Kitabı oku: «The Herapath Property», sayfa 6

CHAPTER XI
THE SHADOW

Mr. Halfpenny, conducting Mr. Tertius to the coupé brougham, installed him in its further corner, got in himself and bade his coachman drive slowly to 331, Upper Seymour Street.

“I said slowly,” he remarked as they moved gently away, “because I wanted a word with you before we see this young man. Tertius—what’s the meaning of all this?”

Mr. Tertius groaned dolefully and shook his head.

“There is so much, Halfpenny,” he answered, “that I don’t quite know what you specifically mean by this. Do you mean–”

“I mean, first of all, Herapath’s murder,” said Mr. Halfpenny. “You think it is a case of murder?”

“I’m sure it’s a case of murder—cold, calculated murder,” replied Mr. Tertius, with energy. “Vile murder, Halfpenny.”

“And, as far as you know, is there no clue?” asked the old lawyer. “There’s nothing said or suggested in the newspapers. Haven’t you any notion—hasn’t Barthorpe any notion?”

Mr. Tertius remained silent for a while. The coupé brougham turned into Upper Seymour Street.

“I think,” he said at last, “yes, I think that when we’ve made this call, I shall ask you to accompany me to my friend Cox-Raythwaite’s, in Endsleigh Gardens—you know him, I believe. I’ve already seen him this morning and told him—something. When we get there, I’ll tell it to you, and he shall show you—something. After that, we’ll hear what your legal instinct suggests. It is my opinion, Halfpenny—I offer it with all deference, as a layman—that great, excessive caution is necessary. This case is extraordinary—very extraordinary. That is—in my opinion.”

“It’s an extraordinary thing that Jacob Herapath should have made that will,” murmured Mr. Halfpenny reflectively. “Why Barthorpe should be entirely ignored is—to me—marvellous. And—it may be—significant. You never heard of any difference, quarrel, anything of that sort, between him and his uncle?”

“I have not the remotest notion as to what the relations were that existed between the uncle and the nephew,” replied Mr. Tertius. “And though, as I have said, I knew that the will was in existence, I hadn’t the remotest idea, the faintest notion, of its contents until we took it out of the sealed envelope an hour or so ago. But–” he paused and shook his head meaningly.

“Well?” said Mr. Halfpenny.

“I’m very sure, knowing Jacob as I did, that he had a purpose in making that will,” answered Mr. Tertius. “He was not the man to do anything without good reasons. I think we are here.”

The landlady of No. 331 opened its door herself to these two visitors. Her look of speculative interest on seeing two highly respectable elderly gentlemen changed to one of inquisitiveness when she heard what they wanted.

“No, sir,” she answered. “Mr. Frank Burchill doesn’t live here now. And it’s a queer thing that during the time he did live here and gave me more trouble than any lodger I ever had, him keeping such strange hours of a night and early morning, he never had nobody to call on him, as I recollect of! And now here’s been three gentlemen asking for him within this last hour—you two and another gentleman. And I don’t know where Mr. Burchill lives, and don’t want, neither!”

“My dear lady!” said Mr. Halfpenny, mildly and suavely. “I am sure we are deeply sorry to disturb you—no doubt we have called you away from your dinner. Perhaps, er, this”—here there was a slight chink of silver in Mr. Halfpenny’s hand, presently repeated in one of the landlady’s—“will, er, compensate you a little? But we are really anxious to see Mr. Burchill—haven’t you any idea where he’s gone to live? Didn’t he leave an address for any letters that might come here?”

“He didn’t, sir—not that he ever had many letters,” answered the landlady. “And I haven’t the remotest notion. Of course, if I had I’d give the address. But, as I said to the gentleman what was here not so long ago, I’ve neither seen nor heard of Mr. Burchill since he left—and that’s six months since.”

Mr. Halfpenny contrived to give his companion a nudge of the elbow.

“Is it, indeed, ma’am?” he said. “Ah! That gentleman who called, now?—I think he must be a friend of ours, who didn’t know we were coming. What was he like, now, ma’am?”

“He was a tallish, fine-built gentleman,” answered the landlady. “Fresh-coloured, clean-shaved gentleman. And for that matter, he can’t be so far away—it isn’t more than a quarter of an hour since he was here. I’ll ask my girl if she saw which way he went.”

“Don’t trouble, pray, ma’am, on my account,” entreated Mr. Halfpenny. “It’s of no consequence. We’re deeply obliged to you.” He swept off his hat in an old-fashioned obeisance and drew Mr. Tertius away to the coupé brougham. “That was Barthorpe, of course,” he said. “He lost no time, you see, Tertius, in trying to see Burchill.”

“Why should he want to see Burchill?” asked Mr. Tertius.

“Wanted to know what Burchill had to say about signing the will, of course,” replied Mr. Halfpenny. “Well—what next? Do you want me to see Cox-Raythwaite with you?”

Mr. Tertius, who had seemed to be relapsing into a brown study on the edge of the pavement, woke up into some show of eagerness. “Yes, yes!” he said. “Yes, by all means let us go to Cox-Raythwaite. I’m sure that’s the thing to do. And there’s another man—the chauffeur. But—yes, we’ll go to Cox-Raythwaite first. Tell your man to drive to the corner of Endsleigh Gardens—the corner by St. Pancras Church.”

Professor Cox-Raythwaite was exactly where Mr. Tertius had left him in the morning, when the two visitors were ushered into his laboratory. And for the second time that day he listened in silence to Mr. Tertius’s story. When it was finished, he looked at Mr. Halfpenny, whose solemn countenance had grown more solemn than ever.

“Queer story, isn’t it, Halfpenny?” he said laconically. “How does it strike you?”

Mr. Halfpenny slowly opened his pursed-up lips.

“Queer?” he exclaimed. “God bless me!—I’m astounded! I—but let me see these—these things.”

“Sealed ’em up not so long ago—just after lunch,” remarked the Professor, lifting his heavy bulk out of his chair. “But you can see ’em all right through the glass. There you are!” He led the way to a side-table and pointed to the hermetically-sealed receptacles in which he had safely bestowed the tumbler and the sandwich brought so gingerly from Portman Square by Mr. Tertius. “The tumbler,” he continued, jerking a big thumb at it, “will have, of course, to be carefully examined by an expert in finger-prints; the sandwich, so to speak, affords primary evidence. You see—what there is to see, Halfpenny?”

Mr. Halfpenny adjusted his spectacles, bent down, and examined the exhibits with scrupulous, absorbed interest. Again he pursed up his lips, firmly, tightly, as if he would never open them again; when he did open them it was to emit a veritable whistle which indicated almost as much delight as astonishment. Then he clapped Mr. Tertius on the back.

“A veritable stroke of genius!” he exclaimed. “Tertius, my boy, you should have been a Vidocq or a Hawkshaw! How did you come to think of it? For I confess that with all my forty years’ experience of Law, I—well, I don’t think I should ever have thought of it!”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Mr. Tertius, modestly. “I—well, I looked—and then, of course, I saw. That’s all!”

Mr. Halfpenny sat down and put his hands on his knees.

“It’s a good job you did see, anyway,” he said, ruminatively; “an uncommonly good job. Well—you’re certain of what we may call the co-relative factor to what is most obvious in that sandwich?”

“Absolutely certain,” replied Mr. Tertius.

“And you’re equally certain about the diamond ring?”

“Equally and positively certain!”

“Then,” said Mr. Halfpenny, rising with great decision, “there is only one thing to be done. You and I, Tertius, must go at once—at once!—to New Scotland Yard. In fact, we will drive straight there. I happen to know a man who is highly placed in the Criminal Investigation Department—we will put our information before him. He will know what ought to be done. In my opinion, it is one of those cases which will require infinite care, precaution, and, for the time being, secrecy—mole’s work. Let us go, my dear friend.”

“Want me—and these things?” asked the Professor.

“For the time being, no,” answered Mr. Halfpenny. “Nor, at present, the taxi-cab driver that Tertius has told us of. We’ll merely tell what we know. But take care of these—these exhibits, as if they were the apples of your eyes, Cox-Raythwaite. They—yes, they may hang somebody!”

Half an hour later saw Mr. Halfpenny and Mr. Tertius closeted with a gentleman who, in appearance, resembled the popular conception of a country squire and was in reality as keen a tracker-down of wrong-doers as ever trod the pavement of Parliament Street. And before Mr. Halfpenny had said many words he stopped him.

“Wait a moment,” he said, touching a bell at his side, “we’re already acquainted, of course, with the primary facts of this case, and I’ve told off one of our sharpest men to give special attention to it. We’ll have him in.”

The individual who presently entered and who was introduced to the two callers as Detective-Inspector Davidge looked neither preternaturally wise nor abnormally acute. What he really did remind Mr. Tertius of was a gentleman of the better-class commercial traveller persuasion—he was comfortable, solid, genial, and smartly if quietly dressed. And he and the highly placed gentleman listened to all that the two visitors had to tell with quiet and concentrated attention and did not even exchange looks with each other. In the end the superior nodded as if something satisfied him.

“Very well,” he said. “Now the first thing is—silence. You two gentlemen will not breathe a word of all this to any one. As you said just now, Mr. Halfpenny, the present policy is—secrecy. There will be a great deal of publicity during the next few days—the inquest, and so on. We shall not be much concerned with it—the public will say that as usual we are doing nothing. You may think so, too. But you may count on this—we shall be doing a great deal, and within a very short time from now we shall never let Mr. Barthorpe Herapath out of our sight until—we want him.”

“Just so,” assented Mr. Halfpenny. He took Mr. Tertius away, and when he had once more bestowed him in the coupé brougham, dug him in the ribs. “Tertius!” he said, with something like a dry chuckle. “What an extraordinary thing it is that people can go about the world unconscious that other folks are taking a very close and warm interest in them! Now, I’ll lay a pound to a penny that Barthorpe hasn’t a ghost of a notion that he’s already under suspicion. My idea of the affair, sir, is that he has not the mere phantasm of such a thing. And yet, from now, as our friend there observed, Master Barthorpe, sir, will be watched. Shadowed, Tertius, shadowed!”

Barthorpe Herapath certainly had none of the notions of which Mr. Halfpenny spoke. He spent his afternoon, once having quitted Burchill’s flat, in a businesslike fashion. He visited the estate office in Kensington; he went to see the undertaker who had been charged with the funeral arrangements; he called in at the local police-office and saw the inspector and the detective who had first been brought into connection with the case; he made some arrangements with the Coroner’s officer about the necessary inevitable inquest. He did all these things in the fashion of a man who has nothing to fear, who is unconscious that other men are already eyeing him with suspicion. And he was quite unaware that when he left his office in Craven Street that evening he was followed by a man who quietly attended him to his bachelor rooms in the Adelphi, who waited patiently until he emerged from them to dine at a neighbouring restaurant, who himself dined at the same place, and who eventually tracked him to Maida Vale and watched him enter Calengrove Mansions.

CHAPTER XII
FOR TEN PER CENT

Mr. Frank Burchill welcomed his visitor with easy familiarity—this might have been a mere dropping-in of one friend to another, for the very ordinary purpose of spending a quiet social hour before retiring for the night. There was a bright fire on the hearth, a small smoking-jacket on Burchill’s graceful shoulders and fancy slippers on his feet; decanters and glasses were set out on the table in company with cigars and cigarettes. And by the side of Burchill’s easy chair was a pile of newspapers, to which he pointed one of his slim white hands as the two men settled themselves to talk.

“I’ve been reading all the newspapers I could get hold of,” he observed. “Brought all the latest editions in with me after dinner. There’s little more known, I think, than when you were here this afternoon.”

“There’s nothing more known,” replied Barthorpe. “That is—as far as I’m aware.”

Burchill took a sip at his glass and regarded Barthorpe thoughtfully over its rim.

“In strict confidence,” he said, “have you got any idea whatever on the subject?”

“None!” answered Barthorpe. “None whatever! I’ve no more idea of who it was that killed my uncle than I have of the name of the horse that’ll win the Derby of year after next! That’s a fact. There isn’t a clue.”

“The police are at work, of course,” suggested Burchill.

“Of course!” replied Barthorpe, with an unconcealed sneer. “And a lot of good they are. Whoever knew the police to find out anything, except by a lucky accident?”

“Just so,” agreed Burchill. “But then—accidents, lucky or otherwise, will happen. You can’t think of anybody whose interest it was to get your esteemed relative out of the way?”

“Nobody!” said Barthorpe. “There may have been somebody. We want to know who the man was who came out of the House with him last night—so far we don’t know. It’ll all take a lot of finding out. In the meantime–”

“In the meantime, you’re much more concerned and interested in the will, eh?” said Burchill.

“I’m much more concerned—being a believer in present necessities—in hearing what you’ve got to say to me now that you’ve brought me here,” answered Barthorpe, coolly. “What is it?”

“Oh, I’ve a lot to say,” replied Burchill. “Quite a lot. But you’ll have to let me say it in my own fashion. And to start with, I want to ask you a few questions. About your family history, for instance.”

“I know next to nothing about my family history,” said Barthorpe; “but if my knowledge is helpful to what we—or I—want to talk about, fire ahead!”

“Good!” responded Burchill. “Now, just tell me what you know about Mr. Jacob Herapath, about his brother, your father, and about his sister, who was, of course, Miss Wynne’s mother. Briefly—concisely.”

“Not so much,” answered Barthorpe. “My grandfather was a medical man—pretty well known, I fancy—at Granchester, in Yorkshire; I, of course, never knew or saw him. He had three children. The eldest was Jacob, who came to his end last night. Jacob left Granchester for London, eventually began speculating in real estate, and became—what he was. The second was Richard, my father. He went out to Canada as a lad, and did there pretty much what Jacob did here in London–”

“With the same results?” interjected Burchill.

Barthorpe made a wry face.

“Unfortunately, no!” he replied. “He did remarkably well to a certain point—then he made some most foolish and risky speculations in American railroads, lost pretty nearly everything he’d made, and died a poorish man.”

“Oh—he’s dead, then?” remarked Burchill.

“He’s dead—years ago,” replied Barthorpe. “He died before I came to England. I, of course, was born out there. I–.”

“Never mind you just now,” interrupted Burchill. “Keep to the earlier branches of the family. Your grandfather had one other child?”

“A daughter,” assented Barthorpe. “I never saw her, either. However, I know that her name was Susan. I also know that she married a man named Wynne—my cousin’s father, of course. I don’t know who he was or anything about him.”

“Nothing?”

“Nothing—nothing at all: My Uncle Jacob never spoke of him to me—except to mention that such a person had once existed. My cousin doesn’t know anything about him, either. All she knows is that her father and mother died when she was about—I think—two years old, and that Jacob then took charge of her. When she was six years old, he brought her to live with him. That was about the time I myself came to England.”

“All right,” said Burchill. “Now, we’ll come to you. Tell about yourself. It all matters.”

“Well, of course, I don’t know what you’re getting at,” replied Barthorpe. “But I’m sure you do. Myself, eh? Well, I was put to the Law out there in Canada. When my father died—not over well off—I wrote to Uncle Jacob, telling him all about how things were. He suggested that I should come over to this country, finish my legal training here, and qualify. He also promised—if I suited him—to give me his legal work. And, of course, I came.”

“Naturally,” said Burchill. “And that’s—how long ago?”

“Between fifteen and sixteen years,” answered Barthorpe.

“Did Jacob Herapath take you into his house?” asked Burchill, continuing the examination which Barthorpe was beginning to find irksome as well as puzzling. “I’m asking all this for good reasons—it’s necessary, if you’re to understand what I’m going to tell you.”

“Oh, as long as you’re going to tell me something I don’t mind telling you anything you like to ask,” replied Barthorpe. “That’s what I want to be getting at. No—he didn’t take me into the house. But he gave me a very good allowance, paid all my expenses until I got through my remaining examinations and stages, and was very decent all around. No—I fixed up in the rooms which I’ve still got—a flat in the Adelphi.”

“But you went a good deal to Portman Square?”

“Why, yes, a good deal—once or twice a week, as a rule.”

“Had your cousin—Miss Wynne—come there then?”

“Yes, she’d just about come. I remember she had a governess. Of course, Peggie was a mere child then—about five or six. Must have been six, because she’s quite twenty-one now.”

“And—Mr. Tertius?”

Burchill spoke the name with a good deal of subtle meaning, and Barthorpe suddenly looked at him with a rising comprehension.

“Tertius?” he answered. “No—Tertius hadn’t arrived on the scene then. He came—soon after.”

“How soon after?”

“I should say,” replied Barthorpe, after a moment’s consideration, “I should say—from my best recollection—a few months after I came to London. It was certainly within a year of my coming.”

“You remember his coming?”

“Not particularly. I remember that he came—at first, I took it, as a visitor. Then I found he’d had rooms of his own given him, and that he was there as a permanency.”

“Settled down—just as he has been ever since?”

“Just! Never any difference that I’ve known of, all these years.”

“Did Jacob ever tell you who he was?”

“Never! I never remember my uncle speaking of him in any particular fashion—to me. He was simply—there. Sometimes, you saw him; sometimes, you didn’t see him. At times, I mean, you’d meet him at dinner—other times, you didn’t.”

Burchill paused for a while; when he asked his next question he seemed to adopt a more particular and pressing tone.

“Now—have you the least idea who Tertius is?” he asked.

“Not the slightest!” affirmed Barthorpe. “I never have known who he is. I never liked him—I didn’t like his sneaky way of going about the house—I didn’t like anything of him—and he never liked me. I always had a feeling—a sort of intuition—that he resented my presence—in fact, my existence.”

“Very likely,” said Burchill, with a dry laugh. “Well—has it ever struck you that there was a secret between Tertius and Jacob Herapath?”

Barthorpe started. At last they were coming to something definite.

“Ah!” he exclaimed. “So—that’s the secret you mentioned in that letter?”

“Never mind,” replied Burchill. “Answer my question.”

“No, then—it never did strike me.”

“Very well,” said Burchill. “There is a secret.”

“There is?”

“There is! And,” whispered Burchill, rising and coming nearer to his visitor, “it’s a secret that will put you in possession of the whole of the Herapath property! And—I know it.”

Barthorpe had by this time realized the situation. And he was thinking things over at a rapid rate. Burchill had asked Jacob Herapath for ten thousand pounds as the price of his silence; therefore–

“And, of course, you want to make something out of your knowledge?” he said presently.

“Of course,” laughed Burchill. He opened a box of cigars, selected one and carefully trimmed the end before lighting it. “Of course!” he repeated. “Who wouldn’t? Besides, you’ll be in a position to afford me something when you come into all that.”

“The will?” suggested Barthorpe.

Burchill threw the burnt-out match into the fire.

“The will,” he said slowly, “will be about as valuable as that—when I’ve fixed things up with you. Valueless!”

“You mean it?” exclaimed Barthorpe incredulously. “Then—your signature?”

“Look here!” said Burchill. “The only thing between us is—terms! Fix up terms with me, and I’ll tell you the whole truth. And then—you’ll see!”

“Well—what terms?” demanded Barthorpe, a little suspiciously. “If you want money down–”

“You couldn’t pay in cash down what I want, nor anything like it,” said Burchill. “I may want an advance that you can pay—but it will only be an advance. What I want is ten per cent. on the total value of Jacob Herapath’s property.”

“Good heavens!” exclaimed Barthorpe. “Why I believe he’ll cut up for a good million and a half!”

“That’s about the figure—as I’ve reckoned it,” assented Burchill. “But you’ll have a lot left when you’ve paid me ten per cent.”

Barthorpe fidgeted in his chair.

“When did you find out this secret?” he asked.

“Got an idea of it just before I left Jacob, and worked it all out, to the last detail, after I left,” replied Burchill. “I tell you this for a certainty—when I’ve told you all I know, you’ll know for an absolute fact, that the Herapath property is—yours!”

“Well!” said Barthorpe. “What do you want me to do?”

Burchill moved across to a desk and produced some papers.

“I want you to sign certain documents,” he said, “and then I’ll tell you the whole story. If the story’s no good, the documents are no good. How’s that?”

“That’ll do!” answered Barthorpe. “Let’s get to business.”

It was one o’clock in the morning when Barthorpe left Calengrove Mansions. But the eyes that had seen him enter saw him leave, and the shadow followed him through the sleeping town until he, too, sought his own place of slumber.