The First R. Austin Freeman Megapack: 27 Mystery Tales of Dr. Thorndyke & Others

by R. Austin Freeman

  “Overboard,” he remarked stolidly.

  “What?” shrieked Barratt.

  “Overboard it is,” the skipper persisted doggedly.

  “But, how did it happen?” demanded Palmer.

  “Why, d’ye see,” replied the skipper, in even, unimpassioned tones, “’twas like this here: we set that there coffin across the fo’ksl scutfie, to be out o’ the way like, ’cos my mate, he didn’t like a-havin’ of it aboard. Said as how it’d bring trouble on us; and right he were, sure enough. We hadn’t fair got out through the Jenkin afore it began. Up comes a bloomin’ collier a-hootin’ like blazes and nearly wipes the paint off our quarter; then up we bumps agin the Yantlet Buoy, and I reckon that started the bloomin’ corfin a-travellin’, though we didn’t twig it. Then up comes a regilar squall from west’ard, and lays us right over to leeward—nearly capsized us, that there squall did, and I reckon the lurch we took give that corfin another lift. But we never noticed nothin’ cos, just then, a steam trawler an’ a collier an’ a Rooshian timber boat all comes on top of us together a-bellerin’ like bulls o’ Bashan. Thought we was bound for the cellar that time, I did, and so did my mate. But we jest managed to get ’er about afore the timber boat ’it us, and, as we come up, we takes a sea right over the ’ead. That’s what done it, I reckon, but we didn’t spot it, you understand. Well, when we was clear o’ them blighters, I says to my mate, I says: ‘Bill,’ I says, ‘jest run forrard and take a turn of a rope’s end round that there corfin.’ So he ’ooks it forrard, and then I ’ears ’im’ oller out. ‘Joe,’ he says, ‘there ain’t no bloomin’ corfin ’ere,’ ’e. says. ‘What!’ I says. ‘No,’ he says, ‘corfin’s gone overboard,’ ’e says, an’ that’s how it happened. I puts up me ’elm, and we cruised about there for nigh upon a hower, but nary a sign o’ that there corfin did we see. Three times we was within a inch o’ bein’ run down, an’ we nearly smashed ourselves on the Middle Blyth buoy, an’ then we lost our tide, an’ ’ad to bring up in Hole Haven. So now yer know about it.”

  As the skipper finished his narrative, he surveyed his hearers with a defiant stare, noting with some surprise the consternation that appeared on the countenances of the four mourners. To his nautical mind it seemed that the obsequies had been very satisfactorily concluded, and the needless expense of a shore funeral saved. Even the undertaker viewed his clients’ emotion with secret wonder, and thought they must have been exceedingly attached to the deceased.

  “Well, Mr. Allen,” said Barratt gloomily, when the skipper had departed; “what’s going to happen, and what is to be done?

  Mr. Allen was doubtful, but opined that the coffin would probably turn up somewhere. “But,” he added, “I don’t suppose you want an inquest.”

  His clients certainly did not, and said so with much emphasis. Then Mr. Allen developed the luminous idea of having some bills printed, or advertising in the papers; and he had begun drafting an advertisement beginning: “Lost, a coffin with contents,” when Barratt interrupted him:

  “The coffin was addressed to you, Mr. Allen,” said he. “For security, I painted the direction on the wood with Stockholm tar, so it won’t have washed off.”

  Mr. Allen was secretly shocked, but outwardly approving.

  “A very wise precaution,” said he, “and most fortunate under the circumstances.” Here he was called away for a short time, and during his absence the four conspirators debated anxiously whether they should scatter and watch the developments from afar, deputing the undertaker to conduct the funeral, or whether they should take the risk of waiting for tidings of the lost sheep. They had not reached any conclusion when Mr. Allen returned, and, having decided to continue the discussion later, they solemnly adjourned the proceedings and prepared to depart.

  Just as they reached the outer door of the premises, a seafaring man of truculent aspect entered, and stared around; and, looking out, they were aware of four other mariners approaching up the street, bearing a large, elongated object wrapped in a tarpaulin.

  “Are you Mr. Allen?” the ship-man inquired, fixing a fierce blue eye on the undertaker; and when the undertaker admitted his identity the seaman continued: “I’m the master of the tug Peacock. Name of Swivells. I’ve got a coffin consigned to you. Picked her up derelict off Yantlet Creek. Will ye ’ave ’er? If you say yes, you’ve got to pay salvage; if not, I delivers ’er to the Receiver of Wrecks.”

  Mr. Allen began cautiously to inquire as to the amount of the salvage dues, when Barratt interrupted:

  “We won’t haggle for a sovereign or so, Mr. Allen. I’ll settle with the captain, if you will arrange to have the funeral carried out without delay.”

  Mr. Allen bowed and hurried away, and so faithfully did he carry out his instructions that when the five mariners came forth from the saloon bar of “The Privateer,” four singularly cheerful-looking mourners were in the very act of scrambling into the mourning carriage.

  Decency will not allow us to follow the proceedings further. On the ears of the less callous Murray, the solemn and beautiful words of the Burial Service jarred painfully, whereas, to Barratt, we have with regret to admit that the references to the Resurrection merely associated themselves with the projected liberation of the swag. And thus the curtain fell on the obsequies of the late William Brunton, and thereafter the funeral baked meats were consumed without tears or lamentation—quite the contrary, in fact—in the festive neighbourhood of Piccadilly Circus.

  PART III

  Nearly six months had passed. The memory of the mysterious and successful robbery, by which the famous Harland collection of Chinese porcelain was plundered of its choicest gems, had faded from the minds of all but professed collectors; and the funeral of the late William Brunton had become to Mr. Allen and his friends as a tale that is told—and told pretty frequently.

  It was a dark night. The Parish Church clock had just struck half-past eleven; the heavy goods train had just rumbled through the station, and belated steamers were hooting on the river, when four men approached the cemetery of Gravelham by a deserted footpath, and gathered under the black shadow of the wall.

  “Your show, Barratt,” said a voice, resembling that of Mr. Jimmy Baker. “I’ll hoist you up while you fix the contraption.”

  In response, Barratt produced from his overcoat pocket a small rope ladder of thin, tough line, with two iron hooks at the top. Being hoisted up by the accommodating Jimmy, he fixed the hooks to the coping, got astride the wall, and dropped down inside. The others quickly followed, and the last one, having been hoisted up for the purpose, detached and pulled over the ladder and refixed it on the inside. Then, leaving it hanging, they stole off along the path towards the catacombs.

  “This is a ghoulish sort of job,” grumbled Murray, as they descended the steps and stood in the well-like cavity before the grisly black doors. It was certainly an eerie place. Even in the darkness they could see the crumbling tablets on the moss-grown jambs, seeming to whisper of dissolution and decay. A strange mouldy smell seemed to hang about that grim portal, and as they waited while Barratt oiled the great key, the wind stirred the big black doors until it sounded as if some one within were stealthily groping for some means of escape.

  At length the great key was inserted, the bolt shot back with a hollow clang, and the gloomy door swung inwards with a long-drawn sepulchral groan.

  “Poof!” exclaimed Murray, breathing the musty air distastefully; “let’s have a light, Barratt, for God’s sake!

  “Wait till I’ve shut the door and stopped up the key-hole,” was the reply; and Murray heard with an uncomfortable thrill the heavy door pushed to and the key turned from the inside. Then Barratt composedly produced a reading lantern and, having lit the candle, threw its light along a massive shelf and on the square ends of the row of coffins.

  “Fourth from the end, I think,” said Palmer, “but I’d better hop up and have a squint”; and as he climbed up, Murray asked:

  “How many are you going to take, B
arratt?”

  “Only three,” was the reply; “two Powder Blues and a Red Hawthorn. It’s no use taking more than we’ve negotiated. Have you got him, Palmer?”

  Yes,” replied Palmer, “it’s all right. Stand by to catch hold when I shove,” and, stooping to grasp the end, he gave a heave that slid the coffin well out beyond the edge of the shelf. His companions caught it, and with some difficulty lifted it to the ground. Then Barratt produced from his pocket a ratchet screwdriver of most approved design, and began skilfully to extract the screws.

  “Now,” he said, as he picked out the last, and his companions each drew a jemmy from his pocket, “stand by to hoist all together.”

  The jemmies were duly inserted into the well-pitched crack; Barratt gave the words “One, two, three,” and as he uttered the word “three” there was a bursting sound, the lid tilted and slid off, and the four men sprang back with astonished gasps. Barratt snatched up the lantern and threw its light into the coffin, and from the four men came simultaneously muffled cries of amazement.

  There was a brief interval of silence, during which the conspirators stood motionless as statues, staring with incredulous horror at the coffin. At length Barratt spoke:

  “You idiot, Palmer; you’ve sent us down the wrong coffin!”

  Palmer stumbled round, and, lifting the lid, held it up to the light of the lantern, which shone inexorably on the name-plate of the mythical William Brunton, and on the tar-written inscription which had so shocked the susceptibilities of the undertaker.

  “It’s our coffin right enough,” said Palmer; “there’s no doubt of that.”

  “Isn’t there?” shouted Baker wrathfully. “Then perhaps you will tell me how that old woman got into it, and what’s become of our swag?”

  “That’s what we should like somebody to tell us,” said Barratt, staring gloomily at the coffin, and holding his handkerchief over his nose. “Some one has butted in and upset our apple cart. Some one who’d got a superfluous corpse.”

  “You’re right, Barratt,” said Murray. “Very superfluous, indeed. Look here,” and he advanced cautiously to the coffin and pointed to a ragged hole in the throat of the repulsive figure within it.

  “Yes,” agreed Barratt, “there’s no mistake about it. That old woman has been ‘done in.’ Our coffin must have come in mighty handy for somebody who was in a tight place. And by that same token, we’re in a pretty tight place ourselves. The sooner we get that coffin lid on again and clear out, the healthier it will be for our necks.”

  The justice of these remarks was obvious. Willing and rather shaky hands replaced the lid. The screws were run rapidly into their holes, and the coffin replaced on its shelf. Once more the lock clanged, the gloomy door swung open with a groan and closed forever on the tragedy of the late William Brunton. A couple of minutes later, four dejected men trailed along the dark footpath on a circuitous route to the station, and for a while none of them spoke. It was Mr. Jimmy Baker who broke the silence in a tone of deep exasperation:

  “Well,” he exclaimed, “you are a pretty lot of blighters! Just see what you’ve done. You’ve blued about three hundred pounds of good money, and what have you got for it? You’ve provided a free funeral for some old Jude who wasn’t wanted, and you’ve made one of her pals a present of fifty thousand pounds worth of stuff. And where do I come in!”

  “You don’t come in at all,” growled Barratt; “you go out—with the rest of us; and devilish thankful you ought to be!”

  PART IV

  It was about a month later that the Morland Telegraph published under conspicuous head-lines the following announcement:

  “STRANGE DISCOVERY OF THE HARLAND TREASURES

  “The mystery which enshrouded the remarkable robbery from Mr. Harland’s collection of priceless Chinese porcelain has been resolved into an even greater mystery. Yesterday morning, the Rector of Stoke, in the Hundred of Hoo, walking down to the Blyth Sand to bathe, and looking round to observe the effects of the recent gale, noticed with surprise the necks of a number of blue jars standing up out of the sand. Picking one up, he saw at once that it was a porcelain vessel of great beauty, and proceeded with extreme care to disinter the remainder. Having some knowledge of porcelain, he immediately recognised the pieces as Chinese vases and jars of the kind known as Powder Blue and Hawthorn; and, recalling the late robbery, he carefully conveyed them to his house and communicated with the police. They have since been identified by Mr. Harland as his property, and he is to be congratulated on the fact that the discovery was made by so cultivated and conscientious a person.”

  The above paragraph was read with very different feelings by different readers. To the four conspirators, and to the public at large, it only made the mystery more profound. One man alone read in it nothing more than the final closing of a painful chapter. Laying down the paper, that man—a simple, white-haired bargeman—closed his eyes, and recalled the tragic incidents of a stormy night some seven months ago. He saw himself on his little barge, breasting the waters of the dark estuary, alone with his turbulent, drunken wife. He saw her, in a fit of wild passion, rush down to the cabin for the old-fashioned service revolver that he had foolishly kept there. He saw her struggle out of the little hatch, gibbering and threatening. He saw the flash and heard the loud report as she fell sprawling on the deck, and recalled his stony horror as he stood looking down at her corpse. And then, that marvellous interposition of Providence! The mysterious bumping and tapping against the barge’s side; the floating coffin, so weirdly opportune; and then that great wonder when, having painfully hauled it on deck and unscrewed the lid, his knife, ripping open the lead case, had revealed no corpse, but a mere collection of crockery! He recalled the dreadful exchange, the hollow splash as the coffin went once more adrift; the secret landing on the Blyth Sand; the careful interment of the china at high-water mark, and the tremulously-spoken, though casuistically true report which he had circulated next day that his old woman had slipped overboard in the darkness. He recalled it all clearly with a sigh that was not wholly regretful; then he opened his eyes, folded the newspaper and closed the chapter for ever.

  THE ATTORNEY’S CONSCIENCE (1918)

  I suppose if I were a sensitive man I should not be writing this history; or, at any rate, should not contemplate its perusal by strangers. For no man cares to be written down a liar; and many will conceal an incredible truth rather than run the risk. However, of these hyper-sensitive folk I am not one. For a good many years now I have practised at the bar; and, if that fact offers no guarantee of unimpeachable veracity it at least furnishes presumptive evidence of a fairly robust moral epidermis. I may not be believed; but the frankest scepticism will leave me undisturbed and unabashed.

  My connection with the surprising events that I am about to record, began at the moment of my entering the shop of Mr. Reuben Solomon in Booksellers’ Row. The “Row” has been swept away some years by a progressive County Council, and sorrowful ratepayers may look in through the palings and see very expensive wild flowers blooming—but not paying rates—upon its site. But in those days it was still standing, a happy hunting-ground for the bibliophile and a perennial joy to the urban artist; and Mr. Solomon’s shop still gladdened the bookish eye with colossal black-letter folios, antique volumes in rusty calf and dainty, vellum-bound Elzevirs.

  I found Mr. Solomon alone at the back of the shop dusting a range of shelves with a feather brush, and at once noticed a departure from his usual sprightly, genial manner. The worthy bookseller looked in decidedly low spirits.

  “Good-morning, Mr. Solomon,” I said cheerfully; “I hope I find you well this beautiful weather.”

  “Then you don’t,” he replied sourly.

  “Indeed! I am sorry for that. What’s the matter?”

  He laid down the feather brush and looked at me gloomily.

  “Balmy,” said he.

  “Balmy?” I repeated.

  “Yes, sir,” he rejoined. “Balmy.” And then, as
I stared at him in astonishment, he added by way of elucidation: “on the crumpet.”

  I was exceedingly surprised. Solomon was a cultivated man—I might say a learned man—and was not addicted to these coarse colloquialisms. But, of course, I did not take him seriously. The diagnosis of insanity is not usually made by the lunatic himself.

  “You’re out of spirits this morning, Mr. Solomon,” I said.

  “Spirits be blowed!” said he. “If I’m not going off my blooming onion I’ll—but there! it’s no concern of yours, Mr. Mitchell. You’ve come to see those books that I wrote to you about. I’ve made them up into a parcel, as I thought you would like to take them home to look at at your leisure. There are five of them—”

  He broke off abruptly, and, to my amazement, began to retreat down the shop in a most singular, stealthy manner, flattening himself against the wall as if he were squeezing past some bulky obstacle, and watching suspiciously the opposite range of bookshelves. When he was half-way down the shop, he turned and almost ran out; and on following him into the street, I found him earnestly examining the stock-in-trade of another bookseller some three doors farther up.

  “You were saying, Mr. Solomon—” I began.

  “Yes, about that parcel of books. It is on the shelf over the fireplace. Your name is written on it. Perhaps you wouldn’t mind going in and taking it. I find the shop rather stuffy just at present.”

  This was certainly very queer behaviour and most unlike Solomon, who was in general the very pink of politeness. I was greatly puzzled; but, as I was somewhat pressed for time, I went into the shop, found my parcel and bustled off with it after a few hasty words to the bookseller.

  As I had to call at the chambers of another barrister, I took the opportunity to run up to my own and leave the parcel there; and, as the books were of some value and were not mine, at present, I bestowed them in the upper part of my bureau, and, according to my invariable habit, turned the key. Then I went about my business.