August Derleth - The Solar Pons Omnibus Volume 1

by August Derleth

  Harris looked gravely at his watch and shook his head. "I am sorry, but I cannot come along. I would be late to my work if I did so. However, I will send a message to my sister to expect you. I am sure I wish you luck, Mr. Pons, for your luck is mine. But I know my uncle's periapt was on my bureau when I went into the bathroom, and it was not there when I came out. That is the long and short of it."

  Immediately after luncheon Solar Pons and I set out for South Norwood.

  Mr. Harris's house appeared to be one of a great number built in the same plan, in a somewhat restricted neighbourhood, for living space was obviously crowded, and the street outside the house was occupied by a great many urchins of both sexes. We were admitted to the house by a tired and harassed-looking woman whose features plainly and unmistakably identified her as our client's sister. Tired as she was, however, she was in good voice.

  "You're the gentlemen Siddie telephoned about. 'Agatha, I'm sending two gentlemen out to look around a bit,' he says to me. 'Whatever for?' I asked him, but he did not answer."

  Nor did Pons volunteer any information, though she paused pointedly.

  "He said I was to show you right to his room, gentlemen, and here it is, just as he left it. I ain't had time to put his clothes away, that he was to wear and forgot. Seems to me Siddie gets more forgetful every day."

  I confess that at this point, with the vision of our client as a forgetful young fellow, I began to feel that the adventure of his uncle's stolen amulet was certain to turn out to be one of the most trivial of all those exploits upon which I had had the good fortune to accompany my friend, Solar Pons. And our almost instant discovery on entering Harris's chamber came as confirmation of this conviction, for there, in plain sight on Harris's bureau, lay the object of our search!

  Pons closed the door behind him, shutting out our client's curious sister, and went directly over to the periapt.

  "Ah, I fancy this is what we want."

  "And more of a wild goose chase I have never seen," I said in disgust. "That fellow simply mislaid it, and his sister found it and put it back."

  "Slowly, slowly, Parker! How delightful and how empty life would be if all things were so simple! But I fear it is not so. You will reflect that his sister has only just now told us she had no time to put Harris's clothes away; it is not too much presumption to believe that she had no time to clean this room, either; there is no evidence of it. Furthermore, the actual reappearance of this periapt is not adequate grounds for adducing that our client did not know what he was talking about. No, you may depend upon it, Parker, our client meant and believed and knew just what he said; as he put it, the long and the short of it is that the periapt was on the bureau when he went to take his bath, and it was not there when he came back; now it is some three hours, almost four, since that time, and here it is back on the bureau once more. Yet it was gone, it had been taken. But manifestly it had not been stolen because of its monetary value."

  "Unless no pawn-broker would accept it," I protested.

  "In less than four hours, the thief had poor faith indeed if he gave up trying to dispose of it so quickly." He picked it up. "Besides, it has a good value. The jewels are real enough, and if I am any judge, the piece is solid gold. I fancy any pawn-broker would be happy to lend a modestly substantial sum on this piece. Let us just examine it."

  He bent over, turned it about, smiled with a most quizzical expression in his eyes, and handed it to me. "What do you make of it, Parker?"

  I took it and scrutinized it closely, aware that something about it had caught Pons's interest and imagination. The face of the amulet was not particularly attractive; indeed, I should have said it was singularly unattractive; its ruby was set squarely in the centre, and four little emeralds framed it in the shape of a cross. The entire face had a rough appearance, as if it had been pounded and worked by hand, and it badly needed burnishing. I turned it over and discovered that the back of the piece was burnished and carried the religious "verses" of which Harris had spoken. Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you. Numbers: 8, 2.

  "It appears to be quite valuable," I said, handing it back.

  "Nothing more?"

  I smiled. "If there is anything more to be learned from that piece, I should be delighted to be instructed."

  "Ah, forgive me, Parker; I am your humble servant. I should say only that it is possible to draw a conclusion or two from it. The late Murchison was a wise old bird, who, though he fancied his nephew, did feel that he lacked imagination and was altogether a little obtuse in matters pertaining to his own best interests. Plainly, too, he was a man who believed that one ought to merit his just deserts."

  "My dear Pons! You are joking."

  "Not at all. It is all written here as plainly as this quotation from the Bible."

  "I fail to see it."

  "Look again."

  He returned the periapt to my hand, and I examined it once more. I could not ascertain what it was that gave Pons any reason to make the deductions he had just made. I said so, with some heat.

  "Ah, well, ponder it. Perhaps it will come to you."

  I shrugged, a little nettled. "Well, this must certainly go down as our most unimportant and most quickly solved puzzle."

  "On the contrary, it has only begun. I daresay we shall have a little excursion before we are done. Come, we are finished here. Let us just go back into the city and surrender the periapt to Mr. Harris."

  So saying, he opened the door of the chamber and stepped out just as our client's sister made a show of being busy not far away. It was clear that she had been listening at the threshold. We bade her good-afternoon and set out for Chasins and Abramson's, to deliver his amulet to Mr. Sidney Harris.

  Our client was soberly pleased at Pons's discovery, though a little nervous at having been summoned from his work to take time for Pons's questions. He strove to settle upon a fee, but Pons would not ask one.

  "By no means, Mr. Harris. I found your little puzzle instructive, and our discovery of the periapt was due to no acumen of mine."

  "I cannot understand it," said Mr. Harris for the third time. "I know it was not there, it was not in the room —I searched for it carefully."

  "Ah, it is strange how objects can elude one. Tell me, Mr. Harris, do you have the key to your late uncle's house?"

  "Yes, Mr. Pons. Would you like to look at it?"

  "I have for some time been entertaining the thought of buying or renting a house in the country. It may be that your uncle's home is in the nature of what I had in mind. Do you think we might go down to look it over?"

  "When I can get away."

  "Ah, but I would rather not lose time. I should prefer to go down within a short time. If you will but lend me the key."

  "I think that will be all right, Mr. Pons. You can bring the key back to me here tomorrow."

  He detached the key from a ring in his pocket, and gave it to Pons.

  "By the way, your late uncle was a Roman Catholic, was he not?"

  "Yes, sir. Our family belongs to that faith."

  "You mentioned your family this noon. Would it be too much to ask you to describe them to me? Your sister, of course, we have seen."

  Harris looked apprehensively toward the clock on the wall of the waiting-room, but nevertheless set forth upon the details Pons had asked of him, with such precision that in a remarkably short time he had brought his father, his brother, and his cousin to vivid life, so that it seemed to me I should be able to identify any one of them at sight.

  "Ah, that is splendid, Mr. Harris. Is it my impression that your uncle carried this periapt as a kind of good-luck charm?"

  "So he said."

  "Of some years' standing?"

  "That was our belief."

  "Well, thank you, Mr. Harris. Good-day."

  As we were walking leisurely back toward our lodgings, Pons beckoned one of the street gamins to us; I recognized him for the son of a locksmith who had his
little shop in the vicinity. The boy came running up, a bright-eyed lad of ten or thereabouts, touched his cap, and stood with his arms akimbo before Pons.

  "Alfred, my lad —do you think you might find three other boys and come round to 7B posthaste?"

  "I think so, Mr. Pons."

  "Capital! I have a little mystery to solve. Be off with you now."

  The boy cut away and vanished into an alleyway; in a moment his voice sounded at a distance, raising a hue and cry for a companion. Pons looked after him with a whimsical smile.

  "Are you taking to the children to assist you now, Pons?" I asked.

  "I have used these lads before your time, Parker. And no doubt I shall use them after. They are remarkably alert. I call them my Praed Street Irregulars." He glanced at me quizzically. "Did not something in Mr. Harris's conversation give you pause, Parker?"

  "Oh, nothing but his fidgeting. Why, the man carried on as if he feared he would be summarily dismissed if he took time to answer your questions."

  "Yes, yes —but it was not that I had in mind. Did it not seem to you a little strange that a man like Teale Murchison should carry a good-luck piece?"

  "Many people do."

  "True. But surely it is inconsistent with the tenets of the Roman Catholic faith to put any trust in such charms and amulets as this?"

  "I believe it is."

  "And since we know that the late Murchison was a religious man, a manufacturer of Bibles, no less, this tale of his good-luck charm does not ring quite true."

  "What are you getting at?"

  "I submit that Mr. Harris's periapt was not designed as a good- luck charm at all."

  Somewhat impatiently, I retorted that very clearly it was meant to be coin of the realm.

  "Strange you should say so, Parker. Now, I had the distinct impression that the amulet was made up of two gold pieces, melted down —somewhat crudely, to be sure. Moreover, I submit that the amulet is not more than four months old at the most, and that it was made out of two of those gold pieces the late Murchison removed from his bank."

  "How can you possibly make that assertion?"

  "Ah, it is a simple matter of deduction, Parker."

  "Well, it is quite beyond me."

  "Indeed, it is so elementary I hesitate to mention it."

  But he offered no explanation, and I did not ask one, for it was manifest that he believed anyone alert and observant should have recognized his premises. So it was in silence that we mounted the steps of Number Seven and went up to our rooms.

  We had hardly removed our light coats before there was a rush and a clatter on the stairs, coupled with Mrs. Johnson's indignantly raised voice; the door was thrown open without ceremony, and young Alfred burst into the room, followed pell-mell by a trio of grinning urchins.

  "Here we are, Mr. Pons!" cried Alfred, closing the door and marching up to the table, followed by his companions, who ranged themselves in a row beside him.

  "So I see," replied Pons. "It is a mystery to me how you can manage to act so quickly, Alfred —even to the extent of having a little bread with jelly before you came. Yes, there at the corner of your mouth, my boy."

  While he spoke, Pons went about gravely taking from his pocket four guineas, which he placed in a neat row at the edge of the table. Four pairs of bright, eager eyes watched him with keen interest.

  "Now, then," continued Pons, standing before them. "How many of you have cycles?"

  Two hands went up.

  "Good. Two will carry the four of you. I have a little errand I want you to do. For the next three hours I want you to watch a house in South Norwood. There are four people of interest to me. The fifth I know. I want you to watch everything these people do, put down where they go, and come back here by six o'clock. Then these guineas will belong to you. Listen to me carefully."

  Thereupon he repeated almost word for word the excellent description of his relatives given us by Mr. Sidney Harris, our recent client; and, so armed, the boys descended the stairs with the same clatter and banging which had accompanied their arrival. Pons, appearing well pleased with himself, rubbed his hands in satisfaction and gazed over at me with a twinkle in his eyes.

  "The lads are far less likely to excite suspicion than you or I might be. And these are onerous details."

  "It would seem to me that Harris might have told you what you wanted to know."

  "Not he. No, no, Parker, he is too trusting. He sees no evil, hears none, and plainly believes little. We must have some unbiased comment on these people, and I am sure we shall get it from the 'Irregulars.' "

  Promptly on the hour set, the boys returned.

  As their acknowledged leader, Alfred instructed them, one after the other, to make their reports. The smallest lad, a red-haired boy called "Pinky," had been detailed to observe Harris's sister, who had emerged once in late afternoon to go shopping. Pinky did not have a high opinion of the lady, for he observed that she quarreled with the greengrocer about the price of vegetables. She was also seen to manifest her insatiable curiosity by peering into windows of the neighbouring houses. She gabbled for a long time with another woman out shopping, and the boy had crept close enough to overhear the two ladies energetically gossiping about a third. The second lad kept his eye out for the old man, Harris's father; he had come home from the house of a friend, and was clearly enough an ailing man. A husky lad had pushed him home in a wheel-chair, and the old man had given him a coin of some kind; he had seemed very friendly and bore very well the immediate scolding set up by his daughter.

  The third lad had watched for Richard Murchison, who had arrived home from his work shortly after four o'clock. He was a boyish young fellow, and shortly after he had gone into the house, he came back out once more carrying a letter, which he read. "It was a love letter," said the lad scornfully.

  "Ah, indeed! How could you tell, Peter?"

  " 'E 'ad such a silly grin, 'e did, all the time 'e was a-readin' it. Then 'e picked a flower and 'eld it under 'is nose, 'e set down on the kerb and read the letter twice over."

  "Ah, observant lad! Poor Richard is a second time bitten in the same place."

  Clearly the lad had no good opinion of Richard for his being in love.

  Alfred, however, had the longest tale to tell. He had watched Harris's brother, whose name, he had discovered, was Charles. Charles had been at home when the boys arrived, but he did not stay there long. He went down the street some distance to a pub; there he sat for some time scribbling on the back of an envelope. Then he went to a library in the neighbourhood and came out whistling. He went back to the pub and bought drinks for the three or four men in the place at that time. He did a little more calculating and writing on the edge of a newspaper. He crumpled up one of the papers on which he had been writing and threw it away as he came out of the pub; Alfred had rescued it, and now handed it to Pons, who took it eagerly and unfolded it.

  "Ah, Mr. Charles's new suit is ready, his tailor writes, 'but please, sir, to come with the money to pay for it in advance.' " He looked up. "Evidently Charles is living on his future."

  "That's all, Mr. Pons," said Alfred.

  "Well done, boys! And there are your guineas. Now be off with you."

  There was a chorus of "Thank you, sir!" and once again that mad clatter on the stairs, followed by Mrs. Johnson's portentous sighs, made pointedly loud from below, so that Pons and I would be sure to hear.

  "Mrs. Johnson bears her cross well," observed Pons. "Well, Parker, what do you make of it?"

  "Frankly, nothing."

  "Oh, it is not as bad as that. I fancy Charles is the man we want. I have no doubt he overheard his brother say he meant to have a bath, and slipped back into the house to take the periapt while Sidney was in his bath. He had begun to wonder about the periapt. That he did not get it back before Sidney came out again was very likely a miscalculation on his part."

  "Oh, come, Pons! How is it possible from these lads' tales to deduce that?"

  "Why, it is a
process of simple elimination. Harris's father and sister are clearly out of it; his cousin is in love, and between his work and his romance —his addiction to romance, you will remember, was responsible for the rift between his father and himself—he has little time for such calculations which plainly occupy the mind of Mr. Charles Harris."

  "What are those figures on the envelope?"

  "They are calculations concerning the probable state of Mr. Charles Harris's finances, if he can riddle himself into riches. He does not seem to be a poor man, for all that there is no evidence of his having saved money." He threw the letter carelessly to the table and got up. "But come, Parker, we have but an hour or two until darkness to get on with it."

  Mystified, I got into my overcoat, and set out with Pons for the street below, where we walked for a short distance before Pons managed to hail a cab. We got in, and Pons gave the driver the address of our destination. It was not South Norwood. It was beyond London, past the outlying districts of the city.

  "I thought it was Charles we were after," I said pointedly.

  "Dear me, no. Charles is the man who purloined the periapt. We are done with him unless he has more wit than I credit him with. As to that, we shall see in good time. We are off to look over Mr. Teale Murchison's country-house."

  "Yes, that is a matter I meant to ask about. What the devil did you mean by telling such a fabrication to Harris?"

  "Ah, you know my methods, Parker. Ponder them."

  Pons sat back and relaxed, his eyes half-closed. Swallowing my chagrin, I did likewise.

  In a little over an hour, we were delivered at a fine old country estate, clearly at one time the property of a wealthy man. Pons instructed the driver to wait, and we walked up a flagstone path under a gracious avenue of trees to the front door, a heavy, paneled piece with bronze finishings. Pons fished from his pocket the key Harris had given him, inserted it into the lock, and opened the door.

  "I take it you are looking for something specific," I said as we entered the house.