The Case of Miss Elliott

by Baroness Orczy

  “What happened immediately afterwards it is difficult to conjecture. Certain it is, however, that over here the newspapers soon were full of vague allusions about the newly found heir to the Earldom of Tremarn, and within a few weeks the whole of the story of the secret marriage at St Pierre was in everybody’s mouth.

  “It created an immense sensation; the Hon. Arthur Le Cheminant had lived a few years in England after his return from abroad, and no one, not even his brother, seemed to have had the slightest inkling of his marriage.

  “The late Lord Tremarn, you must remember, had three sons, the eldest of whom is the present peer, the second was the romantic Arthur, and the third, the Hon. Reginald, who also died some years ago, leaving four sons, the eldest of whom, Harold, was just twenty-three, and had always been styled heir-presumptive to the Earldom.

  “Lord Tremarn had brought up these four nephews of his, who had lost both father and mother, just as if they had been his own children, and his affection for them, and notably for the eldest boy, was a very beautiful trait in his otherwise unattractive character.

  “The news of the existence and claim of this unknown nephew must have come upon Lord Tremarn as a thunderbolt. His attitude, however, was one of uncompromising incredulity. He refused to believe the story of the marriage, called the whole tale a tissue of falsehoods, and denounced the claimant as a bare-faced and impudent impostor.

  “Two or three months more went by; the public were eagerly awaiting the arrival of this semi-exotic claimant to an English peerage, and sensations, surpassing those of the Tichborne case, were looked forward to with palpitating interest.

  “But in the romances of real life, it is always the unexpected that happens. The claimant did arrive in London about a year ago. He was alone, friendless, and moneyless, since the £2,000 lay buried somewhere beneath the ruins of the St Pierre bank. However, he called upon a well-known London solicitor, who advanced him some money and took charge of all the papers relating to his claim.

  “Philip Le Cheminant then seems to have made up his mind to make a personal appeal to his uncle, trusting apparently in the old adage that ‘blood is thicker than water’.

  “As was only to be expected, Lord Tremarn flatly refused to see the claimant, whom he was still denouncing as an impostor. It was by stealth, and by bribing the servants at the Grosvenor Square mansion, that the young man at last obtained an interview with his uncle.

  “Last New Year’s Day he gave James Tovey, Lord Tremarn’s butler, a five-pound note, to introduce him, surreptitiously, into his master’s study. There uncle and nephew at last met face to face.

  “What happened at that interview nobody knows; was the cry of blood and of justice so convincing that Lord Tremarn dare not resist it? Perhaps.

  “Anyway, from that moment the new heir-presumptive was installed within his rights. After a single interview with Philip Le Cheminant’s solicitor, Lord Tremarn openly acknowledged the claimant to be his brother Arthur’s only son, and therefore his own nephew and heir.

  “Nay, more, everyone noticed that the proud, badtempered old man was as wax in the hands of this newly found nephew. He seemed even to have withdrawn his affection from the four other young nephews, whom hitherto he had brought up as his own children, and bestowed it all upon his brother Arthur’s son – some people said in compensation for all the wrong that had been done to the boy in the past.

  “But the scandal around his dead brother’s name had wounded the old man’s pride very deeply, and from this he never recovered. He shut himself away from all his friends, living alone with his newly found nephew in his gloomy house in Grosvenor Square. The other boys, the eldest of whom, Harold, was just twenty-three, decided very soon to leave a house where they were no longer welcome. They had a small private fortune of their own from their father and mother; the youngest boy was still at college, two others had made a start in their respective professions.

  “Harold had been brought up as an idle young man about town, and on him the sudden change of fortune fell most heavily. He was undecided what to do in the future, but, in the meanwhile, partly from a spirit of independence, and partly from a desire to keep a home for his younger brothers, he took and furnished a small flat, which, it is interesting to note, is just off Exhibition Road, not far from the Natural History Museum in Kensington.

  “This was less than a year ago. Ten months later the newly found heir to the peerage of Tremarn was found murdered in a hansom cab, and Harold Le Cheminant is once more the future Earl.”

  3

  “The papers, as you know, talked of nothing else but the mysterious murder in the hansom cab. Everyone’s sympathy went out at once to Lord Tremarn, who, on hearing the terrible news, had completely broken down, and was now lying on a bed of sickness, from which they say he may never recover.

  “From the first there had been many rumours of the terrible enmity which existed between Harold Le Cheminant and the man who had so easily captured Lord Tremarn’s heart, as well as the foremost place in the Grosvenor Square household.

  “The servants in the great and gloomy mansion told the detectives in charge of the case many stories of terrible rows which occurred at first between the cousins. And now everyone’s eyes were already turned with suspicion on the one man who could most benefit by the death of Philip Le Cheminant.

  “However careful and reticent the police may be, details in connection with so interesting a case have a wonderful way of leaking out. Already one other most important fact had found its way into the papers. It appears that in their endeavours to reconstruct the last day spent by the murdered man the detectives had come upon most important evidence.

  “It was Thomas Sawyer, hall porter of the Junior Grosvenor Club, who first told the following interesting story. He stated that deceased was a member of the club, and had dined there on the evening preceding his death.

  “‘Mr Le Cheminant was just coming downstairs after his dinner,’ explained Thomas Sawyer to the detectives, ‘when a stranger comes into the hall of the club; Mr Le Cheminant saw him as soon as I did, and appeared very astonished. “What do you want?” he says rather sharply. “A word with you,” replies the stranger. Mr Le Cheminant seemed to hesitate for a moment. He lights a cigar, whilst the stranger stands there glaring at him with a look in his eye I certainly didn’t like.

  “‘Mind you,’ added Thomas Sawyer, ‘the stranger was a gentleman in evening dress, and all that. Presently Mr Le Cheminant says to him: “This way, then,” and takes him along into one of the club rooms. Half an hour later the stranger comes out again. He looked flushed and excited. Soon after Mr Le Cheminant comes out too; but he was quite calm and smoking a cigar. He asks for a cab, and tells the driver to take him to the Lyric Theatre.’

  “This was all that the hall porter had to say, but his evidence was corroborated by one of the waiters of the club who saw Mr Le Cheminant and the stranger subsequently enter the dining-room, which was quite deserted at the time.

  “‘They ’adn’t been in the room a minute,’ said the waiter, ‘when I ’eard loud voices, as if they was quarrelling frightful. I couldn’t ’ear what they said, though I tried, but they was shouting so, and drowning each other’s voices. Presently there’s a ring at my bell, and I goes into the room. Mr Le Cheminant was sitting beside one of the tables, quietly lighting a cigar. “Show this – er – gentleman out of the club,” ’e says to me. The stranger looked as if ’e would strike ’im. “You’ll pay for this,” ’e says, then ’e picks up ’is ’at, and dashes out of the club helter-skelter. “One is always pestered by these beggars,” says Mr Le Cheminant to me, as ’e stalks out of the room.’

  “Later on it was arranged that both Thomas Sawyer and the waiter should catch sight of Harold Le Cheminant, as he went out of his house in Exhibition Road. Neither of them had the slightest hesitation in recognizing in him the stranger who had called at the club that night.

  “Now that they held this definite clue, the detectives cont
inued their work with a will. They made enquiries at the Lyric Theatre, but there they only obtained very vague testimony; one point, however, was of great value, the commissionaire outside one of the neighbouring theatres stated that, some time after the performance had begun, he noticed a gentleman in evening dress walking rapidly past him.

  “He seemed strangely excited, for as he went by he muttered quite audibly to himself: ‘I can stand it no longer, it must be he or I.’ Then he disappeared in the fog, walking away towards Shaftesbury Avenue. Unfortunately the commissionaire, just like the cabman, was not prepared to swear to the identity of this man, whom he had only seen momentarily through the fog.

  “But add to all this testimony the very strong motive there was for the crime, and you will not wonder that, within twenty-four hours of the murder, the strongest suspicions had already fastened on Harold Le Cheminant, and it was generally understood that, even before the inquest, the police already had in readiness a warrant for his arrest on the capital charge.”

  4

  “It would be difficult, I think, for anyone who was not present at that memorable inquest to have the least idea of the sensation which its varied and dramatic incidents caused among the crowd of spectators there.

  “At first the proceedings were of the usual kind. The medical officer gave his testimony as to the cause of death; this was, of course, not in dispute. The stiletto was produced; it was of an antique and foreign pattern, probably of Eastern or else Spanish origin. In England, it could only have been purchased at some bric-à-brac shop.

  “Then it was the turn of the servants at Grosvenor Square, of the cabman, and of the commissionaire. Lord Tremarn’s evidence, which he had sworn to on his sickbed, was also read. It added nothing to the known facts of the case, for he had last seen his favourite nephew alive in the course of the afternoon preceding the latter’s tragic end.

  “After that the employés of the Junior Grosvenor Club retold their story, and they were the first to strike the note of sensation which was afterwards raised to its highest possible pitch.

  “Both of them, namely, were asked each in their turn to look round the court and see if they could recognize the stranger who had called at the club that memorable evening. Without the slightest hesitation, both the hall porter and the waiter pointed to Harold Le Cheminant, who sat with his solicitor in the body of the court.

  “But already an inkling of what was to come had gradually spread through that crowded court – instinctively everyone felt that behind the apparent simplicity of this tragic case there lurked another mystery, more strange even than that murder in the hansom cab.

  “Evidence was being taken as to the previous history of the deceased, his first appearance in London, his relationship with his uncle, and subsequently his enmity with his cousin Harold. At this point a man was brought forward as a witness, who it was understood had communicated with the police at the very last moment, offering to make a statement which he thought would throw considerable light upon the mysterious affair.

  “He was a man of about fifty years of age, who looked like a very seedy, superannuated clerk of some insurance office.

  “He gave his name as Charles Collins, and said that he resided in Caxton Road, Clapham.

  “In a perfectly level tone of voice, he then explained that some three years ago, his son William, who had always been idle and good for nothing, had suddenly disappeared from home.

  “‘We heard nothing of him for over two years,’ continued Charles Collins, in that same cheerless and even voice which spoke of a monotonous existence of ceaseless, patient grind, ‘but some few weeks ago my daughter went up to the West End to see about an engagement – she plays dance music at parties sometimes – when, in Regent Street, she came face to face with her brother William. He was no longer wretched, as we all are,’ added the old man pathetically, ‘he was dressed like a swell, and when his sister spoke to him, he pretended not to know her. But she’s a sharp girl, and guessed at once that there was something strange there which William wished to hide. She followed him from a distance, and never lost sight of him that day, until she saw him about six o’clock in the evening go into one of the fine houses in Grosvenor Square. Then she came home and told her mother and me all about it.’

  “I can assure you,” continued the man in the corner, “that you might have heard a pin drop in that crowded court whilst the old man spoke. That he was stating the truth no one doubted for a moment. The very fact that he was brought forward as a witness showed that his story had been proved, at any rate, to the satisfaction of the police.

  “The Collinses seem to have been very simple, good-natured people. It never struck any of them to interfere with William, who appeared, in their own words, to have ‘bettered himself’. They concluded that he had obtained some sort of position in a rich family and was now ashamed of his poor relations at Clapham.

  “Then one morning they read in the papers the story of the mysterious murder in the hansom cab, together with a description of the victim, who had not yet been identified. ’William,’ they said with one accord. Michael Collins, one of the younger sons, went up to London to view the murdered man at the mortuary. There was no doubt whatever that it was William, and yet all the papers persisted in saying that the deceased was the heir to some grand peerage.

  “‘So I wrote to the police,’ concluded Charles Collins, ‘and my wife and children were all allowed to view the body, and we are all prepared to swear that it is that of my son, William Collins, who was no more heir to a peerage than your worship.’

  “And mopping his forehead with a large coloured handkerchief, the old man stepped down from the box.

  “Well, you may imagine what this bombshell was in the midst of that coroner’s court. Everyone looked at his neighbour, wondering if this was real life, or some romantic play being acted upon a stage. Amidst indescribable excitement, various other members of the Collins family corroborated the old man’s testimony, as did also one or two friends from Clapham. All those who had been allowed to view the body of the murdered man pronounced it without hesitation to be that of William Collins, who had disappeared from home three years ago.

  “You see, it was like a repetition of the Tichborne case, only with this strange difference: this claimant was dead, but all his papers were in perfect order, the certificate of marriage between Lucie Legrand and Arthur Le Cheminant at Martinique, as well as the birth and baptismal certificate of Philip Le Cheminant, their son. Yet there were all those simple, honest folk swearing that the deceased had been born in Clapham, and the mother, surely, could not have been mistaken.

  “That is where the difference with the other noteworthy case came in, for in this instance, as far as the general public is concerned, the actual identity of the murdered man will always remain a matter of doubt – Philip Le Cheminant or William Collins took that part of his secret, at any rate, with him to his grave.”

  5

  “But the murder?” I asked eagerly, for the man in the corner had paused, intent upon the manufacture of innumerable knots in a long piece of string.

  “Ah, yes, the murder, of course,” he replied, with a chuckle, “the second mystery in this extraordinary case. Well, of course, whatever the identity of the deceased really was, there was no doubt in the minds of the police that Harold Le Cheminant had murdered him. To him, at any rate, the Collins family were unknown; he only knew the man who had supplanted him in his uncle’s affections, and snatched a rich inheritance away from him. The charge brought against him at the Westminster Court was also one of the greatest sensations of this truly remarkable case.

  “It looked, indeed, as if the unfortunate young man had committed a crime which was as appalling as it was useless. Instead of murdering the impostor – if impostor he was – how much more simple it would have been to have tried to unmask him. But, strange to say, this he never seems to have done, at any rate, as far as the public knew.

  “But here again mystery stepped in.
When brought before the magistrate, Harold Le Cheminant was able to refute the terrible charge brought against him by the simple means of a complete alibi. After the stormy episode at the Junior Grosvenor Club, he had gone to his own club in Pall Mall, and fortunately for him, did not leave until twenty minutes past eleven, some few minutes after the two men in evening dress got into the hansom in Shaftesbury Avenue.

  “But for this lucky fact, for which he had one or two witnesses, it might have fared ill with him, for feeling unduly excited, he walked all the way home afterwards; and had he left his club earlier, he might have found it difficult to account for his time. As it was, he was of course discharged.

  “But one more strange fact came out during the course of the magisterial investigation, and that was that Harold Le Cheminant, on the very day preceding the murder, had booked a passage for St Vincent. He admitted in court that he meant to conduct certain investigations there, with regard to the identity of the supposed heir to the Tremarn peerage.

  “And thus the curtain came down on the last act of that extraordinary drama, leaving two great mysteries unsolved: the real identity of the murdered man, and that of the man who killed him. Some people still persist in thinking it was Harold Le Cheminant. Well, we may easily dismiss that supposition. Harold had decided to investigate the matter for himself; he was on his way to St Vincent.

  “Surely common sense would assert that, having gone so far, he would assure himself first whether the man was an impostor or not, before he resorted to crime, in order to rid himself of him. Moreover, the witnesses who saw him leave his own club at twenty minutes past eleven were quite independent and very emphatic.