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CHAPTER III
MR. CHESTERMARKE DISCLAIMS LIABILITY

Gabriel Chestermarke, after that one look at his nephew, turned again to the Earl, politely motioning him to the chair which he had already drawn forward. And the Earl, whose eyes had been wandering over the pile of documents on the senior partner's desk, glancing curiously at the open door of the strong room, and generally taking in a sense of some unusual occurrence, dropped into it and looked expectantly at the banker.

"There's nothing wrong?" he asked suddenly. "You look – surprised."

Gabriel stiffened his already upright figure.

"Surprised – yes!" he answered. "And something more than surprised – I am astonished! Your lordship left the Countess's jewels with our manager? May I ask when – and under what circumstances?"

"About six weeks ago," replied the Earl promptly. "As a rule the jewels are kept at my bankers in London. The Countess wanted them to wear at the Hunt Ball, so I fetched them from London myself. Then, as we were going off to the Continent two days after the ball, and sailing direct from Kingsport to Hamburg, I didn't want the bother of going up to town with them, and I thought of Horbury. So I drove in here with them one evening – the night before we sailed, as a matter of fact – and asked him to lock them up until our return. And as I said just now, we only got home the night before last, and we're going up to town tomorrow, and the Countess wants them to take with her. Of course, you've got 'em all right?"

Gabriel Chestermarke spread out his hands.

"I know nothing whatever about them!" he said. "I never heard of them being here."

"Nor I," affirmed Joseph. "Not a word!"

Gabriel looked at Neale, and drew Lord Ellersdeane's attention to him.

"Our senior clerk – Mr. Neale," he said. "Neale – have you heard of this transaction?"

"Never!" replied Neale. "Mr. Horbury never mentioned it to me."

Gabriel waved his hand towards the open door of the strong room.

"Any valuables of that sort would have been in there," he remarked. "There is nothing of that sort there – beyond what I and my nephew know of. I am sure your lordship's jewels are not there."

"But – Horbury?" exclaimed the Earl. "Where is he? He would tell you!"

"We don't know where Mr. Horbury is," answered Gabriel "The truth may as well be told – he's missing. And so are some of our most valuable securities."

The Earl slowly looked from one partner to another. His face flushed, almost as hotly as if he himself had been accused of theft.

"Oh, come!" he said. "Horbury, now, of all men! Come – come! – you don't mean to tell me that Horbury's been playing games of that sort? There must be some mistake."

"I shall be glad to be assured that I am making it," said Gabriel coolly. "But it will be more to the purpose if your lordship will tell us all about the deposit of these jewels. And – there's an important matter which I must first mention. We have not the honour of reckoning your lordship among our customers. Therefore, whatever you handed to Horbury was handed to him privately – not to us."

Joseph Chestermarke nodded his head at that, and the Earl stirred a little uneasily in his chair.

"Oh, well!" he said. "I – to tell you the truth, I didn't think about that, Mr. Chestermarke. It's true I don't keep any account with you – it's never seemed – er, necessary, you know. But, of course, I knew Horbury so well – he's a member of our golf club and our archæological society – that – "

"Precisely," interrupted Gabriel, with a bow. "You came to Mr. Horbury privately. Not to the firm."

"I came to him knowing that he was your manager, and a man to be thoroughly trusted, and that he'd have safes and things in which he could deposit valuables in perfect safety," answered the Earl. "I never reflected for a moment on the niceties of the matter. I just explained to him that I wanted those jewels taken care of, and handed them over. That's all!"

"And – their precise nature?" asked Gabriel.

"And – their value?" added Joseph.

"As to their nature," replied the Earl, "there was my wife's coronet, her diamond necklace, and the Ellersdeane butterfly, of which I suppose all the world's heard – heirloom, you know. It's a thing that can be worn in a lady's hair or as a pendant – diamonds, of course. As to their value – well, I had them valued some years ago. They're worth about a hundred thousand pounds."

Gabriel turned to his desk and began to arrange some papers on it, and Neale, who was watching everything with close attention, saw that his fingers trembled a little. He made no remark, and the silence was next broken by Joseph Chestermarke's soft accents.

"Did Horbury give your lordship any receipt, or acknowledgment that he had received these jewels on deposit?" he asked. "I mean, of course, in our name?"

The Earl twisted sharply in his chair, and Neale fancied that he saw a shade of annoyance pass over his good-natured face.

"Certainly not!" he answered. "I should never have dreamt of asking for a receipt from a man whom I knew as well as I knew – or thought I knew – Horbury. The whole thing was just as if – well, as if I should ask any friend to take care of something for me for a while."

"Did Horbury know what you were giving him?" asked Joseph.

"Of course!" replied the Earl. "As a matter of fact, he'd never seen these things, and I took them out of their case and showed them to him."

"And he said he would lock them up? – in our strong room?" suggested the soft voice.

"He said nothing about your strong room," answered the Earl. "Nor about where he'd put them. That was understood. It was understood – a tacit understanding – that he'd take care of them until our return."

"Did your lordship give him the date of your return?" persisted Joseph, with the thorough-going air of a cross-examiner.

"Yes – I told him exactly when we should be back," replied the Earl. "The twelfth of May – day before yesterday."

Joseph moved away from the sideboard towards the hearth, and leaning against the mantelpiece threw a glance at the strong room.

"The jewels are not in our possession," he said, half indolently. "There is nothing of that sort in there. There are two safes in the outer room of the bank – I should say that Mr. Neale here knows everything that is in them. Do you know anything of these jewels, Neale?"

"Nothing!" said Neale. "I never heard of them."

Gabriel looked up from his papers.

"None of us have heard of them," he remarked. "Horbury could not have put them in this strong room without my knowledge. They are certainly not there. The safes my nephew mentioned just now are used only for books and papers. Your lordship's casket is not in either."

The Earl rose slowly from his chair. It was evident to Neale that he was more surprised than angry: he looked around him as a man looks whose understanding is suddenly brought up against something unexplainable.

"All I know is that I handed that casket to Mr. Horbury in his own dining-room one evening some weeks ago," he said. "That's certain! So I naturally expect to find it – here."

"And it is not here – that is equally certain," observed Gabriel. "What is also certain is that our manager – trusted in more than he should have been! – is missing, and many of our valuable securities with him. Therefore – "

He spread his hands again with an expressive gesture and once more bent over his papers. Once more there was silence. Then the Earl started – as if a thought had suddenly occurred to him.

"I say!" he exclaimed, "don't you think Horbury may have put those jewels away in his own house?"

Joseph Chestermarke smiled a little derisively.

"A hundred thousand pounds' worth!" he said softly. "Not very likely!"

"But he may have a safe there," urged the Earl. "Most people have a safe in their houses nowadays – they're so handy, you know, and so cheap. Don't you think that may be it?"

"I am not familiar with Horbury's domestic arrangements," said Gabriel. "I have not been in his house for some years. But as we are desirous of giving your lordship what assistance we can, we will go into the house and see if there is anything of the sort. Just tell the housekeeper we are coming in, Neale."

The Earl nodded to Mrs. Carswell as she received him and the two partners in the adjacent hall.

"This lady will remember my calling on Mr. Horbury one evening a few weeks ago," he said. "She saw me with him in that room."

"Certainly!" assented Mrs. Carswell, readily enough. "I remember your lordship calling on Mr. Horbury very well. One night after dinner – your lordship was here an hour or so."

Gabriel Chestermarke opened the door of the dining-room – an old-fashioned apartment which looked out on a garden and orchard at the rear of the house.

"Mrs. Carswell," he said, as they all went in, "has Mr. Horbury a safe in this room, or in any other room? You know what I mean."

But the housekeeper shook her head. There was no safe in the house. There was a plate-chest – there it was, standing in a recess by the sideboard; she had the key of it.

"Open that, at any rate," commanded Gabriel. "It's about as unlikely as anything could be, but we'll leave nothing undone."

There was nothing in the plate-chest but what Gabriel expected to find there. He turned again to the housekeeper.

"Is there anything in this house – cupboard, chest, trunk, anything – in which Mr. Horbury kept valuables?" he asked. "Any place in which he was in the habit of locking up papers, for instance?"

Mrs. Carswell again shook her head. No, she knew of no such place or receptacle. There was Mr. Horbury's desk, but she believed all its drawers were open. Her belief proved to be correct: Gabriel himself opened drawer after drawer, and revealed nothing of consequence. He turned to the Earl with another expressive spreading out of his hands.

"I don't see what more we can do to assist your lordship," he said. "I don't know what more can be done."

"The question is – so it seems to me – what is to be done," replied the Earl, whose face had been gradually growing graver. "What, for instance, are you going to do, Mr. Chestermarke? Let us be plain with each other. You disclaim all liability in connection with my affair?"

"Most certainly!" exclaimed Gabriel. "We know nothing of that transaction. As I have already said, if Horbury took charge of your lordship's property, he did so as a private individual, not on our behalf, not in his capacity as our manager. If your lordship had been a customer of ours – "

"That would have been a very different matter," said Joseph. "But as we have never had any dealings with your lordship – "

"We have, of course, no liability to you," concluded Gabriel. "The true position of the case is that your lordship handed your property to Horbury as a friend, not as manager of Chestermarke's Bank."

"Then let me ask you, what are you going to do?" said the Earl. "I mean, not about my affair, but about finding your manager?"

Gabriel looked at his nephew: Joseph shook his head.

"So far," said Joseph, "we have not quite considered that. We are not yet fully aware of how things stand. We have a pretty good idea, but it will take another day."

"You don't mean to tell me that you're going to let another day elapse before doing something?" exclaimed the Earl. "Bless my soul! – I'd have had the hue and cry out before noon today, if I'd been you!"

"If you'd been Chestermarke's Bank, my lord," remarked Joseph, in his softest manner, "that's precisely what you would not have done. We don't want it noised all over the town and neighbourhood that our trusted manager has suddenly run away with our money – and your jewels – in his pocket."

There was a curious note – half-sneering, half-sinister – in the junior partner's quiet voice which made the Earl turn and look at him with a sudden new interest. Before either could speak, Neale ventured to say what he had been wanting to say for half an hour.

"May I suggest something, sir?" he said, turning to Gabriel.

"Speak – speak!" assented Gabriel hastily. "Anything you like!"

"Mr. Horbury may have met with an accident," said Neale. "He was fond of taking his walks in lonely places – there are plenty outside the town. He may be lying somewhere even now – helpless."

"Capital suggestion! – much obliged to you," exclaimed the Earl. "Gad! I wonder we never thought of that before! Much the most likely thing. I can't believe that Horbury – "

Before he could say more, the door of the dining-room was thrown open, a clear, strong voice was heard speaking to some one without, and in walked a handsome young woman, who pulled herself up on the threshold to stare out of a pair of frank grey eyes at the four startled men.

CHAPTER IV
THE MODERN YOUNG WOMAN

Mrs. Carswell, who had left the gentlemen to themselves after opening the plate-chest, followed the new-comer into the room and looked appealingly at the senior partner.

"This is Miss Fosdyke, sir," she said, as if accounting for the unceremonious entrance. "Mr. Horbury's – "

But Miss Fosdyke, having looked round her, entered the arena of discussion as abruptly as she had entered the room.

"You're Mr. Chestermarke!" she said, turning to Gabriel. "I remember you. What's all this, Mr. Chestermarke? I come down from London to meet my uncle, and to go on with him to Scotland for a holiday, and I learn that he's disappeared! What is it? What has happened? Why are you all looking so mysterious? Is something wrong? Where is my uncle?"

Gabriel, who had assumed his stereotyped expression of calm attention under this tornado of questions, motioned Joseph to place a chair for the young lady. But Miss Fosdyke shook her head and returned to the attack.

"Please don't keep anything back!" she said. "I am not of the fainting-to-order type of young woman. Just say what is the matter, if you please. Mrs. Carswell knows no more – "

"Than we do," interrupted Joseph, with one of his peculiar smiles. "Hadn't you better sit down?"

"Not until I know what has happened," retorted the visitor. "Because if anything has happened there will be something for me to do, and it's foolish to sit down when one's got to get up again immediately. Mr. Chestermarke, are you going to answer my questions?"

Gabriel bowed stiffly.

"I have the honour of addressing – " he began.

"You have the honour – if you like to put it so – of addressing Miss Betty Fosdyke, who is Mr. John Horbury's niece," replied the young lady impatiently. "Mrs. Carswell has told you that already. Besides – you saw me, more than once, when I was a little girl. And that's not so very long ago. Now, Mr. Chestermarke, where is my uncle?"

"I do not know where your uncle is," replied Gabriel suddenly, and losing his starchiness. "I wish to Heaven I did!"

"None of us know where Mr. John Horbury is," repeated Joseph, in his suavest tones. "We all wish to Heaven we did!"

The girl turned and gave the junior partner a look which took in every inch of him. It was a look which began with a swift speculation and ended in something very like distaste. But Joseph Chestermarke met it with his usual quiet smile.

"It would make such a lot of difference – if we knew!" he murmured. "As it is – things are unpleasant."

Miss Fosdyke finished her reflection and turned away.

"I remember you now," she said calmly. "You're Joseph Chestermarke. Now I will sit down. And I insist on being told – everything!"

"My dear young lady!" exclaimed Gabriel, "there is next to nothing to tell. If you will have the unpleasant truth, here it is. Your uncle, whom we have trusted for more years than I care to mention, disappeared on Saturday evening, and nobody knows where he is, nor whither he went. All we know is that we find some of our property missing – valuable securities. And this gentleman – Lord Ellersdeane – tells us that six weeks ago he entrusted jewels worth a hundred thousand pounds to your uncle's keeping – they, too, are missing. What can we think?"

The girl's face had flushed, and her brows had drawn together in an angry frown by the time Gabriel had finished, and Neale, silently watching her from the background, saw her fingers clench themselves. She gave a swift glance at the Earl, and then fixed her eyes steadily on Gabriel.

"Are you telling me that my uncle is a – thief?" she demanded. "Are you, Mr. Chestermarke?"

"I'm not, anyhow!" exclaimed the Earl. "I – I – so far as I'm concerned, I say there's some mistake."

"Thank you!" she answered quietly. "But – you, Mr. Chestermarke? Come – I'm entitled to an answer."

Gabriel showed signs of deep annoyance. He had the reputation of being a confirmed woman-hater, and it was plain that he was ill at ease in presence of this plain-spoken young person.

"You appear to be a lady of much common sense!" he said. "Therefore – "

"I have some common sense," interrupted Miss Fosdyke coolly. "And what amount I possess tells me that I never heard anything more ridiculous in my life than the suggestion that my uncle should steal anything from anybody! Why, he was, and is, I hope, a fairly well-to-do man! And if he wanted money, he'd only to come to me. It so happens that I'm one of the wealthiest young women in England. If my uncle had wanted a few thousands or tens of thousands to play ducks and drakes with, he'd only to ring me up on the telephone, and he'd have had whatever he asked for in a few hours. That's not boasting, Mr. Chestermarke – that's just plain truth. My uncle a thief! Mr. Chestermarke! – there's only one word for your suggestion. Don't think me rude if I tell you what it is. It's – bosh!"

Gabriel's colourless face twitched a little, and he drew himself up.

"I have no acquaintance with modern young ladies," he remarked icily. "I daresay they have their own way of looking at things – and of expressing themselves. I, too, have mine. Also I have my own conclusions, and – "

"I say, Mr. Chestermarke!" said the Earl, hastening to intervene in what seemed likely to develop into a passage-at-arms. "We're forgetting the suggestion made just before this lady – Miss Fosdyke, I think? – entered. Don't let's forget it – it's a good one."

Miss Fosdyke turned eagerly to the Earl.

"What suggestion was it?" she asked. "Do tell me? I'm sure you agree with me – I can see you do. Thank you, again!"

"This gentleman," said the Earl, pointing to Neale, who had retreated into a corner and was staring out of the window, "suggests that Horbury may have met with an accident, you know, and be lying helpless somewhere. I sincerely hope he isn't but – "

Miss Fosdyke jumped from her chair. She turned an indignant look on Gabriel and let it go on to Joseph.

"You don't mean to tell me that you have not done anything to find my uncle?" she exclaimed with fiery emphasis. "You've surely had some search made? – surely!"

"We knew nothing of his disappearance until ten o'clock this morning," replied Gabriel, half-angrily.

"But – since then? Why, you've had five hours!" she said. "Has nothing been done? Haven't you even told the police?"

"Certainly not!" answered Gabriel. "It is not our policy."

Miss Fosdyke made one step to the door and flung it open.

"Then I shall!" she exclaimed. "Policy, indeed! High time I came down here, I think! Thank you, Lord Ellersdeane – and the other gentleman – for the suggestion. Now I'll go and act on it. And when I act, Mr. Chestermarke, I do it thoroughly!"

The next moment she had slammed the door, and Gabriel Chestermarke glanced at his partner.

"Annoying!" he said. "A most unpleasant young woman! I should have preferred not to tell the police until – well, at any rate, tomorrow. We really do not know to what extent we are – but then, what's the use of talking of that now? We can't prevent her going to the police-station."

"Why, really, Mr. Chestermarke," observed the Earl, "don't you think it's the best thing to do? To tell you the truth, considering that I'm concerned, I was going to do the very same thing myself."

Gabriel bowed stiffly.

"We could not have prevented your lordship either," he said, with another wave of the white hands which seemed to go so well with the habitual pallor of his face. "All that is within your lordship's jurisdiction – not in ours. But – especially since this young lady seems determined to do things in her way – I will tell your lordship why we are slow to move. It is purely a business reason. It was, as I said, ten o'clock when we heard that Horbury was missing. That in itself was such a very strange and unusual thing that my partner and I at once began to examine the contents of our strong room. We had been so occupied five hours when your lordship called. Do you think we could examine everything in five hours? No – nor in ten, nor in twenty! Our task is not one quarter complete! And why we don't wish publicity at once in here – we hold a vast number of securities and valuables belonging to customers. Title-deeds, mortgages – all sorts of things. We have valuables deposited with us. Up to now we don't know what is safe and what isn't. We do know this – certain securities of our own, easily convertible on the market, are gone! Now if we had allowed it to be known before, say, noon today, that our manager had disappeared, and these securities with him, what would have been the result? The bank would have been besieged! Before we let the public know, we ourselves want to know exactly where we are. We want to be in a position to say to Smith, 'Your property is safe!'; to Jones, 'Your deeds are here!' Does your lordship see that? But now, of course," concluded Gabriel, "as this Miss Fosdyke can and will spread the news all over the town – why, we must face things."

The Earl, who had listened to all this with an evident desire to comprehend and to sympathize, nodded his head.

"I see – I see, Mr. Chestermarke," he said. "But I say! – I've got another notion – I'm not a very quick thinker, and I daresay my idea came out of Mr. Neale's suggestion. Anyway, it's this – for whatever it's worth. I told you that we only got home night before last – early on Saturday evening, as a matter of fact. Now, it was known in the town here that we'd returned – we drove through the Market-Place. Mayn't it be that Horbury saw us, or heard of our return, and that when he went out that evening he had the casket in his pocket and was on his way to Ellersdeane, to return it to me? And that – on his way – he met with some mishap? Worth considering, you know."

"I daresay a great many theories might – and will – be raised, my lord," replied Gabriel. "But – "

"Does your lordship also think – or suggest – that Horbury also carried our missing securities in his pocket?" asked Joseph quietly. "Because we, at any rate, know they're gone!"

"Oh, well!" said the Earl, "I – I merely suggest it, you know. The country between here and Ellersdeane is a bit rough and wild – there's Ellersdeane Hollow, you know – a queer place on a dark night. And if a man took a short cut – as many people do – through the Hollow, there are places he could fall into. But, as I say, I merely suggest that as a reasonable theory."

"What does your lordship propose to do?" asked Gabriel.

"I certainly think inquiry should be set going," answered the Earl.

"Already done," remarked Joseph drily. "Miss Fosdyke has been with the police five minutes."

"I mean – it should be done by us," said the Earl.

"Very well," said Gabriel suddenly, "it shall be done, then. No doubt your lordship would like to give the police your own story. Mr. Neale, will you go with Lord Ellersdeane to Superintendent Polke? Your duty will be to give him the mere information that Mr. Horbury left his house at a quarter to eight on Saturday evening and has not been heard of since. No more, Neale. And now," he concluded, with a bow to the Earl, "your lordship will excuse my partner and myself if we return to a singularly unpleasant task."

Lord Ellersdeane and Neale left the bank-house and walked towards the police-station. They crossed the Market-Place in silence, but as they turned the corner of the Moot Hall, the elder man spoke, touching his companion's shoulder with a confidential gesture.

"I don't believe a word of all that, Mr. Neale!" he said. "Not one word!"

Neale started and glanced at the Earl's moody face.

"Your lordship doesn't believe – ?" he began, and checked himself.

"I don't believe that Horbury's done what those two accuse him of," affirmed the Earl. "Not for one moment! I can't account for those missing securities they talk about, but I'll stake my honour that Horbury hasn't got 'em! Nor my wife's jewels either. You heard and saw how astounded that girl was. By the by – who is she!"

"Mr. Horbury's niece – Miss Fosdyke – from London," replied Neale.

"She spoke of her wealth," remarked the Earl.

"Yes," said Neale. "She must be wealthy, too. She's the sole proprietor of Fosdyke's Brewery."

"Ho-ho!" laughed the Earl. "That's it, eh? Fosdyke's Entire! Of course – I've seen the name on no end of public-houses in London. Sole proprietor? Dear me! – why, I have some recollection that Fosdyke, of that brewery, was at one time a member of Parliament."

"Yes," assented Neale. "He married Mr. Horbury's sister. Miss Fosdyke is their only child. Mr. Fosdyke died a few years ago, and she came into the property last year when she was twenty-one."

"Lucky young woman!" muttered the Earl. "Fine thing to own a big brewery. Um! A very modern and up-to-date young lady, too: I liked the way she stood up to your principals. Of course, she'll have told Polke all the story by this time. As for ourselves – what had we better do?"

Neale had considered that question as he came along.

"There's only one thing to do, my lord," he answered. "We want the solution of a problem: what became of Mr. Horbury last Saturday night?"