The Bungalow Mystery (25 page)

Lavington pushed his manuscript together and leaned back in his chair.

The old butler waited.

“Shall you want anything more, sir?”

“No, nothing, thank you. Goodnight, Jenkins.”

“Goodnight, sir.” The man withdrew noiselessly and Roger was left alone.

He sighed as he fastened his loose sheets of paper together and laid them in his desk. He had made scant progress of late. It was impossible to discourse learnedly on the origin of certain obscure diseases when the fair face of Elizabeth Luxmore would keep obtruding itself between his eyes and the printed pages. He had even found himself idly sketching her face on the margin of the paper when he should have been reading an article in the
Lancet
on the most recent medical discovery.

He lighted his pipe and strolling over to the mantel-piece, took up a position with his back to the fire. It was early yet, only half-past ten, but with Courtenay's illness the household had fallen into invalid habits and early going to bed prevailed before Lavington's coming to the Manor.

Making up his mind, that, since he could not work, there was nothing to sit up for, he was about to turn out in search of his candle, when the sound of wheels in the avenue caught his ear. He paused; it was an unusual hour for a visitor to arrive. It struck him that it might be Ethel Melville, she had spoken in her last letter of hoping to come down to see her brother shortly.

There was a loud rat-rat at the front door, a peal at the bell, Roger crossed the room, and drawing back the curtains from the unshuttered window, looked out. He could make out a carriage standing outside the porch, two men sat on the box, another stood by the door. Then he caught the sound of voices in the hall; evidently the visitors, whoever they were, were holding a lengthy colloquy with Jenkins. Then Jenkins put his head in.

“If you please, sir, I—they say—”

A glance was enough to convince Roger of the truth of his surmise that the visitors had brought bad news; the old butler's face was white, his eyes were staring, his head was shaking as if with palsy.

“What is it, Jenkins?” he said, moving towards him quickly. “Not Mrs. Melville?”

“No, sir, it—” the old man stammered; he seemed to have almost lost for the time being the power of coherent speech. “No, sir, it is Sir James, sir. It—oh Heaven save us, I can't say it! I think we must all be going mad!”

“Collect yourself, Jenkins.” Roger spoke sternly. He saw this was no time for kindness, the man was on the verge of a womanish outbreak of hysterics. “What is wrong with Sir James?”

“One moment, my good man.” A strong hand put Jenkins on one side. “I will explain matters to Dr. Lavington myself. Excuse me, sir.” Detective Collins advanced into the room, closing the door carefully behind him. “It is as well to have as few mixed up in this business as possible,” he remarked with a deprecating smile. “Dr. Lavington, I hold a warrant for the arrest of Sir James Courtenay. The police are in the hall with Inspector Spencer; we look to you to get the warrant executed as expeditiously as possible.”

“A warrant for the arrest of Sir James Courtenay!” Lavington distrusted the evidence of his own ears. “You must have made some unaccountable mistake. What is the charge?”

Before the detective could reply Jenkins put in his head.

“Sir James, he heard the knock and he sent for me. He says will you please step this way; he will see you at once. You, too, sir, Sir James said,” turning to Roger.

The library door stood wide open; Courtenay, sitting in his wheeled chair before his secretaire, commanded a view of the hall.

“Come in. I was expecting you,” he said quietly. “You see I have been preparing for you,” with a gesture towards the overflowing waste-paper-basket, the neatly-docketed packets on the shelves of the secretaire. “Roger, old fellow, close the door for a minute,” for already the news that something extraordinary was taking place had spread to the servants' hall; frightened faces were peeping out from the passage. Before Roger could obey, however, Inspector Spencer and his colleague had followed him in. The inspector stepped forward. Courtenay met his glance fully.

“Do your duty, inspector. No preparation is needed, thank you!”

“Sir James Francis Lechmere Courtenay, I arrest you for the wilful murder of Maximilian Gerhard von Rheinhart, at The Bungalow, Sutton Boldon, on the night of April 14th, 19—” the inspector read in his clear, strident tones from the warrant in his hand. “It is my duty also to warn you that anything you say now will be taken down and may be used against you in evidence.”

Courtenay bowed slightly.

“Thank you, inspector. I am much obliged to you. Where are you going to take me?”

“Only over to Bredon, sir, until the examination before the magistrates takes place. But Mrs. Cruikshanks, the wife of the inspector there, she will see that you are comfortable for the night.”

“Comfortable!” Courtenay's smile was frankly amused. “I am sure she will be kindness itself,” he hastened to add. “Roger, my dear boy, would you tell them to bring the brougham round. I suppose there will be no objection to that?” glancing at the police-officers.

“Certainly not, sir. We thought you would probably prefer it. One of us will go inside and the other on the box, if you will allow it.”

Roger obeyed mechanically. The one thing that struck him amid the vast bewilderment that had overtaken him was that Courtenay's old genial manner had returned and that the cynical, sneering tone which he had adopted of late had vanished. He gave the order to Jenkins, never even observing in his utter preoccupation the old man's pitiful anxiety for further news. When he returned to the library Courtenay was already wheeling himself towards the door, the police closing in around his chair.

“There; I think there is nothing to wait for. One of the men can bring over what I shall want for the night.” But the old friendship, the old love that had subsisted between the two lonely boys at school, and later on at college, swept over Roger in an overmastering flood now. Remembering Courtenay's high aims, the brilliant promise that his young life had held, the pathos of this pitiful tragedy seemed to be more overwhelming.

He turned from his friend with a groan to the men who stood beside him.

“I must see him alone. I will answer for him.”

“You shall have your way, sir.” Detective Collins took the answer upon himself. “But the door must be left open, and Inspector Spencer and me must stand in sight.”

They moved into the hall. Courtenay wheeled himself back nearer the window. Roger's eyes were full of pleading, of tense, intolerable pain; the face that smiled back at him, the candid eyes, the mouth, strong yet sweet, were surely those of his childhood's friend and hero. The deep lines that the years of sorrow had graven were smoothed out. The long, weary time of ill-health, of sickness of body and mind was forgotten, as if it had never been.

“Courtenay! Jem!” The old name, never used since his coming to Oakthorpe, rose glibly to Roger's lips now. “This is a vile lie! I know you did not do it!”

A passionate appeal lay in the rough tones. Forgetful, Lavington's brown hand gripped his friend's thin shoulder like a vice.

Courtenay's upward look held something of wistful longing.

“I was at The Bungalow that night, Roger; that is true enough!”

“But you did not kill Maximilian von Rheinhart?” Lavington said hoarsely, his eyes fixed upon his friend as though they would force his secret from him, his muscles straining unconsciously. “It is no use you trying to blind me, Jem. I know you did not.”

Courtenay winced involuntarily.

“That is for the jury to determine,” he said slowly. “I knew—I have always known—that this charge might be brought at any time. Sometimes I have thought that the end might come first, and I have been glad. But, now, I fancy, after all, it is better as it is; for the rest, she will be safe, I think. That is what counts.”

She! Lavington gazed before him, bewildered. He realized that for one moment he had forgotten Daphne Luxmore—had forgotten the girl he had found at The Bungalow. Before he had time to collect his thoughts, to realize with any coherency how entirely Courtenay's avowed presence in The Bungalow on the night of the murder must alter things as he knew them, his friend moved forward.

“Officer, I am ready. I hear the carriage outside. May I suggest I am a poor sleeper and I shall be glad to reach my shelter for the night as soon as possible.”

“We are ready, sir.” Detective Collins and Inspector Spencer kept close at hand on either side, while Courtenay wheeled himself across the hall and waited for the footman to bring him his coat and hat.

Old Jenkins stood near the door, tears standing in his eyes.

“If I had known what they had wanted I would have let them blow the house down afore I opened the door to them,” he quavered. “You will forgive me, sir?”

Courtenay held out his hand.

“There is nothing to forgive, my old friend! You have nothing to reproach yourself with—I—” His words were drowned by a noisy outburst of sobbing from a group of frightened servants clustered round the doorway.

Detective Collins shrugged his shoulders.

“I did my best to get him away quietly; but once let these women know and there's no keeping them back. Who's this now?”

The sobbing maids were thrust on one side; a figure clad in rustling black silk, with a white, twitching face, staggered forward.

“What are you doing? Jenkins! Charles! Fools! Are you letting him be taken away without one struggle?”

Courtenay was signing to the men to lift him into the brougham. He turned his head.

“Miller, my poor friend, don't! Talk to her, Roger; show her it is all for the best.”

But the waiting policemen interposed themselves deftly between the housekeeper and her master. He was placed in the carriage. Collins stood at the door waiting. Lavington moved forward. Courtenay held up his hand.

“Not now, Roger, dear old fellow; I would rather be alone. You can do as much for me here. Make my old friend there see that it cannot be helped; that indeed it is best so. And Ethel must be told.” His voice quivered. “I was forgetting Ethel, Roger. There is a midnight express. Would you—could you—”

“I will go,” Roger promised.

“Thank you. Tell her that I am sorry to have brought this upon her. If you come back, if you get the early train in the morning, I shall be glad to see you—if—if you care to come. Ready, inspector!”

Glad to end the scene, the two men got into the carriage and closed the door. Lavington stood in the porch until the last sound of the wheels had died away, then he turned heavily back to the hall.

The housekeeper was clinging to one of the doorposts behind him, her whole frame shaking as if with ague. He put out his hand.

“Come, Mrs. Miller, you must not give way; there is so much to be done! Let me help you back to your room.”

But Mrs. Miller thrust his arm away.

“It cannot be true what they are whispering among themselves, Dr. Lavington”—with a withering glance at the weeping maidservants—“that they have arrested him for murder—arrested Sir James for murder!”

Roger paused a moment; then, conscious that it was useless to deny facts that by the morning would be ringing through the whole country-side, he bowed his head gravely.

“Ah!” Mrs. Miller fought down a strangling sob. “Whose murder? Whose murder, I ask, Dr. Lavington.”

Roger drew her forcibly into the billiard-room at the end of the hall. If help was to be hoped for, surely it must come from this woman.

“For the murder of Maximilian von Rheinhart, at Sutton Boldon, Mrs. Miller!”

The woman interrupted him with a hoarse cry.

“Are they mad—mad? He murder Maximilian von Rheinhart! Sir James—he—I—” She broke off with a moan, struggled for breath, clutched wildly at the air.

Roger caught her before she fell. Laying her on the couch, he summoned the maids. Evidently nothing further could be hoped for from her now, and he had little time to spare if he was going to catch the midnight express.

A terrible thought was torturing him as he made his brief preparations. Now that Courtenay was accused of murdering Rheinhart, would it not be his duty to speak out—to relate the circumstances under which he found Daphne Luxmore on the night of April 14th? Would he be justified in disregarding his friend's wish and making public Miss Luxmore's share in the mysterious events of The Bungalow?

Another question insisted on making itself heard whether he would or not. It was evident from his own words that Courtenay, as well as Miss Luxmore, had been at The Bungalow on the night of the murder. As far as human probability could go, the death of Maximilian von Rheinhart must lie at the door of one of them. It was the old question he asked himself, the one that had been put by Detective Collins at Sutton Boldon, by Inspector Spencer at Corbett's farm—which?

The little court-room at Bredon, in which the magistrates' meeting was held, was crammed to its utmost capacity. The news that Sir James Courtenay had been arrested for murder, and would be brought before the magistrates at Bredon that morning, had spread like wildfire over the neighbourhood. The interest that had been taken in The Bungalow murder was intensified from the accused man's wealth and position, and was raised in this case to fever heat by the romance that had gathered round Sir James Courtenay's name.

Roger elbowed his way through the curious sightseers on his way down from the station. He looked haggard and worn in the clear morning light; his mouth sternly compressed; his eyes sombre and set round with purple rims. He had not slept since Courtenay's arrest; he had scarcely sat down save in the railway carriage. The mental strain involved in breaking his terrible news to Mrs. Melville, in cheering her and encouraging her to believe that everything might yet turn out to be some terrible mistake, was considerable; and his determination at all hazards to be back by the hour fixed for the examination before the magistrates had necessitated two long journeys with barely an hour's interval between them. But, above all, his dark face betrayed the traces of inward conflict; the question he had put to himself last night remained unanswered; his line of conduct was still undecided.