The Third Mystery

by James Holding

  “You see,” he said to Inspector Murchison, who happened to be nearest to him, “Tom here”—he indicated his assistant—“wanted to dig a long trench to yon hedge and carry the water out into the valley, but I says ‘What’s the use of going to all that trouble when it can be done a quicker way?’ I says to Tom, ‘Let’s put a bit of gumption into it and empty it the easiest way. For once the water’s out of the well, it don’t matter a dump where it runs, for it’s no good to nobody.’”

  “Very true,” said Inspector Murchison, who believed in being polite to everybody.

  “‘Therefore,’ says I to Tom, ‘it stands to reason that the quickest way to empty the well, and the way with least trouble to ourselves, will be to cut from here to that there drain there.’”

  “How much longer will you be emptying it?” demanded Detective Gillett, approaching the well and interrupting the flow of the old man’s eloquence.

  “That depends, sir, on what water there’s in it.”

  This reply was too philosophical to appeal to the practical minded detective. He declared with some sharpness that the sooner it was emptied the better it would be for everybody.

  “We are getting towards the bottom now, sir,” said the man at the pump, who interpreted the detective’s words as a promise that beer would make its appearance when the water had gone. “It ain’t a very deep well, not more than fourteen feet at most, and I should say another half hour—maybe more—would see the end of this here job.”

  “Very well, then, be as quick as you can.”

  The three police officers remained beside the well, watching the pumping. In a little more than half an hour the flow of water from the mouth of the pump began to decrease. Then the pump began to gurgle and the water stopped. Suction had ceased and the well was practically empty.

  Under Detective Gillett’s instructions the men who had emptied the well removed the boards which covered the top, and one of them went to the barn and returned with a long ladder. Between them they lowered the ladder into the empty well. The ladder was more than long enough to reach the bottom, for the top was several feet above the mouth of the well.

  “That will do, men,” ordered the Scotland Yard detective. He climbed to the edge of the well as he spoke.

  “Have you a light?” asked Sergeant Westaway in a moment of inspiration.

  For reply Detective Gillett displayed a powerful electric torch, and placed one foot on the ladder.

  “Better take the stable lantern, sir,” urged the inventor of the well-emptying plan. “You’ll find it better down there than them new-fangled lights. You’ll be able to see further with a sensible lantern.”

  “And you’d better put on my boots,” said the other fisherman. “The well’s a bricked ’un, but it’ll be main wet and muddy down there.”

  Detective Gillett pronounced both ideas excellent and acted on them. Sergeant Westaway procured the stable lantern, and lighted it while the detective drew on the fisherman’s long sea boots. Thus equipped, and holding the lantern in his right hand, with an empty bag over his shoulder, the Scotland Yard man stepped on to the ladder, and disappeared from view.

  Sergeant Westaway intimated to the fishermen who had emptied the tank that the work for which they had been engaged was finished; but it was some minutes before he could make it clear to their slow intellects that their presence was no longer required. When they did understand, they were very loath to withdraw, for they had looked forward with delight to seeing the emptied well yield up some ghastly secret—perhaps another murdered body—and it was only by the exercise of much sternness that Sergeant Westaway was able to get them away from the scene by personally escorting them off the farm and locking the gate after them.

  He returned to the well to see Detective Gillett emerging from it. Gillett was carrying the bag and the lantern in one hand, and it was obvious that the bag contained something heavy. The triumphant face of the detective, as he emerged into the upper air, indicated that he had made some important discovery. He stepped off the ladder and emptied the contents of the bag on the ground. They consisted of a heavy pair of boots, hobnailed and iron-shod, such as are worn by country labourers and farmers, and a five-chambered revolver. The revolver was rusty through immersion in the water, and the boots were sodden and pulpy from the same cause.

  Inspector Murchison and Sergeant Westaway inspected the articles in silence. At length the former said:

  “This is a very important discovery.”

  “I would direct your attention to the fact that it is a Webley revolver—one of the two patterns approved by the War Office for Army officers,” said Detective Gillett. “Unless I am much mistaken it is a 4.5—that is the regulation calibre for the Army. And I have discovered more than that!”

  The police officers ceased looking at the articles on the ground, and directed their eyes to the Scotland Yard detective in response to the note of exultation in his voice. In answer to their look he put his hand into a side pocket and withdrew a small article which he had wrapped in a handkerchief. Unrolling the latter carefully, he held up for their inspection a pair of gold-rimmed eyeglasses.

  CHAPTER XVII

  “We have evidence, Captain Marsland, that the statement you made to Sergeant Westaway regarding your discovery of the dead body of Frank Lumsden at Cliff Farm on the night of Friday, 16th October, is untrue.”

  If Detective Gillett had expected the young man to display either alarm or resentment at this statement he was disappointed. Marsland made no outward sign of astonishment at being addressed by his military title by the detective, or at being accused of having made a false statement. With steady eyes he met the detective’s searching gaze.

  In response to a request telephoned by Detective Gillett to Sir George Granville’s house at Staveley, Marsland and Crewe had motored over to Ashlingsea police station. They had been met on their arrival by the detective and Sergeant Westaway, and after a constrained welcome had been conducted to the Sergeant’s inner room. The door had been carefully closed, and Constable Heather, who was in the outer room, had been told by his superior that on no account were they to be disturbed.

  There was such a long pause after Detective Gillett had exploded his bomb, that the obligation of opening up the situation suggested itself to him.

  “Do you deny that?” he asked.

  “I do not.” In a clear tone and without any indication of embarrassment the young man made his reply.

  “You admit that your statement is false?”

  “I do.”

  “What was your object in making a false statement to the police?”

  “I am not prepared to tell you at present.”

  “Well, perhaps you know your own business best, Captain Marsland, but I warn you that you are in a very serious position. It is for you to decide whether the truth will help you or not.”

  “Do you intend to make a charge against me?”

  Gillett was taken aback at this blunt question. He had arranged the interview because he believed he was in a position to embarrass the young man with a veiled threat of police action, but the young man, instead of waiting for the threats, wanted to know if the police were prepared to act. But Detective Gillett was too experienced an officer to display the weakness of his hand.

  “I intend to detain you until I have made further inquiries,” he said.

  “How long will these inquiries take?” asked Crewe.

  “No one knows better than you, Mr. Crewe, that it is impossible for me to answer such a question,” said the Scotland Yard man. “One thing leads to another in these cases. As Captain Marsland shows no disposition to help us, they will take at least three or four days.”

  “But perhaps I can help you,” suggested Crewe.

  “Well, I don’t know what evidence you have picked up in the course of your investigations, Mr. Crewe, but I can tell you that Westaway and I have some evidence that will startle you. Haven’t we, Westaway?”

  “Very startling eviden
ce, indeed,” said the sergeant, in a proud official tone.

  “I am glad of that,” said Crewe. “Perhaps the addition of the little I have picked up—that is the addition of whatever part of it is new to you—will enable you to solve this puzzling crime.”

  “Very likely indeed,” said Gillett. “There are not many links missing in our chain of evidence.”

  “I congratulate you,” responded Crewe. “There are a good many missing in mine.”

  Gillett broke into a laugh in which there was a distinct note of self-satisfaction.

  “That is a very candid admission, Mr. Crewe.”

  “As between you and me why shouldn’t there be candour?” said Crewe. “But what about my young friend Marsland? As it is a case for candour between you and me, we can’t have him present. For my part, I should prefer that he was present, but of course that is impossible from your point of view. You cannot go into your case against him in his presence.”

  “Certainly not,” said Gillett decisively. “And before I produce my evidence to you, Mr. Crewe, I must have your word of honour not to tell a living soul, not to breathe a hint of it to any one, least of all to Captain Marsland. If you give me your word of honour I’ll be satisfied. That is the sort of reputation you have at Scotland Yard—if you want to know.”

  “It is very good of you to talk that way,” replied Crewe. “I give you my word of honour not to speak to any one of what happens here, until you give me permission to do so. Marsland will wait outside in charge of Constable Heather. He will give you his word of honour not to attempt to escape.”

  “Is that so?” asked Gillett of the young man.

  Marsland nodded, and was handed over to Constable Heather’s care by Sergeant Westaway. When the sergeant returned he closed the door carefully.

  “Lock it,” said Gillett. “And cover up the key-hole; we don’t want any one peeping through at what we’ve got here.”

  “I like this,” said Crewe with a smile. “I feel that I am behind the scenes.”

  “As regards Captain Marsland,” said Gillett after a pause, “I may as well tell you, Mr. Crewe, that I don’t want to deal more harshly with him than the situation demands—at this stage. Things may be very different a little later—it may be outside my power to show him any consideration. But I don’t want to detain him here—I don’t want to lock him up if it can be avoided. You know what talk there would be both here and in Staveley. I am thinking of his uncle, Sir George Granville. I’ll tell you what I’ll do. If he will give me his word of honour that he will not attempt to escape, and if you and his uncle will do the same, I’ll let him go back to Staveley in charge of Heather. There will be no difficulty in explaining Heather’s presence there to any friends of Sir George’s. What do you think of it?”

  “Excellent!” said Crewe.

  What was most excellent about it, in the private opinion of Crewe, was the ingenious way in which it extricated Detective Gillett from an awkward situation. When he had arranged the interview for the purpose of frightening Marsland with a threat of detention, he had had this plan in his mind. He had not quite sufficient evidence against Marsland to justify him in arresting that young man without some damaging admissions on the part of the young man himself. And the plan to place him in charge of Heather was a technical escape from the difficulties that surrounded Marsland’s actual arrest at that stage; but, on the other hand, it would appear in the young man’s eyes as though he were under arrest and this was likely to have an important influence in getting some sort of confession from him.

  “Bring out those things,” said Detective Gillett to Sergeant Westaway, and pointing to the cupboard against the wall.

  Westaway produced a hand-bag and placed it on the table. Gillett took a bunch of keys from his trousers pocket and unlocked the bag.

  “First of all, here is the key of the house,” he said, as he held out in the palm of his hand the key of a Yale lock. “As you must have noticed, Mr. Crewe, the front door of the farmhouse closes with a modern Yale lock; the old lock is broken and the bolt is tied back with a string. You will notice, inside the hole for the key to go on a ring, that there is a stain of blood. Next, we have a pair of heavy boots. These were worn by the man who murdered Frank Lumsden, for they correspond exactly with the plaster casts we took of the footprints outside the window.”

  Westaway, who had opened the door of the cupboard, placed on the table near Crewe two plaster casts.

  Crewe, after returning the key he had been examining, compared the boots with the plaster casts.

  “I believe you are right,” he said, after a pause.

  “Here we have the bullet that was fired. As you will remember, Mr. Crewe, it went clean through Lumsden’s body, and through the window. But what you don’t know is that it struck a man who was hiding in the garden near the window. It struck him in the left arm.”

  “Who was this man?” asked Crewe.

  “His name is Tom Jauncey. He is the son of an old shepherd who worked for Lumsden’s grandfather.”

  “One of the servants who was left a legacy in the old man’s will?” said Crewe inquiringly.

  “That is correct,” replied Gillett. “From the bullet we go to the weapon that fired it. Here it is—an ordinary Webley revolver such as is issued to army officers, Mr. Crewe.”

  “Yes, I know a little about them,” said Crewe, as he took it in his hands to look at it.

  “And, last of all, here is a pair of glasses which we have ascertained came from the well-known optical firm of Baker & Co., who have branches all over London, and were made for Captain Marsland.”

  “Where did you find them?” asked Crewe.

  “In the well at the farm.”

  “How did they get there?”

  “I don’t think it is an unnatural assumption that they were blown off when the wearer was stooping over the well to drop some articles into it. Remember that there was a big storm and a high wind on the night of the murder. The boots and the revolver we also found in the well. Our theory is that the murderer dropped these things into the well in order to get rid of them, and that while he was doing it his glasses were blown into the well. As you know, Marsland wears glasses—he is wearing them now. But Sergeant Westaway will swear that he was not wearing them when he came to the station to report the discovery of the body. We have other interesting evidence in the same direction, but let that go for the present.”

  “But the boots,” said Crewe. “You don’t pretend that they belong to Marsland?”

  “They probably belonged to the murdered man—that is a point which we have not yet settled.”

  “And how does that fit in with your theory that the murderer broke into the house?”

  “The murderer found these boots in the barn, the cowshed, or one of the other outbuildings. Lumsden did not wear such heavy boots habitually—remember that he had been a clerk, not a farmer. But he would want a heavy pair of boots like these for walking about the farm-yard in wet weather, and probably he kept them in one of the outbuildings, or at any rate left them there on the last occasion he wore them. The intending murderer, prowling about the outbuildings before breaking into the house, found these boots, and with the object of hiding his traces put them on. After he had finished with them he put on his own boots and threw these down the well.”

  “And your theory is that Marsland is the murderer?”

  “I don’t say that our case against him is quite complete yet, but the evidence against him is very strong.”

  “Can you suggest any motive?”

  “Yes, Marsland was a captain in the London Rifle Brigade; Lumsden was a private in the same battalion. They served together in France.”

  “But the motive?” asked Crewe.

  “Our information is that Lumsden and a man against whom Captain Marsland had a personal grudge—a man whom it was his interest to get out of the way—were sent by Captain Marsland on a false mission towards the German lines. Marsland expected that both would fa
ll victims to the Germans. Lumsden’s companion was killed, but Lumsden was captured alive and subsequently escaped. What is more likely than that Marsland, riding across the downs, should call in at Cliff Farm when his horse fell lame. There, to his surprise, he found that Lumsden was the owner of the farm. They talked over old times, and Marsland learned that Lumsden was aware of his secret motive in sending them on such a dangerous mission. Marsland took his leave, but determined to put Lumsden out of the way. He stole back and hid in the outbuildings, broke into the house, and shot the man who could expose him.”

  “A very ingenious piece of work,” said Crewe. “Everything dovetails in.”

  “I am glad you agree with it,” said Gillett.

  “But I don’t,” was the unexpected reply. “Lumsden was not murdered at the farm. He was shot in the open, somewhere between Staveley and Ashlingsea, and his dead body was brought into the house in a motor-car. It could not have been Marsland who brought the dead body there, because he was on horseback, and his lamed horse was in the stable at the farm when we were all there next day.”

  CHAPTER XVIII

  “You are on the wrong track, Mr. Crewe,” said Gillett, who was determined not to part with the theory he had built up round the evidence he had collected. “I was positive the murder took place in the house. This man Jauncey, whom I mentioned, can swear that he heard a shot fired. And more than that, he can swear that he was hit by the bullet. This is the bullet that was extracted from his wound in the left arm. It fits this revolver.”

  “My dear Gillett, I don’t dispute any of these things,” said Crewe. “They merely support my contention that the murder was not committed at the farm, but that the body was brought there, and that the man who took the body there took certain steps with the object of creating the impression that the tragedy took place in the room in which the body was found.”

  “What evidence have you of that?” asked Sergeant Westaway, coming to the aid of his official superior.