“Yes,” whispered his wife, who was trembling with excitement, in the darkness beside him. “What a good thing we never took a flashlight of him, J.D., when he first came in, we should never have known then. He’s a bad man, but he must be clever.”
Cousin Billy came in quietly once more and examined the table. He must have been satisfied that the direction was now right, for he went out again, and stayed out. They could see him dimly. He appeared to be about halfway towards the centre of the rose-garden. Then they saw him walking in a bent position due east, as though he were trailing something out across the turf.
“He’s measuring seventy-seven feet to the east of the place where the rose touches the ground,” said Jock Danplank. “As soon as he gets to his favourite exercise, Mog, we’ll slip out and look on from close quarters. This is what I call decent of Cousin Billy; he’s doing his level best to help us.”
A few minutes later, after the silent man out on the grass had walked to and fro a great many times between the rose and some point to the eastward of it, he gave a low “miau” like a cat; and immediately there came two figures out of the darkness of the rose bushes to the south of the garden. These joined him, and directly the watchers saw the vague gleam of shirts and bare arms through the darkness, as coats were abandoned by all three; then came the faint noises of drying implements cautiously used.
“Now,” said Jock Danplank, and helped his wife hurriedly into her coat. “Come along.” And he led the way silently through the French windows, out into a little winding path that led them deeply among the rose bushes, and so to the shelter upon the far side, where old Biggle and his two under-gardeners sat, peering silently through the bushes at the three men of the night who were mauling Mr. Biggle’s choice turf, there before his very eyes.
“Biggle,” said Jock, stealing silently into the shelter, “my wife and I have come to join the audience. I think we may conclude, Biggle, that we have them now—eh?”
“We ’ave ’em, Mr. Danplank, sir,” replied Biggle, rising and offering his seat to Mrs. Danplank, with nice courtesy. “The Lord ’elp ’em, Mr. Danplank, sir, when I gets my hands on to ’em. Leastways, I should say ’elp me not to do murder when I starts on ’em.”
The old man’s tone made it clear that he burned and trembled with passion at the visible and audible proofs of outrage to his garden that was going on within thirty or forty feet of them.
“Old Sir Gerald would turn in ’is grave—” began Biggle.
But Mr. Jock Danplank interrupted his assurance with a question regarding the hose. “They’ll need a wash, Biggle, after that dirty work, you know,” he said.
“All’s ready, Mr. Danplank, sir, as you ordered,” said Biggle; “an’ I’ve told Bill an’ Jarge they’m to show their lanterns so soon as you whistles, sir.”
After that, for maybe a full hour and a half, Mr. Danplank allowed his cousin and assistants to indulge in their hobby of hole making to their heart’s content. Then, thinking that it was about time, he drew his wife quietly out of the shelter, and ensconced her with himself among some rose bushes away to the right, from which they commanded a view of Cousin Billy’s operations.
“Now, Mog,” he whispered, “get that flashlight all ready. When I tell you, blaze away.”
He stared hard into the darkness, and could vaguely see the heads and shoulders of the three men working furiously but silently in the big hole they had made. He aimed his camera—a twin-lens—at the hole, then whistled shrilly. As the whistle went across the dark garden the sounds of digging ceased instantly, and then, in the darkness, two jets of light shone out, flashed through the bushes, swung round to and fro, and settled on the sweating faces of Cousin Billy and two other men.
Jock Danplank focussed rapidly, and even as he did so there came the sharp his-hissing of the great hose as Biggle turned on the hydrant. Then Biggle got to work. The powerful stream of water arched through the night, glittering in the light from the two bull’s-eye lanterns, and smote Cousin Billy full in the face. There was a yell and a splutter, and in the same instant of time Mr. Jock Danplank gave the word to his wife. She pressed the trigger of the flashlight, and instantaneously the whole of the visible gardens flashed out in a blaze of white and blinding light, each leaf fluttering in the night breeze showing clear-cut and vivid. It lit up the face of Cousin Billy as he essayed madly to scramble up out of the big hole that was rapidly becoming a lake. He swore incredibly, screaming out his oaths with gasps and bubblings, as the remorseless Biggle kept the hydrant full upon him. The darkness felt upon the gardens with an effect upon the senses as of thunder. But still the hose played on, directed by the aid of the lanterns. The two other men had disappeared with the first arrival of the water, and were gone away through the bushes
And now at last Cousin Billy achieved the almost impossible, and ascended out of the pit of his discomfiture. As he did so the flashlight blazed out again, showing him dripping mud from head to feet, and the hose searching him from top to bottom in every sense of the word.
“Send you a proof to-morrow, Billy!” shouted Mr. Jock Danplank as the darkness fell for the second time. “Good-night, old man!”
There was no reply, only a smashing and rending among the rose-bushes as Cousin Billy left at a high rate of speed, the hydrant following the sounds remorselessly until he was out of range.
“Now,” said Mr. Jock Danplank, when things had subsided a little. “Get some buckets and bail out.” He handed his camera to his wife, and threw off his coat. When the buckets were brought he was first into the hole, up to his knees in mud and water. In twenty minutes the hole was dry, more or less, and digging was resumed. Morning found them still digging, and nowhere any signs of treasure.
Mary Danplank brought them out hot coffee, and tried hard to hide her bitter disappointment. It was plain that almost their last hope of finding the treasure had gone. The men all came up out of the hole, and stood round, drinking, and almost sullen with disappointment and fatigue.
“It’s no use, Mog,” said Jock Danplank, at last. “I’m beginning to think the talk about money in the will must have been all rot. Uncle was a queer chap. I expect he got a bit off his balance towards the end, and just imagined he’d got more than he had. He must have spent it all doing this place up. He— By Jove!”
His speech ended in a shout. He hove his cup and saucer bang down on to the grass, and dashed into the house. A moment later he gave out a great bellow.
“The compass! The compass! Where’s the compass!”
He discovered it even whilst he shouted, put it down on the table, let it steady, and then spied along it.
“Found it!” he roared. “Found it, by gum! The table’s not been put back straight since we shifted it. The hole’s twenty feet too much to the south. Shift the rose to the north! Shift the rose to the north!” He waved one big hand energetically, and his wife ran to obey. “Yes, yes, that’s it Mary. Put it down there—just there. Right. Now the tape; measure off—measure off! More to the north. There! Got it. Stick something in. Right! Now spades!” And he came dashing out through the window.
An hour later they found the money, every sovereign of it. If you please, it was packed neatly in old distemper tins, of the washable variety. That’s all, except that Biggle was very much troubled for a year to come, until his turf once more resumed its velvet look of ages. Even then his trained eye saw imperfections. Meanwhile, Cousin Billy had received his “proofs”, accompanied by the following little note:
“Dear Billy,—Herewith the proofs. We think they’re immense. Treasure safe to hand. Congrat. me, old man.—Your affec. cousin,
“Jock.”
The Mystery of Captain Chappel
I ain’t enough knowledge,” Cobbler Juk was saying, in a narky voice, “not to be what you’d call scientific. But I got the brains I was born with, and I uses my eyes!”
“Well, uncle,” replied the big policeman, who sat on the end of the bench, smoking, “I don’t know as this
wants any scientific idees.”
“A lot you know,” said the little man moodily. “Ole Cap’n Chappel was killed between the porch of the Spread Eagle and the corner of Dobell’s beat, an’ that’s no more than a hundred yards, as you might say. An’ there’s none of you knows to-day, more’n Adam, who done it.”
“It’s right we can’t get on the track of no one,’’ replied the big policeman good naturedly; “an’ that’s what I’m here for, uncle. The chief spoke to me to-night, an’ said as you might have a try on the quiet, just same as you found out that ’sault and rob’ry case. He’ll give you a ten-pound note for your trouble if you get hold of any sort of a cloo; but you’ve got to keep it quiet as you’re in it, or maybe he’ll get into a bother over lettin’ an amachoor come messin’ around—”
“Amachoor!” said the cobbler hotly. “You’re fine perfessionals, ain’t you! Lordy!”
“We don’t think as you’re an amachoor, uncle, up at the station,” said the big policeman cunningly. “ I tell you, uncle, you can do it. It’s just the case as suits your style of thinkin’ out the most likely way it’d come about. Be reasonable an’ have a try.”
“I’m not struck, nevvy, on detectiven’,” said the old man perversely. “I got the gift, I know; but it’s a sneakin’, pryin’, think-evil-of-yer-feller-men sort of job, an’ no work for a decent-hearted man. Half the time it’s just keyhole-listening or sniffing up someone else’s drain—there’s no blessed hero work in it, except the silly stuff you reads. You can tell the chief I’m stickin’ to my own last. I prefers honest cobblin’! I tell you, detectives is nothin’ but lawful sneaks pryin’ out other sneaks.”
Old Cobbler Juk was in a contrary mood; but his nephew knew how to humour him.
“The chief said as how he’d be willin’ to pay you five bob a day expenses while you was on the case,” remarked the big policeman, who was clearly very much off duty. “Jack’s good enough to do all the mendin’ as’ll need doin’ this week or two. That’ll leave you free; an’ you’ll be earnin’ a steady wage—”
“Shows what you know!” snarled his uncle, interrupting. “I’d lose every blessed customer I got if I was to let Jack try his hand to the patchin’. All the same, you can tell the chief I’m on the job. I s’pose if I’m built to be a sneak, I must be a sneak; but it ain’t no work for a decent man. No, you can’t tell me nothin’ about the case. I know more now than you an’ the chief and the whole blessed lot of you. I’ve been studying it over quietly this last two weeks. It amounts to this:
“On Toosday night; and that’s a fortnight gone now, at twenty-five minutes to ten by the market clock, and by Captain Chappel’s own watch—which was a good ’un too! —the old chap said good-night to Master Claud Atkins, the saddler. That’s just a way of speakin’; for, as you know, nevvy, it wasn’t exactly good-night; but the other way round, owing to the two of ’em having drunk too much, and Saddler Atkins—who don’t know a piece of good leather when he’s shown it!—sayin’ as the old cap’n’s watch was no chronometer, but a common lever. That’s how everyone knows the time of the business so exact; for they got out in the porch of the Spread Eagle to test it by the market clock, and found it right to a second, you might say.
“Ole Cap’n Chappel wanted to make the leather man take back what he’d said, but Claud Atkins had drunk just enough not to know what was best for him, and he started in to call the cap’n. Cap’n Chappel never was a man to stand that sort of thing, drunk or sober—as Atkins should have known, if he’d not known a bit less of faces even than he does of leather. Consequence was that the old cap’n knocked him flat, and then staggers off happy as a lord down the street.
“Saddler Atkins gets up, as soon as he sees the cap’n gone, and steps outside, talkin’ brave. But, as he didn’t attempt to follow the cap’n, no one took anymore notice of it all, and never would, only that one minute later, and that’s exactly twenty-four minutes to ten, P.c. Dobell starts blowing his whistle; for he’d come to the corner of his beat, not a hundred yards from the porch itself, and found the cap’n, dead as a brad, with his head broken.
“Now, you know this, and the whole town knows it; and there’s not the least doubt about the time being correct, for the reasons I’ve given, and because, in the second case, Dobell always looks at the market clock each time he comes to the corner. Therefore, you have the case like this, nevvy: Old Cap’n Chappel was killed in the one minute that lies between twenty-five and twenty-four minutes to ten on last Toosday night, in the hundred yards of Talbot Street that lies between the corner of P.c. Dobell’s beat and the porch of the Spread Eagle.
“Dobell was quite sure that there was no living soul in the street when he reached the corner, and the night was that quiet that he could scarce have missed to have heard anyone run away. Now then, nevvy, what killed Cap’n Chappel? That’s what you’re all asking your silly selves, an’ the only answer you can find is Saddler Claude Atkins, him that’s so fat he couldn’t do the distance in twice the time. An’ as for killin’, he ain’t got the good, honest pluck to kill a mouse, let alone a man!
“You leave it to me now, and just tell the chief he can stop scarin’ that fool Atkins, and let him out of gaol right away, so’s he can run along home and let his wife bully him. Come along of me now, nevvy, an’ I’ll show you good common-sense detectivin’, I will that!”
II
“Now,” said old Cobbler Juk; having reached the place where Captain Chappel had been found, “I’ve been all over this a half-dozen times and more, and I’ve come to my own conclusions. But I’ll start in earnest; an’ maybe I’ll get it through the likes of such thick heads as yours and the chief’s as the old buffer was killed in a mighty different way to what you got thinking. Saddler Atkins! Lord, nevvy, why didn’t the chief arrest our black tom, if he was needin’ a desp’rate character?
“See here, now!” he continued. “This is where they found the cap’n. It’s a hundred yards from here to the porch of the Spread Eagle, and ten yards to the corner of Dobell’s beat; and P.c. Dobell must have come on the cap’n within twenty or thirty seconds after he was killed, and not a person in the street. Atkins could never have done it, leavin’ out that he was afraid of the cap’n, for he left the other way; and he’s too fat and short in the wind to go faster’n a slow walk. Then, again, the cap’n was a mighty tall man, and he was hit smack on the top of the head. That’d need a tall man to do; an’ the saddlers just five-foot nothin’, except round the waist. I’m away up now to have a talk with the chief, and try to get some sense into his head.”
This the cobbler did, with such good results that the saddler was shortly released.
“Look here,” said the cobbler, who went to see him at his house. “I got you out of that muckery; an’ I’ll do you one more good turn. Don’t you go foolin’ around after dark, or maybe you’ll get what old Cap’n Chappel got!”
The saddler went very pale.
“Eh, Mr. Juk!” he said, trying to speak easily. “What’s that? What d’yer mean, Mr. Juk?”
“You knows what I means!” said Cobbler Juk quietly, looking him hard in the eyes. “You got more idea of what killed the cap’n than anyone on earth—’cept me! An’ perhaps just one other as I got in my mind. No; you needn’t tell me nothing. I can find out what I wants without screwin’ you. If I am doin’ sneak-work I’ll do it as clean as maybe. Good mornin’, Mister Saddler Atkins. You never did know a piece of good leather when you saw it, nor ever will. I’d not say the same, though, about skins!”
And the cobbler went away, laughing at some hidden wit in his remark. But the saddler certainly never laughed. He just sat back in his chair, very pasty-faced and very breathless.
“ G’lord!” he muttered presently, “what’s he know?”
III
“Uncle, wake up! Wake up!” said the cobbler’s big nephew the following night, shaking him vigorously.
The old man woke, and turned with a snarl.
“What
the divvil—” he began; then, seeing that his nephew was in uniform: “What is it, nevvy? What is it?” he asked, in a changed voice. “It’s not the—”
“Saddler Atkins!” interrupted the policeman. “We just found him, not ten minutes ago, in Varley Street. Stone dead as they makes ’em. Killed same way as the cap’n, to my thinkin’; an’ not a cloo of any kind as could tell us what did it; nor there ain’t nothin’ touched on the body—”
“Whist, nevvy; my boots, quick!” said the cobbler, beginning to dress rapidly. “I got to see just where he was found ’fore the silly fools touch ought. I s’pose he’s at the station?”
Twenty minutes later Cobbler Juk and his nephew reached the place where Saddler Atkins had been found. The old man had been so eager to get there that he had actually run half the way, the big policeman having to jog-trot to keep up with him.
For several minutes Jut searched around, using his nephew’s lantern; and once or twice he picked up things and slipped them into his waistcoat pocket.
“Now,” he said at last, “we’ll have a look at old Saddler Atkins. Poor little fool, I warned him fair an’ square—”
“What’s that, uncle?” gasped the big policeman, for he was again at his lumbering jog-trot in the wake of his energetic relative.
“Not but he fair deserved what he got!” continued the old man, taking no notice of his nephew’s question.
“Did you know, uncle, as the saddler might be murdered?” the big man managed to blurt out as they drew up at the station. “You ought not to have held back infermation as might have led to the arrest!” he added.
“Go an’ boil your big head! I want to see the body!” was all the “information” that the Law—as represented in the body of his nephew—received.
“That’s all I need,’’ said Cobbler Juk, after he had seen what he wanted.
He lowered his voice to a whisper.
The House on the Borderland and Other Mysterious Places Page 50