CHAPTER XX
AN _ALIBI_
"It was close on six weeks before the doctor at last allowed his patientto attend to the grave business which had prostrated him for so long.
"In the meantime, among the many people who directly or indirectly weremade to suffer in this mysterious affair, no one, I think, was morepitied, and more genuinely sympathised with, than Robert Ireland, themanager's eldest son.
"You remember that he had been clerk in the bank? Well, naturally, themoment suspicion began to fasten on his father his position in thebusiness became untenable. I think every one was very kind to him. Mr.Sutherland French, who was made acting manager 'during Mr. LewisIreland's regrettable absence,' did everything in his power to show hisgoodwill and sympathy to the young man, but I don't think that he or anyone else was much astonished when, after Mrs. Ireland's extraordinaryattitude in the case had become public property, he quietly intimatedto the acting manager that he had determined to sever his connectionwith the bank.
"The best of recommendations was, of course, placed at his disposal, andit was finally understood that, as soon as his father was completelyrestored to health and would no longer require his presence in London,he would try to obtain employment somewhere abroad. He spoke of the newvolunteer corps organized for the military policing of the new colonies,and, truth to tell, no one could blame him that he should wish to leavefar behind him all London banking connections. The son's attitudecertainly did not tend to ameliorate the father's position. It waspretty evident that his own family had ceased to hope in the poormanager's innocence.
"And yet he was absolutely innocent. You must remember how that fact wasclearly demonstrated as soon as the poor man was able to say a word forhimself. And he said it to some purpose, too.
"Mr. Ireland was, and is, very fond of music. On the evening inquestion, while sitting in his club, he saw in one of the daily papersthe announcement of a peculiarly attractive programme at the Queen'sHall concert. He was not dressed, but nevertheless felt an irresistibledesire to hear one or two of these attractive musical items, and hestrolled down to the Hall. Now, this sort of alibi is usually verydifficult to prove, but Dame Fortune, oddly enough, favoured Mr. Irelandon this occasion, probably to compensate him for the hard knocks she hadbeen dealing him pretty freely of late.
"It appears that there was some difficulty about his seat, which wassold to him at the box office, and which he, nevertheless, foundwrongfully occupied by a determined lady, who refused to move. Themanagement had to be appealed to; the attendants also remembered notonly the incident, but also the face and appearance of the gentleman whowas the innocent cause of the altercation.
"As soon as Mr. Ireland could speak for himself he mentioned theincident and the persons who had been witness to it. He was identifiedby them, to the amazement, it must be confessed, of police and publicalike, who had comfortably decided that no one _could_ be guilty savethe manager of the Provident Bank himself. Moreover, Mr. Ireland was afairly wealthy man, with a good balance at the Union Bank, and plenty ofprivate means, the result of years of provident living.
"He had but to prove that if he really had been in need of an immediateL5000--which was all the amount extracted from the bank safe thatnight--he had plenty of securities on which he could, at an hour'snotice, have raised twice that sum. His life insurances had been fullypaid up; he had not a debt which a L5 note could not easily havecovered.
"On the fatal night he certainly did remember asking the watchman not tobolt the door to his office, as he thought he might have one or twoletters to write when he came home, but later on he had forgotten allabout this. After the concert he met his son in Oxford Street, justoutside the house, and thought no more about the office, the door ofwhich was shut, and presented no unusual appearance.
"Mr. Ireland absolutely denied having been in his office at the hourwhen James Fairbairn positively asserted he heard Mrs. Ireland say in anastonished tone of voice: 'Why, Lewis, what in the world are you doinghere?' It became pretty clear therefore that James Fairbairn's view ofthe manager's wife had been a mere vision.
"Mr. Ireland gave up his position as manager of the English Provident:both he and his wife felt no doubt that on the whole, perhaps, there hadbeen too much talk, too much scandal connected with their name, to bealtogether advantageous to the bank. Moreover, Mr. Ireland's health wasnot so good as it had been. He has a pretty house now at Sittingbourne,and amuses himself during his leisure hours with amateur horticulture,and I, who alone in London besides the persons directly connected withthis mysterious affair, know the true solution of the enigma, oftenwonder how much of it is known to the ex-manager of the EnglishProvident Bank."
The man in the corner had been silent for some time. Miss Polly Burton,in her presumption, had made up her mind, at the commencement of histale, to listen attentively to every point of the evidence in connectionwith the case which he recapitulated before her, and to follow thepoint, in order to try and arrive at a conclusion of her own, andoverwhelm the antediluvian scarecrow with her sagacity.
She said nothing, for she had arrived at no conclusion; the case puzzledevery one, and had amazed the public in its various stages, from themoment when opinion began to cast doubt on Mr. Ireland's honesty to thatwhen his integrity was proved beyond a doubt. One or two people hadsuspected Mrs. Ireland to have been the actual thief, but that idea hadsoon to be abandoned.
Mrs. Ireland had all the money she wanted; the theft occurred six monthsago, and not a single bank-note was ever traced to her pocket; moreover,she must have had an accomplice, since some one else was in themanager's room that night; and if that some one else was her accomplice,why did she risk betraying him by speaking loudly in the presence ofJames Fairbairn, when it would have been so much simpler to turn outthe light and plunge the hall into darkness?
"You are altogether on the wrong track," sounded a sharp voice in directanswer to Polly's thoughts--"altogether wrong. If you want to acquire mymethod of induction, and improve your reasoning power, you must followmy system. First think of the one absolutely undisputed, positive fact.You must have a starting-point, and not go wandering about in the realmsof suppositions."
"But there are no positive facts," she said irritably.
"You don't say so?" he said quietly. "Do you not call it a positive factthat the bank safe was robbed of L5000 on the evening of March 25thbefore 11.30 p.m."
"Yes, that is all which is positive and--"
"Do you not call it a positive fact," he interrupted quietly, "that thelock of the safe not being picked, it must have been opened by its ownkey?"
"I know that," she rejoined crossly, "and that is why every one agreedthat James Fairbairn could not possibly--"
"And do you not call it a positive fact, then, that James Fairbairncould not possibly, etc., etc., seeing that the glass partition door waslocked from the inside; Mrs. Ireland herself let James Fairbairn intoher husband's office when she saw him lying fainting before the opensafe. Of course that was a positive fact, and so was the one that provedto any thinking mind that if that safe was opened with a key, it couldonly have been done by a person having access to that key."
"But the man in the private office--"
"Exactly! the man in the private office. Enumerate his points, if youplease," said the funny creature, marking each point with one of hisfavourite knots. "He was a man who might that night have had access tothe key of the safe, unsuspected by the manager or even his wife, and aman for whom Mrs. Ireland was willing to tell a downright lie. Are theremany men for whom a woman of the better middle class, and anEnglishwoman, would be ready to perjure herself? Surely not! She mightdo it for her husband. The public thought she had. It never struck themthat she might have done it for her son!"
"Her son!" exclaimed Polly.
"Ah! she was a clever woman," he ejaculated enthusiastically, "one withcourage and presence of mind, which I don't think I have ever seenequalled. She runs downstairs before going to bed in order to seewhethe
r the last post has brought any letters. She sees the door of herhusband's office ajar, she pushes it open, and there, by the suddenflash of a hastily struck match she realizes in a moment that a thiefstands before the open safe, and in that thief she has alreadyrecognized her son. At that very moment she hears the watchman's stepapproaching the partition. There is no time to warn her son; she doesnot know the glass door is locked; James Fairbairn may switch on theelectric light and see the young man in the very act of robbing hisemployers' safe.
"One thing alone can reassure the watchman. One person alone had theright to be there at that hour of the night, and without hesitation shepronounces her husband's name.
"Mind you, I firmly believe that at the time the poor woman only wishedto gain time, that she had every hope that her son had not yet had theopportunity to lay so heavy a guilt upon his conscience.
"What passed between mother and son we shall never know, but this muchwe do know, that the young villain made off with his booty, and trustedthat his mother would never betray him. Poor woman! what a night of itshe must have spent; but she was clever and far-seeing. She knew thather husband's character could not suffer through her action.Accordingly, she took the only course open to her to save her son evenfrom his father's wrath, and boldly denied James Fairbairn's statement.
"Of course, she was fully aware that her husband could easily clearhimself, and the worst that could be said of her was that she hadthought him guilty and had tried to save him. She trusted to the futureto clear her of any charge of complicity in the theft.
"By now every one has forgotten most of the circumstances; the policeare still watching the career of James Fairbairn and Mrs. Ireland'sexpenditure. As you know, not a single note, so far, has been traced toher. Against that, one or two of the notes have found their way back toEngland. No one realizes how easy it is to cash English bank-notes atthe smaller _agents de change_ abroad. The _changeurs_ are only too gladto get them; what do they care where they come from as long as they aregenuine? And a week or two later _M. le Changeur_ could not swear whotendered him any one particular note.
"You see, young Robert Ireland went abroad, he will come back some dayhaving made a fortune. There's his photo. And this is his mother--aclever woman, wasn't she?"
And before Polly had time to reply he was gone. She really had neverseen any one move across a room so quickly. But he always left aninteresting trail behind: a piece of string knotted from end to end anda few photos.