

I saw a look of surprise come into Stecke’s angry eyes; a second, and it changed to one of fear. But Stecke made no answer.

Jalvane pointed to two cabin-trunks and two suit-cases, piled up at one end of the room. “We don’t want the bother of opening and searching those,” he said. “So you’d better speak. Where is that chalice? It’s hopeless to keep things back, Stecke. You took it from Mrs. Effingham, and it’s been in your keeping ever since. Where is it now?”

Stecke’s lips opened slightly, but no reply came. He was still panting for breath after his short struggle with Jalvane.

“Well, then,” continued Jalvane, “if you won’t speak---” He suddenly tossed the remaining pillows aside, as if he had expected to find something under one of them. There was nothing. He turned to Stecke’s clothes, thrown over a chair, and, pointing Chaney to the trousers, picked up the coat. A moment later he turned to us with a pocket-book in his hand. There were papers in that pocket-book which, subsequently examined at leisure, were of importance and interest. Letters from Mrs. Effingham---cuttings from newspapers which showed how Stecke had kept himself informed about matters relating to the Linwood Church affair---notes made by himself which gave one the impression that after discovering Mrs. Effingham’s secret he had concocted some scheme of his own for benefiting by the discovery. But nothing was so interesting or important as a slip of paper which Jalvane unearthed from an inside pocket of the book and silently placed before Atherton, Chaney, and me---a cheque on the London house of a famous French bank for fifteen hundred pounds, drawn by Alfred Moscus in favour of Reverend H. Simpson.

Jalvane bundled cheque, papers, and cuttings back into the pocket-book and, opening the door, signed to the two plain-clothes men waiting in the corridor. They came in.

“Keep your eye on this man,” said Jalvane. “He’s to stay there until I want him further.”

Then, followed by the rest of us, he marched out of the room to the door of Number 269. This time he knocked with his own fingers. And when a voice from inside demanded to know who was there, Jalvane answered in one plain word:

“Police!”

I don’t know what the exact nationality of Mr. Moskievitch, alias Moscus, may have been---whether he was a Pole, or a Hungarian, or a Czecho-Slovakian, or a mixture of something stamped, for lack of particulars, American. But I do know that he was a very frightened man when Jalvane, Chaney, and I walked into his room without let or ceremony. (Mr. Atherton drew back from that job; there was the chance, he said, that Moskievitch might know him, and he did not wish to be regarded as deus ex machina in this matter.) He was a little, swarthy man, and his face turned a bluish white, and I believe his knees knocked together in his beautiful silk pyjamas. Certainly his teeth chattered.

“Wh-wh-what is this?” he stammered agitatedly. “Gentlemen, I----”

“Mr. Alfred Moscus, I believe, according to the register downstairs,” said Jalvane. “But otherwise Mr. Moskievitch, formerly of New York. Now, Mr. Moscus, I have just found a cheque of yours, made out on this date, in favour of the Reverend Henry Simpson, whom I have just arrested. What did you hand Simpson that cheque in exchange for? A plain answer, if you please.”

Mr. Moscus spread his hands.

“But, sir, I have purchased certain articles from Reverend Mr. Simpson!” he protested. “What I have bought I have bought in good faith. If I have been deceived----”

“What have you bought?” demanded Jalvane. “Show the goods!”

Moscus hesitated, wrung his hands, tried to speak; I am not sure that tears did not come into his eyes.

“No nonsense, now!” said Jalvane. “If you’re in possession of stolen goods----”

Moscus turned suddenly and, going over to a chest of drawers in a corner of the room, pulled one open and took out a package done up in much soft paper. He began to unwrap the paper and to protest all at the same time. No one took any notice; we were all watching. And the last wrappings fell away, and there, before us, on the dressing-table, stood the missing chalice---resting on the paten!

“Good Lord!” exclaimed Chaney. “There’s the---what d’ye call it?---the paten, too! The chalice we knew of, but the other thing----”

“I think I know how he got hold of it, Chaney,” said I. “After the death of Seward, and the discovery of the paten in his suit-case, it was given back by the City police to Canon Effingham. Well, we know that Stecke has been going to Linwood now and then since, and that he was there last night. Either he stole it from there or he forced Mrs. Effingham to hand it over to him. Anyhow, there they both are---chalice and paten. Better ask this man to give his account of the transaction between himself and Stecke.”

But that was not Jalvane’s way. Jalvane collared the stolen goods, bade the trembling Mr. Moscus hold himself at the disposal of the police in the morning, and, returning to Stecke’s room, sternly commanded him to dress. Stecke, relieved, for the time being, of his handcuffs, obeyed orders and made his toilet under the close supervision of the plain-clothes men. After which he was marched downstairs and out into the night, where, escorted by Jalvane, the local Inspector, and the two men in mufti, he disappeared in the direction of the police station.

So that was over, at last, and there, standing outside the Lord Warden Hotel at Dover, at nearly midnight, were Chaney, myself, Chippendale, and Miss Fanny Pratt. What next? Mr. Atherton solved that question with characteristic generosity.

“Well, now,” he said, as the echoes of the footsteps of guard and prisoner died away, “I reckon that we shall now be all the better, all of us, for a little refreshment and a little sleep, and I have already told the night-porter that you are all coming in with me as my guests, and that he is to give the young lady a particularly nice room. I do not know,” he added, as we trooped into the hotel at his heels, “if Mr. Stecke will sleep on a plank bed tonight, but I am sure that he will sleep with his own conscience!”

THE END

6  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 26: Miss Pratt Takes Charge on: Today at 03:13:13 am
STECKE gone?---left!---and Miss Pratt out? That, in view of all we had learnt that afternoon, was disconcerting news. A second’s hesitation and I hailed my unknown colloquist again.

“Who, please, is that speaking from the Artemis Hotel?” I asked.

“Reception clerk, sir.”

“Can you tell me when Mr. Stocker left?”

“Yes, sir. Just after five o’clock.”

“And when did Miss Pratt go out?”

“A moment, sir; I’ll inquire. . . . The hall-porter says just before five, sir.”

“Sorry to trouble you, but has Mr. Stocker definitely left---for good?”

“Yes, sir. Continent, I fancy.”

“Thank you. Will you give a message to Miss Pratt on her return? Say Mr. Camberwell wishes to see her at once.”

“Mr. Camberwell wishes to see Miss Pratt at once---very good, sir.”

I rang off and went out to the car. I dare say Chaney saw from my expression that something was wrong. He snapped out a sharp question.

“What is it?”

“Stecke’s off!” I said. “And Fanny Pratt isn’t there and doesn’t seem to have been about when he left. He went off---for the Continent, they think, just after five o’clock, and she’d gone out just before five.”

“If she did, I’ll lay a thousand to one it was with some design on him!” exclaimed Chaney. “I’ll back that girl to see it through. Come on, Camberwell!---back to town and the office as fast as we can. Hopped it, has he? Ah, that’s the result of his visit here last night. Well, you remember what Fanny said in our office? ‘If he hops it, I shall hop after him!’ Get on with it, Camberwell---let’s get back.”

I drove that car of ours back to town faster than I had ever driven it before, taking all sorts of risks; within the hour we were in the office. And there, calmly writing, sat Chippendale, utterly unaware, of course, of anything that might be happening to Miss Fanny Pratt. Chaney was on to him as he set foot across the outer room.

“Heard anything from Fanny, Chip?” he demanded. “Sharp, my lad!”

“No!” snapped Chippendale, staring. “Nothing!”

Chaney turned to me.

“Tell him!” he said.

I told Chippendale what I had learnt on the telephone at Linwood. He shook his head.

“I’ve heard nothing,” he said. “She’s never rung me up. I was going round to meet her at the usual place as soon as you got back; I couldn’t leave the office till you came. But---if Stecke’s off, you can bet your stars, Mr. Camberwell, that Fanny’s after him! She’ll follow him!”

“Ay,” said Chaney. “But---where? Give me a Bradshaw, Chip.”

He took the railway guide in his hand, and motioning me and Jalvane to follow, went into the inner office and began a consultation of the pages in which particulars of cross-channel boat-sailings are set down.

“Thought he’d gone for the Continent, didn’t they?” he said. “Well, five o’clock is a queer time to set off for the Continent. There’s nothing after the four-o’clock from Victoria, Dover and Calais way.”

“Yes, there is,” said Jalvane. “There’s the 8.20 from Victoria, by the Newhaven-Dieppe route. I’ve been by that, often. And there’s the 10.30 from St. Pancras, by Tilbury and Dunkirk.”

“He wouldn’t leave his hotel at five o’clock to catch either of them,” objected Chaney. “Nor to get the nine o’clock from Waterloo to Southampton for Havre.”

“How do you know that he wouldn’t, Chaney?” I asked. “There’s three evening trains and boats available! We ought to be stirring things up. Waterloo---Victoria---St. Pancras---all three ought to be watched.”

“Um!” he muttered. “He’ll not turn up at any one of them. Something else in his head. If only we knew what that girl was after and what she was doing! What time is it?”

“Quarter past seven!”

“Give her another three-quarters of an hour. If we don’t hear anything by then, Jalvane, you’d better set some of your people to work at the three stations, though I don’t believe that’ll do any good. Still, we must get him, now that we know so much---know, at any rate, that he’s got that chalice,” concluded Chaney. “That’s warrant enough for anything.”

“Why waste three quarters of an hour, Chaney?” I said. “Let’s get to work at once---on something! He’s had two hours’ start now! You know what a slippery customer he is---full of tricks. If he gets fairly off----”

“Give the girl three quarters of an hour more!” interrupted Chaney. “If we don’t hear from her before eight o’clock, I shall be surprised.”

“But she was out when he left the hotel!” I said. “So----”

“Umph!” grunted Chaney. “May have been motive in that, Camberwell. Anyhow----”

At that moment Chippendale, who, pen in hand, had followed into our room to stare and listen, heard footsteps running up the stairs and hurried out---to return with a telegram which he shoved into Chaney’s outstretched fingers.

“There you are!” said Chaney, triumphantly. “Told you we should hear! This is from her, of course,” he went on as he tore out the message from its cover. “Handed in at Sevenoaks at 6.51. Listen:

Stecke is on 6.12 train Cannon Street to Dover I am on same follow me there at once ask for me at Police Station Pratt.

“There you are!” he repeated. “She’s on to him! Now, then, full speed ahead, my lads! Camberwell, is the car all right---plenty of stuff for a seventy-mile run? Chippendale, you come, too---you may be useful. Jalvane, of course you’re coming---you’re the man to lay hands on him. And now let’s be off. Seven twenty? We ought to be in Dover by---when, Camberwell?”

“Ten, if we’re lucky,” I answered, “but it means that you’ll all have to go without your dinners till we get there.”

“Oh, damn the dinners!” said Chaney. “Midnight supper’ll be more in our line. Come on, now! Hurry up, Chippendale.”

The car was down at the outer door, and in a few minutes we were packed into it, and I was threading my way through the crowded streets towards the south-east and Dover. Chippendale sat by me; he had contrived, in the minute or two before our start, to shoot into a tea-shop close by our office and had there become possessed of a big parcel of buns and pastry; for the first stage of our journey his jaws worked steadily on these comestibles, and he made no remark to me except that he had had no lunch or tea. Satisfied at last, he leaned back in his seat and watched the Kent landscape unfold itself; now and then, as we came to town or village, he pulled out his watch and made some mental calculation. Behind us Chaney and Jalvane kept up a perpetual chatter; the bits of it that reached me showed that they were indulging in reminiscences. As for myself, I was wrapped up in the car, getting all out of it that I dared. But I had a certain wonder in my mind, and once, when we had gone some distance in the spring twilight, I voiced it.

“What do you suppose Miss Pratt’ll be doing, Chip?” I asked.

“Don’t know, Mr. Camberwell. Ain’t even thought of it,” he answered. “Business, I’m sure!”

“Won’t she be frightened---after that chap, alone?”

“Not her line, sir! Never knew her to be frightened---ain’t in her make-up, that. What d’yer call that gadget there, Mr. Camberwell?”

So Chippendale had no fears for his lady-love; it was all in the day’s business. Just once he allowed himself a personal remark.

“You need have no fear about Stecke’s getting away, Mr. Camberwell! If Fanny’s after him---and we know she is---she’d follow him off the end of Dover Pier if need be. He’ll not slip her!”

So that was that, and we raced on through the evening towards I scarcely knew what, except that I hoped it would end in handing Stecke over to the law’s firm clutch. The towns and villages came and went---Blackheath and Bexley, Dartford and Rochester, Sittingbourne and Canterbury, appearing in front, vanishing behind. And at last the drop down into Dover and its still somewhat busy streets, and the smell of the sea, and the town clocks striking ten. I had done the seventy miles in just about twice as many minutes.

We pulled up at the police station and, leaving the car outside, trooped in, headed by Jalvane. The sergeant in charge, looking up from his desk, stared wonderingly at our procession.

“Inspector Jalvane, headquarters,” said our leader, offering his card. “Have you got a Miss Pratt, from London, here?”

The sergeant’s face betokened instant comprehension. Getting off his stool, and showing the way, he led us down a passage and, throwing open a door, ushered us into a small room, half sitting-room, half office. A man in the uniform of an inspector stood with his back to the fire; there was an expression of amusement on his face. And his face---until our entry diverted his attention---was turned on Miss Pratt. Miss Pratt, very smartly dressed, sat at the centre table. She had a plate of sandwiches and a bottle of stout in front of her, and she seemed to be very much at home. And she took our arrival without a sign of surprise.

“There you all are!” she said. “Haven’t lost any time, have you? He’s all right---safely bottled for the night, I think!”

“Where is he?” demanded Chaney.

“Lord Warden Hotel,” replied Miss Pratt. “He’ll not run away.” She nodded at the local inspector. “You’re seeing to that, aren’t you?” she added.

“We’re seeing to that,” said the inspector, smiling. He turned to Jalvane and Chaney. “Your young lady friend seems to have a natural taste for this sort of thing,” he went on. “Which of you’s Jalvane?”

Jalvane nodded; he, the Inspector, and Chaney drew apart and talked for a minute or two. Miss Pratt went calmly on with her sandwiches and her stout; Chippendale, who, after one glance at her, showed no more interest in her presence than if she had been a lay figure, began to roll a cigarette; as for me, I confess I stared at Miss Pratt, reflecting on her performances and her possibilities. The other three men came back; Chaney pulled a stool up to the table at which Miss Pratt was now finishing her supper.

“Now, my dear!” he said. “All about it!”

“Yes,” replied Miss Pratt. “I’m ready. Better now---I was a bit hungry when I came in here. Well, here’s the tale, Mr. Chaney, and all of you. You know what I promised?---that I’d keep a strict watch on Stecke, and that if I saw the slightest sign of his bolting, I’d act accordingly. Well, of course I knew that the sure sign of his bolting would be the removal of his luggage---I may tell you that I managed to get a peep into his room at the Artemis once, and he’d a fair lot of luggage. As long as that luggage was there, I knew he was safe, and I didn’t bother much about his ordinary goings in and out. Last evening, for instance, he was away from the hotel for some time---I didn’t bother about it; he was there all right this morning. But this afternoon things changed, all of a sudden. About a quarter to five the porters began bringing down Stecke’s things---two cabin-trunks, two suit-cases. He himself was messing about---superintending. I saw him tie on labels. Then he went up in the lift for something or other, and I contrived to get a look at the labels. Dover! And then I had to think jolly quick. I didn’t dare ring you up---there were people about, and, besides, he might have been back any minute. I had to make up my mind what to do. Fortunately, I was all ready dressed for going out---just as you see me. So I went out. There’s a taxi-cab rank not far off; I went there. As I reached it, the first cab went off; the Artemis porter was whistling for it. I got hold of the driver of the next and told him what I was after and begged him to use all his wits. He was a smart man; he understood. And in a second I was in his cab and was watching. Give me a cigarette, somebody. No, Chip, not one of yours---they’re rank bad!”

Miss Pratt accepted one of my cigarettes and, having puffed it for a second or two, resumed her story.

“Well, they stuck Stecke’s stuff on and in his taxi, and off he went,” she continued. “And so did we, at a safe distance---safe in both senses. I don’t know much about this part of the world, nor where it is exactly, but I’d an idea that he’d make for Victoria. However, where he made for first---the cab, that is---wasn’t that way at all. The cab went to Comma Street, off Regent Street, and pulled up outside a place there into which Stecke went. He was some little time in there, and that gave me and my cabby some bother, because the police won’t let you hang about. However, we managed things, and when Stecke came out and set off again, we were there all right, and we followed. But it wasn’t Victoria, nor Waterloo, nor anywhere where I’d thought it would be---it was Cannon Street. I got out of my cab before he was out of his, and from then I gave up all idea of phoning you and devoted such brains as I have to dodging and watching him. And I did it so well that he never got a glimpse of me. But I got plenty of him. I watched him get his things labelled. I contrived to see the label, Dover; when he’d got his ticket---a first---I got mine---a third---and when he finally got into the train, I wasn’t very far away from him, and I knew exactly where his luggage was. The two cabin-trunks were in the van; the two suit-cases in his compartment. And so we went off!”

Miss Pratt helped herself to another cigarette before commencing the next chapter of her story.

“Well,” she resumed, “there we were! I knew I’d got him safe. The next thing was to let you know what was happening. That was easy. I wrote out a message, and when the train stopped at Sevenoaks, I handed it to a porter with half a crown and told him to wire it off at once; so, evidently, he did. I settled down then—there was nothing to do till we got here. Well, we got here, and of course I exercised the greatest care that he shouldn’t see me. And now here comes in some stuff for you that’ll perhaps give you an idea of what you’re dealing with. When Stecke got into the train at Cannon Street, he was wearing a fancy grey suit, with a coloured neck-tie, and all that sort of thing---looked like he was going on a holiday. But when he got out of the train here at Dover, he was dressed as a parson, all black, round collar, you know. The only thing left of what he’d had on when he boarded the train was his hat—pearl-grey slouch hat, black band. All else---parson!”

“Then he’s gone to the Lord Warden as a parson?” exclaimed Chaney.

“That’s it, Mr. Chaney,” replied Miss Pratt. “I watched him safe in there, with his cabin-trunks and his suit-cases, and then I came along here and made friends.”

“He’s safe there for the night,” observed the local Inspector. “I made sure about him. He’s registered as the Reverend Henry Simpson; his room number is 387. And I’ve got a special man looking after him who’ll see, anyhow, that he doesn’t give you the slip between this and morning. It’s for you to decide whether you’ll do anything tonight or not till tomorrow.”

“I’d like to know what he’s after,” said Chaney. “If it’s the Continent, how’s he got his passport in the name of Simpson? And if it’s not the Continent, what’s he doing here at Dover? The main thing is, of course, if he’s got that chalice in his possession. If he has----”

At that moment the door opened and the sergeant looked in, addressing his inspector.

“There’s an American gentleman here, sir, who wants a word with you, particular,” he said. “Mr. Atherton!”

7  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 25: Blackmail on: Today at 02:46:54 am
THE Archdeacon repeated his question twice without eliciting any reply from Jalvane or from either Chaney or me; we were all watching him, wondering if he was the sort of man to whom we could tell all that we knew. Suddenly Jalvane jumped to his feet and, motioning Chaney and me to follow him, walked over to a far corner of the study---an unusually large room---and motioned us to a conference. He jerked a thumb in the direction of the tall figure left silent and amazed on the hearth-rug.

“I think it may be well,” he said hesitating, “well---eh?---to tell him. Evidently she’s playing some game---not to have told him herself. But if he knows---a business-like man, I think---he may be useful.”

“I say, tell him by all means!” agreed Chaney. “Of course, for some reason of her own, she’s bluffed him, somewhere. Told him half the tale. But the other half!---that’s what’s of importance now. She and Stecke! And---no time to be lost, in my opinion. Stecke was here last night. Why? Oh, yes, let’s tell him. Camberwell, you do the talking. Put it short and straight---you know!”

We went back to the hearth, the Archdeacon watching us with a speculative frown, as if we had been hatching some plot. I sat down again, facing him.

“Mr. Archdeacon,” I said, “Inspector Jalvane asked you if Mrs. Effingham had told you anything about Mr. Stecke. You replied that she had not and asked what was meant by the question. What was meant was this: we know that in some way or other Mr. Stecke is mixed up in the matters we have been talking of, and we feel sure that Mrs. Effingham knows a great deal which she has kept back from you. In fact, we feel sure that for some purpose of her own, probably not unconnected with Mr. Stecke, she has wilfully deceived you when she says that her knowledge of the theft and the subsequent happenings is confined to her having handed the keys over to Sewell!”

He was staring at me in genuine wonder, and as he made no attempt to speak, I went on.

“We have found out a great many facts in the course of our investigations, Mr. Archdeacon, and I am going to tell you some of them. Only a few---but they are facts! We know that for some time Mrs. Effingham and Mr. Stecke have been in the habit of frequenting a certain gambling-club in the West End. We know that Mr. Stecke has been in possession of Treasury notes which, without doubt, were paid to Sewell, or, as we know him, Seward, at the Bank of England in exchange for the notes given him in cashing Mr. Atherton’s open cheque, handed to Seward in his assumed role of Dean of Norchester. We know that since the theft of the church treasures Stecke’s doings and movements have been of a very suspicious character. He has, for instance, thrown off his clerical attire and is going about dressed as a layman, and, under another name, he has been living recently at a Bayswater private hotel, where, Mr. Archdeacon, we are having a strict watch kept on him. Altogether there are some very, very suspicious facts known to us in respect of Mrs. Effingham’s friendship, intimacy, or whatever it may be with Mr. Stecke, and our suspicion is added to by the fact that, in telling you what she has, she has not mentioned him.”

“Not a word of him!” he exclaimed eagerly. “Not one word! But---what is it that you really think?”

“We think that there is a secret between Mrs. Effingham and Stecke as to the events of the night of April 11---the date of the theft of the church treasures and the murder of Skate---and as to subsequent events,” I replied. “And the time has come for that secret to be divulged. We hoped to hear it from you, but it is quite evident, from what you say, that Mrs. Effingham has only told you half the story. Now, sir, we want the other half!”

He had listened very attentively to all I said, nodding his head now and then, and now, as I finished, he seemed to make up his mind to something. He gave the three of us a searching, comprehensive look.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “it is quite evident that you know a great deal more about this matter than I do. Now, can you suggest Mrs. Effingham’s motive in telling me what you describe---correctly, no doubt---as half a story?”

“Yes, sir,” I replied. “Probably her motive was to direct attention from herself and Stecke. It may be that she has some idea that something about Stecke and herself was being discovered. Or it may be that she has become frightened and wants to sever whatever connexion there is between Stecke and herself, and at the same time wishes to conceal the fact that there has ever been any connexion.”

“But why have revealed anything?” he asked. “Perplexing!”

“No, Mr. Archdeacon,” I said. “She wants to throw the entire blame of everything on Seward, or Sewell---a dead man! Hers has been---in my opinion---an attempt, through you, to put everybody on a wrong track---exactly why, I don’t know. You see, sir, Mrs. Effingham does not know that we---my partner and I and Inspector Jalvane---know anything; at least, we are not aware that she knows. But we do know things, and we have opportunities of knowing, of which she isn’t aware. For example, she would doubtless be very much surprised if she knew that we know that Stecke was here last night.”

The Archdeacon started at that.

“Stecke here---last night!” he exclaimed. “How do you know that?”

“Will you take my word for it, Mr. Archdeacon? We do know it.”

He nodded and, taking a step or two about the hearth, seemed to be thinking hard. For a minute or two he was silent; then he turned on us again, sharply.

“It is very evident that there is far more behind all this than I had dreamed of,” he said. “Mrs. Effingham sent for me in her husband’s absence, told me what I have told you, and asked me to intercede for her with Canon Effingham. Her object----”

“Seems pretty plain to me, sir,” interrupted Chaney. “She no doubt hopes that, as Sewell is certainly dead and she’s a widow, Canon Effingham would remarry her!”

“That may be,” said the Archdeacon. “I was, of course, intending to do my best to smooth matters out. But----”

“Things must be cleared up, sir,” I said firmly. “Mrs. Effingham has no doubt told you part of the truth. But we must have the whole. We must know the truth about her relations with Stecke---I mean, of course, as relates to the original theft. In plain words, Mr. Archdeacon, we must have the other half of the story.”

“I know---I know!” he said. “Well, now, will you let me make a suggestion?” He pulled out his watch. “It is now four o’clock,” he continued. “Will you three gentlemen go down to the inn and get some tea and return here about, say, half past five? In the mean time I will see and talk to Mrs. Effingham again---I have, I believe, sufficient influence with her to persuade her to tell everything. And---she will talk more freely to me than she would to you.”

“You’ll give us your word, sir, that she won’t leave this house?” I asked. “We must be assured of that!”

“You may rely on me, Mr. Camberwell,” he answered. “She shall not leave this house. Now go away---and come back as I have indicated.”

We left him then and, going out of the Rectory, walked down to the village inn. None of us said anything until we were out of the Rectory grounds. Then Jalvane let out a word or two.

“Useful man! He’ll get it out of her. Better than we should.”

“Shouldn’t wonder,” muttered Chaney. “But---what was Stecke after last night? I’m getting a bit uneasy about Stecke.”

“You needn’t be, Chaney,” said I. “Miss Pratt is responsible for Stecke. She’ll watch him.”

“He was here---Linwood---last night,” he retorted. “I wonder if she was watching him then?”

“May have been, for anything we know,” I said. “What I do know is that if Stecke makes the slightest show of bolting from that hotel in Bayswater, Fanny Pratt will be all alive to his movements. She’s sharper than Chippendale---and that’s saying a good deal.”

“Oh, well,” he said resignedly, “I think it’s coming to an end, somehow. But I do not want Stecke to slip us. And what’s bothering me is---what are we going to bring against him? If Mrs. E.’s first half of the tale’s right, Stecke had nothing to do with either the theft of the church treasures or the murder of Skate---so what have we against him?”

“Wait till we hear the second half of the story,” I said. “Time enough to consider matters when we’ve heard that. Here’s the inn---let’s get some tea.”

We got some tea---and were very silent over it; I think we were all wondering what was going on in that big, book-laden study. And we were all glad and relieved when the time jogged on to half past five, at which hour we once more knocked at the front door of Linwood Rectory.

Bleacher, silent---and obviously inquisitive---admitted us again, but this time took us straight to the study. There stood the Archdeacon, solid and towering and alone---but now he stood by Canon Effingham’s desk, and his first action as we approached him was to lift a large sheet of paper and point us to something which till then it had concealed.

“There, gentlemen!” he said, with a sort of ironic smile. “What you see there will show you at once that I have been---successful!”

We looked at the desk. On the big blotting-pad, each secured by a rubber band, lay four bundles of brand-new Treasury notes, pound notes. I think that all three of us, even Jalvane, started at the sight of them.

“There is a thousand pounds there, gentlemen,” continued the Archdeacon. “Four parcels of two hundred and fifty one-pound notes each. You will observe that they are all unused, absolutely fresh from the press---and I dare say you already have a pretty good idea as to their origin?”

Nobody made any reply to that, and the Archdeacon, dropping into Canon Effingham’s chair at the desk, motioned us to sit round him.

“Mrs. Effingham has told me everything,” he began. “The fact is---I made her! I assumed---I was obliged to, after what you had told me---a very stern and determined manner----”

“Nobody, I am sure, sir, could do it better!” murmured Chaney. “Not even the Lord Chief Justice himself!”

“Thank you, Mr. Chaney,” said the Archdeacon, smiling. “I am usually supposed to be a very mild-mannered person. However, I felt that there was no use in beating about the bush, and I told Mrs. Effingham that you were in possession of certain facts about Mr. Stecke and herself, and that the only thing she could now do was to tell me the plain truth---the whole truth. And---I honestly believe I have got it!”

“Without reserve or concealment, Mr. Archdeacon?” I asked.

“I think so. I think she has now told me everything,” he answered. “And,” he suddenly added, with a singularly unclerical and knowing glance at us, “between you and me, gentlemen, I wish I had Stecke firmly grasped in one of these hands and a stout hunting-crop in the other! But come, come, that is not business! Now I am going to tell you all I have learnt. And as a preface to the very first thing, you had better bear in mind that the man Henry Sewell, alias Henry Seward, was evidently an eccentric being.”

“I think we’ve had some slight evidence of that, sir, in our investigations,” I said.

“Well, he undoubtedly was!” continued the Archdeacon. “Now let us be orderly and systematic in our narration. On the night of April 11 Mrs. Effingham, acting under compulsion and threats, handed Henry Sewell out of the side-door of this house the church keys. She heard and saw no more of him that night. On the morning of April 13 Mrs. Effingham received two registered parcels. They were taken up to her room in the ordinary way, and of course no one but herself had the slightest idea as to the nature of the contents. One parcel contained twenty-five hundred pounds in new one-pound Treasury notes; it also contained a letter from Henry Sewell (I grieve to say that Mrs. Effingham destroyed it), in which he told her that she no doubt had better facilities for keeping money safe than he had, and asked her to take care of the accompanying notes until he wanted them.”

“Good---gosh!” said Chaney, hastily substituting a harmless expletive. “Eccentric? I should think!”

“Odd, certainly,” agreed the Archdeacon. “But not, I think, so odd as a subsequent clause in the letter---I wish I had seen that letter, but, as I said just now, she destroyed it. This told her that in another parcel, safely packed, he was sending her the stolen chalice; the paten, he said, he had some present use for, but the chalice she was to put carefully away until he sent for it. Now this, gentlemen---this procedure on his part stamps Sewell, I think, as one of the most eccentric criminals I have ever heard of! But then, you see, he had a hold over this unfortunate woman---she was his wife.”

“He was building on that all through, sir,” remarked Chaney. “However, whether she knew it or not, she was free of him very soon after.”

“She did know it---I mean, she knew who it was that had been killed in the City when she saw the newspapers,” continued the Archdeacon. “She knew, of course, it was Sewell. And then she made the greatest mistake of all. I am not going to mince matters, gentlemen---you are probably as well acquainted with the frailties and vagaries of human nature as I am. During the time of his stay here as assistant to Canon Effingham, Mr. Stecke and Mrs. Effingham had become very friendly---that is all the term she used, and we will leave it at that. When Stecke came down here for the inquest on Skate, Mrs. Effingham took him into her full confidence and told him---everything. She told him, thinking she could trust him. The result has been that from that day to this, Stecke has steadily and consistently blackmailed her! He is---a scoundrel!”

None of us said anything. We were all wondering---and wondering the same thing. And that was how we could get hold of Stecke---what charge we could bring.

“Blackmailed her from first to last!” continued the Archdeacon, with a thump of his fist. “He began by helping himself to a share of the notes sent by Sewell. He has made her give him more of these notes from time to time. In fact, all that is left of the twenty-five hundred pounds sent by Sewell is the thousand pounds you see here. Stecke has had all the rest. Last night he came demanding this final thousand pounds. Mrs. Effingham refused to give it. She had begun to be frightened, and also to see through Stecke. And---that is all, gentlemen! I advise you to see to Stecke.”

“One word more, sir,” said Chaney, quietly. “Where is the stolen chalice?”

“Ah, yes!” exclaimed the Archdeacon. “I was forgetting! Stecke has it!”

“Stecke has it?” repeated Chaney. “Ah!” He got up, nodding at Jalvane and me. “We will get to work,” he said. “On Stecke!”

We all rose. Jalvane turned to the Archdeacon.

“The---lady?” he asked. “Mrs. Effingham?”

The Archdeacon, who was bundling the Treasury notes into Chaney’s hands, nodded.

“All right, my friend!” he said. “Although I am an Archdeacon, I am, I hope, a Christian man. I am taking Mrs. Effingham home with me---not far off. My wife and I will be responsible for her. Now you go away and get hold of Stecke!”

We shook hands with him, solemnly, and hurried out to our car. At the village post office I jumped down and got to the telephone and on to the Artemis Hotel in Bayswater. I asked for Miss Pratt. Miss Pratt was not in. Then I dared a bold question.

“Is Mr. Stocker in?”

The answer came prompt and clear.

“Mr. Stocker, sir? Mr. Stocker has left the hotel.”

8  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 24: The Archdeacon on: Today at 01:43:22 am
THIS, in my opinion, had been so far a day of surprise and mystery, and Bleacher’s behaviour seemed to indicate that both mystery and surprise were to continue. She had no sooner caught sight of us than, lifting a finger to her lips in sign of silence, she stepped back into the hall and, beckoning us to follow her, showed us into a small room facing the study. Closing the door on the four of us, she turned and spoke---whispering.

“I’d an idea you’d come,” she said. “I’d expected every ring to be yours. There’s something going on here! What, I don’t know, but it seems to me that there’s---well, we’ll call it the end coming. So I think!”

“End of---what?” asked Chaney.

“That I can’t say,” replied Bleacher. “End of all this---this mystery. Things have happened. The Canon’s gone away. He’s gone north---to visit the Dean of Norchester. The Dean, he wrote asking him to go---he wanted to know all about it, and of course they’re old friends. And last night---or evening---that Stecke was here. I think he and the missus had a difference---I heard high words. He looked---well, sore angry and put out when he went away, and I could see that she’d been crying. And this morning she was busy at the telephone for some time, and then this afternoon the Archdeacon came---two hours since, that is---and he’s been with her ever since, in the study. I say something’s up.”

“Who’s the Archdeacon?” asked Chaney, who was not much up in ecclesiastical matters. “Where’s he from? And who and what is he?”

“It’s the Archdeacon of Havering I’m talking about,” said Bleacher. “A very great gentleman---next to the Bishop. And if I know anything of faces, a stern gentleman, too---I shouldn’t like to get across with him!”

“An archdeacon, Chaney,” I explained, “is the business man of a diocese---learned in practical matters. Probably Mrs. Effingham sent for him.”

“Well,” said Chaney, “but we’ve got to see Mrs. Effingham; we must see Mrs. Effingham. It might be well if we could see her while this Archdeacon is in the house. Jalvane, give me your professional card. Here!” he continued, handing Jalvane’s and our own professional cards to Bleacher, “you take those to your mistress, say that we’re here, and that it is imperatively necessary that we should see her as quickly as may be convenient to her.”

Bleacher took the cards and departed, shutting the door on us. We all looked at each other. Jalvane produced his snuff-box and helped himself to a hearty pinch. He snapped the lid with emphasis before restoring the box to his pocket.

“She’ll not see us!” he said. “She’ll use this Archdeacon chap as---deputy. Well---I’d rather deal with a man, even if he is a parson.”

“But we’ve got to see her!” exclaimed Chaney. “This is no time for----”

“Umph!” interrupted Jalvane. “The woman’s coming back.”

Bleacher opened the door---threw it wide open.

“Will you come this way?” she asked. “The study.”

She preceded us across the hall to the closed door of the study; tapped; threw that open, too, motioning us to walk in. We entered, Chaney leading, I bringing up the rear.

There was no Mrs. Effingham there. But posted on the hearth-rug, his gaitered legs set well apart, his hands unseen behind his broad back, stood the Archdeacon, a very fine figure of a man, one glance at whose face was quite sufficient to show that there was one of those men who neither suffer fools gladly nor stand any nonsense. I think we all three recognized that at once and did obeisance to a superior brain in our bows---I know I made mine several inches lower than I usually did!

The Archdeacon brought a strong, shapely hand from behind the small of his back. It held our cards, and after a sharp glance at them he bestowed an equally sharp glance on us.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, in a staccato, business like tone, “which of you is Inspector Jalvane? And which Mr. Chaney? Then the other is Mr. Camberwell. Very well! Sit down. Now, why do you wish to see Mrs. Effingham?”

My two elder associates, usually quite ready to speak, turned to me. Chaney spoke.

“Mr. Camberwell will explain matters, sir,” he answered. “There---there is a great deal to explain.”

The Archdeacon smiled a little as he turned his attention to me. I had been sizing him up and had set him down as a bit of an autocrat in his own domain. And it was a very autocratic tone which characterized the one word of invitation which issued from his lips.

“Yes?”

So I was in for it. But I was not going to be browbeaten.

“Mr. Archdeacon,” I said, “may I ask if you are conversant with the history of this case?”

I saw at once that he was not the sort of man who cares to be questioned. But he replied directly enough.

“I am!”

“Deriving your information, I suppose, from the newspapers, and possibly from Canon Effingham, and perhaps from---Mrs. Effingham?”

He frowned at that and began to give me some particular attention.

“I am quite conversant with the case, from its inception,” he said. “I don’t care to be questioned. I asked you a question. Why do you wish to see Mrs. Effingham? That is the question!”

“I am going to answer it, Mr. Archdeacon, in very plain fashion,” I retorted. “But first I am going to show our credentials. Mr. Chaney and I are responsible private inquiry agents, commissioned by Canon Effingham to discover the truth about this mystery---the theft of the Linwood Church treasures. And we are working in association with Inspector Jalvane, of the Criminal Investigation Department of New Scotland Yard. Will you please understand all that?”

“Your credentials are approved!” he answered, with a slight smile. “I am not aware that they were questioned.”

“It is well to lay stress on them, Mr. Archdeacon,” I said, “especially in view of what I am going to say. From certain information which has come into our hands we are something more than doubtful if Mrs. Effingham, as she represents herself to be, is Mrs. Effingham at all. I put that plainly to you. For you, Mr. Archdeacon, may---know!”

He still stood in his original position on the hearth-rug, looking down on me from his six foot two, his eyes as steady, his mouth as set, as when we had first seen him. For a second or two he was silent. Then, disregarding my last remark, he spoke.

“If she is not Mrs. Effingham, who is she?” he demanded. “Who do you say she is?”

“We say she is the wife---or, rather, the widow, now---of Henry Sewell, alias Henry Seward, the man who stole the church treasures here and who probably killed the man Skate,” I answered. “We say she is not Clarice Effingham at all, but Clarice Sewell, nee Turner.”

“What proof have you of that?” he asked. “Any?”

“Yes, Mr. Archdeacon! A marriage certificate, which I shall now show you. Chaney!”

Chaney pulled out his pocket-book and extracted the all-important document. He handed it over to the Archdeacon. And the Archdeacon stood, stern and rigid, and read, his face as fixed as that of an image. Suddenly he folded the paper up and, passing it back to Chaney, relaxed. Thrusting his hands into the pockets of his archidiaconal breeches, he leaned back against the mantelpiece and, regarding us with a look which was rather more friendly and human than heretofore, began to talk.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, with a wry smile, “the game is up! That, I think, seems to be the correct thing to say. You are quite right in your supposition. Mrs. Effingham (let us call her so still for the purpose of this discussion) is not Mrs. Effingham, and she is the widow of the man Henry Sewell! The fact of the case is, gentlemen, Mrs. Effingham has made a full confession to me, this afternoon, of all she knows in connexion with the robbery and the subsequent events, and she has empowered me, since you are here, to give you the substance of it. I am now prepared to do so.”

Chaney found his tongue at last.

“That will be a very good thing to do, sir,” he said. “A very wise thing, too, on the lady’s part. But---does she understand the---er, consequences?”

“I think Mrs. Effingham is prepared to face any consequences rather than undergo any longer what she has been going through of late!” replied the Archdeacon. “But, at any rate, as soon as she knew that you were here, she authorized me to tell you everything she had just told me. It is fortunate that Canon Effingham has gone away; we must spare him all we can.”

“He knows nothing of this, then, sir?” asked Chaney.

“Nothing whatever! But now,” continued the Archdeacon, dropping into the nearest chair and facing the three of us, “now I want to tell you the real truth, as told me by Mrs. Effingham---I am convinced that she has kept back nothing. It is a sordid, pitiful, nasty story---but I suppose it is one which will not shock or surprise you. Anyhow, gentlemen, it is this: Mrs. Effingham, as a single woman, named Clarice Turner, met Henry Sewell. She was earning her living as a trained nurse; he, as a private tutor. They married. Almost from the first she discovered that her husband was a man of strange behaviour and odd principles. Sometimes she never saw him for weeks together; always she was earning her own living; she assures me that he never contributed one penny to her support. Eventually he disappeared altogether, and for years and years she never set eyes on him. She believed he was dead---and in that belief she married Canon Effingham, whom she had just nursed through a period of convalescence.”

“Pardon me, sir, but did she tell Canon Effingham anything of her past?” asked Chaney. “Anything about Sewell?”

“No,” replied the Archdeacon. “There she made a grave mistake. But she did not. According to her own account, she firmly believed that Henry Sewell was dead. She, of course, encouraged that belief in herself. But, gentlemen, Henry Sewell was not dead! And one day last winter he and his wife came face to face---here in Linwood Church!”

By this time Chaney had got out his note-book and was jotting things down in the curious shorthand which he had devised for himself; as for Jalvane, he had long since produced his snuff-box and was from time to time deriving mental aid from its depths. Both paused from their occupations at the Archdeacon’s last words and looked up at him with renewed interest.

“Ah---in the church, sir?” said Chaney. “One day last winter, eh? Did she tell you what particular day---or month?”

“No,” replied the Archdeacon, “except that it was on a Sunday, during service.”

“On a Sunday, during service!” repeated Chaney. “Accidental, I suppose?”

“Purely accidental! She suddenly caught sight of Sewell in the congregation,” continued the Archdeacon. “It gave her a great fright, of course. And, equally of course, she knew that Sewell would not rest until he had had speech with her.”

“Naturally!” observed Chaney, with a dry laugh. “Naturally, sir.”

“Sewell contrived to speak to her---on pretence of asking some question---as the congregation left the church,” the Archdeacon went on. “He made an appointment to meet her that evening, after dark.”

“She kept it?” inquired Chaney.

“She kept it. She assures me,” continued the Archdeacon, “that from the first moment of seeing Sewell she was in what one calls mortal terror of him, knowing the man with whom she had to deal. And after their first meeting she was absolutely under his control, knowing that a word from him---you understand?”

“We understand quite well, sir,” replied Chaney. “He held her secret! But what we want to know is---what happened?”

“At first,” continued the Archdeacon, “he contented himself with blackmail, getting from her various sums of money. Canon Effingham had always been most generous to her; she had a good deal of money laid by. Sewell got it from her, little by little. But eventually he began to fly at higher game. At the beginning of this spring, in one of their secret interviews, he told her openly what he was after and that he was relying on her to help him to---the famous church treasures of Linwood.”

“Had she told him of them?” asked Chaney.

“Quite unnecessary!” said the Archdeacon. “I used the word ‘famous.’ Everybody knows of them. They have been written about, placed on exhibition, talked of----”

“We’re very well aware of all that, sir,” interrupted Chaney. “I asked what I did for a certain reason of my own, but now I come to think of it, you couldn’t possibly have given me an answer. Well, he wanted her help---and got it?”

“I suppose he forced her to do what she did,” said the Archdeacon. “At any rate, she has confessed to me that at Sewell’s suggestion she took the private keys from her husband’s----”

“From Canon Effingham’s,” corrected Chaney, imperturbably.

“From Canon Effingham’s dressing-table one night, got the church keys from his study drawer, and handed them to Sewell at a side-door of the house,” continued the Archdeacon. “And that is all the share she had in the robbery. Of the death of the man Skate she knows nothing. Nor, of course, did she ever see Sewell again---he was, as you are aware, killed----”

“We saw him killed,” said Chaney dryly. He closed his note-book, put it and his pencil away, and suddenly turned sharply on the Archdeacon. “Why, sir, has Mrs. Effingham told you all this?” he asked.

“Because the strain of preserving the secret has been too much for her,” replied the Archdeacon. “She wishes me to acquaint Canon Effingham with the truth, and she will throw herself on his mercy.”

“But did she commission you to tell us, sir?” asked Chaney. “I want to know that!”

“Yes! when your cards were brought in, I suggested to her that it would be best to let the police authorities know the truth, and she consented that I should tell you what I have told you,” replied the Archdeacon. “I feel convinced that now---now!---Mrs. Effingham, as we will continue to call her, does not desire to conceal anything.”

Chaney, Jalvane, and I looked at each other. I think each was inviting the other to speak. But it was Jalvane who spoke---for the first time since we three had entered the study.

“The lady throws all the blame on Sewell, sir?---and claims that whatever she did, was done under compulsion?” he asked. “Is that it?”

“That is precisely her case,” replied the Archdeacon.

“And she has no further knowledge of---anything---after the moment in which she handed the keys to Sewell?” continued Jalvane.

“So I understand,” said the Archdeacon.

“Then I wish to ask you a question, sir,” concluded Jalvane. “What has she told you about the Reverend Mr. Stecke?”

The Archdeacon started and stared.

“The Reverend Mr. Stecke?” he exclaimed. “Nothing! What do you mean?”

9  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 23: Seward's Safe on: Today at 01:15:13 am
THERE was---to me, at any rate, who had never been in quite such a place before---an atmosphere of mystery about this Harmonial Club, and it was further deepened when the accommodating steward, who, for some reason best known to himself, seemed particularly anxious to please Chaney, led us from that room into an inner one, the chief features of which were a big safe in a corner, and, ranged along one side, a series of lockers, all numbered in black figures. He turned, glancing at Chaney---of me he took next to no notice---and smiled as he pointed to a number---23.

“Some of our members---the better sort,” he said---“like to have lockers wherein they can keep a few little odds and ends which---eh?---it mightn’t be quite convenient to keep at home. You understand?”

“Perfectly!” responded Chaney. “Perfectly, my lad! And----”

“And Mr. Nemo had one,” continued the Steward. “That’s it---Number 23. Of course, he had the key. But,” he added, with a meaning smile, “I have a master-key to---in fact to the whole lot of these little receptacles. You want to take a look inside Mr. Nemo’s---shall we call it ‘safe’?”

Chaney gave the steward another of those winks of his which always seemed---to me---to exercise some profound influence on certain people.

“Well, my lad!” he answered. “Between you and me---and my partner here, of course!---it’s a case of which you prefer. Either it’s me---or it’s Scotland Yard! Which do you fancy?”

The steward laughed and moved towards the locker.

“I prefer you!” he said, and put a key in the little door. “There you are!”

Chaney and I rubbed shoulders as we bent forward and peered into the eighteen-inch-square cavity. There was just one object inside---a box, some 12 x 12 x 8---which, drawn out, proved to be locked. The box itself was interesting; it may have been a work-box, fashioned for some early Victorian lady; the rosewood of which it was made was dull now, but had once been highly polished; the brass corners were tarnished. It weighed fairly heavy in one’s hand; shaken, it seemed to be pretty well full of something soft, papers, something of that sort.

Chaney turned to the steward.

“Ever seen this before?” he demanded.

“Once! I saw him put it in there.”

“When was that?”

“When he rented the locker. Soon after he joined the club.”

“Say anything to you about it?”

“Not a word! He’d seen that other members had lockers; he asked me if he could rent one, and next time he came, brought that box with him, got the key from me, and put the box inside.”

“Well,” said Chaney, after a pause, “I’m going to take this box away. See?”

For answer the steward turned to the locker, turned his key in it, withdrew the key, and dropped it in his pocket. He smiled at Chaney.

“Personally,” he said, “I’ve no objection. And as Mr. Nemo’s dead, he can’t have any. And as nobody else knows---eh?”

“Got a scrap of brown paper about?” asked Chaney.

The steward produced what was wanted, and Chaney wrapping up the rosewood box, tucked it tightly away under his left arm. He gave the steward a nod which that functionary seemed to comprehend exactly.

“All right, my lad!” he said, moving towards the door. “Much obliged to you---far better to deal with me than with----”

“Oh, much pleasanter, much pleasanter!” interrupted the steward, laughing softly. “Some people ask so many questions that are---inconvenient.”

“I don’t!” said Chaney. “But I’ll drop in and tell you how I get on with this---” tapping the box---“a bit later.”

“Do!” said the steward. “Interesting! And, of course, all the rest is---entre nous, eh?”

“In plain English, all p. and c., my lad,” said Chaney. “Bye-bye!”

We went down the two flights of stairs and out into the street. That was not the sort of districts in which you can pick up a taxi-cab by holding out a finger, and for a little distance we walked along the pavement. Then a bus came by, going in the direction of Edgware Road, and we hailed and boarded it. The lower part was empty; Chaney and I had one end to ourselves.

“What did you make of that place, Chaney?” I asked as we moved away. “You seemed to understand its atmosphere---I didn’t.”

He laughed softly, transferring the box from his armpit to his knee.

“Gambling-hell!” he said. “Just that!”

“But---if that’s so, it’s odd that Perkis should have let us go there, isn’t it?” I said. “You’d have thought----”

He laughed again at that.

“Perkis would know nothing about it,” he said. “Perkis’ll be an ordinary frequenter, to drink his pint, smoke his pipe, pass the time o’ day, and go home to bed at a Christian hour. There’ll be at that place what the French call a cercle privé, Camberwell! And that’s why we found that chap we’ve just left so amenable! He’d have let us do anything we liked, being who we are, private inquiry agents, rather than that we should have gone away and told the regular police---what I could have told ’em. He didn’t want any C.I.D. men round there---not he! They’d ha’ been nosing things out!”

“What are we going to do with that?” I asked, pointing to the box.

“When we get to our office, we’ll phone Jalvane and tell him to come,” he answered. “I’ve a notion we may---it’s only may, of course---find something here that’ll throw a bit more light on Seward and possibly on the present position of things, and as Jalvane has helped us, we must help him. And---if there is anything, Camberwell, we’re bound to bring the police authorities in. So---there we are! We must get Jalvane---and open this old box.”

We left the bus when it reached more civilized quarters and, taking a taxi-cab, hurried to our office, where I at once got in touch with Jalvane. Within half an hour he was with us and listening to our story.

“Well,” he said, as Chaney finished, “then the next thing is---a key.”

We all tried whatever keys we had on us, but in the end, rather than spoil what was really a fine bit of cabinet work, Chippendale had to fetch a locksmith. He contrived to open the box without damaging the lock or lid, and presently, locksmith and Chippendale out of the room, we lifted the lid and looked inside. And Chaney immediately pointed to a discoloured bit of parchment, pasted strongly to the left-hand upper corner of the inside of the lid. There was an inscription on it in a delicate feminine handwriting, the ink faded by age: “Henry Sewell, the gift of his Mother, on his 15th birthday.

“Sort of box for a boy to keep his odds and ends in at school,” muttered Jalvane. “He seems to have stuck to it pretty well. Well, let’s see what there is.”

A fold or two of soft paper was laid over the other contents. Beneath these lay a miscellaneous collection of what I can only describe as odds and ends. My own impression about the box and its contents was that the various things found in it had been placed there years previously and never touched---that is to say, unpacked---since, and that Seward, for some reason best known to himself, had preferred to keep the box in the club locker rather than at his lodging in Star Street. Described briefly, the contents were as follows: Papers, showing his connexion with the Sewells of Spalding. Letters, some of them from famous people, chiefly relating to matters and questions of scholarship; several were from eminent classical scholars of world-wide reputation. Several very rare postage stamps, enclosed in a Mulready envelope. A roughly drawn map, with queer signs, figures, and indications on it; of this none of us could make head or tail. Several coins, Roman and Byzantine, tightly wrapped up in a fold or two of wash-leather. A very old leather purse, of the sort known as Portsea, containing in one pocket a quantity of the long obsolete fourpenny pieces; in the other a Jubilee medal, in silver, of 1897. There were more oddities and curiosities; some of them of such a trifling nature that it was difficult to understand why any man should have bothered to preserve them. And then, at the bottom of the box, tightly wedged in, side by side, lay two books; one, a copy of Palgrave’s Golden Treasury, full bound in crimson calf and bearing the arms of Spalding Grammar School on the side (evidently, and as we saw, later, from the inscription inside, a prize book); the other a copy of the Greek Testament, in full morocco. Both these books were as fresh as when they left the hands of the binders and had apparently never been used.

While Jalvane occupied himself with the papers, and Chaney examined the letters, I, to whom any printed book has an irresistible attraction, picked up the two beautifully bound volumes and examined them more closely. The Golden Treasury was a first prize for Latin, awarded to Henry Sewell at Spalding Grammar School (Mr. Francis Sewell, it will be remembered, had said in his evidence before the City Coroner that his was a Spalding family). The Greek Testament---with the Greek and English in parallel columns---was a birthday present to Henry Sewell from his mother. It was so fresh and clean that I doubted if Henry Sewell had ever opened it. But suddenly I knew that he had---once, at any rate. For as I turned its immaculate pages over, there dropped out from amongst them a folded paper, somewhat creased, somewhat yellow with age, and fell on the table by which we were all standing. Chaney’s sharp eyes caught the flutter.

“What’s that?” he demanded. “Fell out of that book!”

I laid the Greek Testament down and, picking up the folded paper, smoothed it out. For a second or two I scarcely comprehended what I was looking at. Then I saw that it was a marriage certificate; the thing commonly known as marriage lines.

“It’s a marriage certificate,” I said, “An old----”

“Marriage certificate?” interrupted Chaney. “Whose marriage certificates are---here, let me look!”

He half-snatched the paper out of my hand; within a second he hit the table with a great thump of his fist and let out a cry.

“By God, we’ve got it!” he almost shouted. “Got it as safe as---as anything! This is it!”

“What’s it? What’re you talking about?” demanded Jalvane. “What----”

“Look, look!” said Chaney, laying the paper on the table, and pointing to a certain place in the faded writing. “Look! This is a certificate of marriage between Henry Sewell and Clarice Turner! Clarice Turner!”

“Well?” said Jalvane. “And what----”

Chaney turned on me.

“Clarice Turner---Clarice!” he repeated, nodding at me. “Clarice!”

“What do you mean, Chaney?” I asked, quietly. “Explain!”

“Explain?” he shouted. “Lord, Camberwell, where’s your memory? Mrs. Effingham’s name is Clarice!

I think I began then to see what he meant. I remembered, too, that he was right. Several times, in our conversations at Linwood, I had heard Canon Effingham address his wife as Clarice; once she had sent some formal communication to me on his behalf and had signed herself Clarice Effingham.

“Yes, Chaney,” I said. “Mrs. Effingham’s name is Clarice. But----”

Jalvane laid his papers down and came nearer to Chaney.

“Make it clear, my lad!” he said. “What’s the notion?”

Chaney was excited; more excited than I had ever seen him before. He spread out the certificate of marriage.

“I’ll make it clear, right enough!” he said, with a sharp laugh. “Look at this! It’s a certificate of marriage between Henry Sewell, bachelor, and Clarice Turner, spinster, celebrated October 5, 1907, fourteen years ago. He’s described as a tutor; she as a nurse. His address is given at 31, Penberthy Villas, Notting Hill; hers as St. Mary’s Hospital, Paddington. Now, then, put a few things together. We know that between the date of this marriage and the present, Henry Sewell, as Henry Seward, has had at least one dose of penal servitude; he may have been in prison, too. We also know that Canon Effingham, returning home from a spell of convalescence some time since, brought with him as his wife the woman now known as Mrs. Effingham, who had been his nurse, and whose Christian name is certainly Clarice. Very well---I don’t call it jumping at conclusions (considering all that’s happened!) when I say that Clarice Turner, Clarice Sewell, Clarice Effingham are all one and the same woman! Establish that, and the mystery’s solved.”

He stamped the table again with his fist, looking challengingly from one to the other of us. And for the moment I had nothing to say; I was looking back over things. As for Jalvane, he pulled out his snuff-box and helped himself to a big pinch. It seemed a long time before he spoke.

“I dare say you’re right!” he said at last. “That would, of course, solve things.”

“Beyond question!” declared Chaney. “I tell you---we’ve got it!”

I found my tongue then.

“Just how Chaney?” I asked. “I don’t quite see----”

“Listen, Camberwell!” he answered, enthusiastic as a boy over his discovery. “I put it like this. Of course, we’ve got to suppose something to start with, and that is that Clarice Effingham is Clarice Sewell, and that both are Clarice Turner, or were originally Clarice Turner. Very well! Clarice Turner marries Henry Sewell. Henry Sewell is a bad lot; he gets into trouble and vanishes to Dartmoor or Portland or where the devil you please! Clarice, left to fend for herself, reverts to her old profession of nursing. She hears no more of Henry---when he emerges from his temporary seclusion Henry goes his own way. She meets a simple old clergyman in the shape of Canon Effingham, and---she marries him. She settles down at Linwood Rectory; she expects, hopes, never to see or hear of Henry Sewell again. But Henry Sewell turns up! When he turns up, where he turns up, we don’t know. But he does turn up! Probably Henry, like his brother Francis, has heard of the treasures of Linwood Church; possibly he goes to spy out the land. But, however that may be, Henry materializes. He and Clarice meet---and from the moment of this meeting, Clarice is in Henry’s power!”

“I take you!” muttered Jalvane. “You’ve got it!”

“In Henry’s power!” continued Chaney. “And so are the old Canon’s keys and the church treasures! Good Lord! I see the whole thing now as---well, never mind, I see it! Mrs. Effingham handed out the keys to Henry; Henry did the rest, and cracked Skate’s skull in doing it. Oh yes, yes---that’s been the way of it! The instant Henry clapped eyes on Clarice again and found out she was now Mrs. Effingham, church doors and vestry doors and safe door---flew wide open!”

There was a moment’s silence. Then I ventured one word---a name.

“Stecke?”

Chaney spread his hands and made a grimace.

“That’ll come a bit later, Camberwell,” he said. “I’ve a theory about all that. But the first thing is---Mrs. Effingham. What do you say, Jalvane?”

“Ditto!” replied Jalvane. “And---at once!”

Chaney carefully folded up the marriage certificate, placed it in a stout envelope, and secured the envelope in his pocket-book. He swept all the other things into the box and put the box away.

“Camberwell,” he said, “get the car! Jalvane’ll come with us. We’ll be at Linwood in an hour. Give Chip his orders about being here in case that girl of his rings up. And---hurry! We’re in sight of the end!”

An hour and a quarter later Chaney, Jalvane, and I walked up to the front door of Linwood Rectory. Everything was very quiet there, but my heart was distinctly thumping with excitement. Then the door opened and revealed the grenadier-like figure of Bleacher.

10  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 22: The Friendly Greengrocer on: Today at 12:50:34 am
WHEN Jalvane had gone, Chaney sat for some time in silence, his legs stretched out across the hearth-rug, his hands thrust in the pockets of his trousers, his chin sunk on his waistcoat, his eyes fixed on the points of his boots. I knew the signs: Chaney was up against a brick wall. And, knowing the signs, I let him alone; he was thinking of how to climb over the brick wall, or break through it, or find a way round it.

He lifted his head at last and looked at me, questioningly.

“What is it that these scientific chaps talk about?” he asked. “What do they call that---you know---the---the thing they want to find between men and monkeys?”

I laughed out loud at that.

“What’re you after, Chaney?” I said. “The missing link?”

“Ah, that’s it!” he said. “I never was much of a reader---in those things, at any rate---but I thought I remembered it. The missing link, eh? Well, that’s just what we want, Camberwell!”

“If we’re as slow in finding it as the scientific chaps, we might as well give the thing up!” I replied. “Give it clean up!”

“Give up nothing!” he declared, with emphasis. “Not my way, my lad. No! But, now, is there anything we’ve left undone? Anything we’ve half done?”

I had notions of my own on that point.

“Well, there is something,” I answered. “I’ve thought, more than once, that the examination we made of Seward’s things at that room of his in Star Street wasn’t thorough enough. It was only a surface examination.”

He jumped from his chair, alert and ready again.

“Good business!” he exclaimed. “It was a bit perfunctory, no doubt. Well, we can make another. Let’s see, we got the old woman---relative term, but I call all landladies old women---to lock the place up, didn’t we? What was the precise arrangement?”

I pulled open a drawer in my desk and produced a labelled key.

“The precise arrangement,” I replied, “was that we locked up the room and took the key, promising payment of the rent at ten shillings a week as long as we retained the key. This is the key.”

Chaney reached for his hat and stuck it firmly on his head.

“Come on!” he said. “Leave whatever you’re doing and we’ll go straight there. It may result in nothing, but at any rate we shall be doing something.”

So for the second time we descended on Star Street and Mrs. Pentridge. Star Street looked as drab and shabby as ever; Mrs. Pentridge, in her working trim, showed an immediate appreciation of our presence, which was further heightened when I handed her some current coin of the realm.

“Which I’d been wondering how much longer you’d be for keeping the room on, gentlemen,” she remarked. “Me having had various applications from gentlemen, the card still being in the window of Mr. Seward’s room and me not being able to get at it, you having the key of the door, and tenants thereof, so to speak, but immaterial to me how long you please to retain same----”

“As long as the rent’s paid, eh, ma’am?” said Chaney. “Oh, well, we’re just going to have another look round, and when we’ve finished, we’ll tell you if we shall want to lock up again or if we shall hand the key over.”

“Whichever you pleases, gentlemen, will be quite agreeable to me,” said Mrs. Pentridge with characteristic affability. “Might I make so bold as to inquire if anything fresh has come to light, gentlemen?”

“You might, ma’am,” replied Chaney. “And I’ll reply in two words. No end! But for what it is, you must wait---you’ll be getting a nice bit of spicy reading in your favourite Sunday paper before long. But has anything fresh occurred with you, ma’am, about this business? Any letters come for Seward? Anybody called to ask after him?”

“Which there ain’t been nothing at all of that nature, sir,” replied Mrs. Pentridge. “The poor gentleman never had no letters, and as far as I reck’lect, nobody ever did call to see him---he was a lone man, gentlemen, was Mr. Seward. All the same there was an inquiry about him made to me in the street the other morning.”

I was just then in the very act of fitting the key into the door of the late Mr. Seward’s room. Chaney laid a detaining hand on my arm.

“Oh?” he said. “Who made it, Mrs. Pentridge?”

“Which it was Mr. Perkis, sir, the gentleman what keeps the greengrocer’s shop at the corner, where you turns up to Praed Street, sir,” replied Mrs. Pentridge. “Of course, I buys my vegetables there, as a rule. And when I was in the other morning, a-buying of a few little things, Mr. Perkis, he says: ‘What’s come of that fresh-coloured gentleman as used to lodge at your place?’ he says. ‘I never knew his name, but I seen him a-coming out of your door frequent,’ he says. ‘Where’s he got to?’ And of course, gentlemen, remembering your request not to say nothing, I says nothing. Leastways, what I did say was: ‘Mr. Perkis!’ I says, solemn-like, ‘you’ll excuse me, but that there is a subject on which I can’t express myself. It’s a delicate matter, Mr. Perkis,’ I says, ‘and one that can’t be referred to, at present.’ ‘Oh, just so!’ says he. ‘I only wondered where he was, ’cause I hadn’t seen him at our club lately.’ And there was no more passed between us, gentlemen.”

“At his club?” said Chaney. “What club did he mean?”

“Which I cannot say, sir, me having no more idea than the man in the moon,” replied Mrs. Pentridge. “Though, to be sure, I am aware there is such institutions, the late Mr. Pentridge having belonged to one, though what good it ever did him I never could make out, and made him smell very strong of beer and tobacco, if you’ll excuse me for referring to such things.”

“Who’s this man---Perkis, greengrocer, end of the street?” asked Chaney. “Um!---we’ll just step along and have a word with him, I think. See you later, Mrs. Pentridge---and in the mean time, keep your tongue still, eh?”

“Trust me, sir,” said Mrs. Pentridge. “Which I never mentioned the name to Mr. Perkis.”

“And Perkis didn’t mention a name to you, eh?” asked Chaney, pausing with his hand on the door.

“He did not, sir,” replied Mrs. Pentridge. “ ‘The fresh-coloured gentleman’---that was the term he used.”

Chaney said no more and we went out into the street and turned towards the corner. The greengrocer’s shop came in sight before we had taken half a dozen steps.

“What’re we after, Chaney?” I asked as we drew near it.

“Anything we can catch!” he answered. “Evidently this chap Perkis knew Seward as a member of some club or other, even if he didn’t know his name. Club is a wide term! I don’t suppose Perkis meant the Carlton, or the Reform, or the Army and Navy, and I shouldn’t think he was referring to a slate club. But he may have meant one of these little political clubs, and if he did, I want to know what Seward was doing there. But we’ll soon see---or hear!”

We came up to the shop---a typical establishment of that quarter, with a lavish display of the cheaper and more popular fruits and vegetables. There was a boy at the door bawling his wares, a stoutish woman busy inside, a little man in an apron with a pen behind his ear doing something in the writing line at a stand-up desk. He looked up as we entered.

“Mr. Perkis?” inquired Chaney.

“Same, sir, at your service,” replied Mr. Perkis, accentuating the preposition. “What can I do for you, sir? Not sell you any vegetables, I’ll bet!” he went on, with something like a wink. “What is it---politics?”

“Scarcely!” laughed Chaney “Just a minute’s talk---in private.”

Mr. Perkis took us both in at one swift glance and ushered us into a dingy little room behind his shop. Then he looked at us again.

“Police?” he asked laconically.

Chaney drew out a card and passed it over.

“You asked Mrs. Pentridge who lives in Star Street about a recent lodger of hers, to whom you referred as the fresh-coloured gentleman----”

“Never knew his name,” interrupted Mr. Perkis.

“---And you mentioned that he belonged to your club----”

“So he did! We called him the Gentleman. Secretary and manager may ha’ known his name, but nobody else did, I’ll swear.”

“What club is that, Mr. Perkis?”

“The Harmonial, sir. Whether there is such a word I don’t know,” said Mr. Perkis, “but as it expresses the feelings of our members, let it stand! Social club, sir---to be found in Harrow Road---Number 5873---up two flights of stairs, and there you are!”

“Social club, eh?” suggested Chaney.

“That’s it, sir---and a very pleasant one.”

“And you used to see this man there?”

“Occasionally. Two or three nights a week. He’d drop in for an hour or so. And, as I said before, we called him the Gentleman. Very affable, very polite, very sociable. Could tell a good tale better than any man I ever heard. And if he did pop a bit of Latin or Greek into his talk, well, it was like a sprinkle of pepper and salt on a tomato; it brought out the flavour.”

“Just so!” agreed Chaney. “Well, now, do you think we could get a talk with the secretary or manager of the Harmonial?”

Mr. Perkis snatched up a business card and scribbled something on the back of it.

“If you give him this---he’s secretary, manager, and steward all in one,” he said---“you can talk as long as you like with him. But,” he continued, looking from one to the other of us. “What’s it all about? Is he wanted?”

Chaney assumed his most mysterious expression. He gave Mr. Perkis a wink.

“Dead!” he whispered. “We’re making some inquiries on behalf of his relations. Big mystery behind it!”

Mr. Perkis’s lips shaped themselves into a compressed circle.

“O---oh!” he said. “Oh, I see! Duke in disguise, or something of that sort, eh? Well---well! But you go and see our steward.”

“What name?” inquired Chaney.

Mr. Perkis scratched his head and then shook it.

“Well, now, there you have me!” he said. “Been a member there this five years, I have, and never known his name! Surname, I mean. Leastways, if I ever have known it, I don’t now. We call him William---Sweet William. Ask for William and hand him my ticket. Mystery, eh? Ah, I always thought there was something o’ that sort about the Gentleman!”

Leaving Mr. Perkis in the midst of his cabbages and cauliflowers, Chaney and I went away and, skirting round by Praed Street and Paddington Green, entered on the long dreary stretches of the Harrow Road. We had walked a mile up that when we came to the Harmonial Club---the presence of which was denoted by a neat board affixed to a side-door flanking a furnishing emporium. The side-door was open; we entered and, walking up two flights of stairs, according to Mr. Perkis’s instructions, found ourselves confronting another door, on the upper panels of which was a second neat board, bearing the inscription “Harmonial Club. Members Only.” This appeared to deny entrance to outsiders, but Chaney pushed boldly in, and I followed at his elbow. We found ourselves in a little hall, or lobby, from which two or three doors opened---all were then closed. But, one suddenly opening, there presented himself before us a smart-looking young fellow of twenty-five or six, who, I would swear, had been a waiter before he became what he was. He gave us a sharp, comprehensive, examining look and for some reason or other was immediately bland, suave, and at the same time watchful.

“Yes, gentlemen?” he said.

Chaney held out Mr. Perkis’s card.

“Mr. Perkis,” began Chaney, “was good enough to say you’d give us a bit of information. You’re the manager, I reckon?”

“Manager, steward, secretary---anything you like, sir,” replied the other, with a ready smile. “What is it, sir?”

“Private and confidential sort of stuff,” said Chaney with a wink. “Here---my card!”

The steward took Chaney’s card, inspected it, looked up, and winked back. Stepping across the lobby, he opened another door and revealed a small room which was half-office and half bar---that is to say, there were the appurtenances of an office on one side, and the apparatus of a bar on the other.

“Come inside, gentlemen,” he said. “All private here---there’s no one comes very much to this place before night. What is it, now?”

“We want to know if you can tell us anything about a member of yours of whom we’ve been talking to Mr. Perkis just now,” began Chaney. “A member who, he says, was known amongst you here as the Gentleman. All the name, Perkis says, that he himself knew him by.”

“All he was known by,” said the Steward, nodding. “The Gentleman!”

Chaney remained silent a second or two. Then he gave our host another wink.

“I’ll bet you knew him by a name;” he said. “Come, now!”

The steward laughed.

“Oh, well, of course!” he admitted readily. “He had to give a name when he signed the book---members’ book, you know.”

“I’m not going into your terms of membership,” said Chaney. “I know a bit about these social clubs. Name and address, eh?”

“Address is---not necessary,” replied the steward.

“Name, then,” continued Chaney. “And in this case---what was it? All between ourselves, you know, my lad!”

“Nemo!” replied the Steward. “Mr. Henry Nemo.”

Chaney turned on me.

“Latin?” he asked. “What’s it mean?”

“No man---nobody---no one!” I answered.

“Knew how to label himself,” muttered Chaney.

The steward was watching us both, closely. He smiled.

“What’s it all about?” he asked. “As you said---all between ourselves!”

“This, then, my lad,” replied Chaney. “Read the famous Linwood Church robbery and what followed? And about the man who’d posed as Dean of Norchester being killed? We saw it, my friend and I---in the City. Well---that’s your man! Nemo here---Seward somewhere else---and something different elsewhere! Got it?”

The steward whistled.

“Never struck me till now!” he said. “So---he’s dead?”

“As last year’s roses!” declared Chaney. “And we want to know a few things. We know where he lodged, in Paddington; we know what he had there. Now, then, this is what we came here for. Had he anything here---any effects? Ever leave anything here? A man like that might use a quiet place like this for stowing away a bit of property. Is there anything of his on your premises? If there is, better let me see it---because you’d rather deal with me than with the official police. And it’s got to be one or the other!”

But the steward made no bones at that question. He smiled knowingly and, thrusting a hand in his pocket, drew out a bunch of keys.

“Come this way,” he said, leaving his seat. “Mr. Nemo had a locker here.”

11  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 21: A One-Man Job on: March 28, 2024, 10:57:40 am
JALVANE, who until then had been standing watching us while we read, dropped into a chair and pulled out his snuff-box; sure sign that he wanted to talk and to be talked to.

“You’ve come to suspect Stecke?” he said. “Just why? We haven’t discussed this for a while---I’ve been engaged elsewhere. Tell me where you’ve got to.”

I left it to Chaney to explain matters, and Chaney epitomized the story up to the point we had arrived at, bringing it down, in fact, to our commissioning the services of Miss Fanny Pratt.

“It just comes to this,” he concluded, preparing to check off his points on his fingers. “We know certain facts about Stecke now which indicate guilt of some sort, whether it’s direct or whether it’s complicity. Just consider them:

1. We know, beyond doubt, that there’s some sort of intimacy, friendship, partnership, call it what you like, between Stecke and Mrs. Effingham.

2. We know that previous to the theft of the church treasures Stecke was very hard up and couldn’t pay his tailor, and that immediately after that he was in funds and paid up.

3. We know that he paid in new Treasury notes, never used before. Also that he got rid of similar notes at Linwood post office. Now, as we all know, absolutely brand-new Treasury notes are not so common as all that---you can get ’em now and then at a bank, but as a rule Treasury notes have been well thumbed and creased before one handles them; I scarcely ever remember having new ones. Is it mere coincidence that Stecke should be in possession of a lot of such new notes just after Seward got five thousand pounds’ worth of them at the Bank of England?

4. We know that Seward, when he called on Mr. Atherton, professing to be the Dean of Norchester, sent in a card which seemed to be genuine. Now, the real Dean of Norchester, when in London or the south of England, used to call on his old friend Canon Effingham at Linwood, and there were three or four of his visiting-cards on a tray on the hall table at Linwood Rectory. There’s no doubt, to our mind, that those cards were handed to Seward. By whom? Stecke had opportunities of abstracting them.

5. But that brings us to another, a critical point---Has all this been a put-up job between Stecke, Seward, and Mrs. Effingham? Mrs. Effingham is a gambler---she may have been in debt. She could hand over those cards; she could put the church keys where Seward and Stecke could get them. We do know, anyhow, that she and Stecke are continually meeting, since the affair at Linwood, and frequenting the Bessington Club. That argues---something. What is still unsolved is: were the three I’ve mentioned joint conspirators in the matter of the theft? The murder of Skate I take to have been---well, an accident. Skate happened to turn up at the wrong moment.”

Jalvane listened to all this in silence, occasionally treating himself to a pinch of snuff. Eventually, he closed his box and put it away.

“You’ve been going on the notion, the supposition, that Stecke was with Seward at Linwood on the night of the theft and murder?” he said. “Eh?”

“Ye---es, I suppose so,” admitted Chaney. “I thought he was the man in the car. But now----”

“Now you know who the man in the car was---this man Massie,” said Jalvane. “So that point is settled. Stecke was not the man in the car spoken of by the garage-proprietor who sold Seward the spanner.”

“Still, for all that, Stecke may have been at Linwood that night,” suggested Chaney. “He may have met Seward there by appointment. There must have been two of ’em at the game. One man couldn’t carry Skate’s dead body from the churchyard to the church and put it in the old Squire’s pew, in which Camberwell found it.”

“I don’t know whether you’re quite right in assuming that, Chaney,” I said. “Skate was a very small-built man---a mere little rat of a chap. I should say---well, I know that I myself could easily have carried, or at any rate dragged, his body into the church.”

“No---at least I’m not saying you couldn’t,” replied Chaney, “but in my opinion there were two men at work---Seward and another. And considering the points I’ve just mentioned, the other seems likely to have been Stecke.”

“This is where I come in, with some fresh news,” said Jalvane. “It was not Stecke. Stecke was not at nor near Linwood that night!”

“How the devil do you know that?” exclaimed Chaney.

Jalvane’s queer mouth and chin relaxed in a knowing grin.

“Ah!” he said, “you two are not the only persons in the world who’ve been doing a bit of investigation into these matters! We’ve done a little that way, you know---elsewhere. But we don’t mind your knowing, Chaney---all in the same boat, eh, and it all helps? Well, you see, I do know that Stecke was not at Linwood on the important date---the night of the theft and murder.”

“What was the exact date?” asked Chaney, interrupting Jalvane and turning to me. “You’ve got it down somewhere, Camberwell---look!”

But there was no need for that---the date was fixed in my memory.

“April 11,” I answered.

“April 11 is right,” agreed Jalvane. “Night of April 11. On the night of April 11 the Reverend Mr. Stecke was not within a hundred miles of Linwood!”

“And again I ask: how do you know that?” demanded Chaney.

“Well, the fact is,” replied Jalvane, “that after first hearing of him and about him and seeing him and listening to his evidence I came to the conclusion that, whatever else he might be, the Reverend Mr. Stecke was, or had it in him to be, a somewhat shifty person. And, taking everything into consideration, I thought there was something fishy---I don’t know what---about his story. So after that second inquest I managed to get into conversation with him and led things round to what he’d told us about the meeting with Seward in Linwood Church. ‘It’s a pity, Mr. Stecke,’ I said, ‘that you didn’t come forward, either to Scotland Yard or to Chaney & Camberwell, as soon as ever you saw anything in the papers---you let a day or two go by, didn’t you?’ ‘Oh!’ says he, ‘but I couldn’t, Mr. Jalvane---I wasn’t in town---I was away in the country, and----’ ”

“Wait a minute, Jalvane,” I said, interrupting him. “That reminds me of something. Let me look at my diary.” I got the book out and turned over its leaves until I came to my notes about Stecke’s call on us. “Yes,” I continued, “that’s in accordance with what I’ve got here. Stecke said when he first called on us that he should have called the day before but for the fact that he was out of town.”

“Yes, yes!” exclaimed Chaney, impatiently. “But what’s that amount to? Nothing! Linwood is out of town. Besides, he would say he was out of town whether he was or not. And if he was out of town that day, what’s that got to do with where he was on the night of the 11th?”

“Wait a bit,” said Jalvane. “He then went on to say that he’d been away in the country taking duty for a few days for a clerical friend at Hegsworthy, in Devonshire, and hadn’t returned to town until early on the morning he called on you. ‘I lost no time,’ he said. ‘I went straight from the train to Camberwell & Chaney’s.’ Then he wanted to know what difference a day or two would have made. I put him off by saying that in these cases every minute is precious, and no detail too small, or some fudge of that sort, which of course he swallowed.”

“Yes, but you don’t know he was in Devonshire,” said Chaney, still cynical and suspicious.

“Oh, yes, I do!” retorted Jalvane. “Because I made secret inquiries at Hegsworthy. Stecke was there on the days and nights of the 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th of April. So there you are!---he couldn’t have been at Linwood.”

Chaney made no answer; at any rate, none beyond a dissatisfied grunt. So I turned to Jalvane.

“Do I understand that you’re---practically---dismissing Stecke from this?” I asked.

“From the events of the night of the 11th at Linwood---yes,” he answered.

“You think he’d nothing to do with the theft of the church treasures?”

“Nothing!” he replied with emphasis. “Nothing!”

“Or with the murder of Skate?”

“Nothing at all!”

“Didn’t even know of them until he read of them in the papers?”

“Come, come! How could he know of them if he’d nothing to do with them?”

“You think he’d no dealing or relations with Seward?”

“None!”

“Do you think he was honestly deceived about Seward?---that he really believed Seward was the man he’d seen in Linwood Church?”

“Yes! I believe all that.”

“And that it was a genuine surprise that he showed on hearing that it wasn’t Seward at all, but Mr. Francis Sewell?”

“I believe that, too.”

Chaney jumped to his feet and began to pace the room.

“Oh, damn it all, Jalvane, ask us to believe that black’s white!” he burst out. “Are you meaning to say that Stecke knew nothing about it?”

“I’m meaning to say that I don’t think Stecke knew anything whatever about either theft or murder until he read of ’em---yes!” declared Jalvane, with emphasis. “I do say so!”

“What about his possession of Treasury notes, brand-new ones, that without doubt were part of the five thousand such notes got by Seward at the Bank of England in exchange for the Bank of England notes he presented?” said Chaney. “Come, now!”

Jalvane laughed. Something in his laughter roused an idea in my mind.

“Stop a bit, Chaney!” I said, as my impetuous partner was about to hold forth again. “I haven’t done with Jalvane. Look here, Jalvane,” I went on, “tell me another thing. Do you seriously say that Stecke has nothing to do with all this?”

Jalvane shook his head. “I haven’t said that,” he replied cautiously.

“You’ve said that it’s your belief that until he read of them in the papers, Stecke knew nothing of either theft or murder. Do you think he knew something---got mixed up in something relative---after? Come, now!”

“Well---between ourselves---yes!” he replied. “Oh, yes!”

“That’s something, anyway,” I said. “Well---how?”

“No!” he said, firmly. “No! I’m not going to say---I’m not yet in a position to say. Perhaps I oughtn’t to have said as much, but----”

“All between friends, you know, Jalvane---old friends, you and me,” said Chaney.

“That’s right enough, my lad!” agreed Jalvane. “Still---enough said for the present. I don’t want to say more until----”

“You know more,” I broke in. “But you can say this---do you think we’re justified in believing that the new Treasury notes of which Stecke has been in possession came from what we’ll call Seward’s stock?”

“Yes,” he said, slowly. “Ye---es, I think you can say that.”

“Then how on earth did he get hold of them?” I exclaimed, beginning to share some of Chaney’s feelings. “How?”

“Got to do a bit more working out yet,” answered Jalvane. “Enough said---on that point.” He pulled out the snuff-box and refreshed himself. “Mazy bit of work, of course! But as regards the theft and murder, my lads, take it from me---one-man job. Seward---solus!

We both stared at him, in silence, while he toyed with his snuff. Suddenly he put the box away and spoke again.

“And I was going to tell you,” he said, “we’ve found out another thing. Where’s the statement that fellow---what’s his name?---Massie---sent on from Devonport? Here---you see what he says there? That the man who gave him a lift that night was driving an old car, one that looked as if it had had a lot of wear. Well, we’ve traced the car.”

“You have!” I exclaimed.

“We have---set to work on that long since; soon as we were put in possession of certain facts,” he answered. “I’ve had a lot of men at work on that business---you didn’t think of it, perhaps, but then, to be sure, it wasn’t exactly in your line. Well, we found the car in a South London garage---yesterday.”

“How do you know it’s the car?” asked Chaney.

“Well, I think you’ll see when I tell you,” replied Jalvane, with a dry chuckle. “First of all, the garage people’s description of the man who left it there on the morning of April 12 corresponds with Seward. Secondly, it’s an old, much worn car---which accords with what Massie says in this statement. And, thirdly, in a pocket in the lining we found a book, Latin, similar to those we saw at Seward’s lodgings. How’s that for evidence?”

“Good enough for me, Jalvane!” I said. “But---have you ascertained if it was his own car, or---anything else about it?”

“As to that,” he answered, “the garage people say that they knew him. For some time he’d been in the habit of leaving this car with them, at odd times. Sometimes he’d leave it for a month and never come near it---sometimes for a day or two. They attached no importance to the fact that until yesterday it had remained there since April 12. They knew him as Mr. Swann---all the name he ever gave. When he left it there on April 12 it was at a very early hour of the morning. Of course, they never saw him afterwards---they’d never even thought of him or connected him with our man. But there’s no doubt Mr. Swann was Seward, or that this old car is the one he used when he went to Linwood that night.”

“Well,” I said, “you seem to be finding out a lot of things, Jalvane---and no doubt you think we’re on the wrong tack?”

“I haven’t said so,” he replied. “I think we shall all land in the same port.”

“But we’ve been following up our ideas about Stecke----” I began.

“Continue to follow ’em!” he said.

“And we think that he and Mrs. Effingham----”

“Um!” he interrupted. “I dare say you can find out a good deal there. Perhaps not what you think, but----”

He broke off abruptly, shaking his head.

“What do you think?” I asked, pointedly.

“I?” he said. “Oh, I think that though she’s no beauty---good figure, though---Mrs. Effingham is a great many years younger than her husband, that life at Linwood Rectory is probably as dull as ditch-water, and that an occasional evening at the Bessington Club comes as a very welcome relief!”

“In the company of the Reverend Herbert Stecke, eh?”

“As you say---in the company of the Reverend Herbert Stecke,” he assented. “He---I suppose he’s a man, even if he is a parson. And---as I remarked before---Mrs. Effingham’s husband is---an old gentleman!”

He got up and buttoned his coat tight up to his throat.

“Queer business!” he said, smiling from one to the other of us. “Interesting! Go on with what you’re after, you two. What is it, now?”

“Our job at present, Jalvane, is to watch Stecke,” I said. “We’re doing it!”

He nodded two or three times, smiled, and in silence went away.

12  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 20: Progress---and Regress on: March 28, 2024, 10:32:19 am
I WAS not quite sure of Chaney’s exact meaning, nor of what scheme or plan he had in view, and before going further I wanted some explanation; I wanted, in fact, to know just what he thought of our present position. For Chaney, though always willing to share opinions with his partner, chose his own time for voicing them.

“I wish you’d tell me---before we go into that matter---exactly where you think we’ve got to, Chaney,” I said. “It’s time we took stock. Now, what is your considered opinion about things?”

“Oh, well, I’ll tell you,” he answered, readily for him. “I don’t think there’s the slightest doubt, now, that Stecke and Mrs. Effingham are mixed up in this business---I think Stecke was the second man in the car; the man that the garage-proprietor saw when he sold the new spanner to Seward; I think, too, that Mrs. Effingham’s share was to abstract the keys from her husband’s dressing-room, get the church keys from his study, and hand them out to Stecke and Seward, probably by that side-door which Canon Effingham found open next morning. What we have not cleared up and shall find difficulty in clearing up is the question: how did Stecke come into communication with Seward? And there’s still another: why did he come to us and identify Seward?”

“In the last matter,” I replied, “I feel certain that in coming to us with the story he told he was bluffing us. Seward was dead! Seward couldn’t contradict!”

“What was there to contradict?” asked Chaney. “Stecke, in my opinion, did believe that Seward was the man he’d met in Linwood Church---believed it firmly till the real man, the brother, turned up at the inquest in the City!”

“But---but how can that be?” I said, incredulously. “If Seward and Stecke met subsequently, as they seem to have done, and Stecke believed that he was the man he’d seen in Linwood Church, Seward would have corrected him; Seward, at any rate, knew he wasn’t the man Stecke had seen.”

Chaney smiled and then laughed.

“You’re a bit green yet, Camberwell,” he said. “Never mind---you’ll improve. Now, hasn’t it entered your head, Seward being what we know him to have been, that it was Seward’s game to let Stecke abide in his belief? We’ll suppose they met, here in London, accidentally. Stecke says: ‘Oh, we’ve met before---in Linwood Church. Sorry I couldn’t show you the treasures.’ What was there to stop Seward---a wrong ’un---from quietly sizing up the situation and letting Stecke talk until Seward knew all about it? That’s how it’s been---in my opinion. Somehow or other, Stecke and Seward got in touch with each other and persuaded Mrs. E. into handing over the keys. I say persuaded---but it may be that the correct word is forced. Forced her into it---through fear.”

“Of what?” I asked.

“Lord knows! Exposure to her husband of her mania for gambling, perhaps. Anyhow, that’s my opinion. Seward, without doubt, was the man who bought that spanner, and I think that Stecke answers to the description of the man who was with him in the car. Well, Seward’s dead---but Stecke’s alive, and we want him. But---not immediately. We want first to know more about Stecke and Mrs. E.”

“What’s the notion of sending somebody into his hotel?” I inquired.

“To keep an eye on him in case he suddenly departs for climes unknown,” replied Chaney. “Which is a likely contingency. We must have him under continual observation now. And, as I said before, Chip’s no good---he knows Chip.”

“Chippendale may know of somebody who would do,” I said, “Let’s have him in.”

Chippendale, summoned to our presence, listened, knowingly, to Chaney’s remarks and showed his absolute understanding of them.

“You’d be no good, you know,” concluded Chaney. “He’s seen you. So---do you know of anybody, my lad? Somebody that could play the part of temporary visitor to a place like that?”

Chippendale nodded---there was decision in the nod.

“Yes, sir---the very person,” he answered promptly. “My fiancée.”

“Your---what?” exclaimed Chaney, taken aback.

“Young lady---sweetheart---whatever you like to call it, sir,” said Chippendale.

“Didn’t know you had one---at your age, too!” muttered Chaney. “But---any good?”

“I reckon!” declared Chippendale. “Wouldn’t suit me if she wasn’t, Mr. Chaney.”

“Smart girl, eh? Tell about her,” commanded Chaney.

“Twenty-one. Good-looking. Clever. Knows her way about. Eyes on all sides of her head,” replied Chippendale. “Just the sort you want. Cool as a cucumber---when it’s necessary.”

“Name and occupation?” asked Chaney.

“Name, Fanny Pratt,” answered Chippendale. “As to occupation, has earned her own living ever since she was sixteen---five years’ business experience. Cashier in the City until recently---left that to look after her mother, who’s been ill. Mother just getting round again, and Fanny’s going back to her job. But she could spare two or three weeks.”

“We’d better have a look at her,” said Chaney. “Can you get her here, my lad?”

“At once!” replied Chippendale, and went out to the telephone in his room. Chaney turned to me.

“That’ll do very well---if she’s all he makes out,” he said. “A smart young woman who can keep her eyes and ears open is just the thing we want for a job of this kind. Of course Chip may have exaggerated the girl’s powers---we’ll see.”

We saw---within the hour. Precisely fifty minutes after he had summoned her by telephone, Miss Fanny Pratt presented herself, Chippendale proudly hovering in the background, in my room. Chippendale had been modest about her appearance---she was not merely good-looking, but pretty. One glance at her showed that she was intelligent, alert, shrewd; all there, as Chaney put it. Also she was well dressed and knew how to wear her clothes.

Chaney did the necessary talking, after catechizing Miss Pratt as to her abilities and powers. Furnished with proper funds---and no stint in them---Miss Pratt was to take a room---one of the best---at the Artemis Hotel in Bayswater. Settled in there, she was to keep an eye on a gentleman resident, Mr. Hildebrand Stocker. Without obtruding herself on him, or on anyone else’s notice, she was to note his comings and goings as far as ever she could, to observe his visitors, guests, callers, to make herself acquainted with his doings as much as possible. And one thing above all---if she saw anything which led her to believe that Mr. Stocker was about to shift his quarters or to set out on a journey, she was to acquaint us on the instant. In short, her job was to watch, and to watch punctiliously.

“Get it all?” inquired Chaney in conclusion. “All clear?”

“I get it!” replied Miss Pratt. “Clear as a Frosty night! Anything else?”

“All right about---clothes and that sort of thing?” asked Chaney, glancing at Miss Pratt’s smart costume.

“Quite! Well equipped, thank you,” said Miss Pratt.

“When can you start?” inquired Chaney.

“Just now,” responded Miss Pratt. “I shall go along there at once, make inquiry, book the room, pay ’em a week in advance, and go in with my things this afternoon.”

“Good!” said Chaney. “Well, now, you’ll want an accurate description of the man----”

“Oh, no, I shan’t!” interrupted Miss Pratt. “I shall know him. Besides, I’ve seen him.”

“You’ve seen him?” asked Chaney. “Where?”

“Oh, of course I know who it is you’re putting me on to,” answered Miss Pratt. “It’s that parson fellow---Stecke. I saw him at the inquest in the City---I got two or three hours off to go to that. And I’ve read all the newspapers, Mr. Chaney, and Pip---that’s what I call him---” she broke off, pointing to Chippendale---“Pip and I have discussed this case, and I know all about it. You leave Mr. Stocker, alias Stecke or Stecke, alias Stocker, to me, Mr. Chaney---I’ll watch him! But now you listen to me a bit---there are two things on which I must insist, if you want me to do any good.”

“Go ahead!” said Chaney, now full of admiration. “Name ’em!”

“Well, the first is, Pip here must arrange to meet me somewhere every evening to get my report, even if it’s only to hear that there’s nothing whatever to report,” continued Miss Pratt. “And the second---much, much more important---is that while I am in residence at the Artemis Hotel, you must have somebody in constant attendance here day and night, so as to be ready if I phone a message. That I must absolutely insist on, because I might want you in a great hurry.”

“That’s easily settled, Miss Pratt,” I said. “There is always somebody here all day long, and as I live here---in rooms over these offices---I get any night call. Make yourself easy on that point---the other you can arrange with Chippendale.”

“Very good,” replied Miss Pratt. “Then make yourselves easy. From the moment I settle in at the Artemis, Mr. Stecke-Stocker is under my very nose---as long as he’s there. And if he hops it---well, I shall hop after him!”

“Good---good!” exclaimed Chaney. “Excellent! Camberwell, write her an open cheque for expenses.”

Miss Pratt presently received her cheque, and Chippendale went off with her to transform it into cash. Two hours later she phoned us to say that she had fixed things at the Artemis Hotel and was moving in there at once. Chaney rubbed his hands over this piece of engineering; he appeared to consider that Stecke already had his neck in a noose, the ends of which we could pull at any time.

But next day Chaney got a smack in the face---a nasty smack, as he himself fittingly described it. Jalvane turned up at our office, and from an inner pocket drew forth a formal-looking document.

“I’ve got a bit of news for you,” he said. “This thing has been sent on to me by the Superintendent of Police at Havering St. Michael. Interesting stuff, very---I thought I’d bring it along to you.”

“What is it?” asked Chaney. “Statement?”

“Well, that’s just what it is,” replied Jalvane. “A statement made by a man at Devonport, who’s been reading all about this Linwood case in the papers. What does he know about it? You’ll see when you read this. He thinks he knows something, anyhow---in fact, he’s so certain of it that he went to the police at Devonport and made this statement to them---they took it down and he signed it. Read it---both of you.”

I took the document which he handed to me---a double sheet of foolscap---and spread it out on my desk; Chaney and I bent over it and read it together:

This is a statement, voluntarily made by me, Walter James Massie, at present residing at 31, Childhampton Place, Devonport, in the presence of John Alistair Colquhoun, Superintendent of Police at Devonport, and of Martin Sellers, an Inspector of Police at the same place.

I am by trade a fitter and up to the end of March last was employed in the workshops of Jones, Charlesworth & Co., at Wolverhampton. Owing to bad trade several of us were thrown out of work there, and I went to London in search of a fresh job at a place I had heard of down East Ham way. As I failed to get anything, I determined to try Portsmouth. I had enough money to keep me going for a few weeks. As it was fine weather and I am fond of walking, I decided to go to Portsmouth on foot, stopping at various places on the way. I left London one morning in April---as near as I can remember, it would be about the 11th of that month---with the intention of walking as far as either Havering St. Michael or Horsham the first day---one was about twenty-five miles, and the other some ten miles farther, according to a map I had. However, I did not get on as fast as I had meant to do, and about seven o’clock in the evening I was still some miles short of the first place I have just mentioned. I turned in to a roadside inn, near a village, the name of which I don’t know, to get some refreshment before continuing to Havering, where I now meant to sleep. While I was in the bar-parlour, a man drove up in a small car, left it at the door, and came in. He was a medium-sized man, a bit over middle age, I should say, fresh-complexioned, well dressed, what you’d call a gentleman. He asked for a whisky and soda. While he was drinking it, we got talking. I happened to mention that I was going to Havering and had meant to get as far as Horsham. He said: “I can give you a good lift---I’ve got a case between Havering and Horsham; you can get down at which you like, Havering or where I’m going.” I thanked him for his offer; we each had another drink, and then went out to his car. From what he’d mentioned about a case, I took him for a doctor; he looked that sort; I noticed too that he’d a bag, or case, in the car, of the sort that doctors carry. He didn’t say he was a doctor: I just thought he was. We set off along the main road; I sat by him; we talked a bit about the scenery. Some little distance along---I can’t say where exactly, for that district was all strange to me---something went wrong with the car. (I might have mentioned before that the car was an old one, looking as if it had seen plenty of wear.) He pulled up at the roadside and began to examine it---he seemed to know all about cars. I don’t, though; my work’s been in other directions. Then he opened a tool-box, and after pottering about in it a bit, he said he hadn’t got a spanner. We’d just passed a roadside garage; he said he’d go back and get a spanner. I offered to go, but he said no, I shouldn’t know what he wanted. He went back and soon came again, with a brand-new spanner. He did something to the car’s machinery with this and put the spanner in his pocket. I am confident that he did not put it in the box; he put it in the right-hand pocket of the leather coat he was wearing. Then the car was all right, and we went on till we came to a town which he said was Havering St. Michael. He asked me if I’d get out there or would I go on as far as he was going, a few miles farther. I asked how far it would be from where he was going to Horsham, and he said not many miles, so I said I’d go on with him. We went on a few miles until we came to a village where there is a big church with a high square tower. We passed right through this village. At the far end he pulled up at the roadside near a lane that turned into woods on the right hand. He said he’d got to go up that lane, so I got out, thanked him, and bade him good-night. It was then nine o’clock---perhaps a bit more. I walked on south, but before losing sight of him, saw him turn the car up the lane. Having read the newspaper accounts, I feel sure that this man was the one about whom I have read and who was afterwards killed in London.

(Signed) Walter J. Massie

I stood up from the desk and looked at Chaney. Jalvane, too, was looking at him. But Chaney still read---he was re-reading. When at last he, too, straightened himself and looked at us, he seemed puzzled and discomfited.

“If that’s all right,” he muttered, “and it seems to be so, it knocks my theory into a cocked hat! Stecke wasn’t the man who accompanied Seward to Linwood!”

13  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 19: Who Stole the Cards? on: March 28, 2024, 10:05:34 am
I TOLD Chippendale to bring in these unexpected visitors and turned to Chaney. Chaney made a grimace, but it was neither of surprise nor wonder; what it really did express, I think, was a patient acceptance of the fact that one never knows what is going to happen next in this world.

“What now?” he muttered. “Watch ’em both, carefully, Camberwell. They’re up to something or other!”

The two came in; Miss Bolton first. She was very smartly dressed; her manner was alert, vivacious, confident. Mr. Gibbs followed; he looked a little sheepish; it needed very little observation on my part to see that Miss Bolton was the senior partner in this amalgamation.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” said Miss Bolton. “Let me introduce my fiancé---Mr. Hugh Gibbs. But ah, I’m forgetting! I believe you’ve met Mr. Gibbs before.”

“For a few moments,” I said, Chaney offering no remark. “Literally a few moments. We called on Mr. Gibbs, at Sir Bartle Shardale’s suggestion, to ask if he knew where you were. He didn’t.”

“Oh, well, yes, of course!” said Miss Bolton, sinking into the easy chair which Chaney had drawn forward. “Oh, yes, I remember hearing of it, now that you mention it. Well, of course, you’re wondering what brings us here, aren’t you?”

“I’m not!” grunted Chaney. “Not at all!”

Miss Bolton turned and looked at him wonderingly.

“No?” she said. “What, then?”

“The hope of getting or sharing in that five thousand pounds reward,” replied Chaney, promptly. “That’s about it, I think!”

Miss Bolton’s pretty face grew a little pink, but she laughed bravely.

“Well, that’s very clever of you,” she began, “very clever----”

“Not a bit!” said Chaney. “Obvious!---considering the circumstances. But you were going to say----”

“I was going to say,” continued Miss Bolton, “that you’re quite right. We are after that five thousand pounds reward, or as much of it as we can get---for value given. We should be very pleased indeed, Mr. Gibbs and I, to receive the whole lot, but we’ve no objection to a good lump of it. You see, Mr. Chaney, we want to marry, and a few thousand pounds would come in handy for taking and furnishing a house. And if we do know something---eh?”

“Do you know anything?” demanded Chaney.

“More than you think, perhaps,” retorted Miss Bolton. “But---to be perfectly frank with you---we have come to a point where we need help; we have carried our bit of detective work as far as we can. The time has come when we’ve got to tell what we know, and we’ve been debating whether to approach you or to go to Scotland Yard. Finally---this morning---we decided to come to you. And here we are!”

“Depends on what you know---or think you know,” said Chaney. “It may be----”

I thought it high time for me to intervene; Chaney, for some reason or other, was not being sufficiently sympathetic.

“I am quite sure that Miss Bolton would not even think she knew something unless she did know something,” I said, “and something of real importance. And,” I added, turning to her, “I am equally sure that I need not assure Miss Bolton and Mr. Gibbs that whatever they care to tell us----”

“Oh!” interrupted Chaney, taking my cue, “that, of course, goes without saying. Everything within these walls is strictly private, confidential, and all the rest of it.” He twisted round in his chair and gave Miss Bolton a keen look. “But we like plain dealing, so---where have you been all this time?” he asked.

“Lying low---trying to find out something, Mr. Chaney!” she answered.

“Have you found what you wanted?” he demanded.

“I tell you, we’ve got to a stage at which it’s necessary to seek help. That’s why we’re here---confiding in you and Mr. Camberwell rather than in the police.”

“You suspect somebody? Let’s be clear. You think you know who stole those things from Linwood Church and---incidentally---murdered Skate? Is that it?”

“Partly,” admitted Miss Bolton. “What we do think is this---we think we have grounds---sure grounds!---of suspicion against two people as having had some share---we don’t know and can’t say precisely what---in the theft of the church treasures. The murder is---outside.”

“Who is it---who are the persons you suspect?” asked Chaney.

Miss Bolton paused a moment. Then she looked from Chaney to me, and from me back to Chaney.

“Well,” she said slowly, “Mr. Stecke and Mrs. Effingham.”

She looked from one to the other of us again, questioningly; I think she wanted to see if her reply surprised us. But I am sure she saw no surprise on either face.

“Of course,” she went on, “we have grounds---strong grounds. They seem so to us, at any rate.”

“Yes?” said Chaney. “Well---let’s have them.”

Miss Bolton hesitated a moment. But she was only marshalling her forces.

“I was just wondering where to begin,” she said. “I think I’ll begin at the morning of the day on which the inquest was held at Linwood---the inquest on the poacher, Skate. That morning---you’ll remember that the inquest was held in the afternoon?---that morning Mr. Stecke came to the Rectory at a fairly early hour---ten o’clock. He saw Canon Effingham for a few moments only; Canon Effingham and I were very busy with proofs and things that morning. Then he was handed over to Mrs. Effingham, and he was with her, in the drawing-room or in the garden, until lunch-time; as soon as lunch was over, it was time to go across to the schoolroom, to the inquest. Now I might tell you here that while he was taking the duty at Linwood during Canon Effingham’s illness last winter, Mr. Stecke and Mrs. Effingham became very close friends---inseparables. When Mr. Stecke first came there, he condescended to pay his addresses to me---as I was impulsive enough to remark at the inquest---but as I literally loathed the very sight of him and let him see it, he transferred his attention to Mrs. Effingham. And I happen to know that after he left the Rectory, he and Mrs. Effingham used to meet, and not only to meet, but to attend a certain bridge club here in London together.”

“How do you know that?” I asked.

Miss Bolton turned to Mr. Gibbs, who up to then had preserved a strict silence.

“Hugh can prove that,” she said. “Hugh sometimes stays at Linwood Hall; he knows Mrs. Effingham and Mr. Stecke quite well by sight. And Hugh has sometimes gone to a certain bridge club called the Bessington and seen these two there. Haven’t you, Hugh?”

Mr. Gibbs, releasing his lips from the top of his walking-cane, nodded.

“Seen ’em there three or four times,” he assented. “Together.”

“Before or after the theft and murder affair?” asked Chaney.

“Before. Never been there myself lately.”

“Do they know you?” inquired Chaney.

“Can’t say. Never went to church at Linwood,” replied Mr. Gibbs. “Saw Mrs. Effingham sometimes in the village, but I don’t know if she knew me---don’t think she did. Only saw the parson chap, Stecke, once at Linwood, last winter. But he’s good to remember---spotted him at once at the Bessington when he came in with her.”

“Not in clerical clothes, I suppose?” suggested Chaney.

“No---mufti. Evening dress.”

“What were they doing at the Bessington Club?” I asked.

Mr. Gibbs turned his somewhat inexpressive countenance on me. A gleam of---something---came into his eyes.

“Oh, well, it’s called a bridge club, you know,” he answered. “But you can play two or three other little things there, you know.”

“Gambling-club, really?” I suggested.

“That’s about it,” assented Mr. Gibbs. “Pretty high play, too, sometimes.”

I turned to Miss Bolton.

“Yes?” I said. “Go on, please.”

“Well, I go on to the inquest now,” she continued. “You may remember that after making my protest against Mr. Stecke’s evidence, as far as it concerned me, I hurriedly left the village schoolroom. Now, do you know why?”

“Not the faintest idea,” replied Chaney. “Felt angry, I suppose.”

“There you’re wrong---partly, anyway,” said Miss Bolton. “I was angry, certainly; but when I left, I was cool enough, for I’d got a sudden notion. I’d read the newspapers carefully that morning and had particularly studied what was said about the so-called Dean of Norchester calling on Mr. Atherton at the Savoy Hotel. I had noticed that this impostor sent in to Mr. Atherton what Mr. Atherton described as a beautifully engraved card bearing the proper inscription. Now, as I sat there at the inquest, I remembered that the real Dean of Norchester whenever he was in London always ran down to Linwood to call on his old friend Canon Effingham, and that on the card-tray in the hall of the Rectory there were two or three of his cards, left there during the preceding winter. And the real reason why I hastily left the village schoolroom and the inquest was to go across to the Rectory to see if the Dean of Norchester’s cards were still there!”

“Good!” muttered Chaney. “Good---very good! And---were they?”

“No!” replied Miss Bolton. “Not one of them! They’d---disappeared! Now, Mr. Chaney and Mr. Camberwell, there’s not a doubt that the man Seward got possession of those cards. Who gave them to him?

“Good---good!” chuckled Chaney. Miss Bolton, it was evident, was going up in his estimation by leaps and bounds. “Go on! What else?”

“Nothing more of that, but now something of another thing,” said Miss Bolton. “As soon as ever I’d made this discovery, I resolved to leave Linwood Rectory there and then. I had a hazy idea of the devilry that was afoot, and I felt that I might be incriminated, and I made up my mind to get away; also, I felt certain that both Mr. Stecke and Mrs. Effingham were concerned in, at any rate, the theft of the church treasures. I ran straight up to my room, made some hasty preparations, took what money I had from the drawer in which I kept it, and left the house without saying anything to anyone. And now comes in the next important thing. You will remember that in the newspapers that very morning there was reference to and stress laid on the fact that Seward after getting Mr. Atherton’s cheque cashed into Bank of England notes went straight across to the Bank of England and changed these notes into Treasury notes of one pound each? Very well---on my way to the station, after leaving the Rectory, I turned into the post office at Linwood to send a telegram to Mr. Gibbs asking him to meet me in town. I had nothing less than a five-pound note in my purse and had to offer that in payment for the telegram to the postmistress, Mrs. Summers. Now, Mr. Chaney and Mr. Camberwell, you listen and pay attention!---Mrs. Summers gave me in change eighteen shillings and sixpence in silver, and four absolutely brand-new one-pound Treasury notes! As far as I remember, I’d never seen a quite new Treasury note before---such a spick and span one, anyway. And I recollect that I said as much to Mrs. Summers. ‘No, miss,’ she replied, ‘and I don’t know that I ever have; they’ve generally been pretty well thumbed and fingered by the time I set eyes on them. But I’ve a stock of ’em this afternoon,’ she continued, ‘I got them from Mr. Stecke, the curate. He came in here just before dinner and asked me if I’d got a couple of five-pound notes I could let him have, and he gave me these new one-pound notes in exchange.’ There. Mr. Chaney!---What do you think of that?”

“Good---good!” muttered Chaney, smiling. “If ever you want a job, come to me! What did you do next?”

“Went up to town, met Mr. Gibbs, and told him all about it,” replied Miss Bolton. “We decided to put our heads together and see what we could do---I mean, what we could find out. I’m bound to admit,” she continued, “that we haven’t found out as much as we hoped to find out; still we’ve found out a few things.”

“Such as---what?” inquired Chaney.

“Well,” replied Miss Bolton, “I’ll tick them off. First, since the Linwood affair Stecke appears to have become possessed of funds. Second, he has discarded his clerical clothes and goes about as a layman. Third, he has left his old lodgings at Laburnam Villas, Newington, and now lives at a private residential hotel, the Artemis, in Bayswater. Fourth, he and Mrs. Effingham still frequent the Bessington Club. And fifth, and perhaps not unimportant, he’s changed his name.”

“How do you know that, Miss Bolton?” I asked.

She gave me a knowing look.

“I’ve been trying a bit of detective work, Mr. Camberwell,” she replied, archly. “And one day, when I’d carefully watched Stecke off the premises and safely away in a taxi, I walked into the Artemis Hotel, told them that I was searching for an American friend of mine who was staying or ought to be staying somewhere in Bayswater, and asked if I might look at their register. They fell to it readily and I searched the register. There is no Reverend Herbert Stecke there, nor Mr. Herbert Stecke, but, you see, I know Stecke’s peculiar handwriting, and there it is. He is now Mr. Hildebrand Stocker.”

I glanced at Chaney, who, during Miss Bolton’s last two or three sentences, had sat smiling and silent, twiddling his thumbs---a trick of his when he was pleased.

“Well?” I said. “What do you think, Chaney?”

“That we’re very much obliged to Miss Bolton for confiding in us,” he said, becoming unusually polite. “Most useful, I’m sure. Every little helps, in these cases.”

“But---what will be done?” asked Miss Bolton. “And what about our chance of the reward?”

“As to the reward, ma’am,” replied Chaney, “you may take it from me that whoever assists in solving the mystery will be rewarded---in due time. The precise amount offered by our enterprising---and inquisitive---American Crœsus may have to be shared---but all who have a just claim will be considered. Now as to what you have told us, I think Mr. Camberwell may have an observation or two to make. You see, ma’am”---Chaney, when he became bland and professional, styled all women “ma’am,” whether they were old or young---“you see, some of the information you have given us was not new---eh, Camberwell?”

“No,” I asserted. “Some of it, Miss Bolton, we certainly knew. But some of it we didn’t know, and your information has, of course, its value. I think you can rely on getting the furniture!”

With this remark---intended to be a pretty compliment---I got rid of Miss Bolton and Mr. Gibbs and turned to business with Chaney.

“Well---what of that?” I asked. “Anything?”

“Good deal on one point, Camberwell,” he replied. “That young woman has brains! She’s cleared up one matter that’s puzzled me a lot---the question of those visiting-cards. There’s no doubt now that the cards with which Seward was armed were taken from the tray at the Rectory. Now, then, how did Seward get them? Did Stecke---who, I feel certain, has tricked us no end about Seward---supply them to him? Or did Mrs. E., who’s another tricky person, hand them over to Stecke? We’ve a lot to find out about Mrs. E. and Stecke, Camberwell. And there’s one thing that must not be overlooked; we must see to it at once. Stecke, this young woman has discovered, is now living at that hotel under the name of Stocker. Now, it’s absolutely necessary for us to keep a constant watch on him. We can’t set Chip on him---he knows Chip. But this is certain---we’ve got to shove somebody into that hotel who knows him and whom he doesn’t know!”

14  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 18: The Little Jew Tailor on: March 28, 2024, 08:54:29 am
CHIPPENDALE’S face, thrust suddenly into my room one morning, gave notice of something important if not unusual.

“There’s a chap outside who wants to see the principals,” he said in a stage whisper. “Won’t have anything to do with me. I tried to pump him; told him you were only seen by appointment---no good!”

“What’s he like?” I inquired.

“Jew!” replied Chippendale. “East End type. Of course I know what he’s after! That five thousand pounds reward.”

“Did he say so?” I asked.

“Not he!---knows better. But I’ll lay anything it’s that. Will you see him?”

Chaney was out and not likely to be in for two or three hours. Still, the man outside might have some valuable information which ought to be in our possession at once.

“Bring him in, Chippendale,” I said. “I’ll soon find out what he wants.”

Chippendale vanished; a moment later he flung the door open again and ushered in a little man who, despite the fact that this was an unusually warm spring day, was buttoned up to the chin in a long black overcoat very shiny at the shoulders and elbows and becoming green with age. Either his boots were too big for him, or the feet within them were of a size incommensurate with his height; his trousers hung in festoons about his ankles; what could be seen of his linen was of a decidedly dingy hue. He presented a very pale, sickly face, a mass of dead-black, slightly curling hair, very full, red lips, and a large nose; I half expected to see him lay his dirty forefinger alongside it as he came into the room, as a hint to me that he desired secrecy. Instead of that, however, he pulled himself up and made me quite a courtly bow.

“Mr. Camberwell?” he said inquiringly, pronouncing the first word with a decided lisp, which I am not going to attempt to represent in writing. “Partner with Mr. Chaney?”

“Exactly!” I answered. “Who----”

Before I could get the next word out, he produced from somewhere a card and handed it over with another polite bow.

“My card, sir,” he said. “Please you to read it.”

I read it.

Solomon Cohen,
Ladies’ & Gentlemen’s Tailor & Outfitter,
528, Newington Causeway, S. E.
Parties’ Own Materials Made Up.

I put the card down on my desk and pointed my visitor to a seat. Already I had an idea of what was coming. Stecke, before migrating to the Artemis Hotel in Bayswater, had lived in Newington.

“Yes, Mr. Cohen?” I said, reseating myself at my desk, “What can I do for you?”

He put his hat---a disreputable old billycock---on the floor at the side of his chair and, plunging his hand into some recess of his coat, pulled out what seemed to be a bundle of newspaper cuttings. He selected one and held it out to me.

“Mr. Camberwell,” he said in a soft, ingratiating voice, “I make bold to ask, sir, if the offer made here is a genuine one?”

I glanced at the bit of newspaper. As I had expected, it referred to Mr. Atherton’s offer of five thousand pounds.

“Quite genuine,” I replied. “Why---can you give any information?”

He made no reply to that question. Instead, he repossessed himself of the scrap of newspaper, returned it to the bundle, and put the bundle back in his pocket.

“I take your word for it, Mr. Camberwell,” he said quietly. “I understand that whoever can give information which would lead---how should it be put, sir?”

“To the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for the murder of Richard Skate at Linwood, and for the theft of certain valuable articles from Linwood Church, will receive the reward mentioned, or such part of it as they are entitled to,” I answered. “That’s about it.”

“Part of it?” he said. “I---what does that mean, Mr. Camberwell?”

“It means this. Suppose you give some information. Suppose somebody else gives some equally valuable information. Well, you’d both expect to be rewarded; but you wouldn’t expect five thousand pounds each, would you?”

“I see,” he replied softly. “I may take it, however, that anybody who gives really practical information----”

“Will be well rewarded, Mr. Cohen,” I interrupted. “You can take my personal assurance for that. Now---do you know anything?”

I already felt sure that my visitor did know something; I felt sure, too, that, in spite of his untidy and almost poverty-stricken appearance, Mr. Solomon Cohen was an intelligent and possibly a clever man; he spoke like an educated one, and his manner, though quiet, was confident and assured.

“Yes, Mr. Camberwell,” he answered, after a pause. “I do know something, and I will tell you what it is, feeling confident that if it is of any use to you in your investigations, you will see that I am suitably rewarded.”

“You may depend on me, Mr. Cohen,” I answered him.

“Well, sir, it is just this,” he continued. “I am, as you see, a tailor and outfitter, in Newington. I have a fairly good business. And one of my customers during the last two years has been the Reverend Herbert Stecke, whose name has appeared in the newspaper accounts in connexion with these affairs at Linwood. I have at one time or another made a good deal of clothing for Mr. Stecke, clerical clothes and layman’s clothes---he wanted the latter for holiday purposes---and at the end of last year he was owing me what---for me, Mr. Camberwell---was really a lot of money----”

“How much?” I asked.

“Well, it was nearly a hundred pounds,” he replied. “The fact was, he had never paid me anything. He had always put me off by telling me that he was going to have a very good post---a living, he called it---presented to him; one that would bring him in several hundreds of pounds a year. I believed him---I knew, of course, that he was a clergyman of the Church of England. But I was put off and put off, and after the end of the year I began to press him for the money---I was obliged to do so, Mr. Camberwell. However, I could not get anything out of him---no, not a penny. And some weeks since---at the beginning of April it was---I told him that I should have to put him in the court. He still persisted that he had no money, but should have some soon. I didn’t believe him---he’d said that so often. But all of a sudden, sir, he came to my shop and paid my account, every penny of it! I was never so surprised in my life. Yes---he came and paid the full amount, all at once. But, sir, I began to think, soon after, and I have been thinking ever since, thinking so much that now I must say to somebody, to you, what I think about! Sir, Mr. Stecke, who had previously said that he hadn’t one penny to rub against another, paid that money, nearly one hundred pounds, to me two days after the affair at Linwood. And, sir, he paid it---ninety odd pounds---in brand-new Treasury notes!”

For the moment I failed to catch his meaning. He saw that, and once more he pulled out his bundle of newspaper cuttings and selected one.

“You may remember, sir,” he went on, “that when the American gentleman, Mr. Atherton, paid for the two old books which he bought from the man who represented himself as being the Dean of Norchester, he gave that man---afterwards identified as one Sewell, alias Seward---an open cheque which the man immediately cashed, receiving Bank of England notes, and that he at once exchanged those for Treasury notes. And you’ll also remember, perhaps, that when the so-called Dean was accidentally killed in the City next day---I think you were present, Mr. Camberwell?---twenty-five hundred pounds’ worth of brand-new Treasury notes were found in his possession---that is, in his bag or suit-case or attaché case?”

“Yes!” I said. “That’s so. And----”

“Well, sir,” he continued, “do you think there’s any connexion between those two facts?---one that Seward had this big stock of brand-new Treasury notes, and that Mr. Stecke just about the same time---I believe the same day---paid me in similar notes? Because---I do!”

I made no answer to this question. Instead I asked a question of him.

“Have you ever seen Mr. Stecke since?”

“No, sir. But I know something about him. This---he no longer lives where he did. He used to lodge at Laburnam Villas, Newington, which is not far from where I live. But he has left.”

“Do you know where he has gone?”

“No, sir; I have no idea.”

“Did you happen to keep any---I mean, have you any---of those notes he gave you---the brand-new notes?”

“I have not, sir. I had a heavy payment to make for cloth just at that time, and I paid them away at once---all of them. You see, sir, I hadn’t read the newspapers then as carefully as I have since.”

I remained silent a minute or two, thinking. Then a notion occurred to me.

“If you’ve read the papers so carefully, Mr. Cohen,” I said, “you’ll have noticed that the man who called himself Dean of Norchester---Sewell, or Seward, as we now know him to be---wore the correct attire of a dean. I suppose you didn’t have anything to do with its supply---through Stecke?”

“No, sir---I never made but one clerical suit for Mr. Stecke,” he answered. “And that was just an ordinary black serge---lounge-jacket style.”

“Can you give me any idea as to where or how Seward could get those things?” I asked. “You know how a dean dresses?”

“I do, sir---from pictures. No---I’ve no idea where he could get a costume of that sort. Peculiar costume, sir---there’s the apron and the gaiters and so on. He might get them second-hand. But I doubt that. There are certain clerical costumes, sir, which are of no use to any but those entitled to wear them---bishops, archdeacons, deans. I know, because I have worked for a clerical tailor in my time. Is the information I have given of any value, sir?”

“Considerable value, and very interesting, Mr. Cohen,” I replied. “I shall discuss it with my partner as soon as he returns.”

“You think I stand some chance of sharing in the reward, sir?” he inquired, a little anxiously. “I am a poor man, Mr. Camberwell.”

“A very good chance,” I said. “Of course, you must remember that it may be a mere coincidence that Stecke paid your account with a lot of brand-new Treasury notes----”

“Pardon me for interrupting you, sir, but there’s another perhaps significant fact that I omitted to mention,” he said. “When I counted the notes Mr. Stecke gave me, I noticed that they ran consecutively.”

“Ah!” I exclaimed. “That is certainly significant! Well---you’ve kept this to yourself so far---all of it?”

“I have not even mentioned it to my wife, sir,” he replied.

“Keep it to yourself a bit longer, Mr. Cohen---in fact, until I send for you,” I said. “I’ll see to your interests.”

He thanked me profusely and went away, and before very long Chaney came in and I told him all that Cohen had told me. Chaney grew more and more attentive and thoughtful as the story progressed.

“This is a damn queer business, Camberwell!” he said at last. “Let’s suppose for the moment that Stecke is mixed up in this affair and that he was one of the principals----”

“And probably the second man in the car, seen by the chap who sold Seward the spanner,” I suggested; “which is likely---if we adopt your supposition.”

“Well, we’ll adopt yours, too, then,” he continued. “Stecke is a principal. He knows from having lived the better part of a month at Linwood all about the church treasures and their value. He enters into a plot with Seward---never mind just now how they became acquainted---for securing them. They go down to Linwood---never mind, too, how they got the keys---and annex books and vessels. Skate---who would recognize Stecke---interrupted them. They settled Skate and put his dead body in the Squire’s pew. They got safely away then. Seward sold the books to Mr. Atherton. Then Seward got accidentally run over and killed. Previously he’d shared the Atherton money with Stecke. And now comes the question to which I want an answer: Why did Stecke come forward to identify Seward as a man he’d once seen in Linwood Church? Eh?”

“If you’re asking me for an answer, Chaney,” I said, “all I’ve got to say is, I haven’t got one! Why, indeed?”

“What was his object?” continued Chaney. “Stecke was clean out of it. We’d never heard of Stecke! Nobody’d ever heard of Stecke---in connexion with this case, anyhow. Why did he suddenly walk on the stage and have the limelight turned full on him? Why, if the first supposition is right, and he’d got his share, should he emerge from his obscurity and draw attention to himself---even if it was only as a witness? He was safe as houses! His partner was dead and so couldn’t speak, and nobody else knew----”

“Ah!” I exclaimed. “But how do you know that somebody else didn’t know? How do you know that there isn’t somebody who does know! For I think there may be!”

“Who, then?” he asked.

“Perhaps---Mrs. Effingham!”

“Of the theft---and the murder?”

“Possibly. We know from what Chippendale told us that Mrs. Effingham and Stecke are---shall we say friends?---and visit a bridge club together. We know---at least I remember---that on the day of the inquest on Skate at Linwood Mrs. Effingham and Stecke were in close conversation in the Rectory grounds. I think Mrs. Effingham knows a good deal that she’s never let out.”

“Very likely---and we’ll have to get it out of her,” assented Chaney. “But, still, that doesn’t answer my question: Why did Stecke come forward? What object had he in coming forward? What good did it do him to come forward? He’d nothing whatever to do---I’m still supposing him to have been a partner in the affair of the theft---but kept still, for Seward was silenced. No!---I can’t make out, can’t think of any reason why Stecke, of his own free will, barged in to tell us what he did! Licks me altogether.”

“Well, you can be certain of one thing, Chaney,” I said. “He’d an object!”

“Yes, but what object?” he demanded. “What?”

“To pull the wool over our eyes,” I answered. “Just that! To trick us!”

“Yes, yes!” he said impatiently, “I’ll grant that---but that isn’t telling me anything. I still ask---why?”

“Well, there is this to be thought of,” I remarked, after thinking a bit: “perhaps Stecke was after the first reward. Perhaps he thought we should be satisfied, through his story, that the dead man, Seward, was the one and only originator and accomplisher of the dual crime, that no more inquiries would be made, and that the reward would be paid over to him. How’s that strike you?”

“Um!---may be something in it,” he answered. “It’s possible. But I still think----”

At that moment Chippendale opened my door and looked in. His face was absolutely impassive, but I caught a curious gleam in his eye as he opened his lips.

“Miss Pamela Bolton!” he announced. “And Mr. Hugh Gibbs!”

15  Our Library / J. S. Fletcher - Murder in the Squire's Pew (1932) / 17: The Club in Comma Street on: March 28, 2024, 08:26:24 am
I KNEW Chaney well enough by that time, his reticence meant that he wanted to think things over before he spoke about them; I knew, too, that he would speak about them when his mind was made up. And next morning he spoke.

“Camberwell!” he said when we were alone after dismissing Chippendale with a handful of letters to answer. “Do you remember any particular thing that our queer visitor told us yesterday?”

“I remember all she told us,” I replied.

“Ay, but did anything strike you particularly?” he asked. “Think!”

“No!” I said, after reflection. “Can’t say that anything did. I was struck by the general trend of it, though. But you refer to some particular thing, eh?”

“I do!” he replied confidently. “Do you remember that she told us that Mrs. Effingham on her return home after these visits to London was sometimes in very good spirits and sometimes in a bad temper?”

“I do,” I answered.

“What do you make of that?” he asked.

But I shook my head. “Do you make anything of it?” I inquired.

“Yes!” he said. “I make this of it. She’s been gambling!”

This was a bit beyond me, and I looked my surprise. He laughed.

“In our trade---or profession, if you like to give it a high-sounding name,” he continued, “it’s a very useful thing to be able to put two and two together in the firm belief that they’ll make four. Let’s put two and two together in this case. Once a week Mrs. Effingham comes to town. Nothing in that, you know---lots of ladies living within a thirty-mile radius of London pay a weekly visit to town. Shopping. Visits to friends. Sightseeing. All that sort of thing. But---it’s usually in the day-time. When it isn’t in the day-time, it’s an evening visit to the theatre or to a concert. But theatre-going and concert attendance on the part of these suburban folk doesn’t usually imply staying the night in town. There’s a splendid series of late trains, run for the special benefit of theatre-goers. But---Mrs. Effingham always stayed in town, returning home early next morning. Now, as, according to Bleacher, she didn’t arrive in town until late in the afternoon and left again early next day, it’s plain that she didn’t come up to shop. What did she come for? And why was she sometimes bad-tempered and sometimes---t’other thing? Plain to see, that!---in my opinion. She was good-tempered when she’d had a good night; bad-tempered when she’d had a bad one. In a word---Mrs. E.’s a gambler!”

“And you think her sole purpose in making these weekly visits is to gamble?” I said.

“Just that!” he replied, confidently. “What her particular form of excitement is we don’t know---but I mean to find out. It may be bridge---in my time I’ve known dozens of women who’ve been ruined, body and soul, especially soul, by bridge. It may be chemin-de-fer---plenty of places where you can indulge yourself in that, and in roulette, and in baccarat---or, yes! Opportunities in this little place for doing any mortal thing you like, Camberwell---as long as you’ve the wherewithal in your pocket.”

“You mean to find out---what?” I asked.

“Where she goes, what she does,” he answered. “We’ll get on with that at once. We don’t know what mayn’t come of it.”

“Mrs. Effingham is very well acquainted with both of us,” I remarked. “Outward appearance, anyway.”

“No doubt---but she isn’t acquainted with our little friend in the next room!” he replied. “We’ll set Chip on to her. He’ll follow her wherever she goes---night or day. All we have to do is to give him his instructions, point the lady out to him, and leave the rest to his own judgment.”

“How can we point her out without attracting her attention?” I asked. “I should say she’s a suspicious woman.”

“Easy!” he answered. “You go down to Waterloo with Chippendale. You point her out, taking care to keep out of her way. Once you’ve shown her to Chip, you can put your hands in your pockets and go home---he’ll track her!”

The next day was Friday, on which day, according to the interesting Miss Anne Bleacher, Mrs. Effingham always came to town by the 4.17 from Havering St. Michael. I gave Chippendale full instructions in the morning, and in the afternoon, after he had been home and attired himself for the part he was to play---which, in his opinion, must be that of a young gentleman just let loose on the town---I accompanied him to Waterloo, where we posted ourselves in a position from whence we could see the passengers of the 4.17 on their leaving it at five o’clock. There was very little danger of Mrs. Effingham’s seeing me; those suburban trains were always full by the time they reached London. The difficulty was to spot her; but spot her I did, though she was attired in much more fashionable style than when I had seen her at Linwood; and when I had made sure that Chippendale had taken her all in and was fairly on the scent, I did precisely what Chaney had said I might do---put my hands in my pockets and went, not home, but into the refreshment room, for a cup of tea. Chippendale, I knew, once on the trail, would keep his nose to the ground till he ran his quarry to earth.

What adventures befell Chippendale we, of course, heard from his own lips next morning. They were not so much exciting as notable, in that they afforded us new ground for suspicion and speculation; indeed, when we had heard all that he had to tell, Chaney and I began to consider the advisability of starting out all over again. It was just one more example of the fact, said Chaney, that in these cases you set off on what appears to be the straight road and get a long, long way upon it only to discover that what you really wanted was some obscure by-path on right or left.

Chippendale followed Mrs. Effingham out of Waterloo. Mrs. Effingham walked down the inclined way into York Road; Chippendale sauntered behind. Mrs. Effingham hailed and boarded a bus; she went inside; Chippendale mounted the same bus and rode outside. The bus in due course reached Piccadilly Circus; Mrs. Effingham left it, and so did Chippendale, taking care that she didn’t notice him. Mrs. Effingham went along Piccadilly and turned into a noted tea-shop; Chippendale thanked his stars that it was of such dimensions that he could follow her and watch her without being seen himself. At a respectful distance he watched her while she ate cakes and sipped tea; he himself being, as he put it, partial to such things, consumed muffins and coffee. Up to that time Mrs. Effingham had been alone, but before she had come to her second cup, she was joined by another lady; Chippendale’s belief was that there had been an appointment between them. He watched the two ladies chat until an hour had gone by; when they rose and departed, he departed too and followed them.

Mrs. Effingham and her companion went out into Piccadilly and hailed a taxi-cab from the nearest rank. Chippendale hailed another and said a word in season to its driver, who was sharp-witted enough to comprehend what his fare was after and played his part like a man and a brother---so Chippendale said, describing his adventures. He followed the first taxi to the respectable quarters of Bayswater and into a quiet street sacred to private residential hotels and first-class boarding-houses. At the door of one of these the first taxi drew up; the ladies dismounted and entered the hotel. But their taxi did not go away; it remained there; obviously its driver had received orders to wait. So Chippendale’s driver went slowly by and halted a little further along the street, and from its back window Chippendale watched—until Mrs. Effingham and her lady friend, some twenty minutes later, came out again.

“And who d’ye think they had with ’em?” said Chippendale at this point of his story. “That chap that came here---the parson! Stecke!”

“Stecke!” I exclaimed.

“Stecke! Reverend Mr. Herbert Stecke, Mr. Camberwell,” replied Chippendale. “Oh, I knew him, at once! But this time---last night, I mean---he wasn’t in his professional toggery. Not he! He was in mufti. Grey suit---soft grey hat, black band---smart enough he was.”

“You’ve no doubt about it, Chippendale?” I said.

“No more than that I see you, sir,” he answered. “It was Stecke, dead certain. I never forget faces, Mr. Camberwell.”

“Well, he came out, you say, with Mrs. Effingham and the other lady. What then? Got into the waiting cab, I suppose?”

“Just so, sir. And off it went, and we after it. Down into the Bayswater Road it went, and back to Oxford Street, and then to Regent Street---do you know a little side-street there, Mr. Camberwell, called Comma Street? Well, I do, if you don’t---anyhow, the taxi turned in there. We slipped past as it pulled up, and I did a bit more squinting through our back window. I saw all three, Stecke and the two ladies, get out and go into a house there. So I paid off my driver then and took a quiet look at the outside of the place they’d entered.”

“Well?” I said, as he paused.

“Name plate on side of door,” continued Chippendale. “Brass plate; well polished; quite smart. Bessington Club. Just that!”

“Never heard of it,” remarked Chaney. “Wasn’t there in my time. I know Comma Street.”

“Well, it’s there now, anyhow, Mr. Chaney,” said Chippendale. “One entrance in Comma Street, and another in Point Street, round the corner. And that’s where they went in. Let ’emselves in, I fancy---I thought I saw Stecke at the latch. Anyhow, the door was tight shut, and so was the other door in Point Street. I hung about a bit, but I didn’t see any other people enter. Then a policeman came along, and I got talking to him---told him just enough of what I was after. ‘What sort of club is this?’ says I. ‘Said to be a bridge club,’ says he. ‘Gambling-hole, I expect.’ ‘Any complaints about it?’ I asked him. ‘Not up to now,’ he says, ‘but it’s only been on tap a few weeks. Used to be called the Arabian Nights Club.’ ”

“Oh, that’s where it is, is it?” remarked Chaney. “Ah, I knew the Arabian Nights. And a nice spot it was, and came to a very pretty end.”

“Well, what else?” I asked, turning to Chippendale.

“That’s all, so far, Mr. Camberwell,” he replied. “I saw no use in hanging about there until the small hours of the morning, as I probably should have had to, and I’d found out where the lady betook herself. However, I know a chap who’s pretty well up in these shady West End places, so this morning, before coming to the office, I just looked him up. He says the Bessington is supposed to be a club for bridge, anchor bridge, and poker, but that it’s pretty well known in his circles that you can get other games there and have a nice flutter---in short, it’s what the policeman suggested, a gambling-resort. Queer spot for a respectable clergyman’s wife, isn’t it, Mr. Camberwell?”

“Keep that moral reflection to yourself, my lad!” said Chaney. “We aren’t inquiring into Mrs. Effingham’s private affairs---in that direction at any rate,” he added. “We just want to know where she goes when she comes up to town. Well, we know where she went last night---to the Bessington Club. Perhaps she’ll go to a May meeting---missionary endeavour or Hottentots Improvement Movement---next time. But now just think again, my lad, on one very important point. Are you dead certain that the man you saw with Mrs. Effingham and her lady friend was the Reverend Mr. Stecke?”

“Dead certain, Mr. Chaney!” asserted Chippendale. “Shouldn’t say so if I weren’t.”

We both felt certain of that, for Chippendale was a model of sureness and of caution, and when he had left us, we began to debate the meaning of this discovery.

“I don’t make much of the fact that Chip saw Stecke in mufti,” said Chaney. “That’s nothing---if, or, rather, as he was going to this club, he’d be sure to be going in a layman’s clothes. And I don’t attach much importance to the other fact that he was going to and did go to the club---he may be a confirmed bridge-player, and even parsons must have some amusement. What I do attach significance to is the fact that he went with Mrs. Effingham, and what I should like to know is: how long has that been going on?”

“There’s a thing that struck me while Chippendale was talking,” I remarked. “Did Stecke know Mrs. Effingham before he went to Linwood to take the duty during Canon Effingham’s illness? Had he met her at the Bessington Club?”

“Good idea!” said Chaney, quick to see the point. “Wish we could find that out! And there’s another thing---who is Stecke? Parson, yes; we know that much. But who is he? What’s his origin? What’s his past? What have you got down about him?”

He was referring to my habit of keeping a sort of register of all the people with whom we did business or came in contact: I considered the keeping of it a highly useful thing.

“Not much,” I answered, getting out my book. “Very little, indeed. Here we are---‘Reverend Herbert Stecke. Clergyman of the Established Church. Took duty for Canon Effingham at Linwood for three Sundays in December last. Recommended to Canon E. by Canon Telson, of Southwark. At present without benefice or employment as curate. Address 247, Laburnam Villas, Newington.’ That’s all.”

“Not enough,” said Chaney, “but as he’s a C. of E. man, there’ll be something in the official books about him. Where’s your library---I mean, haven’t we got anything?”

One of my first cares when we started our business had been to form a small library of highly necessary reference books---I went to it now and took down the current Crockford.

“What is he?” continued Chaney, seeing what I had got. “Oxford? Cambridge?”

“He’s neither,” I replied, presently arriving at what I sought. “He’s no degree from either, anyway, nor from Durham, nor from anywhere---he’s not even an A. K. C. Nor was he educated at any well-known school; at any rate, there’s no mention of it here. He must have been ordained as a literate. Anyhow, he was ordained four years ago, but he only seems to have held one curacy since---at St. Modwen’s, Esterham, two years since. We might enquire there about him.”

“If he’s only had one curacy since he went into the Church, what’s he live on?” asked Chaney. “Earns a bit by doing odd jobs, I suppose, like that he did at Linwood. Well, but you’ve got him down as living at---where?”

“Newington. 247, Laburnam Villas,” I replied.

“But now---at least last night---he was at some address in Bayswater. We must get to know more about that, Camberwell. Let’s have Chip back.”

I rang my bell; Chippendale poked his nose in at the door.

“Chippendale,” said Chaney, “you said that it was a private residential hotel that Stecke and the two ladies came out of. Any name---or merely a number?”

“Artemis Hotel, Ulster Gardens,” replied Chippendale promptly. “Smart place---exterior, anyhow.”

“Big?” asked Chaney.

“Sort of spot where they have accommodation for fifty or sixty guests,” said Chippendale. “You know the type---five or six guineas a week, all in.”

“Well, you listen,” continued Chaney. “We want to know next if this Reverend Mr. Stecke lives there now, and what he’s doing. You’re not to do that job yourself---you can put one of the staff on to it. Post him up---and see he does it thoroughly.”

We got Chippendale’s report on this within the next two or three days. Obviously, the Reverend Herbert Stecke now resided at the Artemis Hotel. Obviously, too, he had completely given up the wearing of clerical costume.

While we were wondering why he had, more light was thrown on this gentleman.

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