Kitabı oku: «The Riddle of the Mysterious Light», sayfa 4

CHAPTER VII
A GARDEN OF TRANSPLANTED FLOWERS

Cleek made not a single sound. A curious, intense, half-frightened expression had settled down over his face. He walked on with brows knit and eyes fixed on the road, and when Overton, impressed by his silence, looked round at him, he saw that his lower lip was pushed outward beyond the upper one, and that the pipe he had taken out and refilled hung from the corner of his mouth still unlighted.

"It was a shocking experience, Mr. Headland," Overton said, fetching a deep breath.

"Must have been," admitted Cleek, without looking up. "You're putting some new ideas into my head, Mr. Overton. If it had been one of the villagers, or even a servant from the Castle – anybody but you! H'm! Wot happened afterward?"

"When I came to I was lying on my back in the road. The wind had died utterly away, the trees were standing motionless again, but there was a curious sound as of wheels passing and repassing me at a furious rate. There was, however, not a moving thing in sight, and as the moon was again shining brightly I could see quite clearly. Nevertheless, frightened as I was – and I confess that I was frightened, Mr. Headland, horribly so – I struck several matches and examined the surface of the road thoroughly."

"Why?"

"I had heard of those phantom wheels that were said to rush about the village by night, but this was my first personal experience with them. To judge by the sound alone, I should have declared that vehicles on rubber tires were scudding past me at the rate of five or six a minute and almost within touching distance. When I struck those matches and looked at the white dust of the road, there was nothing on it but the prints of my own feet and a shapeless mark where I had fallen. The wheels, however, were still speeding by in an unbroken stream of traffic. I turned tail and ran as I haven't run since I was a boy, and I never slackened pace either, until I was safe inside the Lodge and the door bolted behind me. If I had had a bit of pluck just then, I should have faced the dark avenue up to the Castle and told about the affair. I wish now that I had. It would have saved that poor chap's life."

"Maybe, but you can't be sure of it, Mr. Overton. He was a daredevil sort from what I've heard, and you can't do much with them kind of chaps when they take a notion in their heads."

"Possibly not. Still, I might have tried. I shall never be quite able to forgive myself for being such a coward. But I was absolutely in a blue funk, and wouldn't have faced that long walk up the Oak Avenue for the best thousand pounds I ever saw."

"Say anything to the duke about it?"

"No. I was going to do so, but this morning, when poor Davis's body was found, His Grace was in something so very like a panic over the horrible turn the abominable affair had taken, that I hadn't the heart to harrow up his feelings still further – particularly as he was determined on going up to town and putting the matter into the hands of Scotland Yard at once. I shall do so, of course, when he's calmer. It is no use making matters worse than they are. It is bad enough to feel that you have to cope with natural forces without dragging supernatural ones into it. And there is some supernatural force connected with it, Mr. Headland – I'm convinced of that now. Human beings may engineer a plot to haunt a village for some purpose; may even brain a man and spirit away a child to keep what they are up to from being found out – but they can't make church bells ring without hands, nor wheels fly through dust without leaving traces. Nor can they produce that monstrous Thing which I saw with my own eyes last night."

"Well, I'll own it's got a devilish queer look, Mr. Overton," admitted Cleek, gravely. "And, as I said before, if it was anybody but a level-headed gent like you, I should think it was, maybe, a case of the D.T.'s coming on. Still, of course, you know, they can do wonderful things these days with electricity and flying machines – and Solinski's no fool. Besides, the Cement Company's got the money to spend if it wants to set about things properly and means to have a tract of land that it needs. So, of course – Geraniums! Geraniums, fuchsias, delphiniums, and lilies, or I'm a Dutchman!"

This remark had been rapped out so suddenly and with such vehemence, and was so utterly foreign to the subject under discussion, that Mr. Overton looked round at Cleek in absolute bewilderment.

By this time the walk from the station had brought them abreast of the western boundaries of the Castle domain, and a rise in the road gave a view of part of its splendid grounds. Beyond a low wall stretched an expanse of lawn, green, close-clipped, level as a billiard table; on the right there was the gleam of a water garden, the blaze of a rose-laden pergola, and the snow of swans' wings; on the left, two straw-thatched cottages and the rich green of a clipped yew hedge shutting in an enclosure that glowed with a myriad blossoming flowers.

Mr. Overton, following the direction of Cleek's eyes, looked round and saw that they were fixed upon that glorious garden.

"Oh, I see what you mean," he said, with a smile of sudden understanding. "Old Hurdon's flowers. Fine, aren't they?"

"Something more than fine from what I can see of 'em at this distance. They will be 'Pollacks' and 'Paul Crampels' them geraniums, if I know anything about it. Do a bit in that line myself at home."

"I shouldn't have thought it," replied Overton, rather abruptly; then hastened to amend his blunder by adding discreetly, "I should have supposed that the business of Scotland Yard would leave you so little time. But possibly you have 'off days' and little opportunities of that kind."

"Something of that sort. I've always sort of prided myself on my little bit, but it isn't a patch on that show, I can tell you. How would it be if we slipped over the wall and had a look at 'em a bit closer, Mr. Overton? You being who you are, the gardeners wouldn't say nothing, I reckon."

"Yes, I suppose it will be all right if you like. That will be Mrs. Hurdon herself that's working in the garden. Come along."

They swung over the low boundary wall into the Castle grounds, and walked directly toward the cottages, Mr. Overton flinging a reassuring, "That's all right, Johnston, the gentlemen are with me," to a protesting gardener who came running across the lawn.

Cleek observed, however, that, although the gardener heard the land-steward's voice clearly enough, and went about his business at once, the woman in the radiant garden of the cottage did not so much as look up.

"Old lady's something after the style of my mate here, ain't she – a bit deaf?" he observed.

"Yes, a little. That is one reason why she never is worried by the ringing of the bells."

"I see. And the old man – wot about him? He deaf, too?"

"Oh, dear no. Ears as sharp as a badger's. He is a very strong-minded, practical, level-headed old chap, without a grain of superstition in him. He declares that he has never in all his life found soil so fertile or a garden that gives such good return for his work as that one, and he wouldn't give the place up if ghosts danced round the house all night in dozens."

"Oh, so that's why they didn't get out and chuck the place when the mischief began, is it? I was wondering. One deaf and the other with his head screwed on the right way. Old gent must have a power o' confidence in his missus, Mr. Overton, to let her go messing about with his plants and him not there. Blowed if I'd let mine do it – no fear."

"I don't fancy that Hurdon would either, if he could help it. He's as fussy a horticulturist as any," said Overton, with an amused laugh, "and, in an ordinary way, it would be as much as anybody's life was worth to touch a single one of his plants. Unfortunately, however, the old chap had a slight accident the day before yesterday. Fell down the stairs and strained his back. It will probably keep him laid up for the next five or six days; and, as his garden is his hobby, I suppose he has sent the old lady out to attend to it. I'm told, too, that she's as well up in garden matters as he."

"Is she now?" commented Cleek with a casualness which masked an emotion of a totally different character; for he observed, as he drew nearer, that the good lady was in the act of inserting a blossoming begonia into a nice round hole which she had scooped out from one of the beds with her trowel, and that there was an empty flower pot and a full watering-can standing on the tiled path beside her.

Nor did his observations cease there. His eye, seeing while it seemed not to see, detected dotted here and there about the crowded flower beds fuchsias and geraniums whose foliage was of that clear, rich, glossy green which betokens plants fresh bought from a greenhouse and whose general appearance indicated that they had never before been exposed to the rigours of the open and the dust from a near-by road.

He looked round to see if there was any greenhouse attached to the cottage garden, or any glass frame of any sort from whose shelter these speckless plants might have come. There was none. The garden was simply a rectangle of brilliant bloom cut through the middle by a red-tiled footpath – a glowing, gorgeous spot of beauty, blazing in the sunshine.

When he came close enough to lean over the low hedge with Mr. Overton, however, and to see what that hedge had hidden heretofore, he observed that just below him there was a little heap of broken pots and withered plants lying, waiting to be removed. Drooping fuchsias and yellowing geraniums they were with the original ball of earth from a florist's pots still clinging to their dry roots.

Here it was that a flash of memory brought back to Mr. Narkom that moment on the stairs at the Carlton and a recollection of what had been said. If there were geraniums and fuchsias much would depend upon it, Cleek had murmured. And now here were geraniums and fuchsias in dozens!

He twitched an inquiring glance at Cleek; but Cleek was looking at the dying plants, not at the thriving ones, and the curious one-sided smile peculiar to him was looping up his cheek.

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Hurdon," called out the land-steward, leaning over both the low hedge and the stone wall it screened and shouting across the garden to the woman who had never once looked up during the whole period of their approach.

She did now, however.

"Oh, good afternoon, Mr. Overton, sir," she said, rising instantly and brushing down her gardening apron with conspicuous haste as she did so. She displayed as she got on her feet a figure of grenadier-like proportions. "And how will you be doing this fine weather, sir?"

"Very well indeed, Mrs. Hurdon, thank you. And how is the good man coming on?"

"Middling, sir, middling. The pain's a bit less, but he's uncommon stiff, poor dear. Can't bend to so much as pick up a pin!"

"Poor old chap! Too bad he can't come out. I've a gentleman here who takes an interest in gardening, and I'm sure he and Mr. Hurdon would enjoy a few words on a subject so agreeable to both."

"Ah! that he would, yes, indeed! Talk flowers to Joshua, Mr. Overton, sir, and he'll listen to you by the hour."

"And here, evidently, is a kindred spirit. Mr. Headland was so struck with the beauty of your garden that nothing would do him but to come over and have a good look at it. You will be pleased to hear that he calls this as fine a display of the kind as he has ever seen."

"Doo-ee, now? Well, I'm sure that's very nice of him. We do take a pride in our garden, sir, and that's a fact."

During all this Cleek had said nothing – had not even so much as glanced at Mrs. Hurdon a second time after she rose to her feet. He seemed to be wholly absorbed in contemplating the beauty of the flowers, and, with his arms folded on the top of the wall, and his pipe in his mouth, was giving them his entire attention. It had occurred to him, however, that to be owned by one so erect, so broad-shouldered, and so seemingly virile, Mrs. Hurdon's voice was singularly thin and high-pitched, and had the quavering, cracked quality of eighty rather than that which usually goes with the appearance of fifty-five.

"I'm struck most with them Paul Crampels of yours, ma'am," he declared, breaking silence suddenly, and looking up. "Never saw a finer lot in all my life. Would you mind telling me where your husband got them?"

At the first word he knew, from the blank expression which came into her face, that what he had said was Choctaw to her – that she did not know a Paul Crampel from a Pollock, and hastened to land her still deeper into the mire by seeming to give a hint.

"Them with the white and scarlet bells is the best I ever see."

"Yes, they are fine, aren't they now?" she said, her face clearing, as, guided by his gesture, she looked in the direction of the plants bearing blooms of that description. "No; I don't know where he got them, sir. But it will be from somewhere in England, of course – he says he don't hold with them foreign seeds."

"Doesn't know a fuchsia from a geranium!" was Cleek's unspoken comment. "Doesn't even know whether they are propagated from cutting or from seed." Aloud, however, he simply declared, "No more do I, ma'am – that's where me and him agrees. All the same, though, I would like to know where he got that particular lot. You ask him for me, will you? And you can tell me some time when I drop round this way again."

"With pleasure, sir," said she. "Going, are you, Mr. Overton, sir?"

Evidently Mr. Overton was, but Cleek delayed the departure rather unexpectedly. On the top of the wall a seed had found lodgment, and was rooted between the stones. He caught hold of it suddenly, and pulled it up roots and all.

"Here's something your husband will be interested in, ma'am, I know," said he. "Hold your apron – catch! Don't let it get bruised."

With that he swung the plant forward, threw it to her, and she, catching up the corners of her apron, received it therein.

"Well, now, I never! To think of it growing up there, and me never noticing such a beautiful thing before! Oh, thanky, sir, thanky. Joshua will be pleased!"

Then she took up the plant and looked at its fuzzy little yellow blossoms, and let her apron fall into place again.

But not before Cleek had remarked the fact that the skirt it covered was baggy and very badly smudged in the neighbourhood of the good lady's knees, and that the smudges bore a curious resemblance to dried mustard.

The smile went up his cheek again.

CHAPTER VIII
THE MURDER OF CAPTAIN SANDRINGHAM

Overton and Mr. Narkom had already turned away, and with a pleasant "Good afternoon" to Mrs. Hurdon, Cleek moved off after them.

"Sorry to kep' you hanging round so late, gov'ner," he said, as he came up and joined the land-steward, Narkom again dropping back into the rear. "I never give a thought to how the time was flying until I see you make a move."

"Oh, don't let that distress you, Mr. Headland," replied Overton, good naturedly. "I have plenty of time at my disposal, fortunately. It was only my horse I was worrying over. He gets a bit restless if he's tied up too long, and that roadside sapling I fastened him to is none too firm a thing if he should suddenly take it into his mind to go back to the stables and leave me. You can see for yourself that he is beginning to get uneasy."

Cleek could. The animal was exceedingly restless, so they quickened their steps and got back to the road in time to take him before he did any mischief.

A short walk brought them to the curve where the road went round the bend of the Castle grounds and past the front elevation of the two cottages, and there before them stood St. Saviour's, with its moss-grown lich-gate, its well-worn footpath, its grim surroundings of sagging and discoloured tombstones, and its scarred and time-worn bell-tower.

Tower and church stood back from the highway at a distance of some thirty feet or more, and looking past them one could catch a glimpse through the trees of the gate and the path which led to the adjoining vicarage.

Cleek paused a moment and looked at the place. It seemed peaceful enough in the waning light and the pleasant country hush – far too peaceful to be in any way connected with matters of mystery and blood-shed.

"Seen a bit of time go over its head, that has," said he, as he struck a match and lit his pipe. "That'll be the bell-tower over there to the left, won't it, the round thing with the cement pavement all round it?"

"Yes. Would you like to go in and examine it? There's plenty of time."

"Not me. I want my supper and a good night's rest first. Will this be the road where you saw that thing last night, Mr. Overton?"

"No. It is on the other side of the graveyard – over there, where you see that row of trees in the distance. It runs parallel with this one. I couldn't have come over from Willowby Old Church by this road, you know. It takes another sharp turn presently, then another again, and goes off in a totally different direction. I remember hearing an American gentleman who was here last summer saying that he guessed it must have been paced off by an Early Briton who'd just risen from sitting down on a nest of bees and was hunting around for a drug store."

"Hallo!" interrupted Cleek, "this is the front of the Hurdons' cottage, I see. They do keep it tidy and no mistake. And the one adjoining it is where the child disappeared, eh?"

"Yes. Would you care to go in and have a look at it? I haven't the key, of course, but I could borrow Mrs. Hurdon's. They both have the one kind of lock, so I dare say hers would do. Shall I ask?"

"No, thanks. That'll do for to-morrow – when the magnifying glass and the other things arrive. Let's move on. I'm a bit tired and anxious to get to our rooms. I can tell from the way my mate drags his feet that he's about done up, too."

"He is an uncommunicative beggar, and no mistake!" declared Overton, with a laugh. "Hasn't spoken a blessed syllable the whole way. I should say an oyster was about as sociable a companion for you as he."

"Oh, Jim's all right when you know him. Not much on the talk, I'll allow; but deaf folks never is. I like him because he never worries me none. Hallo! who's this Johnnie, I wonder? He looks a bit excited."

By this time they had negotiated the farther turning in the road and had come in sight of a gate and a man standing before it – someone whom the clustering lilac bushes completely screened from view.

"That will be Carstairs, he's butler at the Castle, you remember," said Overton as he looked up and saw him. "The gate is the gate of the vicarage. No doubt it's the vicar himself he's talking to."

It was, as they saw clearly when they came abreast of the place. But even before they did so, the butler hearing their approach, looked round and saw them, and Cleek could not remember when he had seen any man's face and eyes express such exultation.

"Well, Carstairs, taking a constitutional before dinner-time?" inquired Overton, genially. "Ah! good afternoon, Vicar. Instructing Carstairs how to go about putting up the banns? He looks uncommonly well pleased."

"So I am, Mr. Overton; so I am, sir," declared Carstairs, with a satisfaction openly manifest. "One doesn't serve a good master like His Grace for years without being glad when good news comes his way – and this will mean the lifting of a great cross from his shoulders, bless him!"

"Now what do you mean by that? Something come to light about last night's horrible affair, Vicar?"

"No, Mr. Overton, nothing at all – unfortunately. It appears that I have been the means of imparting a piece of important news which has not yet reached the Castle – although I naturally supposed that it had. I dare say, however, that the duke was so much upset this morning that he neglected to read his newspaper."

"There was something of importance in it, then?"

"Of very great importance, Mr. Overton. I had to send to my study for the paper before I could convince Carstairs that I had not made a mistake. Here it is – look! 'Tragic Close of a Mis-spent Life. English Duke's Heir Murdered in Paris.' The victim, Mr. Overton, was Captain Paul Sandringham. He was shot dead in the street in Paris last evening by a Pole he had fleeced and ruined at cards."

Mr. Narkom glanced at Cleek; and Cleek catching that glance from the tail of his eye began to smoke hard.

In Paris, eh? Not in England at all! So, then, whoever was engineering this Valehampton affair, Captain Paul Sandringham was out of it. For last night he was in France; last night he was a dead man; yet last night the bells of St. Saviour's sent forth their peal as usual!