Whilst the others were searching, Ben and Amy took one of the candlesticks and began examining it minutely from sconce to base. They scanned the intricate engraving for any trace of hidden writing. Ned nudged the other candlestick with his nose. It fell over and rolled down the grass bank of the pathside. The Labrador chased after it and grabbed it in his mouth by the top. Eileen was engrossed in searching through the lumps of tallow. Alex had lost interest, having already searched through it once, when he spotted the dog with the candlestick in his mouth. Scrambling forward, the younger boy grabbed the base of it and tried to tug it from Ned’s jaws.
“Where are you going with that? Naughty fellow, give it to me. Let go, Ned!”
But the big Labrador was not about to let go. He dug his front paws into the grass and tugged back, sending a thought out to Ben. “Huh, the nerve of the lad. Tell him to let go, mate. He’s supposed to be messing with the tallow— these candlesticks are our job. Tell him, Ben!”
The boy turned his head to see what was going on, and saw Alex and Ned tugging the candlestick between them. All at once there was a pop, like a cork being pulled from a bottle, and the two fell back upon their bottoms—each holding a half of the candlestick!
Everybody came running at the sound of Ben and Alex shouting. “We’ve found it! We’ve found it!”
The big dog allowed Ben to relieve him of the top half, passing a highly indignant thought to his master. “You’ve found it? Well, of all the nerve, it was me who found it!”
The boy hugged the Labrador’s neck, returning the thought. “Of course you did, pal. When we get home, I’ll make sure Winnie rewards you with the best feed you’ve ever had!”
The dog licked Ben’s face. “Now you’re talking, shipmate!”
Mr. Mackay peered into the hollow cylinder of Ben’s half-candlestick. “Ah yes, yes, yes, a small scroll of paper. I could get at it, if I had a pair of tweezers.”
“Let me try, please.” The lawyer handed the candlestick over to Amy. Her slim fingers and strong fingernails soon extracted the scroll. It was very thin, delicate paper, almost transparent. She gave it to the old seaman, who unrolled it carefully as the others looked on with bated breath.
Will leaned over Jon’s shoulder and looked. His sigh of frustration was audible. “No message, just a lot of little lines.”
Later, Sergeant Patterson made more tea for them as Mr. Braithwaite gazed at the thin paper lying on the charge-office desk. “Hmm, lines and a few dots. Spaced out in, er, rather a, er, peculiar way. Hmmm.”
The lines and the dots seemed to have no connection.
The sergeant glanced at them as he passed out mugs of tea. “Very peculiar, ah’d say, what d’ye think, laddie?”
Ben stood with his eyes riveted on the paper. “I’d say
39
WILL’S MA TOOK LITTLE WILLUM TO visit Mrs. Winn that afternoon. Not having heard from Ben or the others, the anxious older woman was delighted to see them. They had tea and hot, buttered crumpets. Willum liked a dab of strawberry jam on his crumpet and sat on the carpet, the picture of happiness, his cheeks smeared with jam. Catching sight of Horatio, he crawled off in hot pursuit, attempting to get his sticky fingers on the cat, calling, “Fussy ca’, fussy ca’!”
Within minutes they had another visitor come calling. Hetty Sullivan, the Smitherses’ maidservant. Mrs. Winn hastened to top off the teapot and toast more crumpets. Hetty was a good sort—she rescued Horatio from little Willum’s attentions and put him out in the garden.
Willum protested aloud as she cleaned him up with a wet flannel and towel. “Gaaah, wanna fussy ca’!”
The three ladies had just settled down to their tea, when Delia came clopping up the lane. Mrs. Winn threw up her arms in mock despair. “Merciful heavens, it looks like open house here today—there’s a whole crew arriving!”
The servant girl could see the old lady was secretly pleased to have so many callers on a Thursday afternoon. “You stay there, Miz Winn, I’ll see to them.”
Mrs. Winn made a move to rise, then sat back down. “Thank you, Hetty, I’m afraid we’ve eaten all the crumpets. There’s a Dundee cake and a currant loaf in the larder. Oh, and you’d best get the big teapot out!”
Wiping their muddy boots on the doormat, Ben and his friends trooped in. The open-faced farmer’s wife swept little Willum up and hugged him. “You rascal, fancy findin’ you ’ere!”
The older woman’s cheeks were flushed to a rosy hue as she took Ben’s hand. “So many people, lad! Well, did you have any luck?”
The boy winked at Amy. “Show her.”
With a flourish the girl placed both of the candlesticks on the table. “St. Matthew’s treasure, the light bearers ’neath the ground!”
Mrs. Winn held up her hands, as if afraid to touch them. “Oh my! Oh goodness! They’re absolutely beautiful!”
Mr. Braithwaite picked one up and rubbed a fingermark off with his sleeve. “Er, beautiful indeed, marm. Byzantine, er, er, workmanship, hmmm, a long-lost art, yes, er, very good!”
Mr. Mackay folded both hands beneath the tails of his coat and paced around before holding forth. “Unfortunately, madam, we have as yet been unable to find the deeds to your land. In my estimation we now have the three pieces sent up by Bishop Peveril from the court of King Edward the Third: a chalice, a cross, and a set of candlesticks to grace the altar of the church, which later became the almshouse. But it is the deeds that are vital to our cause. And we do not have them! Each piece has given us a clue, leading to the next one, from Luke to John and on to Matthew. But I regret to inform you that the message we found with the candlesticks is very obscure and far, far too cryptic for us to search further. Rather a shame, seeing as the deadline is tomorrow morning.” He rolled out his prediction: “If the deeds are not found by then, Chapelvale will be in the hands of the developers!”
The old woman put down her teacup. “Where did you find the candlesticks?”
The younger boy answered. “Under the old police station yard. Constable Judmann wasn’t going to let us in, but Sergeant Patterson allowed us to dig there. He even helped.”
The Smitherses’ Hetty trundled in with a trolley, laden with tea and cakes. “Sergeant Patterson, ’e’s a nice bobby, where’s ’e now?”
Alex took a wedge of Dundee cake. “Back up at the station. There was a message coming in on the button machine. . . .”
“You mean the telegraph,” his sister corrected him. “The sergeant said he’d follow us up here after the message had arrived.”
Will’s ma was growing impatient. “Well, where’s this obscure clue? Don’t we get to see it?”
“Here ’tis, Sarah, see what you make of it.” The ship’s carpenter passed her the thin paper sheet.
Screwing her eyes up, Ma inspected it briefly before passing it to Mrs. Winn. “Lot o’ lines an’ dots, don’t mean a thing t’me!” she said as a knock at the door announced the sergeant’s arrival.
As Hetty served the young policeman tea, he took the telegram from his tunic pocket. “Ah was on mah way tae check on Judmann at the railway station, when auld Mr. Talbot called me intae the post office an’ gave me this telegraph, from the postmistress at Church Haven, over fifty miles from here. It says that early this mornin’, four o’ Queen Victoria’s couriers passed through there. Seems the poor laddies were lost. Anyway, they drove off in a motorcar, without waitin’ tae hear proper directions. Sounds odd tae me.”
“D’you think it’ll have anything to do with the village bein’ turned into a quarry an’ cement factory, Sergeant?”
Patterson folded the telegraph form, pondering the dairyman’s question.
“Och, ah dinna think the Queen’s even heard of our village. Tae mah knowledge, we’ve never had royal couriers visitin’ Chapelvale. If any such thing were planned, London would contact the police station, not the local post office, an’ ah’ve had no word at all from London, ye ken?” He tucked the telegram back in his pocket. “There’s somethin�
�� strange goin’ on. Ah’m goin’ back tae the village, tae look further intae this matter!”
“Could I come with you, Sergeant Patterson?” The blue-eyed boy had become alert at the mention of London.
Amy tapped the paper upon the table. “But what about solving this riddle?”
Ben made his excuses. “I won’t be too long, Amy, Jon. There’s something I’ve got to talk with the sergeant about. I’ll bet with all the brains here you’ll have the riddle beaten before I get back. Keep them at it, Mr. Braithwaite!”
The old scholar blinked, ruffling his arms in his sleeves, as Ben and his big, black dog accompanied the policeman out.
“Eh, er, keep them at it? Oh, er, yes, very good young, er!”
As the front door closed, Will’s mother, more curious than ever, indicated the paper. “Where did you find this, Will?”
“Inside one of the candlesticks, Ma, why?”
“Which one?”
Eileen picked up a candlestick. “This one, I think.”
Alex shook his head. “No, it was the other one. Ned’s teeth made a slight scratch on that one. I noticed it when I put the two halves back together. See?” He pointed to the faint scratch on the other candlestick.
Mrs. Winn poured herself more tea. ‘That’s the one you found the paper in, eh, Jon?”
“Aye, that’s the one, marm.”
She took a sip of her tea. “Then why haven’t you looked inside the other one? Doesn’t it come apart?”
The good-natured farmer’s wife laughed heartily. “Hahahaha! Good thinkin’, Winnie, what a bunch o’ puddin’ ’eads we are!”
The ex-seaman and the dairyman took an end each, and they pulled, like two children with a Christmas cracker. The candlestick popped apart so easily that Will fell backward and Jon bumped into Mr. Mackay.
Apologies were forgotten as they stared at the slim scroll of paper lying on the floor.
40
SERGEANT PATTERSON WAS AN EASY man to get on with. Ben explained to him how he had come by the information that Smithers’s guest, Maud Bowe, was having four of her father’s company thugs sent up from London to frighten Mrs. Winn into leaving her home.
The sergeant spoke without looking at Ben as they walked toward the village square. “Why didn’t ye inform me of this before, lad?”
The boy thought hard before replying. “Well, I’d never met you before this morning. But when you got that telegraph message, and it mentioned four men coming up from London, I thought you’d better know about what I’d found out, so I’m telling you now.”
The Scots sergeant nodded. “Aye, fair enough. I hope ye don’t mind me askin’, but how did ye plan on dealing with them? Always providing that what Hetty told Miz Winn was fact, and not just kitchenmaid’s tittle-tattle.”
Ben’s blue eyes narrowed. “Oh, I’d think of something, one way or another.”
The sergeant questioned him further. “Did ye tell any o’ the others—Jon or Will, for instance?”
“No, you’re the first one I’ve spoken to about it.”
The policeman could not help admiring the boy’s courage. “And ye were goin’ tae handle it all on your own, eh?”
Ben stopped and stared at the bobby. “Me and Ned could do it!”
There was something about the pair, the manner in which the big, black dog stood by the boy and the determined light in the boy’s blue eyes. Sergeant Patterson smiled. “Ah’d bet money that ye could. But there’s three of us now, and ah’m the law. Ah was a constable for four years in the east end o’ London. Ah think ye’d better let me give ye some assistance, son.” He held out his hand. “All right with ye?”
The boy shook Patterson’s hand. “Fine with me, Sarge. Righto, Ned?”
The black Labrador held out his paw to the astonished sergeant, who shook it firmly and laughed. “Hahahah! Yon’s a pretty intelligent dog!”
The dog flashed a passing thought to his master. “This young sergeant’s fairly bright, too, eh, lad!”
The postmaster, Seth Talbot, had more news for them when they arrived at his office. “Message just come through from Drakehampton. I don’t think those four men in the motor vehicle know who they are. Asked the postmistress there directions for Chapelvale, said they were racehorse buyers. Drove off and nearly knocked an old gent down who was crossing the road.”
The sergeant turned to Ben. “Would ye like to go around tae the railway station sidings for me? Tell Constable Judmann ah can’t relieve him yet and tae stay there. I’m going tae use the telegraph here. Get a description of our four friends and their motorcar from Drakehampton. Then ah’ll contact headquarters in London and see what they know about them.”
The constable was in his element. He stood holding on to the bicycle, in view of the “Prohibition of Movement” notice he had fixed to the railway trucks. Nothing but his sergeant’s command would cause him to quit his post, he assured Ben, adding, “You tell the sarn’t I’ll stand ’ere all day an’ all night, if needs be, lad!”
Sergeant Patterson was beaming when they returned to the post office. The Labrador passed a thought to Ben. “I must look just like that when I get a big beef marrowbone!”
The boy could not hide a grin. “Aye, you do!”
Further thoughts were cut short by the sergeant, who met the two at the door. “Och, ye were right, lad! George Pearson, alias Gripper, Frederick Lloyd, alias Flash, Charles Hyland, alias Chaz, and Eric Wardle, alias Chunk. Driving a motorized vehicle, registration number BLH 98. Stolen from the front drive of Colonel Busby Hythe Simmonds of South Hampstead Crescent, London, yesterday evening!”
He strode from the post office, patting Ben’s back and stroking the dog’s head, a definite spring in his step. “Och aye, they’ve been guests at headquarters quite a few times. Felons, that’s what they are, Ben. Known criminals!”
Ben had to trot to keep up with the sergeant’s long strides. “What’s the next move, then, Sarge?”
Patterson squared his shoulders. “Reception committee, lad. We’ve got tae give our London friends a warm welcome. Haha, if the constable knew he’d be sharpenin’ his bayonet and cleaning up his auld army rifle. . . . Best leave him guarding the railway trucks, eh? Excitement, Ben, the very spice of life!”
“Ask him where we’re off to now, pal?”
Ben caught the Labrador’s thought and asked the sergeant, “Where are we going now, Sarge?”
“Tae Miz Winn’s house, o’ course, ah want tae see if they’ve solved the candlestick riddle. Keep up there, partner!”
Relief flooded the boy as he marched jauntily alongside his competent friend. He had not really known what he was going to do about the London villains. Of course, he had put on a confident air when Winnie told him about them, but that was mainly for her benefit. Truth was he had acted just like a typical Chapelvale villager, pushing the matter to the back of his mind, hoping that it was all just Hetty’s gossip. He counted himself very lucky that he had confided in Sergeant Patterson.
“Don’t blame yourself too much, pal.” The dog followed in Ben’s tracks. “A boy and a dog are pretty thin odds against four full-grown rogues. Our policeman’ll deal with ’em, look at the sergeant. He’s actually looking forward to it.”
Ben tugged Ned’s tail. “Excuse me, pal, but d’you mind not cutting in on my thoughts?”
The Labrador snapped playfully at Ben’s ankle. “And what about my thoughts, pray? I was as worried as you about the issue. Thank goodness for the law, I say!”
They encountered a fairly pensive group in the Winn sitting room, studying a piece of paper that lay unfurled upon the table.
Ben looked hopefully to the seaman. “So you found something, is that it?”
“Aye, lad. That paper was rolled up inside the other candlestick. What d’you make of it?”
The paper, for the most part, was blank, except for one corner, which had two rows of tiny cramped writing.
Ben read aloud. “ ‘Be of good heart, like a fl
ame pure and true. May the light of St. Mark bring my words unto you. E.D.W.’ ”
The sergeant picked up the paper and inspected it. “Good, thick, quality stuff. Far more substantial than the thin slip in the other candlestick. Have ye tried matching them together in any way?”
Mr. Braithwaite placed the thin paper on the table. “We were just, er, about to do so, er, yes, quite so!”
Between them, Braithwaite and Mr. Mackay tried connecting both papers. Heeding every suggestion put forward by the rest, they placed the papers side by side, one over the other, semi-overlapping, and in every other possible combination that could be guessed at.
The result was absolutely nothing.
Will Drummond clenched both fists. Shutting his eyes tight, he called out in frustration, “St. Mark, are you listenin’? We’re all of good heart! D’you think you could let us in on your secret, eh? Before ’tis too late for Chapelvale!”
Will’s ma pursed her lips severely. “William Drummond! Don’t you be so disrespectful to one o’ the Lord’s disciples, you won’t get anythin’ done like that!”
The blue-eyed boy felt pins and needles prickle his scalp, realizing the truth of her statement. He recalled another place and another time, long ago, when a man had ranted and called out against heaven. And he remembered the results of that day.
Eileen rescued little Willum, who was trying to sit on Ned’s back. “Ma’s right, Will. Any’ow, I think there’s too many cooks at the puddin’ round ’ere. Ain’t you got nothin’ else to do, you menfolk?”
Sergeant Patterson had an idea. “Why don’t you ladies and Mr. Braithwaite set your minds tae solving the puzzle. Ah’ll take the men out into the kitchen—there’s something Ah want tae speak tae them about.”
Winnie exchanged a secret smile with her friend Hetty. “Agreed, Sergeant. Would you mind taking these dishes out with you when you go and washing them? We’ll let you know when we want more tea.”
[Flying Dutchman 01] - Castaways of the Flying Dutchman Page 22