by Simon Stern
Except the entry and endorsing in his ledgers of such mysterious items as those enumerated from old Simons’ private note-book, Artful did no other kind of work, never, on any occasion, was sent on an errand, and never accompanied old Simons when he went abroad, which he did daily for an indefinite number of hours.
What on earth was his business? During the old man’s life, in the early period of his clerkship, he had never sought to know, and had not cared to do so. It had been enough for him that he was sure of his food and shelter, and such wages as old Simons chose to give him. Later on, when he was anxious to know all he could, the old man had been even closer about his affairs than ever. Artful had, therefore, bided his time, making certain that at his death, his private papers would reveal all.
Now that he was dead, and the private papers carefully searched, the secret remained as dark as ever. The papers revealed nothing.
There was no evidence of any kind of property existing—no banker’s book, no receipts, no business address—in short, not one tittle of evidence to show that old Simons had ever had anything to do out of doors.
Artful Bruff, the search at an end, felt that affairs were looking anything but promising.
What was he to do when his little store of cash was exhausted, and when he had realized what money he could upon the furniture contained in the room? Well, he could go on for a week or two, and then something might turn up, perhaps. In the meanwhile, he would make inquiries.
To begin with, what did the court-keeper know? The court-keeper had always understood old Simons had some money.
“Did he ever talk to you about his business?”
“He was always precious close about it to me.”
“He never said where it was?”
“Where what was?”
“Where he went to, I mean, when he went down the City.”
“Never knew for certain that he went down the City.”
“He never sent you with any message?”
“Never, all the eighteen years I’ve been here.”
“He came before your time?”
“A matter of ten years before.”
“Do you think the landlord knows anything of him?”
“The present landlord, I think, knows nothing. The one that Mr. Simons took the chambers of is dead.”
This information obtained from the court-keeper was, in substance, the information obtained in all other quarters where Artful Bruff made inquiries, and he lost no opportunity of asking questions.
The night of old Simons’ death was the fourteenth of December. On the night of the twenty-fourth, his self-constituted legatee sat by the fireside, warming himself with his last scuttle of coals, and turning over in his mind the momentous question of what he should do with his last dollar.
It was a bitterly cold night, and the Court seemed more lonely and silent than usual. In the distance, as he sat listening, he thought he could now and then detect the sound of Trinity bells. It was Christmas Eve, and most people were merry-making after their own fashion.
Artful Bruff stabbed the coal in the stove savagely with the poker as this reflection occurred to him. He had not grown over-sociable of late years, and he did not care particularly for merry-makings, but he would have liked to have felt more certain than he did of a Christmas dinner.
There was left of a little store Simons had treasured up a solitary bottle of Bourbon. He brought it out from the cupboard, and half filled a tumbler, then lit a pipe, and drew his chair nearer to the stove.
“I’ll get through to-morrow the best way I can,” said he, “and next day I’d better realize on the chairs and tables—what’s that?”
He was making this reflection when a loud noise upon the stairs caused him for a moment to suspend the progress of the Bourbon from the table to his lips. He put the glass down and listened. Something had bumped loudly against the wall. And now the sound was audible again, nearer the room door. Artful Bruff arose and went to see what was the matter, and saw a large black trunk coming up the stairs.
A second glance showed him that a man accompanied it, but the trunk came up first upon his shoulders. When they reached the landing on which Bruff stood, the man paused for breath, and put the trunk down.
“For Mr. Bruff,” the man said.
“For me?”
“For Mr. Bruff, Earls Court.”
“All right.”
The man carried the box into the room, and took off his cap to wipe the perspiration from his face.
“It’s a heavy one, sir, this is. If it had had on the other corner, I don’t think I could have carted it at all.”
“The other corner?”
“There’s only three on ’em as it is, sir, you see.”
It was, as the man had intimated, a three-cornered trunk, and altogether of a curious build. Was it meant for him? Artful Bruff thought. Most likely not. There was another Bruff in the Court. But if the man persisted in leaving it, that was his look-out, and the other Bruff’s, who ought to have looked out sharper.
“What are you waiting for?”
“Waiting for? I thought you might have the price of a drink, boss, that’s all. It’s a toughish job, all the way from the street across the yard and up these stairs. Shouldn’t like to have to carry such weights often.”
“Don’t the people who employ you pay your wages?”
“Eh? Oh, yes, they pay me.”
“That’s all right, then,” said Artful. “Good evening to you.”
The carter put on his cap again, without waiting until he had left the room.
“I’m much obliged to you,” said he, “and I wish you a merry Christmas, and many on ’em!”
“Thank you,” said Artful, drily.
Then, having listened until the echo of the carter’s steps had died away in the distance, he closed and locked the door, and sat down in front of this peculiarly made trunk.
To take a survey at his ease of his newly-acquired property, Artful seated himself upon a sort of locker, which was a fixture in one corner of the room between the window and the fireplace, close to the spot where the trunk had been put down by the carter.
“It’s very certain,” he said to himself, “that the thing is not meant for me. This is, without doubt, a Christmas present for the other Bruff, and how awfully sold he will be if he expected it particularly!”
There was an inscription on a piece of paper, pasted on the lid, and he leant forward and read the words with some little difficulty, for the ink seemed curiously old and faded.
“The fools have left it out in the rain. There’s hardly any making it out, but sure enough there’s no Christian name given. It’s Bruff only—Mr. Bruff. Why shouldn’t that be me? No harm can come of opening it.”
It was easy to say open it, but the operation promised to be rather a difficult one. As well as he could make out, the lid seemed to be screwed down on all sides. Luckily, he had got a small chisel, to find which, however, occupied a good half-hour. In a fury of impatience at this delay, he then set about the work with great violence, and broke the frail implement in two at almost the first wrench he give to the lid.
The court-keeper would be pretty certain to have a proper screw-driver. Should he ask for it? Why not? What o’clock was it? At the moment he asked himself the question, a neighbouring clock chimed a half-hour. It was half-past twelve.
Rather late for the keeper, who was in the habit of pulling the wire for the gate from his bed, and Artful was on anything but friendly terms with him. Still, it was worth trying.
He went to the keeper’s room, and found that worthy just turning in for the night. He had not got a screw-driver, and didn’t know who had. He was very certain he could not borrow one at that time of night.
Artful Bruff retraced his steps disconsolately to his rooms, and set to work again with the broken chisel, only to break it again, in a few minutes, without causing any noticeable change in the fastenings.
To search the rooms, and prise and wre
nch at the obstinate lid with every likely and unlikely tool and implement, even to the old man’s razors, which he desperately jagged into the semblance of a saw, was the occupation upon which Bruff employed the next three-quarters of an hour. But yet the lid of the trunk remained firm as a rock.
Artful Bruff sat down quite exhausted, and, in a dreamy sort of way, read through the address once more.
“Mr. Bruff, Earls Court.”
But there was something written below that he had not previously noticed,—“NOT TO BE OPENED TILL CHRISTMAS DAY.”
“Why not?” Artful asked aloud. “But, whoever it was who said so, they seem very likely to have their way, for there’s no saying for certain when I shall loosen these beastly screws. The confounded thing is fastened up as tight as if it were a coffin.”
As if it were a coffin! What an unpleasant idea to occur to him all at once, and just at the moment, too, when the candle—the last candle he had got—began to flicker in its socket!
But, after all, the idea was very ridiculous, for who ever heard of a three-cornered coffin? though, for that matter, who ever heard of a three-cornered trunk? And a box shaped like that was, surely no other box had ever been shaped before like it—unless it were—good heavens!
Why, that locker fixed into the wall, between the window and the fireplace, was exactly similar to it! Bruff measured it hastily with his pocket handkerchief. Yes, it was the fellow locker to the one already in the room; and that over there was the corner where it ought to have been fixed in—where, perhaps, it had been fixed, at some remote period, before Artful Bruff made acquaintance with the chambers.
But then came the question, Who had sent it? The rascal’s heart beat faster as a dreadful thought occurred to him, and, catching up the expiring light, he took another more careful look at the address upon the lid.
This time he made a discovery that he wondered he had not made before. This time, however, he was certain of the truth. There could, indeed, be no doubt about the matter.
The writing on the trunk was that of the dead man—old Simons.
One moment after he had arrived at this horrible conclusion, the expiring candle, with a last faint flicker, went out, and he was left in utter darkness.
Artful Bruff stood for a moment uncertain how to act, the perspiration breaking out upon his face. Then, guided by an instinctive sense of self-preservation, he groped his way hastily to the bedroom door, and pulled off his clothes and scrambled into bed.
“After all, though,” he thought, when he had lain there with his head covered up by the bedclothes for some twenty minutes or so, “there’s nothing wonderful in it. He must have directed the trunk to me some time ago. He meant it for a Christmas present. He was always so eccentric, and the weight of the box is easily accounted for, it’s full of money; worse luck, I can’t touch it till the morning, so I’ll go to sleep.”
Creak!
“The wind must have sprung up, and is at work with that crazy old shutter at the back. What a nuisance, if it’s going on like that all night.”
Creak!
“The noise isn’t at the back. I hope I haven’t left the outer door open.”
Creak!
“If I have, I ought to get up and shut it.”
Creak!
“What is there to be afraid of?”
Creak!
“But it isn’t the door. It’s something in the next room! It’s the trunk!” It was the trunk. THE TRUNK WAS OPENING BY ITSELF!
Artful Bruff strained his neck and eyes in the direction from which the sound proceeded. He had left the sitting-room door open behind him when he beat a retreat, and as he lay in bed he could plainly see the mysterious black trunk, standing out from surrounding darkness in a sort of dim grey light.
As he watched, the lid, with a series of creaks, slowly opened, and, to his unutterable horror, a something in the shape of old Simons undoubled itself, as it were, creaking also at its rusty joints, and creeping out with a painful effort, as it seemed, sat down upon the edge of the trunk to get breath.
The hair of his head bristly with terror, Artful Bruff regarded this awful visitor with distended eyes, and wondered what on earth was going to happen next.
The ghost, meanwhile, was yawning, and stretching itself, and presently began very slowly to draw off its clothes, and then, taking up the empty candlestick in his hand, came towards the bed. Artful Bruff’s flesh crept at the sight. His first impulse was to dive under the clothes, but the horror of being fished for by those long, lean, fleshless hands was more terrible for him than to face the phantom which now was standing by his side, and staring in seeming wonder upon him.
“Hallo!” said old Simons’ ghost, “what are you doing in my bed?”
“I beg your pardon, sir,” said Artful Bruff, “I didn’t think you would want it again.”
“Where are my coals and candles?” asked the ghost.
“I thought you’d done with them, sir,” replied Bruff.
“What have you been doing with my razors?”
“If I’d had any idea I was disturbing you, sir,” said Bruff, “I’d never have dreamt of doing it.”
The ghost smiled at this, and scraped its chin with its hand in a way old Simons had of scraping his during his lifetime. Artful Bruff could not help thinking, even through his terror, how well the ghost took old Simons off.
“You’ve jagged the edges dreadfully,” said the ghost; “but I dare say they will do well enough for what I want, even now. I shall go and fetch one, and cut your throat. Then your ghost and I will have a glass or two of Bourbon together until sunrise.”
The phantom glided back into the parlour, having said this, and Artful Bruff fainted.
When he came to his senses again, the first thing he did was to feel his throat, and finding it pretty well in the same condition he had left it over night when he went to bed, except that it was inwardly rather hot and parched, he arose cautiously, and looked around.
Old Simons’ representative was not present. It was past sunrise then, and he had returned to the box.
“He’s shut the bedroom door after him,” thought Bruff; “I recollect leaving it open.”
He peeped cautiously into the next room when he had turned the door-handle, and uttered a loud exclamation of surprise.
Old Simons must have taken away the box—it was nowhere to be seen.
Just then a footstep was audible upon the stairs. It was the court-keeper.
“What time is it, do you know?” asked Artful.
“About noon.”
“Noon! How soundly I have slept.”
“Very sound, I should think, not to hear the noise that man made.”
“What—Simons?”
“Simons! What do you mean?”
“Oh, nothing. What man were you speaking of?”
“The one that came for the box.”
“A man came for the box—when?”
“This morning, about seven.”
“And you let him take it?”
“He left it here in a mistake, he said.”
“A mistake?” asked Artful Bruff; “who said it was a mistake? Where’s he taken it to?—to the other Bruff?”
“No; he took it away altogether.”
“And you let him do it?”
“I didn’t know he had no right to do so. He told me you’d told him he could, and I saw that it was he who brought it last night.”
“Was he an Adams’ Express man? What sort of wagon had he?”
“He had a private wagon, both last night and this morning.”
“Have you no idea where he came from?”
“No. Haven’t you?”
“No,” said Artful; “get out.”
And so the court-keeper got out; and here this mystery ends.
The mystery of the trunk was never cleared up, nor was that of Artful Bruff’s sudden disappearance, which occurred a few days after this strange event.
Whether or not the likeness between
the address on the box and old Simons’ handwriting was only the result of Artful Bruff’s fevered imagination, or the Bourbon, is an open question.
MIRIAM’S GHOST by J. W. Hollingsworth
A Christmas Story
Captain Desmond leaned back in the open carriage with an unusual sense of enjoyment and relief, as his gaze took in spots of peculiar interest in the changing views of the country road, along which he was being rapidly whirled to his destination. The close atmosphere of a first-class carriage of an express train from which he had emerged, after a four hours journey not half-an-hour since, had left its usually cramped depression upon an active man used to open-air exposure, and he felt the rush of the wintry breeze upon his face with keen pleasure.
After the conclusion of the Afghan War, in which Hugh Desmond had gained both honour and distinction for the great ability he had displayed, in the execution of several difficult and arduous commissions, in which untiring watchfulness and marked bravery had placed his name in the forefront of those valued at the War Office, he had now arrived in England on leave of absence, after an unusually long period of service in India.
The Desmonds were an old and extremely aristocratic family, who traced their origin back to a time previous to the period of the Norman Conquest, and to whom the part of the country towards which he was being rapidly driven, had formerly belonged up to the reign of Henry VIII, when the main portion of the Desmond family became open adherents of the Protestant cause and the Reformation. But during the conflict of the two succeeding reigns the vast estates were lost to his family, and had been repeatedly bought and re-sold; the present owner, an extremely wealthy banker, being the grandson of the freeholder. The Maitland family had been bosom friends of Desmond’s father, and so, very soon after his return to England, he was a Christmas guest at Gurthford Manor, which was now visible from the acclivity he had reached on the road, and about a mile distant. A few minutes later the road commenced to descend gradually, leading through a wooded district on both sides of the way, terminating at Gurthford Park, upon entering the gates of which disclosed an avenue in a splendid forest of pine trees, which shortly after opened upon pasture land with the ancient Manor and Priory in full view in the sunshine of the wintry afternoon. On Desmond’s arrival at the mansion a welcome reception awaited him, and he was soon engaged in rapid conversation with his host and family.