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Title: A Wastrel's Romance
   [Story #4 of "The Famous Cases of Dr. Thorndyke"]
Author: Freeman, R. Austin [Richard Austin] (1862-1943)
Date of first publication in this form: July 1929
   ["The Famous Cases of Dr. Thorndyke"]
Edition used as base for this ebook:
   London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1952
   [reprint of the 1929 omnibus]
Date first posted: 7 July 2018
Date last updated: 7 July 2018
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #1546

This ebook was produced by
Delphine Lettau, Mark Akrigg, Jen Haines
& the Online Distributed Proofreading Canada Team
at http://www.pgdpcanada.net


PUBLISHER'S NOTE

Italics in the original printed edition are indicated _thus_.

Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected.

As part of the conversion of the book to its new digital
format, we have made certain minor adjustments in its layout.






A WASTREL'S ROMANCE

by R. Austin Freeman





I. THE SPINSTERS' GUEST


The lingering summer twilight was fast merging into night as a solitary
cyclist, whose evening-dress suit was thinly disguised by an overcoat,
rode slowly along a pleasant country road. From time to time he had been
overtaken and passed by a carriage, a car or a closed cab from the
adjacent town, and from the festive garb of the occupants he had made
shrewd guesses at their destination. His own objective was a large
house, standing in somewhat extensive grounds just off the road, and the
peculiar circumstances that surrounded his visit to it caused him to
ride more and more slowly as he approached his goal.

Willowdale--such was the name of the house--was, to-night, witnessing a
temporary revival of its past glories. For many months it had been empty
and a notice-board by the gate-keeper's lodge had silently announced its
forlorn state; but, to-night, its rooms, their bare walls clothed in
flags and draperies, their floors waxed or carpeted, would once more
echo the sound of music and cheerful voices and vibrate to the tread of
many feet. For on this night the spinsters of Raynesford were giving a
dance; and chief amongst the spinsters was Miss Halliwell, the owner of
Willowdale.

It was a great occasion. The house was large and imposing; the spinsters
were many and their purses were long. The guests were numerous and
distinguished, and included no less a person than Mrs. Jehu B. Chater.
This was the crowning triumph of the function, for the beautiful
American widow was the lion (or should we say lioness?) of the season.
Her wealth was, if not beyond the dreams of avarice, at least beyond the
powers of common British arithmetic, and her diamonds were, at once, the
glory and the terror of her hostesses.

All these attractions notwithstanding, the cyclist approached the
vicinity of Willowdale with a slowness almost hinting at reluctance; and
when, at length, a curve of the road brought the gates into view, he
dismounted and halted irresolutely. He was about to do a rather risky
thing, and, though by no means a man of weak nerve, he hesitated to make
the plunge.

The fact is, he had not been invited.

Why, then, was he going? And how was he to gain admittance? To which
questions the answer involves a painful explanation.

Augustus Bailey lived by his wits. That is the common phrase, and a
stupid phrase it is. For do we not all live by our wits, if we have any?
And does it need any specially brilliant wits to be a common rogue?
However, such as his wits were, Augustus Bailey lived by them, and he
had not hitherto made a fortune.

The present venture arose out of a conversation overheard at a
restaurant table and an invitation-card carelessly laid down and
adroitly covered with the menu. Augustus had accepted the invitation
that he had not received (on a sheet of Hotel Cecil notepaper that he
had among his collection of stationery) in the name of Geoffrey
Harrington-Baillie; and the question that exercised his mind at the
moment was, would he or would he not be spotted? He had trusted to the
number of guests and the probable inexperience of the hostesses. He knew
that the cards need not be shown, though there was the awkward ceremony
of announcement.

But perhaps it wouldn't get as far as that. Probably not, if his
acceptance had been detected as emanating from an uninvited stranger.

He walked slowly towards the gates with growing discomfort. Added to his
nervousness as to the present were certain twinges of reminiscence. He
had once held a commission in a line regiment--not for long, indeed; his
"wits" had been too much for his brother officers--but there had been a
time when he would have come to such a gathering as this an invited
guest. Now, a common thief, he was sneaking in under a false name, with
a fair prospect of being ignominiously thrown out by the servants.

As he stood hesitating, the sound of hoofs on the road was followed by
the aggressive bellow of a motor-horn. The modest twinkle of carriage
lamps appeared round the curve and then the glare of acetylene
headlights. A man came out of the lodge and drew open the gates; and Mr.
Bailey, taking his courage in both hands, boldly trundled his machine up
the drive.

Half-way up--it was quite a steep incline--the car whizzed by; a large
Napier filled with a bevy of young men who economised space by sitting
on the backs of the seats and on one another's knees. Bailey looked at
them and decided that this was his chance, and, pushing forward, he saw
his bicycle safely bestowed in the empty coach-house and then hurried on
to the cloak-room. The young men had arrived there before him, and, as
he entered, were gaily peeling off their overcoats and flinging them
down on a table. Bailey followed their example, and, in his eagerness to
enter the reception-room with the crowd, let his attention wander from
the business of the moment, and, as he pocketed the ticket and hurried
away, he failed to notice that the bewildered attendant had put his hat
with another man's coat and affixed his duplicate to them both.

"Major Podbury, Captain Barker-Jones, Captain Sparker, Mr. Watson, Mr.
Goldsmith, Mr. Smart, _Mr. Harrington-Baillie_!"

As Augustus swaggered up the room, hugging the party of officers and
quaking inwardly, he was conscious that his hostesses glanced from one
man to another with more than common interest.

But at that moment the footman's voice rang out, sonorous and clear--

"Mrs. Chater, Colonel Crumpler!" and, as all eyes were turned towards
the new arrivals, Augustus made his bow and passed into the throng. His
little game of bluff had "come off," after all.

He withdrew modestly into the more crowded portion of the room, and
there took up a position where he would be shielded from the gaze of his
hostesses. Presently, he reflected, they would forget him, if they had
really thought about him at all, and then he would see what could be
done in the way of business. He was still rather shaky, and wondered how
soon it would be decent to steady his nerves with a "refresher."
Meanwhile he kept a sharp look-out over the shoulders of neighbouring
guests, until a movement in the crowd of guests disclosed Mrs. Chater
shaking hands with the presiding spinster. Then Augustus got a most
uncommon surprise.

He knew her at the first glance. He had a good memory for faces, and
Mrs. Chater's face was one to remember. Well did he recall the frank and
lovely American girl with whom he had danced at the regimental ball
years ago. That was in the old days when he was a subaltern, and before
that little affair of the pricked court-cards that brought his military
career to an end. They had taken a mutual liking, he remembered, that
sweet-faced Yankee maid and he; had danced many dances and had sat out
others, to talk mystical nonsense which, in their innocence, they had
believed to be philosophy. He had never seen her since. She had come
into his life and gone out of it again, and he had forgotten her name,
if he had ever known it. But here she was, middle-aged now, it was true,
but still beautiful and a great personage withal. And, ye gods! what
diamonds! And here was he, too, a common rogue, lurking in the crowd
that he might, perchance, snatch a pendant or "pinch" a loose brooch.

Perhaps she might recognise him. Why not? He had recognised her. But
that would never do. And thus reflecting, Mr. Bailey slipped out to
stroll on the lawn and smoke a cigarette. Another man, somewhat older
than himself, was pacing to and fro thoughtfully, glancing from time to
time through the open windows into the brilliantly-lighted rooms. When
they had passed once or twice, the stranger halted and addressed him.

"This is the best place on a night like this," he remarked; "it's
getting hot inside already. But perhaps you're keen on dancing."

"Not so keen as I used to be," replied Bailey; and then, observing the
hungry look that the other man was bestowing on his cigarette, he
produced his case and offered it.

"Thanks awfully!" exclaimed the stranger, pouncing with avidity on the
open case. "Good Samaritan, by Jove. Left my case in my overcoat. Hadn't
the cheek to ask, though I was starving for a smoke." He inhaled
luxuriously, and, blowing out a cloud of smoke, resumed: "These chits
seem to be running the show pretty well, hm? Wouldn't take it for an
empty house to look at it, would you?"

"I have hardly seen it," said Bailey; "only just come, you know."

"We'll have a look round, if you like," said the genial stranger, "when
we've finished our smoke, that is. Have a drink too; may cool us a bit.
Know many people here?"

"Not a soul," replied Bailey. "My hostess doesn't seem to have turned
up."

"Well, that's easily remedied," said the stranger. "My daughter's one of
the spinsters--Granby, my name; when we've had a drink, I'll make her
find you a partner--that is, if you care for the light fantastic."

"I should like a dance or two," said Bailey, "though I'm getting a bit
past it now, I suppose. Still, it doesn't do to chuck up the sponge
prematurely."

"Certainly not," Granby agreed jovially; "a man's as young as he feels.
Well, come and have a drink and then we'll hunt up my little girl." The
two men flung away the stumps of their cigarettes and headed for the
refreshments.

The spinsters' champagne was light, but it was well enough if taken in
sufficient quantity; a point to which Augustus--and Granby too--paid
judicious attention; and when he had supplemented the wine with a few
sandwiches, Mr. Bailey felt in notably better spirits. For, to tell the
truth, his diet, of late, had been somewhat meagre. Miss Granby, when
found, proved to be a blonde and guileless "flapper" of some seventeen
summers, childishly eager to play her part of hostess with due dignity;
and presently Bailey found himself gyrating through the eddying crowd in
company with a comely matron of thirty or thereabouts.

The sensations that this novel experience aroused rather took him by
surprise. For years past he had been living a precarious life of mean
and sordid shifts that oscillated between mere shabby trickery and
downright crime; now conducting a paltry swindle just inside the pale of
the law, and now, when hard pressed, descending to actual theft;
consorting with shady characters, swindlers and knaves and scurvy rogues
like himself; gambling, borrowing, cadging and, if need be, stealing,
and always slinking abroad with an apprehensive eye upon "the man in
blue."

And now, amidst the half-forgotten surroundings, once so familiar; the
gaily-decorated rooms, the rhythmic music, the twinkle of jewels, the
murmur of gliding feet and the rustle of costly gowns, the moving vision
of honest gentlemen and fair ladies; the shameful years seemed to drop
away, and leave him to take up the thread of his life where it had
snapped so disastrously. After all, these were his own people. The seedy
knaves in whose steps he had walked of late were but aliens met by the
way.

He surrendered his partner, in due course, with regret--which was
mutual--to an inarticulate subaltern, and was meditating another
pilgrimage to the refreshment-room, when he felt a light touch upon his
arm. He turned swiftly. A touch on the arm meant more to him than to
some men. But it was no wooden-faced plain-clothes man that he
confronted; it was only a lady. In short, it was Mrs. Chater, smiling
nervously and a little abashed by her own boldness.

"I expect you've forgotten me," she began apologetically, but Augustus
interrupted her with an eager disclaimer.

"Of course I haven't," he said; "though I have forgotten your name, but
I remember that Portsmouth dance as well as if it were yesterday; at
least one incident in it--the only one that was worth remembering. I've
often hoped that I might meet you again, and now, at last, it has
happened."

"It's nice of you to remember," she rejoined. "I've often and often
thought of that evening and all the wonderful things that we talked
about. You were a nice boy then; I wonder what you are like now. Dear,
dear, what a long time ago it is!"

"Yes," Augustus agreed gravely, "it _is_ a long time. I know it by
myself; but when I look at you, it seems as if it could only have been
last season."

"Oh, fie!" she exclaimed. "You are not simple as you used to be. You
didn't flatter then; but perhaps there wasn't the need." She spoke with
gentle reproach, but her pretty face flushed with pleasure nevertheless,
and there was a certain wistfulness in the tone of her concluding
sentence.

"I wasn't flattering," Augustus replied, quite sincerely; "I knew you
directly you entered the room and marvelled that Time had been so gentle
with you. He hasn't been as kind to me."

"No. You have got a few grey hairs, I see, but after all, what are grey
hairs to a man? Just the badges of rank, like the crown on your collar
or the lace on your cuffs, to mark the steps of your promotion--for I
guess you'll be a colonel by now."

"No," Augustus answered quickly, with a faint flush. "I left the army
some years ago."

"My! what a pity!" exclaimed Mrs. Chater. "You must tell me all about
it--but not now. My partner will be looking for me. We will sit out a
dance and have a real gossip. But I've forgotten your name--never could
recall it, in fact, though that didn't prevent me from remembering you;
but, as our dear W. S. remarks, 'What's in a name?'"

"Ah, indeed," said Mr. Harrington-Baillie; and apropos of that
sentiment, he added: "mine is Rowland--Captain Rowland. You may remember
it now."

Mrs. Chater did not, however, and said so. "Will number six do?" she
asked, opening her programme; and, when Augustus had assented, she
entered his provisional name, remarking complacently: "We'll sit out and
have a right-down good talk, and you shall tell me all about yourself
and if you still think the same about free-will and personal
responsibility. You had very lofty ideals, I remember, in those days,
and I hope you have still. But one's ideals get rubbed down rather faint
in the friction of life. Don't you think so?"

"Yes, I am afraid you're right," Augustus assented gloomily. "The wear
and tear of life soon fetches the gilt off the gingerbread. Middle age
is apt to find us a bit patchy, not to say naked."

"Oh, don't be pessimistic," said Mrs. Chater; "that is the attitude of
the disappointed idealist, and I am sure you have no reason, really, to
be disappointed in yourself. But I must run away now. Think over all the
things you have to tell me, and don't forget that it is number six."
With a bright smile and a friendly nod she sailed away, a vision of
glittering splendour, compared with which Solomon in all his glory was a
mere matter of commonplace bullion.

The interview, evidently friendly and familiar, between the unknown
guest and the famous American widow had by no means passed unnoticed;
and in other circumstances, Bailey might have endeavoured to profit by
the reflected glory that enveloped him. But he was not in search of
notoriety; and the same evasive instinct that had led him to sink Mr.
Harrington-Baillie in Captain Rowland, now advised him to withdraw his
dual personality from the vulgar gaze. He had come here on very definite
business. For the hundredth time he was "stony-broke," and it was the
hope of picking up some "unconsidered trifles" that had brought him.
But, somehow, the atmosphere of the place had proved unfavourable.
Either opportunities were lacking or he failed to seize them. In any
case, the game pocket that formed an unconventional feature of his
dress-coat was still empty, and it looked as if a pleasant evening and a
good supper were all that he was likely to get. Nevertheless, be his
conduct never so blameless, the fact remained that he was an uninvited
guest, liable at any moment to be ejected as an impostor, and his
recognition by the widow had not rendered this possibility any the more
remote.

He strayed out on to the lawn, whence the grounds fell away on all
sides. But there were other guests there, cooling themselves after the
last dance, and the light from the rooms streamed through the windows,
illuminating their figures, and among them, that of the
too-companionable Granby. Augustus quickly drew away from the lighted
area, and, chancing upon a narrow path, strolled away along it in the
direction of a copse or shrubbery that he saw ahead. Presently he came
to an ivy-covered arch, lighted by one or two fairy lamps, and, passing
through this, he entered a winding path, bordered by trees and shrubs
and but faintly lighted by an occasional coloured lamp suspended from a
branch.

Already he was quite clear of the crowd; indeed, the deserted condition
of the pleasant retreat rather surprised him, until he reflected that to
couples desiring seclusion there were whole ranges of untenanted rooms
and galleries available in the empty house.

The path sloped gently downwards for some distance; then came a long
flight of rustic steps and, at the bottom, a seat between two trees. In
front of the seat the path extended in a straight line, forming a narrow
terrace; on the right the ground sloped up steeply towards the lawn; on
the left it fell away still more steeply towards the encompassing wall
of the grounds; and on both sides it was covered with trees and shrubs.

Bailey sat down on the seat to think over the account of himself that he
should present to Mrs. Chater. It was a comfortable seat, built into the
trunk of an elm, which formed one end and part of the back. He leaned
against the tree, and, taking out his silver case, selected a cigarette.
But it remained unlighted between his fingers as he sat and meditated
upon his unsatisfactory past and the melancholy tale of what might have
been. Fresh from the atmosphere of refined opulence that pervaded the
dancing-rooms, the throng of well-groomed men and dainty women, his mind
travelled back to his sordid little flat in Bermondsey, encompassed by
poverty and squalor, jostled by lofty factories, grimy with the smoke of
the river and the reek from the great chimneys. It was a hideous
contrast. Verily the way of the transgressor was not strewn with
flowers.

At that point in his meditations he caught the sound of voices and
footsteps on the path above and rose to walk on along the path. He did
not wish to be seen wandering alone in the shrubbery. But now a woman's
laugh sounded from somewhere down the path. There were people
approaching that way too. He put the cigarette back in the case and
stepped round behind the seat, intending to retreat in that direction,
but here the path ended, and beyond was nothing but a rugged slope down
to the wall thickly covered with bushes. And while he was hesitating,
the sound of feet descending the steps and the rustle of a woman's dress
left him to choose between staying where he was or coming out to
confront the new-comers. He chose the former, drawing up close behind
the tree to wait until they should have passed on.

But they were not going to pass on. One of them--a woman--sat down on
the seat, and then a familiar voice smote on his ear.

"I guess I'll rest here quietly for a while; this tooth of mine is
aching terribly; and, see here, I want you to go and fetch me something.
Take this ticket to the cloak-room and tell the woman to give you my
little velvet bag. You'll find in it a bottle of chloroform and a packet
of cotton-wool."

"But I can't leave you here all alone, Mrs. Chater," her partner
expostulated.

"I'm not hankering for society just now," said Mrs. Chater. "I want that
chloroform. Just you hustle off and fetch it, like a good boy. Here's
the ticket."

The young officer's footsteps retreated rapidly, and the voices of the
couple advancing along the path grew louder. Bailey, cursing the chance
that had placed him in his ridiculous and uncomfortable position, heard
them approach and pass on up the steps; and then all was silent, save
for an occasional moan from Mrs. Chater and the measured creaking of the
seat as she rocked uneasily to and fro. But the young man was uncommonly
prompt in the discharge of his mission, and in a very few minutes Bailey
heard him approaching at a run along the path above and then bounding
down the steps.

"Now I call that real good of you," said the widow gratefully. "You must
have run like the wind. Cut the string of the packet and then leave me
to wrestle with this tooth."

"But I can't leave you here all----"

"Yes, you can," interrupted Mrs. Chater. "There won't be anyone
about--the next dance is a waltz. Besides, you must go and find your
partner."

"Well, if you'd really rather be alone," the subaltern began; but Mrs.
Chater interrupted him.

"Of course I would, when I'm fixing up my teeth. Now go along, and a
thousand thanks for your kindness."

With mumbled protestations the young officer slowly retired, and Bailey
heard his reluctant feet ascending the steps. Then a deep silence fell
on the place in which the rustle of paper and the squeak of a withdrawn
cork seemed loud and palpable. Bailey had turned with his face towards
the tree, against which he leaned with his lips parted scarcely daring
to breathe. He cursed himself again and again for having thus entrapped
himself for no tangible reason, and longed to get away. But there was no
escape now without betraying himself. He must wait for the woman to go.

Suddenly, beyond the edge of the tree, a hand appeared holding an open
packet of cotton-wool. It laid the wool down on the seat, and, pinching
off a fragment, rolled it into a tiny ball. The fingers of the hand were
encircled by rings, its wrist enclosed by a broad bracelet; and from
rings and bracelet the light of the solitary fairy-lamp, that hung from
a branch of the tree, was reflected in prismatic sparks. The hand was
withdrawn and Bailey stared dreamily at the square pad of cotton-wool.
Then the hand came again into view. This time it held a small phial
which it laid softly on the seat, setting the cork beside it. And again
the light flashed in many-coloured scintillations from the encrusting
gems.

Bailey's knees began to tremble, and a chilly moisture broke out upon
his forehead.

The hand drew back, but, as it vanished, Bailey moved his head silently
until his face emerged from behind the tree. The woman was leaning back,
her head resting against the trunk only a few inches away from his face.
The great stones of the tiara flashed in his very eyes. Over her
shoulder, he could even see the gorgeous pendant, rising and falling on
her bosom with ever-changing fires; and both her raised hands were a
mass of glitter and sparkle, only the deeper and richer for the subdued
light.

His heart throbbed with palpable blows that drummed aloud in his ears.
The sweat trickled clammily down his face, and he clenched his teeth to
keep them from chattering. An agony of horror--of deadly fear--was
creeping over him--a terror of the dreadful impulse that was stealing
away his reason and his will.

The silence was profound. The woman's soft breathing, the creak of her
bodice, were plainly--grossly--audible; and he checked his own breath
until he seemed on the verge of suffocation.

Of a sudden through the night air was borne faintly the dreamy music of
a waltz. The dance had begun. The distant sound but deepened the sense
of solitude in this deserted spot.

Bailey listened intently. He yearned to escape from the invisible force
that seemed to be clutching at his wrists, and dragging him forward
inexorably to his doom.

He gazed down at the woman with a horrid fascination. He struggled to
draw back out of sight--and struggled in vain.

Then, at last, with a horrible, stealthy deliberation, a clammy, shaking
hand crept forward towards the seat. Without a sound it grasped the
wool, and noiselessly, slowly drew back. Again it stole forth. The
fingers twined snakily around the phial, lifted it from the seat and
carried it back into the shadow.

After a few seconds it reappeared and softly replaced the bottle--now
half empty. There was a brief pause. The measured cadences of the waltz
stole softly through the quiet night and seemed to keep time with the
woman's breathing. Other sound there was none. The place was wrapped in
the silence of the grave.

Suddenly, from his hiding-place, Bailey leaned forward over the back of
the seat. The pad of cotton-wool was in his hand.

The woman was now leaning back as if dozing, and her hands rested in her
lap. There was a swift movement. The pad was pressed against her face
and her head dragged back against the chest of the invisible assailant.
A smothered gasp burst from her hidden lips as her hands flew up to
clutch at the murderous arm; and then came a frightful struggle, made
even more frightful by the gay and costly trappings of the writhing
victim. And still there was hardly a sound; only muffled gasps, the
rustle of silk, the creaking of the seat, the clink of the falling
bottle and, afar off, with dreadful irony, the dreamy murmur of the
waltz.

The struggle was but brief. Quite suddenly the jewelled hands dropped,
the head lay resistless on the crumpled shirt-front, and the body, now
limp and inert, began to slip forward off the seat. Bailey, still
grasping the passive head, climbed over the back of the seat and, as the
woman slid gently to the ground, he drew away the pad and stooped over
her. The struggle was over now; the mad fury of the moment was passing
swiftly into the chill of mortal fear.

He stared with incredulous horror into the swollen face, but now so
comely, the sightless eyes that but a little while since had smiled into
his with such kindly recognition.

He had done this! He, the sneaking wastrel, discarded of all the world,
to whom this sweet woman had held out the hand of friendship. She had
cherished his memory, when to all others he was sunk deep under the
waters of oblivion. And he had killed her--for to his ear no breath of
life seemed to issue from those purple lips.

A sudden hideous compunction for this irrevocable thing that he had done
surged through him, and he stood up clutching at his damp hair with a
hoarse cry that was like the cry of the damned.

The jewels passed straightway out of his consciousness. Everything was
forgotten now but the horror of this unspeakable thing that he had done.
Remorse incurable and haunting fear were all that were left to him.

The sound of voices far away along the path aroused him, and the vague
horror that possessed him materialised into abject, bodily fear. He
lifted the limp body to the edge of the path and let it slip down the
steep declivity among the bushes. A soft, shuddering sigh came from the
parted lips as the body turned over, and he paused a moment to listen.
But there was no other sound of life. Doubtless that sigh was only the
result of the passive movement.

Again he stood for an instant as one in a dream, gazing at the huddled
shape half hidden by the bushes, before he climbed back to the path; and
even then he looked back once more, but now she was hidden from sight.
And, as the voices drew nearer, he turned, and, with stealthy swiftness,
ran up the rustic steps.

As he came out on the edge of the lawn the music ceased, and, almost
immediately, a stream of people issued from the house. Shaken as he was,
Bailey yet had wits enough left to know that his clothes and hair were
disordered and that his appearance must be wild. Accordingly he avoided
the dancers, and, keeping to the margin of the lawn, made his way to the
cloak-room by the least frequented route. If he had dared, he would have
called in at the refreshment-room, for he was deadly faint and his limbs
shook as he walked. But a haunting fear pursued him and, indeed, grew
from moment to moment. He found himself already listening for the rumour
of the inevitable discovery.

He staggered into the cloak-room, and, flinging his ticket down on the
table, dragged out his watch. The attendant looked at him curiously and,
pausing with the ticket in his hand, asked sympathetically: "Not feeling
very well, sir?"

"No," said Bailey. "So beastly hot in there."

"You ought to have a glass of champagne, sir, before you start," said
the man.

"No time," replied Bailey, holding out a shaky hand for his coat. "Shall
lose my train if I'm not sharp."

At this hint the attendant reached down the coat and hat, holding up the
former for its owner to slip his arms into the sleeves. But Bailey
snatched it from him, and, flinging it over his arm, put on his hat and
hurried away to the coach-house. Here, again, the attendant stared at
him in astonishment; which was not lessened when Bailey, declining his
offer to help him on with his coat, bundled the latter under his arm,
clicked the lever of the "variable" on to the ninety gear, sprang on to
the machine and whirled away down the steep drive, a grotesque vision of
flying coat-tails.

"You haven't lit your lamp, sir," roared the attendant; but Bailey's
ears were deaf to all save the clamour of the expected pursuit.

Fortunately the drive entered the road obliquely, or Bailey must have
been flung into the opposite hedge. As it was, the machine, rushing down
the slope, flew out into the road with terrific velocity; nor did its
speed diminish then, for its rider, impelled by mortal terror, trod the
pedals with the fury of a madman. And still, as the machine whizzed
along the dark and silent road, his ears were strained to catch the
clatter of hoofs or the throb of a motor from behind.

He knew the country well--in fact, as a precaution, he had cycled over
the district only the day before; and he was ready, at any suspicious
sound, to slip down any of the lanes or byways, secure of finding his
way. But still he sped on, and still no sound from the rear came to tell
him of the dread discovery.

When he had ridden about three miles, he came to the foot of a steep
hill. Here he had to dismount and push his machine up the incline, which
he did at such speed that he arrived at the top quite breathless. Before
mounting again he determined to put on his coat, for his appearance was
calculated to attract attention, if nothing more. It was only half-past
eleven, and presently he would pass through the streets of a small town.
Also he would light his lamp. It would be fatal to be stopped by a
patrol or rural constable.

Having lit his lamp and hastily put on his coat he once more listened
intently, looking back over the country that was darkly visible from the
summit of the hill. No moving lights were to be seen, no ringing hoofs
or throbbing engines to be heard, and, turning to mount, he
instinctively felt in his overcoat pocket for his gloves.

A pair of gloves came out in his hand, but he was instantly conscious
that they were not his. A silk muffler was there also; a white one. But
his muffler was black.

With a sudden shock of terror he thrust his hand into the ticket-pocket,
where he had put his latch-key. There was no key there; only an amber
cigar-holder, which he had never seen before. He stood for a few moments
in utter consternation. He had taken the wrong coat. Then he had left
his own coat behind. A cold sweat of fear broke out afresh on his face
as he realised this. His Yale latch-key was in its pocket; not that that
mattered very much. He had a duplicate at home, and, as to getting in,
well, he knew his own outside door and his tool-bag contained one or two
trifles not usually found in cyclists' tool-bags. The question was
whether that coat contained anything that could disclose his identity.
And then suddenly he remembered, with a gasp of relief, that he had
carefully turned the pockets out before starting, with this very idea.

No; once let him attain the sanctuary of his grimy little flat, wedged
in as it was between the great factories by the river-side, and he would
be safe: safe from everything but the horror of himself, and the
haunting vision of a jewelled figure huddled up in a glittering, silken
heap beneath the bushes.

With a last look round he mounted his machine, and, driving it over the
brow of the hill, swept away into the darkness.




II. MUNERA PULVERIS

(Related by Christopher Jervis, M.D.)


It is one of the drawbacks of medicine as a profession that one is never
rid of one's responsibilities. The merchant, the lawyer, the civil
servant, each at the appointed time locks up his desk, puts on his hat
and goes forth a free man with an interval of uninterrupted leisure
before him. Not so the doctor. Whether at work or at play, awake or
asleep, he is the servant of humanity, at the instant disposal of friend
or stranger alike whose need may make the necessary claim.

When I agreed to accompany my wife to the spinsters' dance at
Raynesford, I imagined that, for that evening, at least, I was
definitely off duty; and in that belief I continued until the conclusion
of the eighth dance. To be quite truthful, I was not sorry when the
delusion was shattered. My last partner was a young lady of a slanginess
of speech that verged on the inarticulate. Now it is not easy to
exchange ideas in "pidgin" English; and the conversation of a person to
whom all things are either "ripping" or "rotten" is apt to lack
subtlety. In fact, I was frankly bored; and, reflecting on the utility
of the humble sandwich as an aid to conversation, I was about to entice
my partner to the refreshment-room when I felt someone pluck at my
sleeve. I turned quickly and looked into the anxious and rather
frightened face of my wife.

"Miss Halliwell is looking for you," she said. "A lady has been taken
ill. Will you come and see what is the matter?" She took my arm and,
when I had made my apologies to my partner, she hurried me on to the
lawn.

"It's a mysterious affair," my wife continued. "The sick lady is a Mrs.
Chater, a very wealthy American widow. Edith Halliwell and Major Podbury
found her lying in the shrubbery all alone and unable to give any
account of herself. Poor Edith is dreadfully upset. She doesn't know
what to think."

"What do you mean?" I began; but at this moment Miss Halliwell, who was
waiting by an ivy-covered rustic arch, espied us and ran forward.

"Oh, do hurry, please, Dr. Jervis," she exclaimed; "such a shocking
thing has happened. Has Juliet told you?" Without waiting for an answer,
she darted through the arch and preceded us along a narrow path at the
curious, flat-footed, shambling trot common to most adult women.
Presently we descended a flight of rustic steps which brought us to a
seat, from whence extended a straight path cut like a miniature terrace
on a steep slope, with a high bank rising to the right and a declivity
falling away to the left. Down in the hollow, his head and shoulders
appearing above the bushes, was a man holding in his hand a fairy-lamp
that he had apparently taken down from a tree. I climbed down to him,
and, as I came round the bushes, I perceived a richly-dressed woman
lying huddled on the ground. She was not completely insensible, for she
moved slightly at my approach, muttering a few words in thick,
indistinct accents. I took the lamp from the man, whom I assumed to be
Major Podbury, and, as he delivered it to me with a significant glance
and a faint lift of the eyebrows, I understood Miss Halliwell's
agitation. Indeed, for one horrible moment I thought that she was
right--that the prostrate woman was intoxicated. But when I approached
nearer, the flickering light of the lamp made visible a square reddened
patch on her face, like the impression of a mustard plaster, covering
the nose and mouth; and then I scented mischief of a more serious kind.

"We had better carry her up to the seat," I said, handing the lamp to
Miss Halliwell. "Then we can consider moving her to the house." The
major and I lifted the helpless woman and, having climbed cautiously up
to the path, laid her on the seat.

"What is it, Dr. Jervis?" Miss Halliwell whispered.

"I can't say at the moment," I replied; "but it's not what you feared."

"Thank God for that!" was her fervent rejoinder. "It would have been a
shocking scandal."

I took the dim little lamp and once more bent over the half-conscious
woman.

Her appearance puzzled me not a little. She looked like a person
recovering from an anaesthetic, but the square red patch on her face,
recalling, as it did, the Burke murders, rather suggested suffocation.
As I was thus reflecting, the light of the lamp fell on a white object
lying on the ground behind the seat, and holding the lamp forward, I saw
that it was a square pad of cotton-wool. The coincidence of its shape
and size with that of the red patch on the woman's face instantly struck
me, and I stooped down to pick it up; and then I saw, lying under the
seat, a small bottle. This also I picked up and held in the lamplight.
It was a one-ounce phial, quite empty, and was labelled "Methylated
Chloroform." Here seemed to be a complete explanation of the thick
utterance and drunken aspect; but it was an explanation that required,
in its turn, to be explained. Obviously no robbery had been committed,
for the woman literally glittered with diamonds. Equally obviously she
had not administered the chloroform to herself.

There was nothing for it but to carry her indoors and await her further
recovery, so, with the major's help, we conveyed her through the
shrubbery and kitchen garden to a side door, and deposited her on a sofa
in a half-furnished room.

Here, under the influence of water dabbed on her face and the plentiful
use of smelling-salts, she quickly revived, and was soon able to give an
intelligible account of herself.

The chloroform and cotton-wool were her own. She had used them for an
aching tooth; and she was sitting alone on the seat with the bottle and
the wool beside her when the incomprehensible thing had happened.
Without a moment's warning a hand had come from behind her and pressed
the pad of wool over her nose and mouth. The wool was saturated with
chloroform, and she had lost consciousness almost immediately.

"You didn't see the person, then?" I asked.

"No, but I know he was in evening dress, because I felt my head against
his shirt-front."

"Then," said I, "he is either here still or he has been to the
cloak-room. He couldn't have left the place without an overcoat."

"No, by Jove!" exclaimed the major; "that's true. I'll go and make
inquiries." He strode away all agog, and I, having satisfied myself that
Mrs. Chater could be left safely, followed him almost immediately.

I made my way straight to the cloak-room, and here I found the major and
one or two of his brother officers putting on their coats in a flutter
of gleeful excitement.

"He's gone," said Podbury, struggling frantically into his overcoat;
"went off nearly an hour ago on a bicycle. Seemed in a deuce of a stew,
the attendant says, and no wonder. We're goin' after him in our car.
Care to join the hunt?"

"No, thanks. I must stay with the patient. But how do you know you're
after the right man?"

"Isn't any other. Only one Johnnie's left. Besides--here, confound it!
you've given me the wrong coat!"

He tore off the garment and handed it back to the attendant, who
regarded it with an expression of dismay.

"Are you sure, sir?" he asked.

"Perfectly," said the major. "Come, hurry up, my man."

"I'm afraid, sir," said the attendant, "that the gentleman who has gone
has taken your coat. They were on the same peg, I know. I am very sorry,
sir."

The major was speechless with wrath. What the devil was the good of
being sorry? and how the deuce was he to get his coat back?

"But," I interposed, "if the stranger has got your coat, then this coat
must be his."

"I know," said Podbury; "but I don't want his beastly coat."

"No," I replied, "but it may be useful for identification."

This appeared to afford the bereaved officer little consolation, but as
the car was now ready, he bustled away, and I, having directed the man
to put the coat away in a safe place, went back to my patient.

Mrs. Chater was by now fairly recovered, and had developed a highly
vindictive interest in her late assailant. She even went so far as to
regret that he had not taken at least some of her diamonds, so that
robbery might have been added to the charge of attempted murder, and
expressed the earnest hope that the officers would not be foolishly
gentle in their treatment of him when they caught him.

"By the way, Dr. Jervis," said Miss Halliwell, "I think I ought to
mention a rather curious thing that happened in connection with this
dance. We received an acceptance from a Mr. Harrington-Baillie, who
wrote from the Hotel Cecil. Now I am certain that no such name was
proposed by any of the spinsters."

"But didn't you ask them?" I inquired.

"Well, the fact is," she replied, "that one of them, Miss Waters, had to
go abroad suddenly, and we had not got her address; and as it was
possible that she might have invited him, I did not like to move in the
matter. I am very sorry I didn't now. We may have let in a regular
criminal--though why he should have wanted to murder Mrs. Chater I
cannot imagine."

It was certainly a mysterious affair, and the mystery was in no wise
dispelled by the return of the search party an hour later. It seemed
that the bicycle had been tracked for a couple of miles towards London,
but then, at the cross-roads, the tracks had become hopelessly mixed
with the impressions of other machines, and the officers, after cruising
about vaguely for a while, had given up the hunt and returned.

"You see, Mrs. Chater," Major Podbury explained apologetically, "the
fellow must have had a good hour's start, and, with a high-geared
machine, that would have brought him pretty close to London."

"Do you mean to tell me," exclaimed Mrs. Chater, regarding the major
with hardly concealed contempt, "that that villain has got off
scot-free?"

"Looks rather like it," replied Podbury, "but if I were you I should get
the man's description from the attendants who saw him and go up to
Scotland Yard to-morrow. They may know the Johnnie there, and they may
even recognise the coat if you take it with you."

"That doesn't seem very likely," said Mrs. Chater, and it certainly did
not; but since no better plan could be suggested the lady decided to
adopt it; and I supposed that I had heard the last of the matter.

In this, however, I was mistaken. On the following day, just before
noon, as I was drowsily considering the points in a brief dealing with a
question of survivorship while Thorndyke drafted his weekly lecture, a
smart rat-tat at the door of our chambers announced a visitor. I rose
wearily--I had had only four hours' sleep--and opened the door,
whereupon there sailed into the room no less a person than Mrs. Chater
followed by Superintendent Miller, with a grin on his face and a
brown-paper parcel under his arm.

The lady was not in the best of tempers, though wonderfully lively and
alert considering the severe shock that she had suffered so recently,
and her disapproval of Miller was frankly obvious.

"Dr. Jervis has probably told you about the attempt to murder me last
night," she said, when I had introduced her to my colleague. "Well, now,
will you believe it? I have been to the police, I have given them a
description of the murderous villain, and I have even shown them the
very coat that he wore, and they tell me that nothing can be done. That,
in short, this scoundrel must be allowed to go his way free and
unmolested."

"You will observe, doctor," said Miller, "that this lady has given us a
description that would apply to fifty per cent. of the middle-class men
of the United Kingdom, and has shown us a coat without a single
identifying mark of any kind on it, and expects us to lay our hands on
the owner without a solitary clue to guide us. Now we are not sorcerers
at the Yard; we're only policemen. So I have taken the liberty of
referring Mrs. Chater to you." He grinned maliciously and laid the
parcel on the table.

"And what do you want me to do?" Thorndyke asked.

"Why, sir," said Miller, "there is a coat. In the pockets were a pair of
gloves, a muffler, a box of matches, a tram-ticket and a Yale key. Mrs.
Chater would like to know whose coat it is." He untied the parcel, with
his eye cocked at our rather disconcerted client, and Thorndyke watched
him with a faint smile.

"This is very kind of you, Miller," said he, "but I think a clairvoyant
would be more to your purpose."

The superintendent instantly dropped his facetious manner.

"Seriously, sir," he said, "I should be glad if you would take a look at
the coat. We have absolutely nothing to go on, and yet we don't want to
give up the case. I have gone through it most thoroughly and can't find
any clue to guide us. Now I know that nothing escapes you, and perhaps
you might notice something that I have overlooked; something that would
give us a hint where to start on our inquiry. Couldn't you turn the
microscope on it, for instance?" he added, with a deprecating smile.

Thorndyke reflected, with an inquisitive eye on the coat. I saw that the
problem was not without its attractions to him; and when the lady
seconded Miller's request with persuasive eagerness, the inevitable
consequence followed.

"Very well," he said. "Leave the coat with me for an hour or so and I
will look it over. I am afraid there is not the remotest chance of our
learning anything from it, but even so, the examination will have done
no harm. Come back at two o'clock; I shall be ready to report my failure
by then."

He bowed our visitors out and, returning to the table, looked down with
a quizzical smile on the coat and the large official envelope containing
the articles from the pockets.

"And what does my learned brother suggest?" he asked, looking up at me.

"I should look at the tram-ticket first," I replied, "and then--well,
Miller's suggestion wasn't such a bad one; to explore the surface with
the microscope."

"I think we will take the latter measure first," said he. "The
tram-ticket might create a misleading bias. A man may take a tram
anywhere, whereas the indoor dust on a man's coat appertains mostly to a
definite locality."

"Yes," I replied; "but the information that it yields is excessively
vague."

"That is true," he agreed, taking up the coat and envelope to carry them
to the laboratory, "and yet, you know, Jervis, as I have often pointed
out, the evidential value of dust is apt to be under-estimated. The
naked-eye appearances--which are the normal appearances--are misleading.
Gather the dust, say, from a table-top, and what have you? A fine powder
of a characterless grey, just like any other dust from any other
table-top. But, under the microscope, this grey powder is resolved into
recognisable fragments of definite substances, which fragments may often
be traced with certainty to the masses from which they have been
detached. But you know all this as well as I do."

"I quite appreciate the value of dust as evidence in certain
circumstances," I replied, "but surely the information that could be
gathered from dust on the coat of an unknown man must be too general to
be of any use in tracing the owner."

"I am afraid you are right," said Thorndyke, laying the coat on the
laboratory bench; "but we shall soon see, if Polton will let us have his
patent dust-extractor."

The little apparatus to which my colleague referred was the invention of
our ingenious laboratory assistant, and resembled in principle the
"vacuum cleaners" used for restoring carpets. It had, however, one
special feature: the receiver was made to admit a microscope-slide, and
on this the dust-laden air was delivered from a jet.

The "extractor" having been clamped to the bench by its proud inventor,
and a wetted slide introduced into the receiver, Thorndyke applied the
nozzle of the instrument to the collar of the coat while Polton worked
the pump. The slide was then removed and, another having been
substituted, the nozzle was applied to the right sleeve near the
shoulder, and the exhauster again worked by Polton. By repeating this
process, half-a-dozen slides were obtained charged with dust from
different parts of the garment, and then, setting up our respective
microscopes, we proceeded to examine the samples.

A very brief inspection showed me that this dust contained matter not
usually met with--at any rate, in appreciable quantities. There were, of
course, the usual fragments of wool, cotton and other fibres derived
from clothing and furniture, particles of straw, husk, hair, various
mineral particles and, in fact, the ordinary constituents of dust from
clothing. But, in addition to these, and in much greater quantity, were
a number of other bodies, mostly of vegetable origin and presenting
well-defined characters and considerable variety, and especially
abundant were various starch granules.

I glanced at Thorndyke and observed he was already busy with a pencil
and a slip of paper, apparently making a list of the objects visible in
the field of the microscope. I hastened to follow his example, and for a
time we worked on in silence. At length my colleague leaned back in his
chair and read over his list.

"This is a highly interesting collection, Jervis," he remarked. "What do
you find on your slides out of the ordinary?"

"I have quite a little museum here," I replied, referring to my list.
"There is, of course, chalk from the road at Raynesford. In addition to
this I find various starches, principally wheat and rice, especially
rice, fragments of the cortices of several seeds, several different
stone-cells, some yellow masses that look like turmeric, black pepper
resin-cells, one 'port wine' pimento cell, and one or two particles of
graphite."

"Graphite!" exclaimed Thorndyke. "I have found no graphite, but I have
found traces of cocoa--spiral vessels and starch grains--and of
hops--one fragment of leaf and several lupulin glands. May I see the
graphite?"

I passed him the slide and he examined it with keen interest. "Yes," he
said, "this is undoubtedly graphite, and no less than six particles of
it. We had better go over the coat systematically. You see the
importance of this?"

"I see that this is evidently factory dust and that it may fix a
locality, but I don't see that it will carry us any farther."

"Don't forget that we have a touchstone," said he; and, as I raised my
eyebrows inquiringly, he added, "the Yale latch-key. If we can narrow
the locality down sufficiently, Miller can make a tour of the front
doors."

"But can we?" I asked incredulously. "I doubt it."

"We can try," answered Thorndyke. "Evidently some of these substances
are distributed over the entire coat, inside and out, while others, such
as the graphite, are present only on certain parts. We must locate those
parts exactly and then consider what this special distribution means."
He rapidly sketched out on a sheet of paper a rough diagram of the coat,
marking each part with a distinctive letter, and then, taking a number
of labelled slides, he wrote a single letter on each. The samples of
dust taken on the slides could thus be easily referred to the exact
spots whence they had been obtained.

Once more we set to work with the microscope, making now and again an
addition to our lists of discoveries, and, at the end of nearly an
hour's strenuous search, every slide had been examined and the lists
compared.

"The net result of the examination," said Thorndyke, "is this. The
entire coat, inside and out, is evenly powdered with the following
substances: Rice-starch in abundance, wheat-starch in less abundance,
and smaller quantities of the starches of ginger, pimento and cinnamon;
bast fibre of cinnamon, various seed cortices, stone-cells of pimento,
cinnamon, cassia and black pepper, with other fragments of similar
origin, such as resin-cells and ginger pigment--not turmeric. In
addition there are, on the right shoulder and sleeve, traces of cocoa
and hops, and on the back below the shoulders a few fragments of
graphite. Those are the data; and now, what are the inferences? Remember
this is not mere surface dust, but the accumulation of months, beaten
into the cloth by repeated brushing--dust that nothing but a vacuum
apparatus could extract."

"Evidently," I said, "the particles that are all over the coat represent
dust that is floating in the air of the place where the coat habitually
hangs. The graphite has obviously been picked up from a seat, and the
cocoa and hops from some factories that the man passes frequently,
though I don't see why they are on the right side only."

"That is a question of time," said Thorndyke, "and incidentally throws
some light on our friend's habits. Going from home, he passes the
factories on his right; returning home, he passes them on his left, but
they have then stopped work. However, the first group of substances is
the more important as they indicate the locality of his dwelling--for he
is clearly not a workman or factory employee. Now rice-starch,
wheat-starch and a group of substances collectively designated 'spices'
suggest a rice-mill, a flour-mill and a spice factory. Polton, may I
trouble you for the Post Office Directory?"

He turned over the leaves of the "Trades" section and resumed: "I see
there are four rice-mills in London, of which the largest is Carbutt's
at Dockhead. Let us look at the spice-factors." He again turned over the
leaves and read down the list of names. "There are six spice-grinders in
London," said he. "One of them, Thomas Williams & Co., is at Dockhead.
None of the others is near any rice-mill. The next question is as to the
flour-mill. Let us see. Here are the names of several flour millers, but
none of them is near either a rice-mill or a spice-grinder, with one
exception: Seth Taylor's, St. Saviour's Flour Mills, Dockhead."

"This is really becoming interesting," said I.

"It has become interesting," Thorndyke retorted. "You observe that at
Dockhead we find the peculiar combination of factories necessary to
produce the composite dust in which this coat has hung; and the
directory shows us that this particular combination exists nowhere else
in London. Then the graphite, the cocoa and the hops tend to confirm the
other suggestions. They all appertain to industries of the locality. The
trams which pass Dockhead, also, to my knowledge, pass at no great
distance from the black-lead works of Pearce Duff & Co. in Rouel Road,
and will probably collect a few particles of black-lead on the seats in
certain states of the wind. I see, too, that there is a cocoa
factory--Payne's--in Goat Street, Horsleydown, which lies to the right
of the tram line going west, and I have noticed several hop warehouses
on the right side of Southwark Street, going west. But these are mere
suggestions; the really important data are the rice and flour mills and
the spice-grinders, which seem to point unmistakably to Dockhead."

"Are there any private houses at Dockhead?" I asked.

"We must look up the 'Street' list," he replied. "The Yale latch-key
rather suggests a flat, and a flat with a single occupant, and the
probable habits of our absent friend offer a similar suggestion." He ran
his eye down the list and presently turned to me with his finger on the
page.

"If the facts that we have elicited--the singular series of agreements
with the required conditions--are only a string of coincidences, here is
another. On the south side of Dockhead, actually next door to the
spice-grinders and opposite to Carbutt's rice-mills, is a block of
workmen's flats, Hanover Buildings. They fulfil the conditions exactly.
A coat hung in a room in those flats, with the windows open (as they
would probably be at this time of year), would be exposed to air
containing a composite dust of precisely the character of that which we
have found. Of course, the same conditions obtain in other dwellings in
this part of Dockhead, but the probability is in favour of the
buildings. And that is all that we can say. It is no certainty. There
may be some radical fallacy in our reasoning. But, on the face of it,
the chances are a thousand to one that the door that that key will open
is in some part of Dockhead, and most probably in Hanover Buildings. We
must leave the verification to Miller."

"Wouldn't it be as well to look at the tram-ticket?" I asked.

"Dear me!" he exclaimed. "I had forgotten the ticket. Yes, by all
means." He opened the envelope and, turning its contents out on the
bench, picked up the dingy slip of paper. After a glance at it he handed
it to me. It was punched for the journey from Tooley Street to Dockhead.

"Another coincidence," he remarked; "and, by yet another, I think I hear
Miller knocking at our door."

It was the superintendent, and, as we let him into the room, the hum of
a motor-car entering from Tudor Street announced the arrival of Mrs.
Chater. We waited for her at the open door, and, as she entered, she
held out her hands impulsively.

"Say, now, Dr. Thorndyke," she exclaimed, "have you got something to
tell us?"

"I have a suggestion to make," replied Thorndyke. "I think that if the
superintendent will take this key to Hanover Buildings, Dockhead,
Bermondsey, he may possibly find a door that it will fit."

"The deuce!" exclaimed Miller. "I beg your pardon, madam; but I thought
I had gone through that coat pretty completely. What was it that I had
overlooked, sir? Was there a letter hidden in it, after all?"

"You overlooked the dust on it, Miller; that is all," said Thorndyke.

"Dust!" exclaimed the detective, staring round-eyed at my colleague.
Then he chuckled softly. "Well," said he, "as I said before, I'm not a
sorcerer; I'm only a policeman." He picked up the key and asked: "Are
you coming to see the end of it, sir?"

"Of course he is coming," said Mrs. Chater, "and Dr. Jervis too, to
identify the man. Now that we have got the villain we must leave him no
loophole for escape."

Thorndyke smiled dryly. "We will come if you wish it, Mrs. Chater," he
said, "but you mustn't look upon our quest as a certainty. We may have
made an entire miscalculation, and I am, in fact, rather curious to see
if the result works out correctly. But even if we run the man to earth,
I don't see that you have much evidence against him. The most that you
can prove is that he was at the house and that he left hurriedly."

Mrs. Chater regarded my colleague for a moment in scornful silence, and
then, gathering up her skirts, stalked out of the room. If there is one
thing that the average woman detests more than another, it is an
entirely reasonable man.

The big car whirled us rapidly over Blackfriars Bridge into the region
of the Borough, whence we presently turned down Tooley Street towards
Bermondsey.

As soon as Dockhead came into view, the detective, Thorndyke and I
alighted and proceeded on foot, leaving our client, who was now closely
veiled, to follow at a little distance in the car. Opposite the head of
St. Saviour's Dock, Thorndyke halted and, looking over the wall, drew my
attention to the snowy powder that had lodged on every projection on the
backs of the tall buildings and on the decks of the barges that were
loading with the flour and ground rice. Then, crossing the road, he
pointed to the wooden lantern above the roof of the spice works, the
louvres of which were covered with greyish-buff dust.

"Thus," he moralised, "does commerce subserve the ends of justice--at
least, we hope it does," he added quickly, as Miller disappeared into
the semi-basement of the buildings.

We met the detective returning from his quest as we entered the
building.

"No go there," was his report. "We'll try the next floor."

This was the ground-floor or it might be considered the first floor. At
any rate, it yielded nothing of interest, and, after a glance at the
doors that opened on the landing, he strode briskly up the stone stairs.
The next floor was equally unrewarding, for our eager inspection
disclosed nothing but the gaping keyholes associated with the common
type of night-latch.

"What name was you wanting?" inquired a dusty knight of industry who
emerged from one of the flats.

"Muggs," replied Miller, with admirable promptness.

"Don't know 'im," said the workman. "I expect it's farther up."

Farther up we accordingly went, but still from each door the artless
grin of the invariable keyhole saluted us with depressing monotony. I
began to grow uneasy, and when the fourth floor had been explored with
no better result, my anxiety became acute. A mare's nest may be an
interesting curiosity, but it brings no kudos to its discoverer.

"I suppose you haven't made any mistake, sir?" said Miller, stopping to
wipe his brow.

"It's quite likely that I have," replied Thorndyke, with unmoved
composure. "I only proposed this search as a tentative proceeding, you
know."

The superintendent grunted. He was accustomed--as was I too, for that
matter--to regard Thorndyke's "tentative suggestions" as equal to
another man's certainties.

"It will be an awful suck-in for Mrs. Chater if we don't find him after
all," he growled as we climbed up the last flight. "She's counted her
chickens to a feather." He paused at the head of the stairs and stood
for a few moments looking round the landing. Suddenly he turned eagerly,
and, laying his hand on Thorndyke's arm, pointed to a door in the
farthest corner.

"Yale lock!" he whispered impressively.

We followed him silently as he stole on tip-toe across the landing, and
watched him as he stood for an instant with the key in his hand looking
gloatingly at the brass disc. We saw him softly apply the nose of the
fluted key-blade to the crooked slit in the cylinder, and, as we
watched, it slid in noiselessly up to the shoulder. The detective looked
round with a grin of triumph, and, silently withdrawing the key, stepped
back to us.

"You've run him to earth, sir," he whispered, "but I don't think Mr. Fox
is at home. He can't have got back yet."

"Why not?" asked Thorndyke.

Miller waved his hand towards the door. "Nothing has been disturbed," he
replied. "There's not a mark on the paint. Now he hadn't got the key,
and you can't pick a Yale lock. He'd have had to break in, and he hasn't
broken in."

Thorndyke stepped up to the door and softly pushed in the flap of the
letter-slit, through which he looked into the flat.

"There's no letter-box," said he. "My dear Miller, I would undertake to
open that door in five minutes with a foot of wire and a bit of resined
string."

Miller shook his head and grinned once more. "I am glad you're not on
the lay, sir; you'd be one too many for us. Shall we signal to the
lady?"

I went out on to the gallery and looked down at the waiting car. Mrs.
Chater was staring intently up at the building, and the little crowd
that the car had collected stared alternately at the lady and at the
object of her regard. I wiped my face with my handkerchief--the signal
agreed upon--and she instantly sprang out of the car, and in an
incredibly short time she appeared on the landing, purple and gasping,
but with the fire of battle flashing from her eyes.

"We've found his flat, madam," said Miller, "and we're going to enter.
You're not intending to offer any violence, I hope," he added, noting
with some uneasiness the lady's ferocious expression.

"Of course I'm not," replied Mrs. Chater. "In the States ladies don't
have to avenge insults themselves. If you were American men you'd hang
the ruffian from his own bedpost."

"We're not American men, madam," said the superintendent stiffly. "We
are law-abiding Englishmen, and, moreover, we are all officers of the
law. These gentlemen are barristers and I am a police officer."

With this preliminary caution, he once more inserted the key, and as he
turned it and pushed the door open, we all followed him into the
sitting-room.

"I told you so, sir," said Miller, softly shutting the door; "he hasn't
come back yet."

Apparently he was right. At any rate, there was no one in the flat, and
we proceeded unopposed on our tour of inspection. It was a miserable
spectacle, and, as we wandered from one squalid room to another, a
feeling of pity for the starving wretch into whose lair we were
intruding stole over me and began almost to mitigate the hideousness of
his crime. On all sides poverty--utter, grinding poverty--stared us in
the face. It looked at us hollow-eyed in the wretched sitting-room, with
its bare floor, its solitary chair and tiny deal table; its unfurnished
walls and windows destitute of blind or curtain. A piece of Dutch
cheese-rind on the table, scraped to the thinness of paper, whispered of
starvation; and famine lurked in the gaping cupboard, in the empty
bread-tin, in the tea-caddy with its pinch of dust at the bottom, in the
jam-jar, wiped clean, as a few crumbs testified, with a crust of bread.
There was not enough food in the place to furnish a meal for a healthy
mouse.

The bedroom told the same tale, but with a curious variation. A
miserable truckle-bed with a straw mattress and a cheap jute rug for
bed-clothes, an orange-case, stood on end, for a dressing-table, and
another, bearing a tin washing-bowl, formed the wretched furniture. But
the suit that hung from a couple of nails was well-cut and even
fashionable, though shabby; and another suit lay on the floor, neatly
folded and covered with a newspaper; and, most incongruous of all, a
silver cigarette-case reposed on the dressing-table.

"Why on earth does this fellow starve," I exclaimed, "when he has a
silver case to pawn?"

"Wouldn't do," said Miller. "A man doesn't pawn the implements of his
trade."

Mrs. Chater, who had been staring about her with the mute amazement of a
wealthy woman confronted, for the first time, with abject poverty,
turned suddenly to the superintendent. "This can't be the man!" she
exclaimed. "You have made some mistake. This poor creature could never
have made his way into a house like Willowdale."

Thorndyke lifted the newspaper. Beneath it was a dress suit with the
shirt, collar and tie all carefully smoothed out and folded. Thorndyke
unfolded the shirt and pointed to the curiously crumpled front. Suddenly
he brought it close to his eye and then, from the sham diamond stud, he
drew a single hair--a woman's hair.

"That is rather significant," said he, holding it up between his finger
and thumb; and Mrs. Chater evidently thought so too, for the pity and
compunction suddenly faded from her face, and once more her eyes flashed
with vindictive fire.

"I wish he would come," she exclaimed viciously. "Prison won't be much
hardship to him after this, but I want to see him in the dock all the
same."

"No," the detective agreed, "it won't hurt him much to swap this for
Portland. Listen!"

A key was being inserted into the outer door, and as we all stood like
statues, a man entered and closed the door after him. He passed the door
of the bedroom without seeing us, and with the dragging steps of a
weary, dispirited man. Almost immediately we heard him go to the kitchen
and draw water into some vessel. Then he went back to the sitting-room.

"Come along," said Miller, stepping silently towards the door. We
followed closely, and as he threw the door open, we looked in over his
shoulder.

The man had seated himself at the table, on which now lay a hunk of
household bread resting on the paper in which he had brought it, and a
tumbler of water. He half rose as the door opened, and as if petrified
remained staring at Miller with a dreadful expression of terror upon his
livid face.

At this moment I felt a hand on my arm, and Mrs. Chater brusquely pushed
past me into the room. But at the threshold she stopped short; and a
singular change crept over the man's ghastly face, a change so
remarkable that I looked involuntarily from him to our client. She had
turned, in a moment, deadly pale, and her face had frozen into an
expression of incredulous horror.

The dramatic silence was broken by the matter-of-fact voice of the
detective.

"I am a police officer," said he, "and I arrest you for----"

A peal of hysterical laughter from Mrs. Chater interrupted him, and he
looked at her in astonishment. "Stop, stop!" she cried in a shaky voice.
"I guess we've made a ridiculous mistake. This isn't the man. This
gentleman is Captain Rowland, an old friend of mine."

"I'm sorry he's a friend of yours," said Miller, "because I shall have
to ask you to appear against him."

"You can ask what you please," replied Mrs. Chater. "I tell you he's not
the man."

The superintendent rubbed his nose and looked hungrily at his quarry.
"Do I understand, madam," he asked stiffly, "that you refuse to
prosecute?"

"Prosecute!" she exclaimed. "Prosecute my friends for offences that I
know they have not committed? Certainly I refuse."

The superintendent looked at Thorndyke, but my colleague's countenance
had congealed into a state of absolute immobility and was as devoid of
expression as the face of a Dutch clock.

"Very well," said Miller, looking sourly at his watch. "Then we have had
our trouble for nothing. I wish you good afternoon, madam."

"I am sorry I troubled you, now," said Mrs. Chater.

"I am sorry you did," was the curt reply; and the superintendent,
flinging the key on the table, stalked out of the room.

As the outer door slammed the man sat down with an air of bewilderment;
and then, suddenly flinging his arms on the table, he dropped his head
on them and burst into a passion of sobbing.

It was very embarrassing. With one accord Thorndyke and I turned to go,
but Mrs. Chater motioned us to stay. Stepping over to the man, she
touched him lightly on the arm.

"Why did you do it?" she asked in a tone of gentle reproach.

The man sat up and flung out one arm in an eloquent gesture that
comprehended the miserable room and the yawning cupboard.

"It was the temptation of a moment," he said. "I was penniless, and
those accursed diamonds were thrust in my face; they were mine for the
taking. I was mad, I suppose."

"But why didn't you take them?" she said. "Why didn't you?"

"I don't know. The madness passed; and then--when I saw you lying
there---- Oh, God! Why don't you give me up to the police?" He laid his
head down and sobbed afresh.

Mrs. Chater bent over him with tears standing in her pretty grey eyes.
"But tell me," she said, "why didn't you take the diamonds? You could if
you'd liked, I suppose?"

"What good were they to me?" he demanded passionately. "What did
anything matter to me? I thought you were dead."

"Well, I'm not, you see," she said, with a rather tearful smile; "I'm
just as well as an old woman like me can expect to be. And I want your
address, so that I can write and give you some good advice."

The man sat up and produced a shabby card-case from his pocket, and, as
he took out a number of cards and spread them out like the "hand" of a
whist player, I caught a twinkle in Thorndyke's eye.

"My name is Augustus Bailey," said the man. He selected the appropriate
card, and, having scribbled his address on it with a stump of lead
pencil, relapsed into his former position.

"Thank you," said Mrs. Chater, lingering for a moment by the table. "Now
we'll go. Good-bye, Mr. Bailey. I shall write to-morrow, and you must
attend seriously to the advice of an old friend."

I held open the door for her to pass out and looked back before I turned
to follow. Bailey still sat sobbing quietly, with his head resting on
his arms; and a little pile of gold stood on the corner of the table.

"I expect, doctor," said Mrs. Chater, as Thorndyke handed her into the
car, "you've written me down a sentimental fool."

Thorndyke looked at her with an unwonted softening of his rather severe
face and answered quietly, "It is written: Blessed are the Merciful."






[End of A Wastrel's Romance, by R. Austin Freeman]