The Safety Pin

Joseph Smith Fletcher

Chapter 1 THE THIRTEENTH CLIENT

Shelmore, then three-and-twenty years old, had been in practice as a solicitor for precisely six months, and, probably because he had set up in his own native city of Southernstowe, the end of that period found him with exactly twelve clients on his roll. His line was the eminently safe one of conveyancing and the clients were profitable ones; he knew enough of his profession to know that his first half-year's experience was satisfactory and promising. Another fledgling, lower down the street, a former fellow-articled-clerk, admitted at the same time as himself, who had gone in for police-court practice, was doubtless having livelier times, but not making so much substantial gain; his office, perhaps, was more crowded, but Shelmore preferred the dignified quiet of his own, wherein he and his clients talked of nothing less important than the transference or acquisition of real estate.

In a youthful fashion he was somewhat proud of that office. At the street door there was a beautiful, highly-polished brass plate, engraved in the very best of taste: Francis D. Shelmore, Solicitor; at the head of the stair leading up from it there was a smaller one, similarly inscribed, on an oak door; within that door, in the dark room liberally provided with all the proper show of papers, parchments, and japanned tin boxes, sat Shelmore's one clerk, an astute, sharp-eyed, precocious youth named Simmons Hackdale; within an inner door, duly covered with green baize, sat Shelmore himself, in a private office very neatly and tastefully furnished and ornamented.

Whenever one of the twelve clients came, Shelmore was always busy, and the client was kept waiting a little, the time of waiting being adjusted by the clerk in accordance with his own estimate of the client's value and importance. But, in plain truth, Shelmore had a lot of time on his hands, and it was a good deal to his credit that he spent some of it in improving his own knowledge of law, and some in giving a gratuitous course of legal education to his—unarticled—clerk. Shelmore, having been a bit of a precisian since boyhood, kept exact hours. He arrived at the office at exactly ten minutes to ten every morning; at ten minutes to five every afternoon he prepared to leave it. He was preparing to leave it now—a certain Wednesday afternoon in the last week of what had been an unusually fine September, He had tidied up his desk and put away his books and assumed his hat and overcoat; his umbrella, tightly rolled, stood ready to his hand; close by it lay the Times, neatly folded, to be carried home to his aunt. Miss Olivia Chauncey, with whom he lived, in an old-fashioned house in the oldest part of Southernstowe. He stood by the window, fitting on his gloves with meticulous precision; thus engaged, he looked out on the scene beneath and in front; he had gone through that performance every afternoon for six months; it would not have disconcerted him if he had been assured by some infallible prophet that he would go through it every afternoon for many and many a long year to come. It was all part of what he wished and liked—a well-ordered, calm, systematic life routine, in, which tomorrow should be as today.

Yet, at that very moment, had Shelmore but known it, things were stirring close by, which were not according to any routine of his, and were going to break in upon the regularity of his daily life. As he stood there, looking unemotionally out of the window, he saw something which, if it did not exactly excite him, at any rate interested him. The block in which his office was situate was a corner one. It commanded views of a good bit of the centre of the old city, and in particular a full prospect of the front of the ancient Chancellor Hotel. And what interested Shelmore was the sudden appearance of a girl at the entrance of the court-yard of the Chancellor—a girl, who, for a second or two stood on the curb, looking doubtfully and inquiringly around, as people look at unfamiliar things and scenes. She was a tallish girl; she was slim and willowy; he had a convinced idea that she was young and pretty; she was smartly dressed; she was a stranger. He wondered about her without knowing why he wondered: then, as he saw her look round again, hesitate, and suddenly cross the street in his direction, he formulated a theory.

"She's in some perplexity," mused Shelmore. "Wants to know something."

The girl disappeared from view amongst the folk on the sidewalk, and Shelmore, the last finger of his gloves being adjusted, picked up the neatly rolled umbrella and the equally neatly folded Times, and prepared to quit the scene of his daily labour. But before he had opened the green baize door, he heard voices in the clerk's room. He paused: the green baize door opened, and Simmons Hackdale's sharp-eyed face appeared, and his hand held out a card.

"Young lady," said Simmons, laconically. "Wants to consult you."

Shelmore took the card mechanically and stared at the neat script. Of course this was the girl he had just seen from his window. And this that he was staring at would be her name—Miss Cynthia Pretty, St. Meliot's, Camborne. Camborne! Why, Camborne was a good two or three hundred miles away, in Cornwall! What… he suddenly looked up, nodded at his clerk, and, drawing off his gloves and removing his hat, turned to his desk, as to a refuge. But being there again, his eyes went to the door…

He got a general impression of Miss Cynthia Pretty as Simmons Hackdale showed her in. She was tallish, and she was slim and willowy, as he had thought at first, and she was undeniably attractive. He was not sure whether her hair was gold—deep gold—or whether it weren't a bit reddish; he was uncertain, too, about her eyes, whether they were blue or whether they were violet—anyway, the lot of her, put together, lighted up the office. And she was young—perhaps nineteen, perhaps twenty; he couldn't tell; certainly she was very young. And suddenly he felt very young—and a little small—himself. For at sight of him, Miss Cynthia Pretty let out an involuntary exclamation.

"Oh!" she said, pausing between the door and the desk. "Are—are you the Mr. Shelmore whose name is on the door downstairs. You are? Oh! Well, you look so awfully young to be a solicitor. And it's a solicitor I want."

"Perhaps I'm older than I look," answered Shelmore, recovering his wits. "And I assure you I'm very wise! Will you sit down and tell me—"

His client dropped into the easy chair to which he pointed, and let her hands fall together in her lap. She gave him another critical inspection.

"You look a bit clever," she said. "And anyway, you're a man and a lawyer, and that's what I want. I'm in a mess, Mr. Shelmore!—at least, I don't know what to do. As you see from my card, my name's Pretty—Cynthia Pretty. I live near Camborne, in Cornwall. I'm half-proprietor of a famous tin mine there. The other half belongs to my partner, Mr. James Deane. Mr. Deane is also my guardian and trustee and all that sort of thing, under my father's will, because, you see, I'm not yet of age—I'm only nineteen. I'm telling you this as a sort of preliminary to the really important business. Well, that's just this—Mr. Deane and I have lately been travelling about. Not together—separately. He's been in the North of England—he's fond of old places, antiquities and so on. I've been staying with an old school friend at Bath. Mr. Deane and I arranged to meet here, at the Chancellor Hotel, Southernstowe, today—this afternoon, to be exact. We were to stay here a few days, to look round; then we were going on to Dover, and to the continent—Holland and Belgium, and perhaps Germany. Well, I got here, not half-an-hour ago, from Bath, with all my luggage, and drove straight to the Chancellor. They'd got a room booked for me right enough—Mr. Deane booked it when he arrived here on Monday—that's the day before yesterday. But Mr. Deane himself isn't there!—he's clean disappeared!"

"Disappeared!" exclaimed Shelmore. "How? Why?"

"Don't ask me," replied his caller. "I don't know! That's what the girl clerk in the office, across there, says. The landlord wasn't in, and I couldn't get much out of her—she isn't very brilliant or illuminating. But that's what she says—that Mr. Deane came there on Monday, some time, and disappeared mysteriously during Monday night, and they've never seen him since. And—and I thought I'd better consult somebody at once, and so I came out and looked about for a solicitor, and I saw your name, and—well, that's just where it is."

"How old is Mr. Deane?" asked Shelmore.

"Sixty-three last June," answered Miss Pretty. "Any reason why he should disappear?"

"Goodness, no! What reason should there be?"

"Not knowing him, I can't say. Any financial reasons?"

"Mr Deane is a wealthy man. He and I, as partners, are both wealthy."

"An domestic trouble now? Is Mr. Deane married?"

"He's a widower. His wife died when I was a little girl."

"Any sons or daughters?"

"He's neither. I've hoard him say that he hasn't a relative in the world."

"A contented sort of man? No worries?"

"I should say, having known him all my life, that Mr. Deane hadn't a care or a trouble. He's a very sunny-natured, bright-tempered man."

"And you can't think of any reason whatever why he should disappear?"

"Not one! Not the ghost of a reason! I know he was looking forward awfully keenly to this tour on the continent; and, the last letter I had from him—here, in my bag—he promised faithfully to be waiting for me at the Chancellor today at four o'clock. He's the sort of man who's most punctilious about appointments. And I'm just certain, Mr. Shelmore—there's something wrong."

Shelmore picked up his hat.

"I'll go across with you to the Chancellor, Miss Pretty," he said, "I know Belling, the landlord—we'd better see him at once."

"He was out when I was there," remarked Miss Pretty. "And I don't see what he can know about it any more than that Mr. Deane's not there since Monday night."

"Mr. Deane may have left a message with him of which the girl in the office knows nothing," suggested Shelmore. "Anyway, Belling's the man—and there he is just going in."

He led his new client through the courtyard of the old hotel, and past the office to a private room, wherein the landlord, a cheery-faced, middle-aged man, was just taking off his hat and overcoat. He made Miss Pretty a polite bow and gave Shelmore a comprehending nod.

"I've just heard of Miss Pretty's arrival and her enquiries about Mr. Deane," he said, drawing chairs forward for his visitors. "I see you've not been long in seeking legal advice, miss!—but let's hope there's no need for that. Still, it's a fact, Mr. Shelmore. I don't know anything about Mr. Deane. He's not here—and I don't know where he is."

"Just tell me what you do know," replied Shelmore. "Miss Pretty is naturally anxious about him—she's afraid something may have happened."

"Well, sir, Mr. Deane looked to me the sort of man who could very well look after himself," answered the landlord, as he took a seat opposite his callers. "But I'll tell you everything I know. Mr. Deane arrived here, from London, I understood, on Monday afternoon, about four o'clock. He booked a room for himself—number seven. Then he booked a room for his ward. Miss Pretty, who, he said, would be here on Wednesday—number eleven. Here, of course, is Miss Pretty, and the room is all ready for her. But where's her guardian? Well, all I can tell is this: Mr. Deane's luggage was taken up to his room. He went up there himself, and had some tea sent up. He came down to dinner at seven o'clock, and dined in just the usual fashion. After dinner, he came to me in the bar-parlour and asked if there was any particular amusement in the place. I told him we'd just opened a new picture house, the first thing of its kind ever known in Southernstowe, and that it was well worth seeing. He said he'd go. He went. He came back about ten o'clock, or a little after. He asked me to join him in a drink. He had a whisky and soda in this very room—Mr. Deane sat in that very chair you're in, Mr. Shelmore. We talked about the picture house, and the money there was in that industry nowadays. Then he observed that he'd seen a very handsome lady at the picture house, who occupied what, he said, was evidently a place of honour, and seemed to be some local celebrity. I told him that that would be Mrs. Champernowne, the Mayor of Southernstowe. He was much interested in that, he said that though he'd heard of ladies being mayors before, he'd never actually seen one in office. I told him that Mrs. Champernowne was a very smart, clever woman, proprietress of one of the biggest businesses in the city, that since her coming to Southernstowe twenty-odd years ago, she's always taken a vast interest in civic affairs, and that this was her second year of office as chief magistrate. We talked a while about women's share in politics and municipal life, and then about eleven o'clock, he said he'd get off to bed. We said good-night at the foot of the stairs—and that, Mr. Shelmore, was the very last I saw of him! Never seen, nor heard of him since!"

"But—your people?" suggested Shelmore.

"Ah, to be sure!" asserted Belling. "The chambermaid—she saw him last."

"Under what circumstances?" enquired Shelmore.

"Well," replied the landlord, "a few minutes—perhaps ten minutes or a quarter of an hour after he'd gone upstairs, he rang the bell for her, and asked for a glass of hot milk. She came down and got it for him; when she went back with it, Mr. Deane, according to what she told me next morning, was in his pyjamas and dressing gown, sitting in an easy chair and reading a book. He asked her to bring him some China tea and a dry biscuit at seven o'clock sharp next morning. She bade him good-night and went away, leaving him there sipping his hot milk, and reading his book-and there you are!"

"There he was—late on Monday night—anyway," remarked Shelmore. "Well-but let's get to seven o'clock, Tuesday morning. What about that?"

"Seven o'clock Tuesday morning, the chambermaid took up the tea and biscuits," continued Belling. "There was no response to her knock, so she went into the room. There was no one there. She thought Mr. Deane had gone to the bathroom, so she set down the tea and went away. But presently she took hot water there. Still he wasn't there. And we've never seen or heard of him since. As I said before, the last person who ever saw him in this house was the chambermaid, late on Monday night, when, apparently, he was about to get into bed—ready for bed, anyway!"

"Did the chambermaid notice if the bed had been slept in?" enquired Shelmore. "I mean on Tuesday morning?"

"Oh, yes! I asked her about that. It had. Certainly it had—I went up there myself afterwards and saw that it had."

Shelmore glanced at Miss Pretty. She was listening intently to the conversation, and already a puzzled look was fixing itself on her face. Suddenly she put a question to Belling, in prompt, direct fashion.

"When did you first miss my guardian?" she asked.

Belling gave Shelmore a smile which seemed to suggest that a man would more readily understand the situation than a woman.

"Well, miss," he replied, turning to his questioner, "probably not until the morning was well advanced. We had a good many guests in the house yesterday morning, and I was very busy. It was, I should say, about eleven o'clock before it suddenly struck me that I hadn't seen Mr. Deane about. Then I made enquiry of the chambermaid, and heard all that I've told you. She, of course, thought the gentleman had risen early and gone out for a walk before breakfast—so many gentlemen do."

"That means that his clothes had gone with him!" said Miss Pretty, sharply. "He wouldn't go out in his pyjamas! But did no one see him go out?"

"Yes," observed Shelmore, rising from his chair, "that's it!—did no one see him go out? Because he must have gone out between last thing at night and first thing next morning. But there's only one thing to do. Belling—we shall have to consult the police. I see your telephone's in the corner. You don't mind if I ring up the City Hall? There's no time to be lost in an affair of this sort."

He crossed over to the telephone… within a couple of minutes he turned to his companions. "That's all right." he said. "Mellapont's coming over himself—Superintendent Mellapont."

Chapter 2 WHAT ABOUT THE BED?

There presently strode into the landlord's private parlour a man, who, had he been in plain clothes instead of in a smart, tightly-fitting, black-braided blue uniform, would have been set down by nine people out of ten as a Life-Guardsman in mufti. A very tall, heavily-built man, with a keen, determined face, he turned a sharp, enquiring glance on Miss Cynthia Pretty in the same second wherein he nodded, half-carelessly, to Belling and Shelmore.

"Evening, Mr. Belling—even, Mr. Shelmore," he began. "What's all this?—gentleman disappeared from the Chancellor? This young lady's guardian, eh? Yes?—well. What are the surface facts, now?"

He dropped into a chair and sat, listening attentively, while Shelmore briefly explained matters. Then he turned alertly on the landlord.

"Why didn't you put yourself in communication with me, Mr. Belling, as soon as you missed this gentleman?" he asked, with something of judicial severity in his tone. "It's a good deal more than twenty-four hours since you missed him, and this is the first I've heard of it!"

Belling spread out his hands and shook his head.

"That's all very well, superintendent," he retorted, "but if you'd been in this business as many years as I have, you'd know that hotel guests do strange things! The only notion I had at first was that this gentleman had gone out for a walk, gone further than he intended, got breakfast somewhere, and would turn up for lunch at the usual time. I took the trouble to go up and look at his room, and saw that the bed had been slept in—that confirmed my first idea. Then, later, when he didn't come in, and as the day—yesterday—wore on, I got another idea—that Mr. Deane probably had friends in the neighbourhood, and had gone to breakfast with them, and was staying on for the day with them. As the day passed, I got more certain that the second was the right idea—friends. You see—"

"A moment," interrupted Mellapont. He turned to Miss Pretty. "Has your guardian any friends or acquaintances in Southernstowe or neighbourhood?" he asked. "I mean—to your knowledge?"

"To my knowledge, no," replied Miss Pretty. "Indeed, I'm quite sure he hadn't. Mr. Deane had never been in Southernstowe before Monday, and he knew no one here, nor near here. We talked a good deal about Southernstowe when we were making our holiday plans. He wanted to see the cathedral, and the old walls, and the old churches and houses here—if he'd known anybody here or hereabouts I'm confident he'd have mentioned it. I know this—he'd never been in this part of England before."

"That seems to settle your second theory, Mr Belling," remarked Mellapont. "But you were about to observe—"

"I was only going to say that Mr. Deane's absence seemed to fit in with what he'd told me about his ward coming," said Belling. "He'd said that Miss Pretty wouldn't arrive until Wednesday afternoon. Very well!—he'd until Wednesday afternoon to do as he liked—no engagement that could keep him in. What more likely than that, if he had friends—I say if, mind you—in this place or neighbourhood he should stop with them until it was time to meet Miss Pretty. I think I was justified in thinking that. I've often had gentlemen come here, book a room, have their luggage put in it, stroll out to see somebody, and never come back for one, two, or three days. That's what I thought about this case—gone off to see somebody, and stopped."

"Theory!" said Mellapont. "Now let's get down to plain fact. Thee plain fact is that Mr. James Deane was in his bedroom, number seven, at the Chancellor Hotel at eleven o'clock on Monday night, and that at noon next morning he was gone. Now then, when did he go? Monday night or Tuesday morning? Mr. Belling!—let me have a word or two with the chambermaid we've heard about—fetch her in."

Belling left the room, and Mellapont, with a glance at the door, bent forward to Miss Pretty.

"Would your guardian be likely to have a good deal of money on him?" he asked, quietly. "Ready money?"

"Yes!" replied Miss Pretty, promptly. "He would! He'd have a lot on him. You see, we were going on the continent. Besides, he always had a lot of money on him when lie was travelling about—I've travelled with him before, often."

"And valuables, now? Watch, chain—that sort of thing?" suggested Mellapont. "Good jewellery?"

"He'd a lot of very valuable jewellery on him," said Miss Pretty. "It was rather a weakness of his."

"H'm!" murmured Mellapont, with a glance at Shelmore. "Ah!—it's as well to know that much, eh, Mr. Shelmore? Monday, as you'll remember, was quarterly fair-day, and there are always some queer characters about, and they hang on in the place until late next morning. However—but here's the chambermaid."

 

Belling came back, ushering in a young woman who looked curiously and enquiringly at the people awaiting her, but chiefly at the superintendent, who, on his part, gave her a keen, appraising glance as if estimating her quality as a reliable witness.

"Mary Sanders," said the landlord. "She it was who saw Mr. Deane last."

"Just so," assented Mellapont. "And that was—what time, Mary?"

"Just after eleven o'clock, Monday night, sir," replied the chambermaid, readily.

"When you took him some hot milk, saw him evidently ready to go to bed, and got his order for tea at seven o'clock next morning?"

"Yes, sir."

"And at seven o'clock next morning, when you went, he wasn't there?"

"No, sir."

"So he never drank the tea you took up?"

"Oh, no, sir!—the tea was never touched."

Mellapont became silent and remained silent for a full minute. The chambermaid, a self-possessed, alert-looking young woman, watched him steadily. Suddenly, he bent forward, looking hard at her, and whispered rather than spoke his next question.

"What about the bed, Mary? What about the bed?"

The chambermaid started and flushed a little.

"What—what do you mean, sir?"

"I mean—had the bed been slept in, Mary!—had the bed been slept in? Come, now, with your experience as a chambermaid, eh? But—I see you've got some idea of your own on this very important point. Out with it, Mary!"

The chambermaid smiled a little, glancing covertly at her master.

"Well, sir," she said. "I certainly did think something when the gentleman didn't come in before breakfast, and I'd looked more closely round the room, and more particularly at the bed. I think he'd got into bed, but he hadn't stopped in bed! I think he'd got out again pretty quick."

Mellapont slapped his hands on his knees and looked slowly and significantly from Belling to Shelmore and from Shelmore to Miss Pretty.

"She thinks he'd got in bed and had got out again pretty quick!" he said, in a sort of dramatic stage aside. "Ah! And what made you think that, Mary?" he went on, turning again to the chambermaid. "You have reasons?"

"Well, sir, when I looked more closely at it, the bed didn't look to me as if it had been slept in all night," answered Mary. "There was just one dint in the top pillow. The sheets were quite straight and uncreased. It was just as if the gentleman had got into bed, bethought himself of something, got up again, and never gone back."

Mellapont slapped his knees again.

"Admirable!" he exclaimed. "Admirable! Mr. Deane went to bed and immediately got up again! Now Mary, you're evidently a girl who keeps her eyes open. When you took Mr. Deane his hot milk where did you set down your tray?"

"On the dressing table, sir, close by where he was sitting in an easy chair, reading."

"Did you notice anything on that dressing table? You did, of course. What, now?"

"Well, sir. I couldn't help noticing—they were there in the middle. A gold watch and chain, a diamond pin, and some rings—diamond rings, I think."

"He wore two diamond rings—valuable," murmured Miss Pretty.

"Just so," said Mellapont. "And now, Mary, were these things on the dressing table when you went in next morning?"

"Oh, no, sir!—there was nothing there! Except brushes and combs and that sort of thing. No valuables, sir."

Mellapont turned and nodded two or three times at Shelmore.

"Nothing could be plainer." he said, in a low confidential voice. "Mr. Deane got up, dressed himself, even to the putting on of his jewellery, and went out—that night! Mary!"

"Sir!"

"I take it that you have charge of the corridor, or passage, or whatever it is, in which the bedroom number seven is situate?"

"Yes, sir. It's the first floor. There are six rooms—numbers three, five, seven on one side; four, six, eight on the other."

"What time did you go off duty that night?"

"Usual time, sir—half-past-eleven."

"Now, then!—did you ever see Mr. Deane leave his room?"

"No, sir—certainly not!"

"Supposing he'd wanted anything after you went off duty—who'd he have got it from?"

"Kight, the night porter, sir. Any bell from the bedrooms is answered after eleven-thirty by Kight."

Mellapont turned to Belling with a wave of his hand.

"Now—Kight!" he commanded. "Kight!" Belling nodded to the chambermaid. "Send him here, Mary," he said. "At once." When the chambermaid had gone, silence fell in the private parlour. It was largely caused by the behaviour of Mellapont, who folded his arms across his broad chest, turned his face towards the ceiling and, fixing his eyes on some real or imaginary spot, seemed to lose himself in profound meditation. He only came to earth again when a stockily-built man in a green apron entered the room and looked enquiringly at Belling.

"The superintendent wants to ask you a question or two, Kight," said the landlord.

Mellapont turned on the night porter—less critically than on the chambermaid. He put his first question with seeming carelessness.

"You're on duty from eleven-thirty to seven, aren't you, Kight?" he asked.

"No, sir! Eleven o'clock at night to eight o'clock in the morning."

"Half-an-hour's difference one way and an hour's the other, eh? All right!—anyway you were on duty on Monday night?"

"As usual, sir."

"Do you know Mr. Deane—the gentleman in number seven?"

"Yes, sir. Saw him say good-night to Mr. Belling when he went upstairs Monday night."

"Did you ever see him come down again that night?"

"I did not, sir."

"Nor early next morning?"

"No, sir."

"Never saw him at all during the night?"

"Never set eyes on the gentleman, sir, after I saw him go upstairs."

"Could he have come down and gone out without your seeing him?"

"It's hard to see how he could, sir. In fact, in an ordinary way, impossible."

"Why, now?—why impossible?"

"Well, sir, the guv'nor there'll understand. You see, this old courtyard outside makes a sort of main passage through the house, from front to back. There's a front entrance to it, as you know, into the High Street; there's a back entrance into Sepulchre Alley. Both entrances are closed at eleven o'clock, when I come on duty: it's my first job to close them. Half-way up the courtyard I've a little room, the door of which is always open. If anybody wants to get in during the night—late travellers, motorists, cyclists, and such-like—they have to ring me up from outside. Same way, if anybody wanted to go out, I'd have to open a door for 'em. Though, to be sure, there is a way out without bothering me—if anybody knows it."

"Ah, there's a way out without bothering you, is there, Kight?" said Mellapont. "And what's that, pray?"

"Well, sir, in our back entrance into Sepulchre Alley there's a sort of wicket door in the big one. It's just kept on the latch. Anybody inside the hotel can let himself out by that door. But—he couldn't get in again without ringing for me."

Mellapont turned to Shelmore with a convinced nod.

"Mr. Deane let himself out by that door!" he said. "Good! Now—when? Kight!"

"Sir!"

"On Monday night, between eleven o'clock, and up to Tuesday morning at eight o'clock, were you ever away from your little room in this courtyard. Gone away in any other part of the house?"

"I was, sir—twice. I keep a supply of liquors in my room, sir, for night consumption. I took a whisky and soda up to number fifteen, second floor, at a quarter to twelve—gentleman had come in by a very late train. He kept me talking a few minutes."

"And the other occasion?"

"I took a cup of coffee and some biscuits to number five at six o'clock in the morning, sir. That was a motoring gentleman, who wanted to be off early."

"And on both these occasions you'd be away upstairs for a few minutes, eh?"

"Only a few, sir."

"Still, it would be possible for anybody to come downstairs, unobserved, during those few minutes, and let himself out by that wicket door into Sepulchre Alley?"

"Possible, sir," agreed Kight, with a grin, "but—not very probable. It would mean, anyway, that whoever did it knew the house, and the wicket door and Sepulchre Alley. And I understood that this gentleman was a total stranger."

Mellapont rose from his chair.

"All the same," he said, turning to Belling. "I'm convinced that Mr. Deane, after retiring on Monday night, immediately got up again, dressed, came down, and let himself out while Kight was in number fifteen! The questions now are—where did lie go, and where is he? That's my job! I'm going to start on it straight off. Mr. Shelmore, you come with me to my office. Miss Pretty, let me advise you to settle down and get some dinner, and to be no more alarmed or anxious than's natural—I'll do my best. Now, Mr. Shelmore."

Shelmore only lingered a moment to tell Miss Pretty that he would send his aunt. Miss Chauncey, to call on her that evening, and then followed Mellapont out of the hotel. The Superintendent tapped his shoulder.

"Mr. Shelmore!" he whispered. "Don't you be surprised if this turns out to be a bad case! Robbery, and maybe murder?—aye, murder! And I'm handicapped. As you know, owing to that big coal strike in South Wales, all our regular police have been dragged off there to help, and I've nothing but special constables at my disposal—civilians. However, I must do what I can, and the first thing is to comb out the city for this unfortunate gentleman. Mr. Shelmore!—I smell murder!"

With this dark prediction on his lips, he led Shelmore into the police station beneath the ancient City Hall, and through a vaulted ante room, where, all alone, a tall, athletic, smart-looking young man was just fastening on his sleeve the striped badge of a special constable.

Chapter 3 THE SAND PIT

Mellapont strode quickly across the room and gave its solitary occupant a hearty smack on the badged arm.

"The very man I most wanted to see at this moment," he exclaimed. "Come into my office!—come, both of you. You know Mr. Hackdale, Mr. Shelmore?—Mr. Hackdale's the most reliable of my specials—just the man for this job."

Shelmore knew John Hackdale well enough. He knew him as being under-manager at Champernowne's Drapery Store, the big establishment owned by the clever woman who at that time was Mayor of Southernstowe: he knew him also as the elder brother of his own clerk, Simmons Hackdale. But he knew more of him—as did most natives of the city. He knew that John Hackdale and his brother Simmons had been left orphans when one was seventeen and the other ten, unprovided for and practically friendless, and that the elder, by his own unaided efforts, had kept the two of them, clothing, feeding, and educating the younger until Simmons was old enough to do something for himself. He knew, too, that John Hackdale, now a young man of twenty-six, had the reputation of being a pushing and an ambitious fellow, and that he was looked upon at Champernowne's as the mainspring of the business, and as being its real controller, in spite of the fact that there was above him a nominal manager.

"Of course I know Mr. Hackdale," he answered, as they passed into the superintendent's office. "It would be odd if anybody didn't know everybody in a place as small as Southernstowe, superintendent."

"Ah, well, you see, I'm not a native!" said Mellapont, with a shy laugh. "My two years here haven't made me familiar with the smallness of the place, even yet. But now let's tell Mr. Hackdale chat's occurred—he's the main man amongst my special constables, and he can talk to the rest. Just give me your close attention for five minutes, Mr. Hackdale."

John Hackdale listened quietly while Mellapont told him the story which had been elaborated in the landlord's parlour at the Chancellor. Shelmore watched him while he listened, and thought to himself that John Hackdale was fitted for something better than a draper's counter, however long and big and wide that counter might be. Unlike his brother Simmons, who was meagre and sharp-featured, and had a good deal of the fox or ferret look about him, John was a tall, well-built man, handsome of face, and with an air of quiet reserve in eyes arid lips that would have stood him in good stead, thought Shelmore, if he had gone in for professional work—his own, for instance. He had the barrister look—Shelmore mentally pictured him in a wig and gown. And that he had something of legal acumen was proved by his first remark.

"What do you think of that, now?" asked Mellapont, making an end of the story. "How's it strike you?"

Hackdale looked slowly from one man to the other.

"It strikes me like this," he answered. "Whatever the young lady may think, her guardian has been in Southernstowe before."

"Aye?—and what makes you think that now?" demanded Mellapont, eagerly. "What?"

"Obvious!" said Hackdale. "He knew all about the wicket door in the entrance to Sepulchre Alley. To my knowledge that wicket door's been there—well, ever since I was a youngster. When I first earned my living as a shop boy, I've carried many a parcel into the Chancellor by that door."

"Good!" said Mellapont. "So you think—"

"I think Mr. Deane knew Southernstowe, and somebody in Southernstowe," replied Hackdale, "and that he took it into his head, suddenly, to go out and see that somebody, late as it was. That he never returned is a matter which—"

He paused, glancing meaningly at his companions.

"Well?" said Mellapont, sharply. "Well?"

"Which needs closely enquiring into," concluded Hackdale. He paused again, looking still more meaningly and narrowly at the superintendent. "I suppose, as he was travelling about, he would have money on him—and valuables?" he suggested.

"Lots!—according to all we've just heard," asserted Mellapont.

"It was quarterly fair-day, Monday," remarked Hackdale. "As you're aware, a good many of the riff-raff—drovers, hangers-on, and the like—stop about the town overnight, sleeping out, many of them. If Mr. Deane went out at midnight, say to some house on the outskirts—"

"Just what I've been thinking!" exclaimed Mellapont. "Well, the only thing is to search and enquire and make the thing public. There's one advantage of being in a place as small as this-any rumour'll be all over the spot in an hour. Make it known, Hackdale—you too, Mr. Shelmore. Hackdale, I suppose you're going on your beat—north side of the city, yours, isn't it? Drop the news wherever you go—somebody, surely, must have seen or heard something of this man."

"I don't know," said Hackdale, doubtfully. "Ninety-nine out of every hundred of Southernstowe people are in bed by ten o'clock. During this special constable business, I've scarcely met a soul in the streets after that hour."

He nodded to Shelmore and went out, pausing in the outer room to say a few words to a couple of fellow special constables who had just come in and were preparing for their voluntary duties. Then, leaving the police station, he went out into the street and turned down a narrow lane that ran along the side of the City Hall. At the end of that lane there was a small square, set round with old, half-timbered houses; in one of these, a boarding house, kept by two old maiden ladies, Hackdale lodged with his brother Simmons. He wanted to see Simmons now: Simmons was the likeliest means he knew of for noising anything abroad: Simmons, at a word, would spread the news of Deane's strange disappearance all over Southernstowe in half-an-hour.

Hackdale opened the door of the boarding house and walked into a square, oak-wainscotted hall, lighted from the centre by a swinging lamp. Beneath this lamp stood a man in immaculate evening dress, who was carefully brushing an opera hat. He was a tall, well-built man of sixty or thereabouts, who had been strikingly handsome in his time, but who now bore something of the appearance of a carefully-preserved and skilfully patched up ruin. This was Mark Ebbitt, whom Hackdale knew both as a fellow lodger and as manager of the newly established picture house; he also knew that in his time Ebbitt had been an actor, and that his career had not proved over successful; indeed, Hackdale remembered him, on his first coming to Southernstowe, as having been in the down-at-heel and frayed-linen stage. But now he had blossomed out again, and as manager of a flourishing place of amusement was revelling once more in purple and fine linen.

The two men nodded familiarly, and Hackdale paused on his way to his own sitting room.

"Heard any news?" he asked.

"Not an atom, my boy," replied Ebbitt. "Have you?"

Hackdale told him of what he had just heard; Ebbitt, carefully adjusting the opera hat in front of a mirror that hung over the fireplace, listened without any great show of interest.

"That must have been the stranger I noticed at our show on Monday night," he remarked. "Tallish, Spanish, grey-bearded chap, in a brown tweed suit: I noticed, too, he'd got a damned fine diamond in his cravat! Um!—Well, if elderly gentlemen with jewels like that on 'em will go walking abroad at midnight in country towns—eh?"

"Well, just mention it to anybody you come across tonight, will you?" suggested Hackdale. "Publicity—"

"My boy, the whole thing'll be all over the town before supper time!" declared Ebbitt; "Lord bless you! if the poll-parrot upstairs took it into her head to fly out of window, do you think all Southernstowe wouldn't know it in five minutes? Publicity?—trust country-town tongues for that!"

He wrapped a white silk muffler round his throat, gave the opera hat an extra tilt over his right ear, and swaggered out, and Hackdale, opening a door on the left of the hall, walked into the parlour which he and his brother shared as a sitting room. Simmons was there—the remains of his tea-supper before him, but he himself deep in a big law-book, on either side of which he had firmly planted an elbow. From between the knuckles which pressed against his temples, he looked up at John.

"Here's a nice job for you, Sim," said Hackdale. "Just suit you. You're going out, of course?"

"For a bit," answered Simmons, questioningly. "What's up?"

"This is up," replied Hackdale. He sat down, keeping his hat and coat on, and told his brother all about it. "So, if you're going to drop in at the club, mention it—mention it anywhere. Tell everybody you meet."

Simmons nodded. His sharp eyes grew thoughtful.

"That would be the girl who came to Shelmore this afternoon, just as we were leaving," he remarked. "Shelmore went out with her. Name of Pretty—Miss Cynthia Pretty."

"Anything like her name?" asked the elder brother. "Was she pretty?"

"Top hole!" declared Simmons. "Swell, too. Card said she lived in Cornwall, but I'll lay a fiver to a penny she didn't get her clothes in those wilds! London make—from top to bottom."

"Good lad," said Hackdale, approvingly. "Always cultivate your power of observation, Sim, and you'll do! Well-I'm off on my beat. See you at breakfast."

A small packet which he knew to contain sandwiches, and a flask in which he had stored a supply of weak whisky and water, lay on a side table; stowing these away in his pockets, Hackdale nodded to his brother and left the room. But instead of going out of the house by the front door, he went through a passage to the back-yard, and there released his dog, a pure bred Airedale terrier, known to the neighbourhood as Martin; with this valuable assistant at his heels he turned back towards the City Hall, and went off towards that part of Southernstowe which was just then under his charge.

Mellapont had reason when he spoke of the smallness of the city whose police arrangements he superintended. So old that its people boasted of it as being the oldest settled town in England; famous as possessing one of the most ancient of English cathedrals: interesting and notable to all lovers of archaeology and its ways, Southernstowe was utterly insignificant in point of size. A square half-mile held all there was of it, within its ancient and still well preserved walls, at any rate: you could walk in and out and all round it within an hour. It had but three streets; one, High Street, ran across it from east to west; another, North Bar, ran from High Street to the walls on the northward; the third, South Bar, ran from the centre of the town to the southern extremity. Out of these streets meandered, to be sure, almost aimlessly, various alleys, courts, and passages, but they were so narrow, and their entrances so often veiled by modern frontages, that only the inhabitants knew of them; in many cases they had no name.

Hackdale's beat lay on the north side of the city. Out there, once the walls were passed, there was a district of residential houses—mansions and villas standing in private grounds, with open country beyond. The principal people of the place lived up there; professional men, merchants, well-to-do tradesmen. His own employer, Mrs. Sophia Champernowne, the mayor, had a big place that way, Ashenhurst House, where she lived with her brother, a queer, apparently shiftless, do-nothing-at-all sort of amiable, well-dressed person, commonly known as Mr. Alfred. What Mr. Alfred's surname was, neither Hackdale, nor anybody else knew—he was just Mr. Alfred. All that anybody knew about him was that when Mrs. Champernowne first came to Southernstowe, twenty years before, and bought up a decaying business which she speedily transformed into a first class, up-to-date equal-to-London and Paris drapery store, Mr. Alfred came with her, and had been with her, as parasite or satellite, ever since.

Hackdale was not very far from the gates of Ashenhurst House when a man suddenly came across the road and hailed him. In the light of a neighbouring lamp he recognised the man as one James Bartlett, a well-known figure in Southernstowe. Bartlett had been a man of substance in his time, but a fatal passion for betting on one hand, and for strong drink on the other, had reduced him to the position of a loafer who lived from hand to mouth. But loafer and ne'er-do-well though he was, he had a confident manner and a ready tongue, and he lost no time in saying his say, as he accosted John Hackdale under the lamp.

"Hullo, Mr. Hackdale," he said, familiarly. "Doing a bit more special constabling, eh?—Well, I daresay you'll do it as well as the regular police, what? But what's this I hear, Mr. Hackdale, about a gentleman being missing from the Chancellor? It is so, is it?—aye, well, maybe I could tell a bit about that."

Hackdale, who would not have wasted one minute of his time on Bartlett in broad daylight in a Southernstowe street, had no objection to talk to him in a lonely place under cover of partial darkness. He whistled his dog to him and halted.

"What could you tell?" he asked, half contemptuously.

"Well, I don't mind telling you," answered Bartlett, with a marked emphasis on the personal pronoun. "You're a cautious young fellow, and can keep your tongue still—if need be: I'm not a fool myself, Mr. Hackdale. But it's this—I was out, latish, Monday night, up this way—been to see somebody; never mind who. And just as I got within North Bar about midnight, I met a strange gentleman. Tallish, thinnish man, grey beard—very well dressed; I could see that. He stopped me—wanted to know something. Eh, Mr. Hackdale?"

"What did he want to know?" asked Hackdale, vaguely convinced that something important, something which would, somehow, affect himself, was coming out. "What?"

Bartlett tapped the special constable's arm, and lowered his voice to a whisper.

"He wanted to know where Ashenhurst House, Mrs. Champernowne's was!" he answered. "Just that!"

Hackdale remained silent. It was Deane, without doubt, that Bartlett was talking of. What did Deane—a stranger—want with Mrs. Champernowne, at midnight? However…

"Did you tell him?" he asked suddenly.

"I did! Why not?"

"Did he go that way?"

"Straight ahead!—after giving me five shillings."

There was another silence, during which Hackdale did some hard and quick thinking. Bartlett broke it.

"I reckon that would be the missing gentleman, Mr. Hackdale! Went up this way, seeking for Mrs. Champernowne—and has never been seen since! Queer!"

Hackdale looked round. There was nobody within sight or hearing on that quiet road. He touched Bartlett's shoulder.

"Have you mentioned this to anybody?" he asked. "You haven't?—to a soul? Look here!—don't! There's some mystery, and—well, it won't do to have Mrs. Champernowne's name mixed up with it. Keep it to yourself, Bartlett, until I see you again. And—here!"

He had loose money in his pocket—gold, silver—and, scarcely realising what he was doing, he pulled it out and dropped it into Bartlett's ready palm. Bartlett made haste to put it away with that hand, while he squeezed Hackdale's arm with the other.

"Mum is the word, Mr. Hackdale!" he whispered. "I'm your man, sir! Not a word… "

He shot off suddenly into the gloom, and Hackdale, after staring in that direction for a second or two, went slowly forward. He was dazed by what he had heard. What did it mean? He was near the grounds of Ashenhurst House by then, and he gazed at the lighted windows, wondering if anybody behind them knew… anything?

He went along, past the gates, past the grounds, and down a narrow side lane that bounded Mrs. Champernowne's tennis lawn and fruit orchard. And there, following his usual track, he turned into an old sand pit, long disused and now thickly grown over with shrubs and vegetation, across which there was a short cut to another part of his beat. But Hackdale never took the short cut that night. The Airedale terrier, plunging in amongst the undergrowth, began to growl and then to whine, and Hackdale, following him, suddenly stumbled upon a man's body… supine, motionless.

Chapter 4 THE SAFETY PIN

Hackdale was essentially cool and calculating in temperament and disposition, and when the first thrill of his discovery had spent itself, which it did very quickly, his natural calmness in dealing with a difficult situation came to the surface. He had no doubt whatever that the body lying at his feet was that of the man who had so mysteriously disappeared from his room at the Chancellor Hotel. He had no doubt, either, that the man was dead. So much, he knew, was certain. And what was another, and to him a much more pertinent certainty, was that the man was lying dead in an unfrequented waste which lay within a hundred yards of Ashenhurst House—the private residence of Mrs. Champernowne.

There was just sufficient light—twilight—left to see what Hackdale saw, but he had the means of more accurate vision in one of his pockets. Quietly and slowly, hushing the Airedale terrier with a gentle word or two, he produced an electric torch and, turning its light on, stooped closely to the still figure. Dead, of course!—dead as a door nail, he said to himself, using the hackneyed simile. And there, in a black and congealed pool in the sandy turf, was blood. One more look, a closer one, and he saw that the dead man had been shot through the head, from just behind the ear—there was a mark there. And not shot by himself, for neither of the outstretched hands grasped any weapon, nor did any weapon lie near. Murder!—sheer murder!

Hackdale stood up, wondering when the murder had occurred. He himself had been past that very spot, about the same time, only the previous evening, and had noticed nothing. But then, he reflected, he had not had his dog with him. He would have passed the place, unsuspecting, tonight, if it had not been for the dog. But—had the man been shot there, where he lay, or had his body been dragged or carried there from elsewhere? He held the electric torch to the ground, examining its surface. All around, save for small, insignificant patches, the flooring of the old sand pit was thickly grown over with short, wiry grass, on which any footmarks were necessarily difficult to trace—Hackdale saw none. Nor did he notice any disturbance of the bushes amongst which the body lay. But they were very low, stunted bushes, there; it was quite probable that two people, wandering and strolling aimlessly about in that sand pit in the darkness would never notice things that only grew knee-high, and would not realise that they were off his short cut. And, of course, there had been two people—one was the murdered man lying at his feet; the other was the murderer. And—who was he?

He turned back to the body, and without as much as laying a finger on it, held the electric torch still closer. This was the man, of course. A tallish, thinnish, grey-bearded man, in a suit of brown tweed, of smart cut—so he had been described to Hackdale, and there all the features of the description were. The face was pressed into the sandy turf; he saw little of that, and at the moment had no wish to see more: he wanted others, Mellapont, in particular, to see everything as he himself had first seen it. He had some vague idea that when a dead body is found, no one should touch or interfere with it until the police have been called, and he was temperamentally strict in adherence to usage and custom. But suddenly, as he moved the electric torch to and fro above the inanimate figure. Hackdale saw something which, in that same instant, he knew he would touch… and not only touch but make haste to secrete.

That something was a safety pin—a curiously shaped, unusually made safety pin of bronze wire. It was pinned in the dead mans' tweed jacket, a little over the flapped pocket on the right hand side, and Hackdale saw at once how it came to be there. Either in passing through a fence, or getting over a fence, the dead man had caught his smart new jacket against a nail or some equally sharp projection, and had got a long, irregular rent in it, extending for several inches through the outer cloth rid the inner lining. And the rent had been faistened together with the safety pin at which Hackdale was now staring as he had never to his knowledge stared at anything in his life: the stare was accompanied by a jerky, involuntary exclamation.

"Good God!—that?"

Within the instant, and with a furtive glance round him, as though, even in that solitude he feared observation, Hackdale had unfastened and withdrawn the safety pin from the dead man's jacket and hidden it away in his purse. And that done, he switched off his light, murmured a word to the Airedale terrier, and turned back to the path. Before he had gone six yards he realised that he was trembling all over—the coolness which he had felt at first had vanished at sight of the safety pin. But it had got to come back—he had got to be cooler than ever. Then he remembered the flask in his pocket; its contents were meant to last him for the whole of his night's vigil, but now he swallowed them at a draught. That revived him, and with something between a sigh and a sardonic laugh he left the sand pit and went off in the direction of Ashenhurst House.

Mrs. Champernowne's residence stood in the midst of ornamental grounds—a fine, commodious, red brick mansion, big enough for a large family; far too big, Hackdale had often thought, for a single woman, her brother, and half-a-dozen servants. But Mrs. Champernowne, as Hackdale knew well enough, was a very rich woman, and could afford to do what she pleased: afford to keep up these fine gardens, and a couple of motor cars, light the house with electricity, and surround herself, as she did, with every luxury. Yet, as he made his way up the asphalted drive to the front door, the contrast between the brilliantly lighted windows of the house and the darkness and solitude of the sand pit struck him forcibly—he could not tell why. Here was light, warmth, life—there, a hundred yards away, coldness, death. Was there any link between the house and the sand pit, and if so…

His reflections were cut short by the opening of the door. A smart young woman, spick and span in her black dress and coquettish cap and apron, glanced at him smilingly and demurely: Hackdale, who cultivated politeness as a business asset, touched his cap.

"Evening, Jennie," he said, marvelling at the steadiness of his own voice. "Mrs. Champernowne in?"

The parlourmaid came a step nearer, familiar and confidential.

"The mistress is out, Mr. Hackdale," she answered. "Gone to dine with Sir Reville Childerstone—there's a dinner party there. I don't expect her back before eleven. Mr. Alfred's in, though," she added.

"Oh, well!—I'll see him a minute, then," replied Hackdale. "I suppose he's not engaged."

The girl laughed, tossing her head as much as to imply that Mr. Alfred was never engaged, and, retreating into the hall, preceded Hackdale along its length to a door which she threw open without any preparatory knock.

"Mr. Hackdale, Mr. Alfred," she announced, with the same easy familiarity that she had shown to the caller. "Wants to see you a minute."

Hackdale walked into a small, cosily furnished room, in the open grate of which a bright fire of pine logs blazed and crackled. In front of it, in the depths of a roomy lounge chair, his slippered feet to the fire, sat Mr. Alfred, an elderly, spare-figured man, wrapped in a smart dressing gown, and wearing a tasselled velvet smoking cap. He had a mild and weak blue eye, a weaker mouth, scarcely hidden by a grizzled moustache, a retreating chin, and an amiable smile. He held a large cigar in one hand, the Times in the other, and on the table at his elbow stood a decanter of whisky, a syphon of mineral water, and a half-filled tumbler. His first action on seeing Hackdale was to wave him towards these comforts.

"Hullo, Hackdale!" he said. "Glad to see you! Sit down—have a drink—clean tumbler on the sideboard there—help yourself. Turning a bit coldish o' nights, what?"

"No thank you, Mr. Alfred," answered Hackdale. "I'm on special constable duty—mustn't stop. Mrs. Champernowne's not in?"

"Dining with Sir Reville," replied Mr. Alfred. "Party there! Anything up?"

"You haven't heard any news from the town tonight?" asked Hackdale. "No? Well, there's a queer sort of business occurred at the Chancellor Hotel. A gentleman who came there on Monday afternoon has disappeared—mysteriously."

"Pooh!—run away without paying his bill!" remarked Mr. Alfred. "Usual explanation of such mysteries."

"No," said Hackdale. "He's a known man—a man of wealth. Name of—" he paused, carefully watching the other's face—"name of Deane, James Deane."

"Never heard of him!—don't know him!" declared Mr. Alfred. "Quite unfamiliar to me. Anybody in the town know him?"

"I don't think so," replied Hackdale. "There's—no evidence that anybody does. A tallish, spare-figured, grey-bearded man. I know you stroll round about a good deal, Mr. Alfred—you haven't seen such a man during this last day or two?"

"No, not to my knowledge—lots of men like that about, though," replied Mr. Alfred. "Not an uncommon type, from your description. Looking for him?"

"Everybody's looking for him," said Hackdale. "The whole town, by this time!"

"Then they can very well spare you for half-an-hour," observed Mr. Alfred, with a knowing grin. "Sit down and have a drink and a cigar."

But Hackdale said no once again, and, letting himself out of the house, went swiftly away in the direction of City Hall. He met a fellow special constable in North Bar, and, without telling him of his discovery, took him back to the police station. And there Hackdale, alone, marched into the superintendent's office, where Mellapont sat at his desk, examining a pile of documents. He shut the door, turned, and spoke two words.

"Found him!"

Mellapont leapt to his feet.

"What!—Deane?" he answered.

"Of course—who else?" retorted Hackdale. "Yes!"

"Where, then?"

"In that old sand pit behind Ashenhurst House."

Mellapont came a step nearer, staring. For a moment he remained silent.

"You—you don't mean—dead?" he asked, tensely.

"He's dead enough," answered Hackdale. "Shot through the head. And—it's not suicide, either. There's no revolver lying about."

Mellapont stared at him during another moment's silence. Then he pointed to a chair. "Sit down, Hackdale, and tell me all about it," he said. "Stop!—have you told anybody?"

"No one, so far," replied Hackdale. "It was this way… "

Mellapont listened attentively and in silence while Hackdale told of his evening's doings. At the end he put one direct question.

"You didn't examine the clothing?"

"No!" said Hackdale. "No!"

"Then you don't know whether he's been robbed or not," said Mellapont. "Probably he has! Now the thing is to get him down here."

"There's a thing should be done," remarked Hackdale suddenly, as the superintendent began bustling about. "Footmarks, you know! I couldn't trace any—close by, that is. But then I'd only an electric torch. Still, there must be some about, somewhere. Because, whoever shot him must have gone with him into that sand pit. You see?"

"Unless he was shot elsewhere, or carried there," said Mellapont. "That's to be thought of, you know."

"I thought of it—and I looked carefully at the bushes, where he's lying," replied Hackdale. "I saw no signs of his having been carried or dragged."

"No clue to anything, in fact?" suggested Mellapont.

"I got no clue to anything," said Hackdale deliberately. Nothing, he said to himself, should induce him to tell about the safety pin which lay in his purse. That was his own secret, for the time being, at any rate. "To anything." he repeated. "I don't know, of course, because he's lying face downwards, and I didn't touch him—didn't want to, until you'd seen him yourself—but I should say that most likely he's been robbed, as you suggested at first."

"Probable!" assented Mellapont. "Well—we'll get off."

Hackdale stood by while the superintendent got his available forces together, and then prepared to lead him and them back to the sand pit. Outside, Mellapont touched him on the arm.

"Chilham, the police surgeon," he whispered. "You know where he lives?—top of North Bar. Go on ahead and tell him, and ask him to come with us. May as well have him there at once."

Hackdale found Chilham in his surgery and got him out in time to join the superintendent and his men. In silence he led them out of the town, past the grounds of Ashenhurst House, and into the sand pit. Presently the glare of half-a-dozen bulls'eye lanterns was concentrated on the dead man. Chilham got down on his knees. But he only said what Hackdale already knew.

"Shot through the head from behind!" muttered Chilham. "Close quarters, too. Turn him over. Look there—front of his head shot away. The murderer must have been close behind him, and held the revolver within an inch or two of his ear."

But Mellapont, bearing in mind what he had learnt at the Chancellor, was looking at something else. It was obvious enough that Deane had been shot, murdered—now he wanted to know why. He pointed to the dead man's neckwear, a smart four-in-hand cravat.

"Diamond pin gone!" he said. Then he pointed lower. "Gold chain gone! Feel in his pockets, Watson."

The man addressed, a plain clothes policeman, dipped his fingers into one pocket after another, and suddenly looked up.

"There isn't a thing on him, superintendent! Clear sweep—not even a pocket handkerchief left!" he exclaimed. "Empty—the whole lot!"

"Just what I expected," muttered Mellapont. "Not going to be much mystery about this case, I reckon! Robbery as well as murder!—murder for robbery. Hackdale," he went on, turning away from the main group, "there's nothing more you can do here. Run down to Shelmore's private house, and tell him all about it, and ask him to get his aunt to go with him to the Chancellor to break the news to the young lady. And look here—ask Shelmore to wait at the Chancellor until I come there. We must have a look at the poor fellow's effects."

Hackdale went away, found Shelmore, gave his message, and, purposely keeping aloof from the police station, finished his duties for the night—by going carefully round his beat. At midnight he went home. Ebbitt had just come in, and was standing outside the door of his own sitting room, divesting himself of his cloak and muffler. He beckoned Hackdale to enter and pointed to the whisky decanter.

"Have a spot after your labour?" he suggested. "Just going to have one myself. Well, heard anything of that missing man?"

"Yes," said Hackdale. "He's been found. Murdered—shot. And robbed."

"Robbed, eh!" exclaimed Ebbitt. "Ah!"

"Wasn't so much as a pocket handkerchief on him," continued Hackdale. "And, according to our information, he'd a lot on him when he went out. Money—valuables."

"I told you I noticed a fine diamond pin on him," remarked Ebbitt. "That is, if that was the man."

"That would be the man," said Hackdale.

He drank off his whisky, said good-night, and went upstairs to his own room. He had a small safe there, set on a stand in a recess, and his first action after entering the room was to unlock it. His next was to take from his purse the curiously shaped safety pin, and to put it away in the safe's furthest corner.

Chapter 5 THE PICTURE POSTCARD

Mellapont strode up to the front entrance to the Chancellor, just as the night porter was closing the doors, and slipped inside with a sharp question.

"Mr. Shelmore here, Kight?"

"With the guv'nor in the private parlour, sir," answered the night porter, pointing down the courtyard. "Said he was expecting you, sir."

"That's it," said Mellapont. He moved in the direction indicated; then suddenly paused and turned back. "Look here, Kight," he continued, confidentially, "there's a question I wanted to put to you. You aren't the boots as well as the night porter here, are you?"

"No, sir—there's a regular boots, Marsh."

"I suppose he's not about here? He is?—in the kitchen? Fetch him here a minute, Kight, I want to see him."

The night porter went along the courtyard, turned in at a door, came back with a man who, judging from his hands and his apron, was already engaged at his job of boot cleaning. Mellapont went up to him.

"Look here!" he said. "When do you collect the boots and shoes from the bedroom doors—night or morning?"

"Both times, sir," answered the man. "Depends a good deal on how many people there are in the hotel. If it's pretty full, I go round late at night, and get a start on what there is put outside the doors. If there aren't many people here, I don't go round till say five o'clock in the morning."

"Monday night, now?—night before last?" suggested Mellapont. "How were things then?"

"House was full, sir—there wasn't a room empty. I went round, first, at half-past eleven and gathered up what there was—a good lot. Went round again for another lot when I took back the first."

"Can you remember anything about what was outside number seven?" asked Mellapont. "Think now '"

"Yes, well enough!" answered the man. "There were two pairs of walking shoes there, when I went round the first time—a black pair and a brown pair. I cleaned them, with others, and took them back about—well, it would be about one o'clock in the morning. They were still there, outside the door, when I passed it again at five o'clock."

Mellapont nodded, reflected a moment, said a word of thanks to the man, and then, turning away, walked quickly forward to the private parlour. There he found Shelmore and Belling, evidently discussing the situation. Without preface he broke in upon their talk with a reference to what he had just heard.

"You may think there's nothing in that," he said, when he had told them about the two pairs of shoes, "but I see a good deal in it. When we examined Deane's body and clothing tonight, I noticed something at once which to me seemed very significant. He'd gone out in a pair of dress shoes—thin-soled, patent leather things! What do you make of that, Mr. Shelmore?—as a lawyer?"

"I'm not versed in this sort of thing," replied Shelmore. "What do you make of it?"

"Why, that he'd no intention of going far; that he knew he wasn't going off the pavement; that he knew where he was going—to some private house, close by!" replied Mellapont, triumphantly. "Let the young lady upstairs say what she likes, Deane knew this town, and somebody in it! Who? That's to be found out. The young lady may think her guardian had never been here before, and had no acquaintance here, but… we shall see! By-the-by, how is this young lady? Much shocked?"

"She was very much shocked, but she took it very well," replied Shelmore. "My aunt is with her—she'll stay the night with her."

"Your aunt is a good sort, sir," said Mellapont. "Well, we shall have to ask the young lady a lot of questions in the morning. But now," he went on, turning to the landlord, "I want to have a quiet look at whatever this poor gentleman left in number seven. You never know what you may find, and there's no time like the present. I suppose all's quiet upstairs, Mr. Belling? Then take Mr. Shelmore and me up."

Belling led the way across the courtyard to an inner hall on the opposite side, and then up a flight of oak-balustered stairs to the first floor. Opening the door of the room number seven, he switched on the electric light, whispered to Mellapont that he and Shelmore could count on not being disturbed and could lock up his room and bring away the key when their investigations were finished, and left them. Mellapont, turning the key in the lock when the landlord had gone, looked round.

"A very precise and orderly gentleman, the dead man, Mr. Shelmore," he murmured. "I can see that at once!"

Shelmore saw what he meant. Whether it had been so left by its unfortunate late occupant, or had since been tidied up by the chambermaid, the room was spick and span in its neatness. Various toilet articles lay disposed in symmetrical fashion on the dressing table: magazines and newspapers were laid out in order on a side table; the half open doors of a tall wardrobe showed garments hung on stretchers; every object in the room seemed to be in its proper place.

"What do you expect to find here?" asked Shelmore, who was feeling vague as to the reason for Mellapont's visit to this room. "Some clue?"

"You never know what you may find, Mr. Shelmore," replied Mellapont, still looking about him. "There's more to be found and seen here than we found on the man's clothing, anyway! I suppose Hackdale told you?—there wasn't a thing on him! Every pocket had been emptied—even to his pocket handkerchief. Now that last matter seems to me very odd and perhaps significant. Why rob a dead man of a thing like that!—a handkerchief! But there it is—there was nothing. Money, valuables, papers—if he had any—all gone. That reminds me—when we go down again, I want to ask Belling a question or two. But now, let's look round. These suitcases first—when you're at this game, Mr. Shelmore, always begin at the beginning. Good solid leather stuff, these suitcases—don't make as good as that nowadays."

One after the other he lifted the lids of two suitcases, which lay on a stand at the foot of the bed: each was empty.

"Methodical and orderly man," muttered Mellapont. "Put all his things away in a wardrobe and chest of drawers. Well—clothes first. Might be some letters or papers in pockets."

There were two suits of clothes and one overcoat in the wardrobe, but a search of the pockets revealed nothing. Nor was there anything in the chest of drawers but a plentiful supply of linen, hosiery and the like, all neatly folded and laid away. Mellapont turned to a leather attache case which lay on a chair close by.

"This'll be the likeliest thing in which to find papers," he said. "And luckily, it's not locked. Now, then, what have we here?"

He lifted the attache case on to a table immediately beneath the electric light, and threw back the lid; Shelmore stood at his elbow while he examined the contents.

"Papers and books mostly," muttered Mellapont. "Guide books, by the look of 'em."

He took out, one after another, several paper-bound books of the sort he had mentioned—guide books to towns, cathedrals, famous ruins, and the like. Beneath these lay a writing case, furnished with its owner's own stationery: Shelmore noticed that the address engraved on the notepaper was the same that he had seen on Miss Pretty's visiting card. In one pocket of the case were several letters, addressed to James Deane, Esquire, at various places, and all signed "Your affectionate Cynthia"—in another was a collection of hotel bills, neatly folded and docketed.

"Trace his recent movements from there, anyway," remarked Mellapont, after a glance at the dates. "Seems to have been knocking around a good deal, lately. And here, evidently, are pictures that he's collected on his travels—must have had a mania for that sort of thing, I think, Mr. Shelmore—unless he intended them as a present for the young lady—perhaps she collects them."

He pointed to the left hand half of the attache case, which was filled with packet upon packet of picture postcards, all neatly secured with indiarubber bands and ranged in order. Mellapont began to take these packets out, pointing to the fact that they were all methodically labelled. He began, too, to recite the names of the places which they pictured.

"Evidently collected these as he went along," he remarked. "Didn't the young lady say he'd gone North while she was slaying at Bath? Just so—well, here we can follow his route. Exeter. Bristol, Gloucester, Worcester, Birmingham, Sheffield, Normansholt—where's Normansholt, Mr. Shelmore?"

Shelmore, unobserved by Mellapont, had started a little at the mention of Normansholt. One of his twelve clients, Sir Reville Childerstone, of Childerstone Park, just outside the city, had some property at Normansholt, and had lately been much concerned about his conduct of one of his tenants there: he had been obliged to employ Shelmore's professional services in the matter: the name, therefore, was quite familiar to Shelmore. He glanced inquisitively at the packet of cards which Mellapont was handling.

"Normansholt?" he repeated. "Oh, that's in Yorkshire. Historical old town—famous castle and that sort of thing."

"Um!—that seems to have been his top mark," said Mellapont, continuing to turn over the carefully arranged packets. "Seems to have turned southward then. Doncaster, Newark, Peterborough, Stamford, Ely, Cambridge, London, Dorking, and so here. Good round, Mr. Shelmore!—mostly old places, I reckon—probably had a taste for antiquities. Well, I'll just glance through these letters, to see if there's anything—"

He picked up the letters which he had taken out of the visiting case, and, sitting down on the nearest chair began to skim them over. Shelmore, out of idle curiosity about a place of which he had heard in the course of professional business but had never seen, took up the packet of cards labelled Normansholt, and, releasing them from the rubber band, turned them over one by one. Normansholt, he thought, must certainly be an interesting and picturesque place. Deane had collected some twenty or thirty cards of it—views of the great Norman castle, the old churches, the various remains of antiquity. Each made a picture… but Shelmore suddenly found himself looking at a particular one with a sharply aroused sense of wonder and speculation.

This was a coloured photograph of what seemed to be an old-world nook and corner in a peculiarly old town. It depicted a sort of square, with a patch of green in the centre; out of this green rose a tall mast. All around were quaint, half-timbered houses of early Jacobean architecture. In the left hand corner of the card were the words May Day Green, Normansholt. And Shelmore knew sufficient of old English customs to know that this was a picture of a place where the old May Day revel had been celebrated aforetime, and that the tall mast was one of the last of the ancient Maypoles.

But this was not the thing that aroused his wonder and speculative faculties. In the corner of the square of houses stood one which was larger, more important looking, more picturesque than the others. From its roof and clustered chimneys, some hand, Deane's presumably, had drawn a thick pencil line to the top edge of the card—a line that terminated in an equally thickly-marked asterisk. And seeing this Shelmore felt a question spring up, uncontrollably, in his mind.

"Why?"

"Why?—yes, that was it," he repeated to himself—"why? Why out of the twenty, twenty-five or thirty picture postcards of Normansholt had Deane selected that particular one and that particular house for marking in an unmistakably distinct fashion? What was his reason? Why had he done it. Again—why?"

He glanced round at Mellapont. Mellapont was deep in the letters and the hotel bills. And, seeing that, Shelmore hastily but carefully went through his collection of cards, from start to finish, beginning with those of Exeter and ending with those of Dorking, which was evidently the last place visited by Deane before coming on to Southernstowe. Out of the entire collection not one single card was marked, with the exception of that which had aroused his wonder. And, as he put the cards back in the attache case a definite question shaped itself before him—what particular interest had James Deane in the corner house in May Day Green in the old far away northern town of Normansholt?

Mellapont suddenly rose from his chair, bringing back the letters and hotel bills to the writing case.

"Nothing there that throws any light, Mr. Shelmore," he said. "Hotel bills—nothing! And the letters—just chatty gossipy letters from the young lady to her guardian—nothing in them, except to confirm his statement that they were to meet here, spend a day or two looking around, and go on to the continent. Well, let's put all back, lock up the room, and go downstairs: I want to see Belling again."

Belling was in his parlour with the door open, evidently waiting. Mellapont motioned Shelmore inside, closed the door and sat down.

"Nothing that gives any clue up there," he said. "But look here, Mr. Belling, I want to get a bit more information from you. You're aware already that this gentleman, when found, hadn't a thing on him in the way of money, valuables or personal property. Now you had opportunities of seeing him on Monday night, and you saw that he'd both money and valuables. But—did other people?"

"Anybody could see that he'd a fine diamond pin, an expensive gold watch chain, and a couple of diamond rings on his fingers!" replied Belling. "That is, if they'd got any eyes at all, and turned them on him!"

"Aye, just so!" agreed Mellapont. "But—money? Did he make any show of money? I don't mean boastingly, swaggeringly, but—just naturally, as some men do. You know—some men pull their money out without thinking—some—"

"I know what you mean," interrupted Belling. "Well, yes, he was certainly one of the sort that are a bit what I should call careless in that way. He came into the bar a little before dinner, and asked the barmaid for a sherry and bitters—I was in there, and I noticed that he pulled out a handful of notes—fivers—openly, and picked some silver from amongst them—seemed to have a lot of money, notes and coins all mixed up in his pocket. He did the same thing after dinner, when he came to me in the bar and asked me about whatever amusements were going on. He pulled out a fistful of money, then, to pay for two cigars."

"Were there people about?" asked Mellapont.

"Several! The bar was full, both times."

"Townsfolk, or strangers?"

"Both. There were several strangers there. Men I didn't know anyway—and I think I know everybody in Southernstowe. Motorists, some of them. Others I took to be men who'd been to the fair."

"And they could see his money?"

"If they were looking at him, just as easily as they could see his diamond pin! Nothing to prevent them!"

Mellapont suddenly rose and bidding good-night to the landlord, went away with Shelmore into the deserted High Street.

"What do you think, superintendent?" asked Shelmore precisely.

Mellapont coughed discreetly, and, alone though they were, lowered his voice.

"I'll tell you what I think, Mr. Shelmore," he answered. "And I don't suppose I shall ever think anything else I think that Mr. Deane was watched, followed, murdered, and robbed by some person at present unknown, who knew that he'd money and valuables on him. That's what I think! But—I also think something else. I think that Mr. Deane, whatever he may have said to his ward, knew somebody in Southernstowe, and had some extraordinary reason for seeing that somebody on Monday night! And I'm going to move heaven and earth to find out who that somebody is!"

Chapter 6 THE OPPORTUNE MOMENT

Shelmore was not the first man to whom Mellapont had made this declaration of future policy. Mellapont had already made it, even more emphatically, to John Hackdale, and Hackdale had thought about it a good deal before he went to sleep and again as soon as he awoke. All the same, Hackdale went to his work at Champernowne's next morning as if nothing unusual had occurred since his leaving it at five o'clock the previous afternoon. Nominally under-manager, with an under-manager's salary, he was in reality the mainspring of a big industrial machine.

For so small a town, Champernowne's was a big store, doing a big business. That business had all developed to its present state of commercial prosperity through the energy of Mrs. Champernowne, whom everybody knew to be a very remarkable woman. Nobody in Southernstowe, however, knew who Mrs. Champernowne really was. Twenty years before, she had suddenly appeared in the city, and before anybody knew what she was doing, had bought up a decaying, though old-fashioned draper's business, pulled the out-of-date premises to pieces, built a first class modern store, and surrounded herself with a small army of capable assistants. There were those in Southernstowe who prophesied the loss of Mrs. Champernowne's money, but Mrs. Champernowne knew what she was doing. Southernstowe though a small city was an unusually wealthy one; the people of the immediate neighbourhood were wealthy, too; aristocrats and gentlefolk, but thick as blackberries: Mrs. Champernowne proposed to bring the modes and goods of London and Paris to their very doorsteps. And, ere long, visitors to Southernstowe found themselves staring in amazement at a shop which would have done credit to either Oxford Street or the Rue de la Paix; Mrs. Champernowne and her establishment represented the last thing in contemporary fashion. And Mrs. Champernowne made money, and within ten years was reputed to be the richest woman in the neighbourhood, and possibly the wealthiest citizen of her adopted dwelling place. But she had other interests than her store. She played a considerable part in the affairs of her adopted city, gave large sums to its charities, and furthered all schemes of civic improvement, and in the end a grateful and admiring Corporation unanimously elected her Mayor. Her election and the duties consequent upon it took her away a great deal from her business, but everybody in her employ knew that whatever other engagement she had on hand, Mrs. Champernowne was always in her private office at the store every morning at nine-thirty sharp, and that during the next hour and a half she took good care to assure herself that the well-oiled wheels of her machinery were running with their usual smoothness.

At half-past ten on the morning following his discovery of Deane's dead body, John Hackdale knocked at the door of that private office and was bidden by his employer to enter. He went in to find Mrs. Champernowne seated at her desk and alone. She was writing a letter, and, as she looked up, Hackdale gave her a keen, searching inspection. A tall, plump, handsome, well-preserved woman, still on the right side of fifty, Mrs. Champernowne usually showed signs of great good temper, good humour, and general contentment with life in general. But it seemed to the under-manager that on this particular morning she looked harassed and worried, and that her usual fresh colour had somewhat faded; there were signs of anxiety about her, and when she spoke her voice was slightly irritable in tone.

"What is it, Hackdale?" she asked. "Anything important?"

"I want a few minutes' conversation with you, Mrs. Champernowne," replied Hackdale, ostentatiously closing the door behind him. "Private conversation—if you please."

Mrs. Champernowne's pen stopped dead in the middle of a line, and she looked more closely at her visitor. Hackdale gave her look for look.

"Strictly private," he added, "strictly!" Mrs. Champernowne pointed to a chair at the side of her desk.

"Well—what is it, then?" she demanded, with some asperity. "You'll have to be brief, for I've a Council meeting at eleven o'clock—an important one."

"This is more important, much more, than any council meeting, Mrs. Champernowne," said Hackdale. He seated himself by the desk and leaned forward. "Mrs. Champernowne," he went on. "You've heard, of course, of what happened last night—that a man was found, murdered, in the old sand pit behind your house?"

"I've heard that a man was found there who'd been shot dead," replied Mrs. Champernowne, with an affectation of carelessness which Hackdale was quick to see through. "Whether it was murder or suicide, I don't know."

"Murder!" said Hackdale. "No question of suicide. The man was deliberately murdered, Mrs. Champernowne!—it was I who found him! And it was very fortunate—very fortunate indeed—that I was quite alone when I found him. Very fortunate, Mrs. Champernowne, for—you!"

The colour suddenly rose to Mrs. Champernowne's face in an angry flush. She made as if she would rise from her chair. But Hackdale went on, with a shake of the head.

"Fortunate, I say, for you, Mrs. Champernowne! For—I found something on him! Can you guess what it was? Well, then—this!"

With the last word he suddenly produced from his pocket and held towards his employer, laid on the open palm of his left hand, the curiously-shaped safety pin which he had taken from the tear in the dead man's coat. He glanced from it to the woman; it needed but the merest look to see that Mrs. Champernowne's cheeks had turned deadly pale.

"You recognise that, Mrs. Champernowne?" Hackdale continued, in a low, smooth voice. "Of course you do! Do you remember that on Monday afternoon you came to me in the drapery department and showed me a small specimen box of these pins which you said had just come in for your approval, from a man who had taken out provisional protection for their patenting, and who wanted to know your opinion of them as a business proposition? You said to me that the idea was a remarkably good one—and then you put the box in your pocket, and went home with it. How came it that I found one of these pins in that dead man's coat? Obvious! Mrs. Champernowne, all that's known about the dead man is that his name is Deane, that he came to the Chancellor Hotel on Monday, and that on Monday night late he slipped out of the hotel—without doubt to visit somebody: Mrs. Champernowne, that somebody was you!

"He was with you that night—sometime. There's a certain man here in Southernstowe, on whom I could put my finger in ten minutes, of whom Deane asked the way to your house, near midnight, on Monday. Deane found his way to your house, Mrs. Champernowne! He was with you—some time. Probably he tore his coat in your grounds, or in getting into your grounds—and you gave him this peculiarly made safety pin to fasten the torn pieces together till he could get them mended. Mrs. Champernowne, you know as well as I do that that's all—fact! Fact!"

Mrs. Champernowne, big, strong woman though she was, sat silent under all this, nervously knitting her fingers together. It was some time before she spoke, and when words came they were faltering.

"Who—who knows of—of all you've said?"

"Nobody! Not a soul, Mrs. Champernowne! Do you think I'm a fool? Nobody knows—nobody can know—unless I speak."

"Who—who is the other man you referred to?"

"That's my business, Mrs. Champernowne. Best not ask—leave him to me. I can silence him—if you make it worth while to be silent. Look here, Mrs. Champernowne, let's be practical. Nobody knows anything of what I've told you. Mellapont is firmly of the opinion that Deane was followed, murdered, and robbed—that he was murdered for the money and valuables which, undoubtedly, he had on him. So far, so good =-the police'll stick to that. But Mellapont has another theory—that Deane went out to call on somebody in the city whom he knew, and Mellapont swears he'll find out who that somebody is! Mellapont can't!—he hasn't a clue—not a single clue. I'm the only soul living that has the clue—that safety pin is the clue, Mrs. Champernowne! Make it worth my while to hold my tongue for ever, and you can rest assured that you're as safe—as if all this had never happened. I don't know what took place between you and the dead man—and I don't want to know. It's nothing to do with me. But—I can save you from an unpleasant situation. Give me what I want, and nobody will ever know that Deane went out to see you—and did see you! The episode will be—closed!"

Mrs. Champernowne was watching him as intently as she was listening.

"But—the other man?" she asked suddenly.

"I tell you I can silence him," replied Hackdale. "Easily! With money—your money, of course."

"And—yourself?" she said. "Yourself?" Hackdale drew a long breath, and, folding his arms, looked round the room. When he turned again to his employer, it was with a smile—the smile of a man who finds it vastly agreeable to be in a position to dictate terms.

"Well, Mrs. Champernowne," he answered. "I've been a very good, trustworthy, dependable servant to you—you've never once had to find fault with me that I remember. It will be in your interest to give me what I want. And that's this—your present manager, Mr. Bywater, is out-of-date and useless—he's worse than useless; he's a nuisance! Pension him off, at once, and give me the managership. Date my appointment from last January the first, and give me a thousand a year—salary to be further considered at the end of two years. Reasonable, Mrs. Champernowne!—very reasonable."

Mrs. Champernowne's cheeks were assuming their usual colour. She remained silent for a moment or two, watching Hackdale, and turning her rings round and round on her plump fingers.

"How much money will satisfy that other man?" she asked abruptly.

"A couple of hundred pounds, put in my hands, and judiciously used," answered Hackdale, with promptitude. "Ample!"

Mrs. Champernowne rose from her desk, and going over to a small safe in a corner of the room, took from it a bundle of notes and without counting handed them to Hackdale. Then she picked up a handful of papers.

"Come in and see me about the other matter at twelve-thirty,"' she said. "I must go to the Council meeting."

Without another word she left the room, and Hackdale, having put the safety pin in one pocket and the notes in another, went back to his duties. But at half-past twelve he was back. Mrs. Champernowne had just come in—and as he closed the door, she turned on him and to their business without waste of words.

"Hackdale!—you're going to play straight about this?"

"My interest is to do that, Mrs. Champernowne!"

"I know nothing—nothing—as to how or why that man was murdered," she went on. "Nothing—absolutely nothing! Still, I won't deny—to you—that I saw him that night. Why—is my business. Still—I don't want that to get out. You're sure that it can't get out through you or that other man?"

"Make yourself easy, Mrs. Champernowne! It'll not get out from either. Are you certain that nobody at your house knows?"

"Certain of that—yes! He caught me at the entrance gate—I talked with him there—a little. Never mind why. Well, this managership. I can do better than that, Hackdale. Sit down—listen. I'm going to be married—to Sir Reville Childer—stone. You expected it?—very well. This business will be converted into a limited liability concern. I can make you secretary and manager. Now for details… "

Hackdale went away from Champernownes to his dinner feeling as if a couple of inches had been added to his stature. Simmons, awaiting him in their sitting room, was quick to observe his good spirits. He looked his wonder when Hackdale, suddenly rising from the table, went over to a cupboard and produced a bottle of champagne.

"It's neither my birthday nor yours," observed Simmons.

"Never mind, my boy!" exclaimed John. "I've had a stroke of big luck this morning. Bit of a secret at present, Sim, but you'll hear all about it before long. Going to be great developments at our place, and I shall be biggest man there, Sim!"

"What'll it run to—then?" enquired Sim.

Hackdale laughed. The prospect which Mrs. Champernowne had opened out before him was infinitely better than that he had sketched for himself.

"Can't say as to that yet, my boy!" he answered. "But—big—big, Sim! Didn't I always tell you I should be top dog at Champernowne's some day. Nothing like my motto, Sim—always look after your own interest! Self first!—never mind where the other fellow gets to. You don't look round in running races—at least, if you do, some other chap'll be past you in a flash. You look after yourself at Shelmore's as well as I've looked after myself at Champernowne's, and you'll do. I'll tell you what, Sim!—now that this is coming off. I'll pay for your being articled to Shelmore, and then, if you work hard, you'll be a fully qualified solicitor in a few years. What do you say to that, Sim?"

Sim cocked his ears. His sharp eyes went to the champagne in his brother's glass. But it was still as untouched as his own; clearly John made this offer in soberness.

"I'll drink to that, John!" he said, suddenly. "Cost you a bit, you know."

"Don't mind that, my boy, as long as you do well, and it pays," declared Hackdale. "Well, here's luck to it and the Hackdale motto—'Look after Number One!' Sim, if ever I—start a crest or that sort of thing, I'll have that underneath! Never mind anybody else—self first, and hang the second fellow."

"Good!" assented Simmons, and went steadily on with his dinner. "I'll speak to Shelmore about the articling when I go back. But—I shall try to bargain with him."

"Bargain? How?" asked Hackdale.

"Try to get something out of him," answered Simmons, with a crafty look. "Suggest that he should do a bit towards it. I've been jolly useful to Shelmore! If I can screw something out of him, why not? Save your pocket."

Hackdale nodded, sipped his wine, and smiled.

"I don't think you'll let the flies settle on you, Sim!" he said, with evident satisfaction. "You know pretty well how to take care of yourself! Bargain all you like with Shelmore. You know your own interests."

"Trust me!" muttered Simmons. "Been studying 'em long enough!"

He went back to Shelmore's office at half—past two, intending to broach the subject there and then. But just as he was about to knock at Shelmore's door, Shelmore's bell rang, and Simmons responded to find his principal standing near his desk, reading a written document with an air of something very like doubt or disfavour.

"Hackdale," he said. "Miss Pretty has been here. She's a very determined young lady, Hackdale!—the sort that insists on having her own way; also, it seems that though she's not of age, she's a very large sum of money in her bank which she can spend as she likes; and though she's been in consultation with Superintendent Mellapont all the morning, and Mellapont has practically proved to her that her guardian was murdered by strangers for the sake of what he'd got on him, she won't believe it—she's got it firmly fixed in her head that Deane was followed here and murdered by some enemy. And she insists on offering a reward, and has asked me to get a bill printed and posted for her. I don't see much good in it—I firmly believe Mellapont to be right. What do you think, Hackdale?"

"What's the amount?" asked Simmons.

"She fixed it herself!" replied Shelmore. "A thousand pounds! A very wilful young lady!—she declared that if that didn't bring any result, she'd double it. I suppose we'll have to get it printed and distributed for her?"

"If she likes to do it, why not?" said Simmons.

"Seems to me waste of time and money," answered Shelmore. "However—take it over to Pemberton's, and give them instructions for printing and posting it. Something may come of it—but I'm doubtful. Still—somebody's guilty, and that somebody's somewhere."

He handed over the copy to Simmons, and the clerk, without further comment, turned away. As he went down the stairs to the street, he met an elderly gentleman coming up, and recognising Sir Reville Childerstone, told him that Mr. Shelmore was in his office, and then, for particular reasons of his own, made more haste than ever to discharge his errand.

Chapter 7 THE CREVICED WALL

Pemberton's printing office lay in a narrow alley at the back of the Chancellor Hotel, and when Simmons Hackdale hurried in at its door, Pemberton himself, one of those men who wear a perpetually worried look, stood behind the counter, sorting paper. He listened with something of an aggrieved air while Simmons explained what he wanted, and then shook his head.

"Can't get it out by tonight, nohow!" he declared. "Don't care how insistent the young lady is. Get it done and distributed and posted, too, for you by noon tomorrow, Mr. Simmons—that's the quickest I can do."

"All right," said Simmons. "No such hurry as all that, when it comes to it. What about a proof?"

"Look in when you go home this evening," answered Pemberton. "I'll have one ready for you."

Simmons hurried back to Shelmore's. He had his own reasons for hurrying. He knew that Sir Reville Childerstone was now closeted with Shelmore in his private room, and he wanted to hear what they were talking about. Also he knew how he would easily satisfy that desire. Simmons had a natural propensity for finding out every thing possible about anything or anybody, and he was not beyond eavesdropping or listening at keyholes. But there was no need to listen at the keyhole of Shelmore's room. Before Simmons had been a week in Shelmore's employ, he had discovered that the wall which separated the clerk's room from the private office was by no means sound proof. It had crevices in it—and, being merely a lath-and-plaster erection at best, the crevices in course of time had opened, and were not at all obscured by flimsy wallpaper. Indeed, there was one in particular, through which Simmons had poked his finger, so wide that you could see through it into Shelmore's room: over that crevice Simmons always kept an old overcoat hanging on his side, while, on Shelmore's, he had hung a local calendar. And now, going quietly up the stair and entering his own room with the tread of a cat: he went over to this convenient crack, held the overcoat aside, and put his ear to the wall. He had not been listening many minutes when he knew that he was getting first hand confirmation of the truth of a rumour which had been gradually spreading through Southernstowe, for some time—Sir Reville Childerstone was going to marry Mrs. Champernowne. Sir Reville was discussing marriage settlements with Shelmore, who was evidently making elaborate notes of his wishes; Simmons gathered from the conversation that the marriage was to be solemnized before long—probably before Christmas. He learnt that Mrs. Champernowne, on becoming Lady Childerstone, would give up Ashenhurst House and go to Childerstone Park, four miles outside the city. And then came personal details which, for family reasons, interested the listener much more.

"I gather that Mrs. Champernowne won't take on the mayoralty again?" said Shelmore, after a slight pause in the conversation, during which Simmons had heard the steady scratching of his employer's pen. "Or will she?"

"She won't," replied Sir Reville. "As Lady Childerstone she'll retire into private life. Done her duty, I think, Shelmore—indefatigable in her discharge of it, what?"

"An admirable mayor!" assented Shelmore. "I question if they'll find any man in the city who'll do as well as she's done. But the business? What's she going to do about that?"

"She's just come to a decision—this very morning," said Sir Reville. "She and I have just been lunching at the Chancellor, and she informed me of her settled intentions. The thing's private at present, but, of course, I don't mind telling you, as between solicitor and client, knowing that the news won't go any further. Champernowne's, Shelmore, is to be turned into a limited liability company."

"Ah!" said Shelmore. "Good idea, Sir Reville! Of course, Lady Childerstone will keep a controlling interest in it?"

"To be sure—she'll hold a majority of the shares, and, for a time at any rate, she'll act as chairman of the directorate," assented Sir Reville. "I propose to take up a considerable number of shares myself and to become a director—the business is too valuable a property to neglect, though, of course, after its conversion into a company it won't need the daily supervision which Mrs. Champernowne now gives it."

"It'll need a first rate manager," remarked Shelmore.

"He's there to hand!" said Sir Reville, with a satisfied chuckle. "Made and trained and taught all the tricks of the trade by Mrs. Champernowne herself! Young Hackdale!—smart fellow! He's to act as secretary and manager—Mrs. Champernowne proposes to give him a couple of thousand a year."

"Well, I daresay he's worth it in a big business like that," said Shelmore. "Yes, Hackdale's all right—clever man, and a pushing, hard working man. I suppose all this is to be carried out shortly?"

"At once," replied Sir Reville. "Before the marriage. So you can get on with those settlements—always well to be in time, Shelmore. Um!—well, I think that's all just now, and I'll be off. By-the-by, heard any more about this murder affair?—any fresh news?"

"Nothing," answers Shelmore. "The police—such of them as are left in the city, for, as you know, nearly the whole lot are away on this coal strike business—are making enquiries all round, but they've not resulted in anything yet. No doubt the man was murdered for what he'd got on him. But there's a curious thing about that matter which I was going to speak to you about. Sir Reville, next time we met. This man, Deane, had been travelling about in the North of England for three or four weeks before he came down here, and when Mellapont and I examined his belongings at the Chancellor we found a considerable collection of picture postcards of places he'd visited. I was much interested in seeing that one of these places was the old town where that bit of property of yours is, about which we've had so much bother—Normansholt."

"Normansholt, eh?" said Sir Reville. "Oh, been there, had he?"

"Evidently, from the number of pictures he had of it. Fine, picturesque old town," continued Shelmore. "He'd collected some striking views."

"Only been to Normansholt once, myself," remarked Sir Reville. "When I came into that piece of property there, I went down to have a look at it—had a look at the town, too, of course, while I was there. Historic place—old castle, ruined abbeys, ancient buildings—that sort of thing."

"Just so," agreed Shelmore. "Well, this man, as I say, had collected a lot, twenty to thirty, of picture postcards of Normansholt. And—this was what I'd wanted to mention to you—on one of them he'd made a conspicuous pencil mark against a certain picturesque old house. Odd—very odd, to my mind."

"Why, Shelmore?" asked Sir Reville.

"I'll tell you. There was a big collection of similar cards in his suitcase, there are four hundred in all, that he'd evidently picked up in his travels, and that was the only card that bore any mark. Why did he mark that particular card, and that particular house?" asked Shelmore. "Why?"

"Oh, I don't see anything in that!" replied Sir Reville, with a laugh. "Sort of thing that anybody might do. Probably took a fancy to the house. How do you know what the man was after? Perhaps he went up north with the idea of buying a house?—hang it, I wish he'd bought my property at Normansholt!—it's nothing but a confounded nuisance as it is—and the tenant's a confounded nuisance. I'll tell you what Shelmore, if that affair's not settled soon, you'll have to take drastic measures!"

"I've given his solicitors a fortnight in which to make an offer for settlement," answered Shelmore.

 

"If their client's still impenitent and defiant at the end of that time, we'll see about a writ Odd, though, isn't it, that this murdered man should have been at Normansholt and singled out a house there?—just when the place was in my thoughts."

But Sir Reville saw nothing in this but very ordinary and commonplace coincidence, and said so. He gave signs of moving, and Simmons slipped away from his crack in the wall, replaced the old overcoat, and made ready to bow the baronet out. When Sir Reville had gone, he memorized the important features of the overheard conversation. One—Mrs. Champernowne was going to marry Sir Reville Childerstone. Two—Champernowne's was to be converted into a limited liability company, and his brother John was to be secretary and manager at a commencing salary of two thousand pounds a year. Three—the murdered man, Deane, had lately been to Normansholt, in Yorkshire, and for some reason or other had marked a certain house shown in a picture postcard of that place—a circumstance which Shelmore, who was no fool, thought very odd. All right, concluded Simmons, storing these things away in his retentive memory: now he knew more, much more, than he had known at the beginning of the afternoon. And to him a day was lost unless he added to his store of knowledge.

For reasons of his own, not unconnected with the news about Champernowne's, Simmons said nothing to Shelmore that afternoon in respect of the proposed articling. At a quarter past five he left the office and went round to Pemberton's. Pemberton at sight of him pushed a damp, freshly—pulled proof across the counter.

"I can do a bit better for you," he said. "If you pass the proof now, I can print a supply off and get it distributed and posted early in the morning—get it out before breakfast-time if you like."

"The sooner the better—for the responsible party," remarked Simmons. He produced a pencil and rapidly ran over the proof. "Quite all right," he said. "No mistakes there. Then you'll get it out early—distribution, too?"

"I'll see to it," agreed Pemberton. "Shop-windows—public houses—that sort of thing."

Simmons nodded and turned away; then a thought struck him, and, re-entering the shop, he asked the printer for another copy of the proof. With this in his pocket, he went home to tea.

John Hackdale was already at the tea table, refreshing himself before starting out on his special constable duties. Simmons, entering, laid before his brother the proof of the reward bill.

"Latest!" he said, laconically.

He sat down and helped himself to tea and toast, while John, a lump of cake bulging his cheek, read the bill.

"Whose notion's that?" he demanded, suddenly. "Shelmore's?"

"The girl's," replied Simmons. "Miss Pretty. Insists on it. Came to Shelmore, said she'd piles of ready money in the bank and would spend it like water to find out who murdered Deane, and made him draft that. Shelmore?—no!—Shelmore doesn't approve of it."

"Why not?" asked John.

"Thinks it's waste of time and money," answered Simmons. "If there's anybody in Southernstowe who knows anything of Deane's movements that night, or had ever seen him, they'd have told Mellapont before now."

John Hackdale said nothing. But he was thinking—thinking of Bartlett. Bartlett the impecunious!—who would see this bill as soon as it was passed.

"When's this going to be out, Sim?" he asked presently. "Tonight?"

"No—but by breakfast time tomorrow," replied Simmons. "Why—do you think any thing'll come of it?"

"Somebody might know something," answered John, carelessly. "A thousand pounds' offer is a wonderful thing for sharpening memories!"

"And for quickening imaginations!" sneered Simmons.

John said no more. He set off for the City Hall and stayed there some little time. When he left the dusk had fallen. Instead of going northward on his proper beat he turned down into a network of alleys and courts, and, coming at last to a cheap boarding house, knocked at its door and asked for James Bartlett.

Bartlett presently appeared, a subdued eagerness in his eyes. Hackdale motioned him to follow and led the way to a quiet spot at the end of the alley. He plunged into his business without any unnecessary preface.

"About that affair the other night," he said, eyeing his man as closely as the failing light allowed. "You've kept your mouth shut?"

"Tight, Mr. Hackdale," answered Bartlett. "Not one syllable has passed these lips, sir, to a soul, except yourself."

"I know more, now, than I did when I saw you," continued Hackdale. "Found out more. That man—we needn't mention names—did want to see Mrs. Champernowne, and did see her—met her, accidentally, outside her gates, had a brief talk with her, and left her—or she left him. She knows no more than that. He must have been lured by somebody into that sand pit, murdered there, and robbed. Of course, Mrs. Champernowne knows nothing whatever of anything that happened to the man after she left him. But—you understand? She doesn't want it known that she ever saw him. She has—reasons. And—nobody but you knows—what you know. Eh?"

"I'm following you, Mr. Hackdale," said Bartlett, knowingly. "I'm taking it all in, sir."

"Then take this in," continued Hackdale. "Questions are sure to be asked—enquiries made. Don't you think it would be just as well—for everybody—if you went where you wouldn't be questioned? Come, now? Look here!—you told me one night, some time ago, that you'd relatives in America—and that if you'd money, you'd go to them. Eh?"

"And so I would, Mr. Hackdale, so I would, I'd the passage money," answered Bartlett, with obvious eagerness. "I would, indeed; I'd go—

"Listen to me," interrupted Hackdale. "There a steamer from Southampton to New York tomorrow—she'll leave about noon. If you'll be off to Southampton tonight, by the nine fifty—three train, and will promise to sail tomorrow, I'll give you a hundred and fifty pounds to take with you, and on hearing of your arrival at whatever town it is in America you want to go to, I'll cable you another hundred and fifty. Come, now—make up your mind, Bartlett. Is it a bargain?"

Bartlett suddenly thrust out his hand.

"Done!" he said. "I'll go! I've so often talked of it—amongst what friends I have—that nobody'll think it strange. Yes, I'll go, Mr. Hackdale. I'll just pack a bag, and be off to Southampton. I can buy a few things there in the morning, and catch the boat. Done, sir!"

Within five minutes, Hackdale had handed over the hundred and fifty pounds to Bartlett, made a few arrangements with him, and gone away. He had no doubt whatever that Bartlett would clear out—none.

And Bartlett went back into the cheap lodging house and began to pack his small belongings, fully intending to be off to a new world on the morrow—fully. But before he had got half—way through his task, another visitor summoned him downstairs. This was Pemberton, the printer, who held out to him a bundle of what looked like circulars, damp from the press.

"Bit of a job for you, Jim," said Pemberton. "Just distribute these amongst the shops and public houses early in the morning, and when it's done, call round on me for half-a-quid. See?"

Bartlett held the topmost bill to the light of the door lamp and read it through with unmoved countenance. A thousand pounds reward for… he suddenly thrust the bundle back into Pemberton's hands.

"Sorry—can't do it, old man!" he said, cavalierly. "I'm just going away—to visit an old friend in the country. Try somebody else."

Without waiting for comment, he turned, hastened upstairs, and finished his packing. And as he packed, he thought, and puzzled things out, and began to develop a theory. He went on thinking and developing as he walked to the station: he continued to think and to develop after he had got into the nine fifty-three.

The nine fifty-three stopped at Portsmouth at ten twenty-eight. And at Portsmouth Bartlett got out, forfeited his ticket, and went off to find a cheap hotel. By that time he had given up all thoughts of America: at present, he considered, there were better chances in England.

Chapter 8 MISS PRETTY'S WAY

Pemberton, baulked of Bartlett's services in the matter of bill distributing, turned elsewhere. He had no difficulty in finding a substitute, there were plenty of idle men about, any one of whom were glad enough to earn the half-sovereign which Bartlett spurned. And by nine o'clock next morning every shop window in the business quarter of Southernstowe was displaying the bill, and early risers were wondering if anybody would be lucky enough to gain the thousand pounds reward.

Mellapont saw the bills as he came down from his house on the outskirts of the city and swore softly to himself. From the start out of his career in the police force he had always been wanting a case, a big case, a suitable cause celebre, and it had seemed to him that at last he had one in the Chancellor Hotel mystery. He had meant to keep it to himself, to do all the spade work himself, to have all the credit of detection and discovery for himself. He had purposely avoided the calling in of outside assistance; he did not want any sleuth hounds from the Criminal Investigation Department at Scotland Yard poking their noses into Southernstowe, or sticking their fingers in his pie—he wanted to be able to say, when the job was done, that he had lone it all unaided and by his own astuteness and ability. And now here was interference, and of the very sort that, just then, he certainly did not want. It was vexing—and when he had finished his routine duties at the police station he went round to Shelmore's office and said so, plainly. Shelmore shook his head and spread out his hands.

"Not my fault, superintendent," he protested. "I'm not sure that I don't entirely agree with you. But what can we do with a young lady who—who's about the most determined person I ever came across? Miss Pretty came here and insisted on this being done. She told me coolly that although she isn't of age, she's piles of ready money in her bank which she can draw on as she likes, and she informed me further that she'd spend every penny of it in tracking down her guardian's murderer! She's the sort of young woman who's jolly well going to have her own way, and who'll make things deuced unpleasant for anybody who tries to thwart her. I don't know if all Cornish people are like her, for I never came across any of 'em before, but she's—well, not exactly vindictive, but filled to the brim with a spirit that's—something very like revenge. Got it into her head that it's up to her to avenge her guardian—and she isn't going to mince matters, or stick at anything. She was absolutely resolved about offering this reward, and if I hadn't done the thing for her, she'd have gone out and gone to some other solicitor. If you knew her better—"

At that moment Simmons Hackdale opened the green baize door and stood aside. "Miss Pretty!" he announced.

Miss Pretty walked in with one nod to Shelmore and another to Mellapont. So far she made no display of mourning garments; on the contrary she was arrayed in her smartest clothes, and she looked very much alive and decidedly alert.

"We were just talking about you, Miss Pretty!" said Shelmore, as he drew an easy chair towards the hearth, and gave his recently lighted fire a poke. "Superintendent Mellapont regrets that we've put out that reward bill."

Miss Pretty dropped into the easy chair and turned sharply on Mellapont. "Why, pray?" she demanded.

Mellapont rubbed his chin. He was not used to dealing with self-sufficient young ladies, and he looked at this one, as a biologist might look at a new and surprising specimen.

"Um!" he said, reflectively. "Er—a little primitive, you know, Miss Pretty. In cases like the present one, it's best to leave things to us, to the police. But to wait a little, you know, before—"

"I don't see any reason at all why I should wait!" interrupted Miss Pretty. "While one's waiting, the murderer gets away. I'm not interfering with you, superintendent—you follow your methods, and I'll follow mine. My guardian was foully murdered in this city, and I'm going to know who murdered him!"

"Just so!—I quite sympathise with your feelings, Miss Pretty," agreed Mellapont, in his suavest manner. "But—in cases like this—mysterious cases—a little diplomacy is often a good deal better than open warfare. There are various ways of going to work—I prefer the—shall we call it secret, under-the-surface way? We've agreed on the fact that somebody murdered Mr. Deane—now, have you got any theory about it?"

Miss Pretty considered matters for awhile.

"I think somebody followed him to Southernstowe," she said at last. "Somebody who knew he had money and valuables on him. I think that somebody probably stayed at the hotel and followed him out. There were lots of people staying at the hotel that night, according to what I've been told. Most of them left next morning—I don't know if they can be traced or not. I suppose you police can trace and question them?"

"The thing—to my mind—is this," observed Mellapont. "Why did Mr. Deane go out from the Chancellor Hotel so very late at night?—midnight!"

"I've been thinking about that," said Miss Pretty. "I think there may have been a reason. Mr. Deane was not a very good sleeper, and I've heard him say that he never slept well in strange beds. Now, at home, he used to go for a walk late at night—just before bedtime. I think that on that night at the Chancellor he felt that he wasn't going to sleep, so he just got up again, dressed, and went out for a stroll. Simple!"

"That he went out is certain; that he was murdered and robbed is certain," remarked Mellapont. "And," he added, "it's also certain, unfortunately, that we haven't the slightest clue to the criminal's identity. Now, my idea, my belief, Miss Pretty, is that your guardian met his death at the hands of some loafer, who afterwards robbed him. But I've another belief—I feel certain that Mr. Deane knew Southernstowe and somebody in Southernstowe, and that his real object in going out was to visit that somebody—late as the hour was."

Miss Pretty shook her head.

"When we were talking over this holiday," she said firmly. "Mr. Deane remarked to me that he'd never seen Southernstowe, never been in this part of England. So how could he know it, or know anybody here? If I thought that he knew anybody here, and that he went to see that somebody that night—if I really do get, from any evidence you can bring, to think that… "

She paused, shaking her head again, and Mellapont waited.

"Yes?" he said at last. "If you ever do get to think that?—What?"

"This!" answered Miss Pretty, with a very sombre look in her eyes. "This—I'll stop in this place until I've found out who that somebody is and have it out with him or her—I will!—if it costs me every penny I have in the world! And I've got a lot of pennies."

"You believe in a policy of thoroughness, Miss Pretty?" suggested Mellapont. "Going right through with it, eh?"

"I'm going to know all and everything about what happened to my guardian and partner that night!" declared Miss Pretty. "You go on with your police work, and let me go my way!—if we can't find and hang the murderer between us, we must be poor tools! I came to see you, Mr Shelmore," she went on, turning to the solicitor, "about two matters—my guardian's funeral and this inquest you said I'd have to attend. I'm going to have Mr. Deane buried here—I've settled that, and the time and place. But—this other affair?"

Shelmon looked at Mellapont and Mellapont hastened to explain.

"The inquest opens this afternoon," he said. "It will be quite a formal affair today—just identification and so on. Then the coroner will adjoin for a week or ten days. The adjourned inquest will be the thing. Perhaps, by then, we, the police, will be in possession of more evidence. I'm doing my utmost, Miss Pretty. But look here, now—if this reward bill of yours brings anybody forward, let me know! Mutual confidence, eh?—don't do anything without me. I suppose you will remain here awhile?"

Miss Pretty gave the two men a steady look.

"I'm not going one yard out of this city till I know who killed James Deane!" she said. "That's flat!"

Then she rose, and with a careless nod, went away, and Shelmore and Mellapont, left to themselves, looked at each other.

"You see?" said Shelmore, after a pause.

"I see!" answered Mellapont, drily. "Um!—I don't think anybody's going to get any small change out of that young woman! Do you say she's only nineteen?"

"Thereabouts," replied Shelmore.

"Good Lord!—what will she be at twenty-nine?" exclaimed Mellapont. "Prime Minister, I should think. Well!—but you'll let me know if anything comes of this reward offer? Don't let's get at cross purposes. United action, eh?"

"I'll let you know," said Shelmore. "If the promise of a thousand pounds, cash down, doesn't produce anything, though—eh?"

"Just so!" assented Mellapont. "It'll look as if we were never going to know anything. Still—I've my own methods. That jewellery, now—whoever robbed him of it will want to dispose of it. To track that will be one of my lines."

"Yes," said Shelmore. "But… supposing the person who took the jewellery is under no necessity to dispose of it?"

"Eh?" exclaimed Mellapont. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," replied Shelmore, "that the valuables on Deane may have been removed as a blind; to divert suspicion; to suggest that he was the victim of a vulgar murder-and-robbery, when, as a matter of fact he was murdered for set purpose and design."

Mellapont stared, comprehended, and became thoughtful.

"I certainly hadn't thought of that," he said at last. "Yes! might be. That would argue that the murderer was some person of means, education, unusual cleverness—to think of such a thing. Um! We're all in the dark. Well—we must wait."

Miss Pretty waited, during the next fortnight. She saw her guardian buried in a quiet churchyard just outside the town; she occupied herself in clearing up her affairs; she had regular interviews with Shelmore and Mellapont. But she got no news, for nothing in the shape of news turned up. The adjourned inquest came round; the coroner and his jury heard every scrap of evidence that could be produced. And after sitting all day, the jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown, and everybody went away from the court, declaring that it was the only verdict possible, and that nobody, now, would ever know who killed James Deane.

"Reckon I do know who killed he, poor man, all the same!" declared a native wiseacre in Miss Pretty's hearing, as she passed out of the coroner's court. "Do so!"

"Who, then, if so be as you knows in your cleverness?" enquired his companion. "Mortial clever, you be, for to know it, when coroner and jury don't."

"Don't call for no mortial cleverness, that don't!" retorted the wiseacre. "One 'o they pesky idle good-for-nothing's what comes moochin' round, fair days, and hangs about the place all night, him it would be as did felonious kill and slay this here gentleman—or it med be two on 'em. Sleeps out, they does, in such places as that there old sand pit. Well, he take his walk up there; they sees him, wi' his fine clothes and goold watch chain, and sparklin' pin, and they sattles him. Plain as my old stick here, that be!—don't want no crowner, nor jury, nor pleecemen, nor yet lawyers, to tell I that! I reckon I be filled wi' more o' the meat o' common sense than all they lawyers and crowners put together—all talk they be!"

Miss Pretty went away to think. She thought a great deal that night, and the next morning she called on Mellapont at the police station.

"I've changed my opinions," she said laconically, when he had given her a chair. "Completely!"

"Yes?" enquired Mellapont. "In—what way?"

"I now think that Mr. Deane did know somebody in Southernstowe, and that he went out that night with the express purpose of seeing that somebody," she said. "Probably by appointment."

"No!" declared Mellapont, with emphasis. "Not by appointment! You remember—the chambermaid saw him in his night clothes, about to retire. He got up and dressed, after that. It was an afterthought, a sudden thought, that rising and going out."

"Well," said Miss Pretty. "Anyway, he went—to see this somebody. This somebody must have lived near where he was murdered."

"There are at least sixty houses, detached houses, villa residences, mansions, lived in by people of reputation and position round there," replied Mellapont. "It's the best residential quarter of Southernstowe."

"That was where he went—to that quarter," persisted Miss Pretty. "Why don't you make a house to house visitation? If he called at one of these houses—"

"We don't know that he ever did call," interrupted Mellapont. "He may have been going to call. I don't think he ever did call, anywhere. Had he called, late as it was, the possibility is that a servant would have answered his knock or ring, and in that case, your reward would have brought that servant forward."

"Supposing he went somewhere by appointment?" suggested Miss Pretty.

"That would argue that he'd made an appointment during the evening," said Mellapont. "We have no evidence that he spoke to anyone except Belling and the hotel servants from the time of his arrival at the Chancellor to his going out of his bedroom. I think he went to call on somebody—and never got there."

Miss Pretty rose, and looked round the drabness of the superintendent's room. "Are you any further forward?" she asked abruptly.

"Honestly—no," replied Mellapont. "Not one yard further. The whole thing is more of a mystery—an unsolved mystery—than ever."

Miss Pretty nodded and went away, and back to her rooms at the Chancellor Hotel. She had told Belling that she was going to stay there indefinitely, and had engaged his best bedroom and an adjoining sitting room. In the sitting room she now sat down, and, after a prolonged spell of thinking, over a convenient piece of fancy work, she came to a conclusion. That led her to her writing table, where, with more thought, she produced the copy for a new reward bill. When she had completed it, she took it round to Pemberton's herself and made all arrangements about printing, distributing, and posting it: this time, she said to herself, she would neither consult nor trouble Shelmore or anybody else: this was her own affair.

By noon next day everybody in Southernstowe had read the new bill. It went far beyond the terms of the old one. Miss Pretty made three offers. She would give one thousand pounds to anybody who could prove that he or she saw James Deane after he left the Chancellor Hotel on the night of his death. She would give one thousand pounds to anybody who could tell anything about the missing jewellery. And, finally, she would give three thousand pounds to any person who could give information which would lead to the arrest and conviction of James Deane's murderer.

Simmons Hackdale was one of the first people to see this new bill, and his mouth began to water, and his hands to itch. If he could but get a clue—the slightest clue! And that very afternoon, if he had only known it, opportunity was coming his way. Shelmore called him into the private office and told him that he had an important, confidential mission for him. It was absolutely necessary that somebody should go down to Normansholt in Yorkshire and make personal inspection of Sir Reville Childerstone's property in that town: he, Simmons, should go. Next day…

Simmons went home to make ready. And, as he packed his bag, he remembered what he had overheard Shelmore tell Sir Reville about the marked picture postcard Was there anything in it?

Chapter 9 BIRDS OF A FEATHER

Simmons, after a two hundred and fifty miles' journey, found himself and his modest kitbag in Nonnansholt at six o'clock on the following afternoon. He had never been in the North of England before, and his surroundings struck him, accustomed as he was to the South, as being gray and gloomy. But as he wandered through the old market square, looking about him for accommodation, his sharp eye spotted what seemed to be quite an up-to-date hotel, The Bear, and he promptly stepped aside, booked a room, and ordered dinner. Simmons had plenty of ready money in his pocket, and, knowing that whatever he laid out would be returned to him, through Shelmore, out of Sir Reville Childerstone's amply supplied coffers, he was determined to do himself well. If you are spending your own money, said Simmons, be frugal; if somebody else's, be lavish. This is a principal on which all officials are brought up, from big-wigs in Whitehall to the servants of obscure town corporations.

He was halfway through his dinner in the coffee room of The Bear when a waiter ushered in a smart, alert looking young gentleman of his own age, whose eyes were full of polite enquiry. The waiter indicated Simmons, who had written his name and address with a flourish in the register downstairs, and the young gentleman, doffing his somewhat rakish hat, came forward, smiling widely.

"Mr. Hackdale, from Southernstowe?" he suggested, coming up to Simmons. "Mr. Simmons Hackdale?"

"That's me," replied Simmons, regardless of grammatical niceties. "You've the advantage of me, though."

"Mr. Swale, Swilford Swale—of Pike and Pilkins, Mr. Hackdale," said the caller. "We heard from Mr. Shelmore this morning that you were coming down today to inspect this property of Sir Reville Childerstone, and, feeling sure you'd be here at The Bear, I thought I'd just drop in and give you a welcome to the old town—never been here before, I suppose, Mr. Hackdale?"

"Never, nor anywhere near it," answered Simmons. "Very kind of you, I'm sure, Mr. Swale. If you'd been a bit earlier, I'd have asked you to dinner. What'll you have to drink?"

Mr. Swale replied that he'd already dined, and, after some little consideration, decided to take a glass of The Bear's famous old port; Simmons, who up to then had drunk nothing, decided to join him. Mr. Swale dropped into a chair close by, and, while Simmons finished his dinner they exchanged the confidences of youth. Mr. Swale told Simmons all about Pike and Pilkin's; Simmons told Mr. Swale all about Shelmore. By the time they had had two glasses each of the famous old port they were fast friends, and had ceased to call each other mister.

"And now, what would you like to do, old man?" demanded Mr. Swale, when he and Simmons quitted the coffee room. "There's not a great deal doing in this ancient borough, but there's something. There's a theatre and a picture house, and if you care for billiards I can take you to the club. Or, as it's a fine moonlight night. I can show you round the old place, and we'll drop in at a famous pub, where the landlord's a friend of mine—he's got a drop of port that's fully equal to that we've just sampled—fully! What's your preference?"

Simmons, who had a natural inquisitiveness about anything new and unfamiliar, said that if it were left to him, he'd like to have a general look round, and Mr. Swale, pleased to act the part of cicerone, led him forth and began a systematic tour of the town. He exhibited the Market Cross, the Parish Church, the Moot Hall, the Castle, the ruins of two or three abbeys and priories, various ancient houses, and the site of the old gallows, and finally turned him round a corner into a square, from the centre of which towered a tall mast.

"That's something which, I'm given to understand, you don't often see in England nowadays, old man!" said Mr. Swale. "A real, genuine, old—fashioned maypole!—the original, antique one. There aren't many left now—don't know if you've any down your way?"

"Never seen one in my life before!" declared Simmons. "Heard of 'em, of course."

"This square," continued the guide, waving his hand around him, "is called May Day Green. They used to hold the old May Day revels here, dancing round that maypole, and so on. I've heard old residents talk about 'em—given up they are now, though I myself have seen the maypole decorated. One of the oldest parts of Normansholt this, my boy!—centuries old. There's the Maypole Inn, in that corner—that's where we'll drop in for half—an—hour. In that other corner is a fine old place—the Manor House—that with the long, sloping roofs and tall gables. There was a most extraordinary thing happened at that Manor House some twenty—two years ago—don't remember it, personally myself, but I've heard my father tell about it, many a time."

"What was it?" asked Simmons.

"Strange and mystifying disappearance of a man who lived there," answered Mr. Swale. "Sort of thing that you read about in these tales and novels—only more so. Tell you about it if you like—but let's look in at the Maypole."

Simmons followed his new found friend into an old-fashioned inn, which looked as if it had been lately transported from Elizabethan or even early Tudor days, and seemed to be a rabbit warren of cosy nooks and corners. Its landlord, to Mr. Swale's great disappointment, proved to be out for the evening, but Mr. Swale knew which particular brand of port to ask for, and, providing himself and his companion with a couple of glasses, led the way to a quiet corner in an oak-panelled room, wherein burnt a cheery fire, and suggested that as the night was still young they should make themselves comfortable.

"And I'll tell you about that Manor House affair," he added, as they settled themselves in contiguous elbow chairs. "I've often thought I'd try my hand at making a story of it, for the magazine, you know, but I'm doubtful if I've the writing trick, and besides I shouldn't know how to wind it up. Perhaps you could make something of it, old man. What?"

"Can't say till I've heard it," replied Simmons. "What's it all about—a disappearance?"

"Queerest disappearance ever you heard of!" assented Mr. Swale. "People hereabouts talk of it to this very day! Disappearance of a man who used to live in that Manor House twenty-two years ago—name of Arradeane."

"Name of what?" asked Simmons.

"Arradeane—a, double r, a, d, e, a, n, e," replied Mr. Swale, spelling it out. "Queer name, but that was it—Arradeane, James Arradeane, civil engineer."

Simmons' ears suddenly pricked and widened. Arradeane? James Arradeane? Leave off the first four letters, and you got Deane, James Deane—the name of the murdered man at Southernstowe! And—he suddenly remembered Miss Pretty and her first visit to Shelmore. She had said that her guardian, James Deane, was, by profession, a civil engineer. Could it be that he had stumbled on.

"Yes?" he said, quietly. "And—the story?"

Mr. Swale sipped his port with the air of a connoisseur and composed himself in his chair.

"I'll tell you," he answered. "Oddest thing I ever heard of!—some features of it, the features about the actual disappearance, anyway. It was like this—as my father told it. To start with, you must understand that all about twenty to twenty—five years ago, there was a big boom in coal development in this neighbourhood. It was believed that there were very rich, undeveloped seams of coal all around this town, and people began to grow rich in anticipation, and a lot of strangers came about, on the lookout for what they could get. Now amongst them was this man, James Arradeane. He was a civil engineer by profession, but he evidently had considerable private means of his own. No one ever knew where he came from, but he came, and his wife with him, and he took that old Manor House that I've just shewn you, and settled down, and let it be known openly that he was prospecting. He had some transaction with a company that was forming here; they did a lot of boring in some land they bought, just outside the borough boundary, but it didn't come to anything. According to what my father said—and he knew him well—"

"Is your father alive?" interrupted Simmons.

"Dead—these five years," answered Swale. "Well, according to him, this Arradeane was by no means dependent on his profession—he seemed to be just waiting for a likely thing to put capital into. It was well understood in the town that both he and his wife had money—my father said she was a very handsome woman; clever, too—"

"Just to get the proper hang of it, old man," interrupted Simmons again, "how old might these two have been at that time.'

"Oh, they were youngish people—under the thirties—she, at any rate," replied Swale. "He would be a bit older, perhaps. Smart couple—used to drive very good horses, and cut a bit of a dash, you understand. But it got out in the town, somehow, that they didn't hit it off, that there were differences between 'em. They'd no children, but Mrs. Arradeane had a brother who lived with them, a sort of hanger—on, you know, a chap who never did anything but loaf round and enjoy himself, at her expense, of course, and it was said that Arradeane very much objected to it and wanted to clear him out, which Mrs. Arradeane wouldn't hear of—she'd looked after this brother all their lives, though that wasn't long, and she refused to be parted from him.

"All that got to be known in the town—you can't conceal anything in a little place like this, you know, old man! And my father said that that might be the main bone of contention, or there might have been lesser ones, but anyway, it was well known that Arradeane and his wife didn't get on—the servants knew, and they talked, of course—and all of a sudden Arradeane cleared out."

"Left her?" suggested Simmons.

"In the queerest way," answered Swale. "It was the manner of the disappearance that licked everybody—the manner! To start with, this Arradeane, according to my father's story, was known to every soul in the town; he was the sort of man that makes himself popular. Well, as I tell you, he and his wife lived in that corner house, the old Manor House, which I've just shown you, with the brother I spoke of. Now, one morning these three sat down to breakfast. The servant who waited on them, a parlourmaid, said that they were quite friendly and amiable. She heard Arradeane say that he'd got to meet a couple of mining experts at The Bear Hotel at ten o'clock, and she saw him quit the house for that purpose at ten minutes to ten; she also saw him turn the corner of May Day Green in the direction of the Market Place and The Bear. From that minute to this, old man, nobody in Normansholt has ever seen that man again! The parlourmaid was the last person that ever set eyes on him—as he turned that corner! Vanished!"

"Impossible!" said Simmons. "Somebody must have seen him!"

"I tell you he was well known to everybody in this place," asserted Swale. "And this was a much smaller town twenty years ago than it is now, and now we've only seven or eight thousand people in it. Nobody saw Arradeane again: anyway, when the hunt-and-cry was raised for him, not a soul came forward who could say that he or she had set eyes on him that morning. From the moment he turned that corner he vanished utterly—just as if he'd sunk into the earth, or been snatched up into the heavens. Of course, he was not particularly missed for some hours—in fact, not till next day. He didn't go home to lunch on the day of his disappearance, nor to dinner, and he didn't turn up at night. His wife, however, thought little of that; she concluded that he'd gone somewhere out of town with the mining experts he'd spoken of, and was staying the night with them. But when she got no news of him the next day she began to make enquiries. Then things came out. He'd never been to The Bear. The men he was to meet had waited an hour for him and gone away. Nobody, as I say, had seen him. There are three railway stations in this town, small as it is—three different systems, you see, old man. Well, he'd never been seen at any one of them. He hadn't hired a trap; however he'd got away, it had been on foot. People wondered if he'd turned into the castle and fallen amongst the ruins—there are some nasty places. But although they searched here, there and everywhere, and made enquiries all round the neighbourhood, they never heard one syllable about him. Clean gone!"

"Nobody got any theory?" asked Simmons, who was quietly taking it all in and putting the pieces of his puzzle together.

"My father had one—probably a correct one," replied Swale. "It was this. Just round the corner of May Day Green there, where he disappeared from the parlourmaid's view, is what we call a ginnell—"

"What on earth's that?" demanded Simmons. "Ginnell?"

"It's what you call in English an alley, a passage," said Swale, laughing. "A narrow alley between houses—backs of houses. This particular ginnell runs down back of the Market Place to the meadows at the foot of the town. Cross the meadow and you come to the edge of a big wood that extends south-east for a couple of miles. My father's notion was that Arradeane slipped down that ginnell, crossed the meadows, behind the thick hedgerows, took to the woods, and once outside them, went clean away across a very lonely bit of country until he came to a railway line which doesn't touch us at all, and boarded a train at some small station where he wasn't known. See?"

"Good theory!" said Simmons, approvingly. "That, I should say, is what he did. But—his money?"

"Ah!" answered Swale. "That, of course, was looked into. As I said, he and his wife were people of means: they had money, both of 'em. He owed nothing in the town—sort of man who paid spot for everything. He hadn't a banker's account in the town, either: banked at Alsthford, twelve miles away. Well, it was found out, when enquiry was made about his disappearance, that two days before it happened, he drew out pretty nearly every penny of his balance—a big one—from his bank, and also took away a quantity of securities which they kept for him. Gave no reason, either. So—he carried off his money with him. Plant, old man, a clever plant!—wanted to get right away from his wife! That was about it."

"And—she?" asked Simmons. "What became of her?"

"Oh, she stopped here for awhile," replied Swale. "According to my father, after the first bit of enquiry she never made any attempt to find Arradeane. Of course, she may have known something that nobody else knew. But anyway, at the end of three months or so she sold up everything at the Manor House, and she and the brother departed—went to London, it was said. And nobody's ever heard a word of any of 'em since—not a ward. But it's still talked of—of course, it was the clever disappearance that excited people's wonder—smart thing, you know, old man, to slip clear out of a place where every man-jack knew you, unobserved, and without leaving a trace! And, as I say, it would make the beginning of a rare good story—don't know if you've got any talent that way?"

"Haven't tried it yet, anyhow," answered Simmons, drily. "Might have. And all this was—when do you say?"

"Twenty to twenty—three years ago," replied Swale. "Just before I arrived into this vale of tears!"

"There'll be plenty of people in Normansholt who'll remember all three of 'em," suggested Simmons. "Must be."

"Lord bless you, old man, no end!" asserted Swale. "Lots! If the landlord had been in here, he'd have been able to tell the tale better than I've done—he knew Arradeane well enough. He'd have told it first hand—of course, I can only tell what my father used to tell me."

"Oh! well, there are a good many queer things in this world," remarked Simmons. "Hear a lot of 'em in our profession, don't we?"

"I believe you, old man!" said Mr. Swale, solemnly. "We do! Our profession lends itself to that. Ah!—if people only knew what secrets we lawyers know—eh, what? Have another port, old man?"

"Well, just one," responded Simmons. "Business to do in the morning, you know."

He did his business in the morning, had another look round the old town, and then caught the early afternoon train southward. And he went homeward absolutely certain that James Arradeane was James Deane; Mrs. Arradeane, Mrs. Champernowne; and the loafing brother, Mr. Alfred—whose surname seemed to be an unknown quantity.