The Victorian Mystery Megapack (5 page)

“In Mrs. Armitage’s case the taking of an inferior brooch and the leaving of a more valuable ring pointed clearly either to the operator being a fool or unable to distinguish values, and certainly, from other indications, the thief seemed no fool. The door was locked, and the gas-fitter, so to speak, on guard, and the window was only eight or ten inches open and propped with a brush. A human thief entering the window would have disturbed this arrangement, and would scarcely risk discovery by attempting to replace it, especially a thief in so great a hurry as to snatch the brooch up without unfastening the pin. The bird could pass through the opening as it was, and
would have
to tear the pin-cushion to pull the brooch off, probably holding the cushion down with its claw the while.

“Now in yesterday’s case we had an alteration of conditions. The window was shut and fastened, but the door was open—but only left for a few minutes, during which time no sound was heard either of coming or going. Was it not possible, then, that the thief was
already
in the room, in hiding, while Mrs. Cazenove was there, and seized its first opportunity on her temporary absence? The room is full of draperies, hangings, and what not, allowing of plenty of concealment for a bird, and a bird could leave the place noiselessly and quickly. That the whole scheme was strange mattered not at all. Robberies presenting such unaccountable features must have been effected by strange means of one sort or another. There was no improbability. Consider how many hundreds of examples of infinitely higher degrees of bird-training are exhibited in the London streets every week for coppers.

“So that, on the whole, I felt pretty sure of my ground. But before taking any definite steps I resolved to see if Polly could not be persuaded to exhibit his accomplishments to an indulgent stranger. For that purpose I contrived to send Lloyd away again and have a quiet hour alone with his bird. A piece of sugar, as everybody knows, is a good parrot bribe; but a walnut, split in half, is a better—especially if the bird be used to it; so I got you to furnish me with both. Polly was shy at first, but I generally get along very well with pets, and a little perseverance soon led to a complete private performance for my benefit. Polly would take the match, mute as wax, jump on the table, pick up the brightest thing he could see, in a great hurry, leave the match behind, and scuttle away round the room; but at first wouldn’t give up the plunder to
me
. It was enough. I also took the liberty, as you know, of a general look round, and discovered that little collection of Brummagem rings and trinkets that you have just seen—used in Polly’s education, no doubt. When we sent Lloyd away, it struck me that he might as well be usefully employed as not, so I got him to fetch the police, deluding him a little, I fear, by talking about the servants and a female searcher. There will be no trouble about evidence; he’ll confess. Of that I’m sure. I know the sort of man. But I doubt if you’ll get Mrs. Cazenove’s brooch back. You see, he has been to London today, and by this time the swag is probably broken up.”

Sir James listened to Hewitt’s explanation with many expressions of assent and some of surprise. When it was over, he smoked a few whiffs and then said: “But Mrs. Armitage’s brooch was pawned, and by a woman.”

“Exactly. I expect our friend Lloyd was rather disgusted at his small luck—probably gave the brooch to some female connection in London, and she realized on it. Such persons don’t always trouble to give a correct address.”

The two smoked in silence for a few minutes, and then Hewitt continued: “I don’t expect our friend has had an easy job altogether with that bird. His successes at most have only been three, and I suspect he had many failures and not a few anxious moments that we know nothing of. I should judge as much merely from what the groom told me of frequently meeting Lloyd with his parrot. But the plan was not a bad one—not at all. Even if the bird had been caught in the act, it would only have been ‘That mischievous parrot!’ you see. And his master would only have been looking for him.”

THE HOUSE OF CLOCKS, by Anna Katharine Green

Miss Strange was not in a responsive mood. This her employer had observed on first entering; yet he showed no hesitation in laying on the table behind which she had ensconced herself in the attitude of one besieged, an envelope thick with enclosed papers.

“There,” said he. “Telephone me when you have read them.”

“I shall not read them.”

“No?” he smiled; and, repossessing himself of the envelope, he tore off one end, extracted the sheets with which it was filled, and laid them down still unfolded, in their former place on the table-top.

The suggestiveness of the action caused the corners of Miss Srange’s delicate lips to twitch wistfully, before settling into an ironic smile.

Calmly the other watched her.

“I am on a vacation,” she loftily explained, as she finally met his studiously non-quizzical glance. “Oh, I know that I am in my own home!” she petulantly acknowledged, as his gaze took in the room; “and that the automobile is at the door; and that I’m dressed for shopping. But for all that I’m on a vacation—a mental one,” she emphasized; “and business must wait. I haven’t got over the last affair,” she protested, as he maintained a discreet silence, “and the season is so gay just now—so many balls, so many—But that isn’t the worst. Father is beginning to wake up—and if he ever suspects—” A significant gesture ended this appeal.

The personage knew her father—everyone did—and the wonder had always been that she dared run the risk of displeasing one so implacable. Though she was his favourite child, Peter Strange was known to be quite capable of cutting her off with a shilling, once his close, prejudiced mind conceived it to be his duty. And that he would so interpret the situation, if he ever came to learn the secret of his daughter’s fits of abstraction and the sly bank account she was slowly accumulating, the personage holding out this dangerous lure had no doubt at all. Yet he only smiled at her words and remarked in casual suggestion:

“It’s out of town this time—way out. Your health certainly demands a change of air.”

“My health is good. Fortunately, or unfortunately, as one may choose to look at it, it furnishes me with no excuse for an outing,” she steadily retorted, turning her back on the table.

“Ah, excuse me!” the insidious voice apologized, “your paleness misled me. Surely a night or two’s change might be beneficial.”

She gave him a quick side look, and began to adjust her boa.

To this hint he paid no attention.

“The affair is quite out of the ordinary,” he pursued in the tone of one rehearsing a part. But there he stopped. For some reason, not altogether apparent to the masculine mind, the pin of flashing stones (real stones) which held her hat in place had to be taken out and thrust back again, not once, but twice. It was to watch this performance he had paused. When he was ready to proceed, he took the musing tone of one marshalling facts for another’s enlightenment:

“A woman of unknown instincts—”

“Pshaw!” The end of the pin would strike against the comb holding Violet’s chestnut-coloured locks.

“Living in a house as mysterious as the secret it contains. But—” here he allowed his patience apparently to forsake him, “I will bore you no longer. Go to your teas and balls; I will struggle with my dark affairs alone.”

His hand went to the packet of papers she affected so ostentatiously to despise. He could be as nonchalant as she. But he did not lift them; he let them lie. Yet the young heiress had not made a movement or even turned the slightest glance his way.

“A woman difficult to understand! A mysterious house—possibly a mysterious crime!”

Thus Violet kept repeating in silent self-communion, as flushed with dancing she sat that evening in a highly-scented conservatory, dividing her attention between the compliments of her partner and the splash of a fountain bubbling in the heart of this mass of tropical foliage; and when some hours later she sat down in her chintz-furnished bedroom for a few minutes’ thought before retiring, it was to draw from a little oak box at her elbow the half-dozen or so folded sheets of closely written paper which had been left for her perusal by her persistent employer.

Glancing first at the signature and finding it to be one already favourably known at the bar, she read with avidity the statement of events thus vouched for, finding them curious enough in all conscience to keep her awake for another full hour.

We here subscribe it:

I am a lawyer with an office in the Times Square Building. My business is mainly local, but sometimes I am called out of town, as witness the following summons received by me on the fifth of last October.

DEAR SIR,—

I wish to make my will. I am an invalid and cannot leave my room. Will you come to me? The enclosed reference will answer for my respectability. If it satisfies you and you decide to accommodate me, please hasten your visit; I have not many days to live. A carriage will meet you at Highland Station at any hour you designate. Telegraph reply.

A. Postlethwaite, Gloom Cottage, ——, N. J.

The reference given was a Mr. Weed of Eighty-sixth Street—a well-known man of unimpeachable reputation.

Calling him up at his business office, I asked him what he could tell me about Mr. Postlethwaite of Gloom Cottage, ——, N. J. The answer astonished me:

“There is no Mr. Postlethwaite to be found at that address. He died years ago. There is a Mrs. Postlethwaite—a confirmed paralytic. Do you mean her?”

I glanced at the letter still lying open at the side of the telephone:

“The signature reads A. Postlethwaite.”

“Then it’s she. Her name is Arabella. She hates the name, being a woman of no sentiment. Uses her initials even on her cheques. What does she want of you?”

“To draw her will.”

“Oblige her. It’ll be experience for you.” And he slammed home the receiver.

I decided to follow the suggestion so forcibly emphasized; and the next day saw me at Highland Station. A superannuated horse and a still more superannuated carriage awaited me—both too old to serve a busy man in these days of swift conveyance. Could this be a sample of the establishment I was about to enter? Then I remembered that the woman who had sent for me was a helpless invalid, and probably had no use for any sort of turnout.

The driver was in keeping with the vehicle, and as noncommittal as the plodding beast he drove. If I ventured upon a remark, he gave me a long and curious look; if I went so far as to attack him with a direct question, he responded with a hitch of the shoulder or a dubious smile which conveyed nothing. Was he deaf or just unpleasant? I soon learned that he was not deaf; for suddenly, after a jog-trot of a mile or so through a wooded road which we had entered from the main highway, he drew in his horse, and, without glancing my way, spoke his first word:

“This is where you get out. The house is back there in the bushes.”

As no house was visible and the bushes rose in an unbroken barrier along the road, I stared at him in some doubt of his sanity.

“But—” I began; a protest into which he at once broke, with the sharp direction:

“Take the path. It’ll lead you straight to the front door.”

“I don’t see any path.”

For this he had no answer; and confident from his expression that it would be useless to expect anything further from him, I dropped a coin into his hand, and jumped to the ground. He was off before I could turn myself about.

“‘Something is rotten in the State of Denmark,’” I quoted in startled comment to myself; and not knowing what else to do, stared down at the turf at my feet.

A bit of flagging met my eye, protruding from a layer of thick moss. Farther on I espied another—the second, probably, of many. This, no doubt, was the path I had been bidden to follow, and without further thought on the subject, I plunged into the bushes which with difficulty I made give way before me.

For a moment all further advance looked hopeless. A more tangled, uninviting approach to a so-called home, I had never seen outside of the tropics; and the complete neglect thus displayed should have prepared me for the appearance of the house I unexpectedly came upon, just as, the way seemed on the point of closing up before me.

But nothing could well prepare one for a first view of Gloom Cottage. Its location in a hollow which had gradually filled itself up with trees and some kind of prickly brush, its deeply stained walls, once picturesque enough in their grouping but too deeply hidden now amid rotting boughs to produce any other effect than that of shrouded desolation, the sough of these same boughs as they rapped a devil’s tattoo against each other, and the absence of even the rising column of smoke which bespeaks domestic life wherever seen—all gave to one who remembered the cognomen Cottage and forgot the pre-cognomen of Gloom, a sense of buried life as sepulchral as that which emanates from the mouth of some freshly opened tomb.

But these impressions, natural enough to my youth, were necessarily transient, and soon gave way to others more business-like. Perceiving the curve of an arch rising above the undergrowth still blocking my approach, I pushed my way resolutely through, and presently found myself stumbling upon the steps of an unexpectedly spacious domicile, built not of wood, as its name of Cottage had led me to expect, but of carefully cut stone which, while showing every mark of time, proclaimed itself one of those early, carefully erected Colonial residences which it takes more than a century to destroy, or even to wear to the point of dilapidation.