‘I think,’ said he, ‘that as we shall all undoubtedly be subpoenaed by the coroner, it would be well to put together a few notes of the facts. I see there is a writing table by the window, and I would propose that you, Brodribb, just jot down a précis of the statement that you heard last night, while Jervis notes down the exact condition of the body. While you are doing this, I will take a look round.’
‘We might find a more cheerful place to write in,’ grumbled Mr Brodribb; ‘however –’
Without finishing the sentence, he sat down at the table, and, having found some sermon paper, dipped a pen in the ink by way of encouraging his thoughts. At this moment Thorndyke quietly slipped out of the room, and I proceeded to make a detailed examination of the body: in which occupation I was interrupted at intervals by requests from the lawyer that I should refresh his memory.
We had been occupied thus for about a quarter of an hour, when a quick step was heard outside, the door was opened abruptly, and a man burst into the room. Brodribb rose and held out his hand.
‘This is a sad home-coming for you, Alfred,’ said he.
‘Yes, my God!’ the newcomer exclaimed. ‘It’s awful.’
He looked askance at the corpse on the bed, and wiped his forehead with his handkerchief. Alfred Calverley was not extremely prepossessing. Like his cousin, he was obviously neurotic, but there were signs of dissipation in his face, which, just now, was pale and ghastly, and wore an expression of abject fear. Moreover, his entrance was accompanied by that of a perceptible odour of brandy.
He had walked over, without noticing me, to the writing-table, and as he stood there, talking in subdued tones with the lawyer, I suddenly found Thorndyke at my side. He had stolen in noiselessly through the door that Calverley had left open.
‘Show him Brodribb’s note,’ he whispered, ‘and then make him go in and look at the peg.’
With this mysterious request, he slipped out of the room as silently as he had come, unperceived either by Calverley or the lawyer.
‘Has Captain Raggerton returned with you?’ Brodribb was inquiring.
‘No, he has gone into the town,’ was the reply; ‘but he won’t be long. This will be a frightful shock to him.’
At this point I stepped forward. ‘Have you shown Mr Calverley the extraordinary letter that the deceased left for you?’ I asked.
‘What letter was that?’ demanded Calverley, with a start.
Mr Brodribb drew forth the note and handed it to him. As he read it through, Calverley turned white to the lips, and the paper trembled in his hand.
‘“He has beckoned to me, and I must go”,’ he read. Then, with a furtive glance at the lawyer: ‘Who had beckoned? What did he mean?’
Mr Brodribb briefly explained the meaning of the allusion, adding: ‘I thought you knew all about it.’
‘Yes, yes,’ said Calverley, with some confusion; ‘I remember the matter now you mention it. But it’s all so dreadful and bewildering.’
At this point I again interposed. ‘There is a question,’ I said, ‘that may be of some importance. It refers to the cord with which the poor fellow hanged himself. Can you identify that cord, Mr Calverley?’
‘I!’ he exclaimed, staring at me, and wiping the sweat from his white face; ‘how should I? Where is the cord?’
‘Part of it is still hanging from the peg in the closet. Would you mind looking at it?’
‘If you would very kindly fetch it – you know I – er – naturally – have a –’
‘It must not be disturbed before the inquest,’ said I; ‘but surely you are not afraid –’
‘I didn’t say I was afraid,’ he retorted angrily. ‘Why should I be?’
With a strange, tremulous swagger, he strode across to the closet, flung open the door, and plunged in.
A moment later we heard a shout of horror, and he rushed out, livid and gasping.
‘What is it, Calverley?’ exclaimed Mr Brodribb, starting up in alarm.
But Calverley was incapable of speech. Dropping limply into a chair, he gazed at us for a while in silent terror; then he fell back uttering a wild shriek of laughter.
Mr Brodribb looked at him in amazement. ‘What is it, Calverley?’ he asked again.
As no answer was forthcoming, he stepped across to the open door of the closet and entered, peering curiously before him. Then he, too, uttered a startled exclamation, and backed out hurriedly, looking pale and flurried.
‘Bless my soul!’ he ejaculated. ‘Is the place bewitched?’
He sat down heavily and stared at Calverley, who was still shaking with hysteric laughter; while I, now consumed with curiosity, walked over to the closet to discover the cause of their singular behaviour. As I flung open the door, which the lawyer had closed, I must confess to being very considerably startled; for though the reflection of the open door was plain enough in the mirror, my own reflection was replaced by that of a Chinaman. After a momentary pause of astonishment, I entered the closet and walked towards the mirror; and simultaneously the figure of the Chinaman entered and walked towards me. I had advanced more than halfway down the closet when suddenly the mirror darkened; there was a whirling flash, the Chinaman vanished in an instant, and, as I reached the glass, my own reflection faced me.
I turned back into the room pretty completely enlightened, and looked at Calverley with a newborn distaste. He still sat facing the bewildered lawyer, one moment sobbing convulsively, the next yelping with hysteric laughter. He was not an agreeable spectacle, and when, a few moments later, Thorndyke entered the room, and halted by the door with a stare of disgust, I was moved to join him. But at this juncture a man pushed past Thorndyke, and, striding up to Calverley, shook him roughly by the arm.
‘Stop that row!’ he exclaimed furiously. ‘Do you hear? Stop it!’
‘I can’t help it, Raggerton,’ gasped Calverley. ‘He gave me such a turn – the mandarin, you know.’
‘What!’ ejaculated Raggerton.
He dashed across to the closet, looked in, and turned upon Calverley with a snarl. Then he walked out of the room.
‘Brodribb,’ said Thorndyke, ‘I should like to have a word with you and Jervis outside.’ Then, as we followed him out on to the landing, he continued: ‘I have something rather interesting to show you. It is in here.’
He softly opened an adjoining door, and we looked into a small unfurnished room. A projecting closet occupied one side of it, and at the door of the closet stood Captain Raggerton, with his hand upon the key. He turned upon us fiercely, though with a look of alarm, and demanded:
‘What is the meaning of this intrusion? And who the deuce are you? Do you know that this is my private room?’
‘I suspected that it was,’ Thorndyke replied quietly. ‘Those will be your properties in the closet, then?’
Raggerton turned pale, but continued to bluster. ‘Do I understand that you have dared to break into my private closet?’ he demanded.
‘I have inspected it,’ replied Thorndyke, ‘and I may remark that it is useless to wrench at that key, because I have hampered the lock.’
‘The devil you have!’ shouted Raggerton.
‘Yes; you see, I am expecting a police officer with a search warrant, so I wished to keep everything intact.’
Raggerton turned livid with mingled fear and rage. He stalked up to Thorndyke with a threatening air, but, suddenly altering his mind, exclaimed, ‘I must see to this!’ and flung out of the room.
Thorndyke took a key from his pocket, and, having locked the door, turned to the closet. Having taken out the key to unhamper the lock with a stout wire, he reinserted it and unlocked the door. As we entered, we found ourselves in a narrow closet, similar to the one in the other room, but darker, owing to the absence of a mirror. A few clothes hung from the pegs, and when Thorndyke had lit a candle that stood on a shelf, we could
see more of the details.
‘Here are some of the properties,’ said Thorndyke. He pointed to a peg from which hung a long, blue silk gown of Chinese make, a mandarin’s cap, with a pigtail attached to it, and a beautifully made papier-mâché mask. ‘Observe,’ said Thorndyke, taking the latter down and exhibiting a label on the inside, marked ‘Renouard à Paris’, ‘no trouble has been spared.’
He took off his coat, slipped on the gown, the mask, and the cap, and was, in a moment, in that dim light, transformed into the perfect semblance of a Chinaman.
‘By taking a little more time,’ he remarked, pointing to a pair of Chinese shoes and a large paper lantern, ‘the make-up could be rendered more complete; but this seems to have answered for our friend Alfred.’
‘But,’ said Mr Brodribb, as Thorndyke shed the disguise, ‘still, I don’t understand –’
‘I will make it clear to you in a moment,’ said Thorndyke. He walked to the end of the closet, and, tapping the right-hand wall, said: ‘This is the back of the mirror. You see that it is hung on massive well-oiled hinges, and is supported on this large, rubber-tyred castor, which evidently has ball bearings. You observe three black cords running along the wall, and passing through those pulleys above. Now, when I pull this cord, notice what happens.’
He pulled one cord firmly, and immediately the mirror swung noiselessly inwards on its great castor, until it stood diagonally across the closet, where it was stopped by a rubber buffer.
‘Bless my soul!’ exclaimed Mr Brodribb. ‘What an extra-ordinary thing!’
The effect was certainly very strange, for, the mirror being now exactly diagonal to the two closets they appeared to be a single, continuous passage, with a door at either end. On going up to the mirror, we found that the opening which it had occupied was filled by a sheet of plain glass, evidently placed there as a precaution to prevent any person from walking through from one closet into the other, and so discovering the trick.
‘It’s all very puzzling,’ said Mr Brodribb; ‘I don’t clearly understand it now.’
‘Let us finish here,’ replied Thorndyke, ‘and then I will explain. Notice this black curtain. When I pull the second cord, it slides across the closet and cuts off the light. The mirror now reflects nothing into the other closet; it simply appears dark. And now I pull the third cord.’
He did so, and the mirror swung noiselessly back into its place.
‘There is only one other thing to observe before we go out,’ said Thorndyke, ‘and that is this other mirror standing with its face to the wall. This, of course, is the one that Fred Calverley originally saw at the end of the closet; it has since been removed, and the larger swinging glass put in its place. And now,’ he continued, when we came out into the room, ‘let me explain the mechanism in detail. It was obvious to me, when I heard poor Fred Calverley’s story, that the mirror was “faked”, and I drew a diagram of the probable arrangement, which turns out to be correct. Here it is.’ He took a sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to the lawyer. ‘There are two sketches. Sketch 1 shows the mirror in its ordinary position, closing the end of the closet. A person standing at A, of course, sees his reflection facing him at, apparently, A 1. Sketch 2 shows the mirror swung across. Now a person standing at A does not see his own reflection at all; but if some other person is standing in the other closet at B, A sees the reflection of B apparently at B 1 – that is, in the identical position that his own reflection occupied when the mirror was straight across.’
‘I see now,’ said Brodribb; ‘but who set up this apparatus, and why was it done?’
‘Let me ask you a question,’ said Thorndyke. ‘Is Alfred Calverley the next of kin?’
‘No; there is Fred’s younger brother. But I may say that Fred has made a will quite recently very much in Alfred’s favour.’
‘There is the explanation, then,’ said Thorndyke. ‘These two scoundrels have conspired to drive the poor fellow to suicide, and Raggerton was clearly the leading spirit. He was evidently concocting some story with which to work on poor Fred’s superstitions when the mention of the Chinaman on the steamer gave him his cue. He then invented the very picturesque story of the murdered mandarin and the stolen pearl. You remember that these “visitations” did not begin until after that story had been told, and Fred had been absent from the house on a visit. Evidently, during his absence, Raggerton took down the original mirror, and substituted this swinging arrangement; and at the same time procured the Chinaman’s dress and mask from the theatrical property dealers. No doubt he reckoned on being able quietly to remove the swinging glass and other properties and replace the original mirror before the inquest.’
‘By God!’ exclaimed Mr Brodribb, ‘it’s the most infamous, cowardly plot I have ever heard of. They shall go to gaol for it, the villains, as sure as I am alive.’
But in this Mr Brodribb was mistaken; for immediately on finding themselves detected, the two conspirators had left the house, and by nightfall were safely across the Channel; and the only satisfaction that the lawyer obtained was the setting aside of the will on facts disclosed at the inquest.
As to Thorndyke, he has never to this day forgiven himself for having allowed Fred Calverley to go home to his death.
About the author
Nick Rennison is a writer, editor and bookseller with a particular interest in the Victorian era and in crime fiction. He has written several Pocket Essential guides published by Oldcastle Books including Short History of Polar Exploration, Roget, Freud and Robin Hood. He is the editor of two anthologies: The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes and The Rivals of Dracula, both collections of short stories. He is also the author of The Bloomsbury Good Reading Guide to Crime Fiction, ١٠٠ Must-Read Crime Novels and Sherlock Holmes: An Unauthorised Biography. His debut crime novel, Carver’s Quest, set in nineteenth-century London, was published by Atlantic Books. He is a regular reviewer for both The Sunday Times and BBC History Magazine.
Also by Nick Rennison
The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes
Supernatural Sherlocks
The Rivals of Dracula
Freud and Psychoanalysis
Peter Mark Roget – The Man Who Became a Book
Robin Hood – Myth, History & Culture
A Short History of Polar Exploration
Bohemian London
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Copyright
First published in 2019
by No Exit Press
an imprint of Oldcastle Books
Harpenden
www.noexit.co.uk
All rights reserved
Editorial comment © Nick Rennison, 2019
The right of Nick Rennison to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
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