CHAPTER IV
Promptly, at the hour appointed, "Mr. Jim Rickaby" and his black servantarrived at Laburnam Villa; and certainly the former had no cause tocomplain of the welcome he received at the hands of his beautiful younghostess.
He found her not only an extremely lovely woman to the eye, but onewhose gentle, caressing ways, whose soft voice and simple girlish charmwere altogether fascinating, and, judging from outward appearances, fromthe tender solicitude for her elderly husband's comfort and well-being,from the look in her eyes when she spoke to him, the gentleness of herhand when she touched him, one would have said that she really and trulyloved him, and that it needed no lure of gold to draw this particularMay to the arms of this one December.
He found Captain Travers a laughing, rollicking, fun-loving type ofman--at least, to all outward appearances--who seemed to delight insports and games and to have an almost childish love of card tricks andthat species of entertainment which is known as parlour magic. He foundthe three other members of the little house-party--to wit: Mrs.Somerby-Miles, Lieutenant Forshay, and Mr. Robert Murdock--respectively,a silly, flirtatious, little gadfly of a widow; a callow, love-struck,lap-dog, young army officer, with a budding moustache and a full-blownidea of his own importance; and a dour Scotchman of middle age, with apassion for chess, a glowering scorn of frivolities, and a deep andabiding conviction that Scotland was the only country in the world for aself-respecting human being to dwell in, and that everything outside ofthe Established Church was foredoomed to flames and sulphur and theperpetual prodding of red-hot pitchforks. And last, but not least by anymeans, he found Mr. Michael Bawdrey just what he had been told he wouldfind him, namely, a dear, lovable, sunny-tempered old man, who fairlyidolised his young wife and absolutely adored his frank-faced,affectionate, big boy of a son, and who ought not, in the common courseof things, to have an enemy or an evil wisher in all the world.
The news, which, of course, had preceded Cleek's arrival, that thiswhilom college chum of his son's was as great an enthusiast as hehimself on the subject of old china, old porcelain, bric-a-brac andcurios of every sort, filled him with the utmost delight, and he couldscarcely refrain from rushing him off at once to view his famouscollection.
"Michael, dear, you mustn't overdo yourself just because you happen tohave been a little stronger these past two days," said his wife, layinga gentle hand upon his arm. "Besides, we must give Mr. Rickaby time tobreathe. He has had a long journey, and I am sure he will want to rest.You can take him in to see that wonderful collection after dinner,dear."
"Humph! Full of fakes, as I supposed--and she knows it," was Cleek'smental comment upon this. And he was not surprised when, finding herselfalone with him a few minutes later, she said, in her pretty, pleadingway:
"Mr. Rickaby, if you are an expert, don't undeceive him. I could not letyou go to see the collection without first telling you. It is full ofbogus things, full of frauds and shams that unscrupulous dealers havepalmed off on him. But don't let him know. He takes such pride in them,and--and he's breaking down--God pity me, his health is breaking downevery day, Mr. Rickaby, and I want to spare him every pang, if I can,even so little a pang as the discovery that the things he prizes are notreal."
"Set your mind at rest, Mrs. Bawdrey," promised Cleek. "He will not findit out from me. He will not find anything out from me. He is just thekind of man to break his heart, to crumple up like a burnt glove, andcome to the end of all things, even life, if he were to discover thatany of his treasures, anything that he loved and trusted in, is a shamand a fraud."
His eyes looked straight into hers as he spoke, his hand rested lightlyon her sleeve. She sucked in her breath suddenly, a brief pallor chasedthe roses from her cheeks, a brief confusion sat momentarily upon her.She appeared to hesitate, then looked away and laughed uneasily.
"I don't think I quite grasp what you mean, Mr. Rickaby," she said.
"Don't you?" he made answer. "Then I will tell you--sometime--to-morrow, perhaps. But if I were you, Mrs. Bawdrey--well, nomatter. This I promise you: that dear old man shall have no idealshattered by me."
And, living up to that promise, he enthused over everything the old manhad in his collection when, after dinner that night, they went, incompany with Philip, to view it. But bogus things were on every hand.Spurious porcelains, fraudulent armour, faked china were everywhere. Theloaded cabinets and the glazed cases were one long procession of fakedDresden and bogus faience, of Egyptian enamels that had beenmanufactured in Birmingham, and of sixth-century "treasures" whosemakers were still plying their trade and battening upon the ignorance ofsuch collectors as he.
"Now, here's a thing I am particularly proud of," said the gulled oldman, reaching into one of the cases and holding out for Cleek'sadmiration an irregular disc of dull, hammered gold that had aniridescent beetle embedded in the flat face of it. "This scarab, Mr.Rickaby, has helped to make history, as one might say. It was once theproperty of Cleopatra. I was obliged to make two trips to Egypt before Icould persuade the owner to part with it. I am always conscious of acertain sense of awe, Mr. Rickaby, when I touch this wonderful thing. Tothink, sir, to think! that this bauble once rested on the bosom of thatmarvellous woman; that Mark Antony must have seen it, may have touchedit; that Ptolemy Auletes knew all about it, and that it is older, sir,than the Christian religion itself!"
He held it out upon the flat of his palm, the better for Cleek to seeand to admire it, and signed to his son to hand the visitor a magnifyingglass.
"Wonderful, most wonderful!" observed Cleek, bending over the spuriousgem and focussing the glass upon it; not, however, for the purpose ofstudying the fraud, but to examine something just noticed--somethinground and red and angry-looking which marked the palm itself, at thebase of the middle finger.
"No wonder you are proud of such a prize. I think I should go off myhead with rapture if I owned an antique like that. But, pardon me, haveyou met with an accident, Mr. Bawdrey? That's an ugly place you have onyour palm."
"That? Oh, that's nothing," he answered, gaily. "It itches a great dealat times, but otherwise it isn't troublesome. I can't think how in theworld I got it, to tell the truth. It came out as a sort of red blisterin the beginning, and since it broke it has been spreading a great deal.But, really, it doesn't amount to anything at all."
"Oh, that's just like you, dad," put in Philip, "always making light ofthe wretched thing. I notice one thing, however, Rickaby, it seems togrow worse instead of better. And dad knows as well as I do when itbegan. It came out suddenly about a fortnight ago, after he had beenholding some green worsted for my stepmother to wind into balls. Justlook at it, will you, old chap?"
"Nonsense, nonsense!" chimed in the old man, laughingly. "Don't mind thesilly boy, Mr. Rickaby. He will have it that that green worsted is toblame, just because he happened to spy the thing the morning after."
"Let's have a look at it," said Cleek, moving nearer the light. Then,after a close examination, "I don't think it amounts to anything, afterall," he added, as he laid aside the glass. "I shouldn't worry myselfabout it if I were you, Phil. It's just an ordinary blister, nothingmore. Let's go on with the collection, Mr. Bawdrey; I'm deeplyinterested in it, I assure you. Never saw such a marvellous lot. Got anymore amazing things--gems, I mean--like that wonderful scarab? Isay!"--halting suddenly before a long, narrow case, with a glass front,which stood on end in a far corner, and, being lined with black velvet,brought into ghastly prominence the suspended shape of a human skeletoncontained within--"I say! What the dickens is this? Looks like adoctor's specimen, b'gad. You haven't let anybody--I mean, you haven'tbeen buying any prehistoric bones, have you, Mr. Bawdrey?"
"Oh, that?" laughed the old man, turning round and seeing to what he wasalluding. "Oh, that's a curiosity of quite a different sort, Mr.Rickaby. You are right in saying it looks like a doctor's specimen. Itis--or, rather, it was. Mrs. Bawdrey's father was a doctor, and it oncebelonged to him. Properly, it ought to have no place in a collection ofth
is sort, but--well, it's such an amazing thing I couldn't quite refuseit a place, sir. It's a freak of nature. The skeleton of a nine-fingeredman."
"Of a what?"
"A nine-fingered man."
"Well, I can't say that I see anything remarkable in that. I've got ninefingers myself, nine and one over, when it comes to that."
"No, you haven't, you duffer!" put in young Bawdrey, with a laugh."You've got eight fingers--eight fingers and two thumbs. This bonyjohnny has nine fingers and two thumbs. That's what makes him a freak. Isay, dad, open the beggar's box, and let Rickaby see."
His father obeyed the request. Lifting the tiny brass latch which alonesecured it, he swung open the glazed door of the case, and, reaching in,drew forward the flexible left arm of the skeleton.
"There you are," he said, supporting the bony hand upon his palm, sothat all its fingers were spread out and Cleek might get a clear view ofthe monstrosity. "What a trial he must have been to the glove trade,mustn't he?" laughing gaily. "Fancy the confusion and dismay, Mr.Rickaby, if a fellow like this walked into a Bond Street shop in a hurryand asked for a pair of gloves."
Cleek bent over and examined the thing with interest. At first glance,the hand was no different from any other skeleton hand one might see anyday in any place where they sold anatomical specimens for the use ofmembers of the medical profession; but as Mr. Bawdrey, holding it on thepalm of his right hand, flattened it out with the fingers of his left,the abnormality at once became apparent. Springing from the base of thefourth finger, a perfectly developed fifth appeared, curling inwardtoward what had once been the palm of the hand, as though, in life, ithad been the owner's habit of screening it from observation by holdingit in that position. It was, however, perfectly flexible, and Mr.Bawdrey had no difficulty in making it lie out flat after the manner ofits mates.
The sight was not inspiring--the freaks of mother Nature rarely are. Noone but a doctor would have cared to accept the thing as a gift, and noone but a man as mad on the subject of curiosities and with as littlesense of discrimination as Mr. Bawdrey would have dreamt for a moment ofadding it to a collection.
"It's rather uncanny," said Cleek, who had no palate for the abnormal inNature. "For myself, I may frankly admit that I don't like things ofthat sort about me."
"You are very much like my wife in that," responded the old man. "Shewas of the opinion that the skeleton ought to have been destroyed orelse handed over to some anatomical museum. But--well, it is acuriosity, you know, Mr. Rickaby. Besides, as I have said, it was oncethe property of her late father, a most learned man, sir, most learned,and as it was of sufficient interest for him to retain it--oh, well, wecollectors are faddists, you know, so I easily persuaded Mrs. Bawdrey toallow me to bring it over to England with me when we took our leave ofJava. And now that you have seen it, suppose we have a look at moreartistic things. I have some very fine specimens of neolithic implementsand weapons which I am most anxious to show you. Just step this way,please."
He let the skeleton's hand slip from his own, swing back into the case,and forthwith closed the glass door upon it; then, leading the way tothe cabinet containing the specimens referred to, he unlocked it, andinvited Cleek's opinion of the flint arrow-heads, stone hatchets, andgranite utensils within.
For a minute they lingered thus, the old man talking, laughing, exultingin his possessions, the detective examining and pretending to be deeplyimpressed. Then, of a sudden, without hint or warning to lessen theshock of it, the uplifted lid of the cabinet fell with a crash from thehand that upheld it, shivering the glass into fifty pieces, and Cleek,screwing round on his heel with a "jump" of all his nerves, was in timeto see the figure of his host crumple up, collapse, drop like a thingshot dead, and lie foaming and writhing on the polished floor.
"Dad! Oh, heavens! Dad!" The cry was young Bawdrey's. He seemed fairlyto throw himself across the intervening space and to reach his father inthe instant he fell. "Now you know! Now you know!" he went on wildly, asCleek dropped down beside him and began to loosen the old man's collar."It's like this always; not a hint, not a sign, but just this uttercollapse. My God, what are they doing it with? How are they managing it,those two? They're coming, Headland. Listen! Don't you hear them?"
The crash of the broken glass and the jar of the old man's fall hadswept through all the house, and a moment later, headed by Mrs. Bawdreyherself, all the members of the little house-party came piling excitedlyinto the room.
The fright and suffering of the young wife seemed very real as she threwherself down beside her husband and caught him to her with a littleshuddering cry. Then her voice, uplifting in a panic, shrilled out awild appeal for doctor, servants--help of any kind. And, almost as shespoke, Travers was beside her, Travers and Forshay and RobertMurdock--yes, and silly little Mrs. Somerby-Miles, too, forgetting inthe face of such a time as this to be anything but helpful andwomanly--and all of these gave such assistance as was in their power.
"Help me get him up to his own room, somebody, and send a servantpost-haste for the doctor," said Captain Travers, taking the lead afterthe fashion of a man who is used to command. "Calm yourself as much aspossible, Mrs. Bawdrey. Here, Murdock, lend a hand and help him."
"Eh, mon, there is nae help but Heaven's in sic a case as this,"dolefully responded Murdock, as he came forward and solemnly stooped toobey. "The puir auld laddie! The Laird giveth and the Laird taketh awa',and the weel o' mon is as naething."
"Oh, stow your croaking, you blundering old fool!" snapped Travers, asMrs. Bawdrey gave a heart-wrung cry and hid her face in her hands. "Youand your eternal doldrums! Here, Bawdrey, lend a hand, old chap. We canget him upstairs without the assistance of this human trombone, I know."
But "this human trombone" was not minded that they should; and so itfell out that, when Lieutenant Forshay led Mrs. Somerby-Miles from theroom, and young Bawdrey and Captain Travers carried the stricken man upthe stairs to his own bed-chamber, his wife flying in advance to seethat everything was prepared for him, Cleek, standing all alone besidethe shattered cabinet, could hear Mr. Robert Murdock's dismal croakingsrumbling steadily out as he mounted the staircase with the others.
For a moment after the closing door of a room overhead had shut themfrom his ears, he stood there, with puckered brows and pursed-up lips,drumming with his finger-tips a faint tattoo upon the framework of theshattered lid; then he walked over to the skeleton case, and silentlyregarded the gruesome thing within.
"Nine fingers," he muttered sententiously, "and the ninth curves inwardto the palm!" He stepped round and viewed the case from all points--bothsides, the front, and even the narrow space made at the back by theangle of the corner where it stood. And after this he walked to theother end of the room, took the key from the lock, slipped it in hispocket, and went out, closing the door behind him, that none mightremember it had not been locked when the master of the place was carriedabove.
It was, perhaps, twenty minutes later that young Bawdrey came down andfound him all alone in the smoking-room, bending over the table whereonthe butler had set the salver containing the whiskey decanter, the sodasiphon, and the glasses that were always laid out there, that thegentlemen might help themselves to the regulation "night-cap" beforegoing to bed.
"I've slipped away to have a word in private with you, Headland," hesaid, in an agitated voice, as he came in. "Oh, what consummate actorsthey are, those two. You'd think her heart was breaking, wouldn't you?You'd think--Hullo! I say! What on earth are you doing?" For, as he camenearer, he could see that Cleek had removed the glass stopper of thedecanter, and was tapping with his finger-tips a little funnel of whitepaper, the narrow end of which he had thrust into the neck of thebottle.
"Just adding a harmless little sleeping-draught to the nightlybeverage," said Cleek, in reply, as he screwed up the paper funnel andput it in his pocket. "A good sound sleep is an excellent thing, my dearfellow, and I mean to make sure that the gentlemen of this house-partyhave it--one gentleman in particular: Captain Travers.
"
"Yes; but--I say! What about me, old chap? I don't want to be drugged,and you know I have to show them the courtesy of taking a 'night-cap'with them."
"Precisely. That's where you can help me out. If any of them remarkanything about the whiskey having a peculiar taste, you must stoutlyassert that you don't notice; and, as they've seen you drinking from thesame decanter--why, there you are. Don't worry over it. It's a very,very harmless draught; you won't even have a headache from it. Listenhere, Bawdrey. Somebody is poisoning your father."
"I know it. I told you so from the beginning, Headland," he answered,with a sort of wail. "But what's that got to do with drugging thewhiskey?"
"Everything. I'm going to find out to-night whether Captain Travers isthat somebody or not. Sh-h-h! Don't get excited. Yes, that's my game. Iwant to get into his rooms whilst he is sleeping, and be free to searchhis effects. I want to get into every man's room here, and wherever Ifind poison--well, you understand?"
"Yes," he replied, brightening as he grasped the import of the matter."What a ripping idea! And so simple."
"I think so. Once let me find the poison, and I'll know my man. Now oneother thing: the housekeeper must have a master-key that opens all thebedrooms in the place. Get it for me. It will be easier and swifter thanpicking the locks."
"Right you are, old chap. I'll slip up to Mrs. Jarret's room and fetchit to you at once."
"No; tuck it under the mat just outside my door. As it won't do for meto be drugged as well as the rest of you. I shan't put in an appearancewhen the rest come down. Say I've got a headache, and have gone to bed.As for my own 'night-cap'--well, I can send Dollops down to get thebutler to pour me one out of another decanter, so that will be allright. Now, toddle off and get the key, there's a good chap. And, I say,Bawdrey, as I shan't see you again until morning--good-night."
"Good-night, old chap!" he answered in his impulsive, boyish way. "Youare a friend, Headland. And--you'll save my dad, God bless you! A true,true friend--that's what you are. Thank God I ran across you."
Cleek smiled and nodded to him as he passed out and hurried away; then,hearing the other gentlemen coming down the stairs, he, too, made hasteto get out of the room and to creep up to his own after they hadassembled, and the cigar cabinet and the whiskey were being passedround, and the doctor was busy above with the man who was somebody'svictim.
* * * * *
The big old grandfather clock at the top of the stairs pointed tenminutes past two, and the house was hushed of every sound save thatwhich is the evidence of deep sleep, when the door of Cleek's room swungquietly open, and Cleek himself, in dressing-gown and wadded bedroomslippers, stepped out into the dark hall, and, leaving Dollops on guard,passed like a shadow over the thick, unsounding carpet.
The rooms of all the male occupants of the house, including that ofPhilip Bawdrey himself, opened upon this. He went to each in turn,unlocked it, stepped in, closed it after him, and lit the bedroomcandle.
The sleeping-draught had accomplished all that was required of it; andin each and every room he entered--Captain Travers's, LieutenantForshay's, Mr. Robert Murdock's--there lay the occupant thereofstretched out at full length in the grip of that deep and heavy sleepwhich comes of drugs.
Cleek made the round of the rooms as quietly as any shadow, evenstopping as he passed young Bawdrey's on his way back to his own to peepin there. Yes; he, too, had got his share of the effective draught, forthere he lay snarled up in the bed-clothes, with his arms over his headand his knees drawn up until they were on a level with his waist, andhis handsome, boyish face a little paler than usual.
Cleek didn't go into the room, simply looked at him from the threshold,then shut the door, and went back to Dollops.
"All serene, Gov'nor?" questioned that young man, in an eager whisper.
"Yes, quite," his master replied, as he turned to a writing-tablewhereon there lay a sealed note, and, pulling out the chair, sat downbefore it and took up a pen. "Wait a bit, and then you can go to bed.I'll give you still another note to deliver. While I'm writing it youmay lay out my clothes."
"Slipping off, sir?"
"Yes. You will stop here, however. Now, then, hold your tongue; I'mbusy."
Then he pulled a sheet of paper to him and wrote rapidly:
"DEAR MR. BAWDREY:
"I've got my man, and am off to consult with Mr. Narkom and to have whatI've found analysed. I don't know when I shall be back--probably notuntil the day after to-morrow. You are right. It is murder, and Java isat the bottom of it. Dollops will hand you this. Say nothing--just waittill I get back."
This he slipped, unsigned in his haste, into an envelope, handed it toDollops, and then fairly jumped into his clothes. Ten minutes later, hewas out of the house, and--the end of the riddle was in sight.