A Case In Camera - free ebook by Oliver Onions

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A Case In Camera

Oliver Onions

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93 chapters

A Case in Camera

A Case in Camera

AUTHOR OF "THE COMPLEAT BACHELOR" "IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE EVIDENCE" "THE DEBIT ACCOUNT" New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1921 All rights reserved Copyright, 1920 and 1921 , By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY Set up and electrotyped. Published March, 1921 TO OLE LUK OIE [Pg 8] [Pg 9]...

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PART I WHAT HAPPENED IN LENNOX STREET

PART I WHAT HAPPENED IN LENNOX STREET

[Pg 10] [Pg 11]...

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I

I

The tale I am setting out to tell has to do with the killing, on a May morning of the year 1919, of one young man by another who claimed, and still claims, to have been his friend. The circumstances were singular—perhaps even unique; the consequences affected a number of people in various interesting ways and byways; and since the manner of telling the story has been left entirely to me, I will begin with the breakfast-party that Philip Esdaile gave that morning at his studio in Lennox Street, C

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II

II

Philip had at least two good reasons for being in high feather that morning. The first of these was that barely a week ago, with a magnificent new quill pen, he had signed the Roll, had shaken august hands, and was now Philip Esdaile, A.R.A., probably the most gifted among the younger generation of painters of the pictorial phenomena of Light. I and his second reason for contentment happened to arrive almost simultaneously at the wrought-iron gate that opened on to his little front garden. We al

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III

III

I have told the foregoing in some detail because I want you to see the careless and happy party into which that morning's bolt dropped a quarter of an hour later. I want you to see the contrast between our homely light-heartedness and the complex tangle of all that followed. I will now tell you what the bolt was. Breakfast was over, and we men had gone into the studio again. Mrs. Cunningham was helping Mollie to clear away, and Joan Merrow had joined the children in the garden, and with them was

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IV

IV

One order at any rate was superfluous—that to telephone to the police. Aeroplanes do not crash in Chelsea in the middle of the morning unobserved. Already the windows on the other side of the street were packed with faces, and every face was turned in the same direction. This was towards the torn fabric of a parachute that had lodged partly on the studio roof, partly in the branches of the mulberry in the garden. Hubbard ran out through the French windows and looked up. Tapes trailed and rippled

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V

V

For a moment we all gazed stupidly at that jar and candle; but the next moment our eyes were fastened on Philip's face. Now ordinarily Esdaile's face, clean-shaven since 1914, is quite a pleasant one to look at, lightly browned, and with the savor of the sea still lingering about it. Nor was it noticeably pale now. Indeed, you might have said that some inner excitation made it not pale at all. But there was no disguising the strained tenseness of it. At the same time he was obviously attempting

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VI

VI

The studio (into which Hubbard and I immediately followed him) was a large oblong apartment, with a portion of one of its longer sides and almost the whole of the roof glazed. More or less light could be admitted by means of a system of dark blue blinds and cords running to cleats on the walls. It was to the roof-glass that my eyes turned first of all. One corner of it was darkened, as if melted snow had slipped down its slope, but the irregular triangle thus made was not so dark but that the sh

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VII

VII

Perhaps at this point I had better tell you who "I" am who write this, and also how our little circle came to choose me for the task. As a minor actor in these events you may set me down as a working journalist. Among other things I am one of the sub-editors of the Daily Circus . But that is not the whole of my life. I am also a novelist of sorts. And one of my reasons for sticking to journalism when I could manage at a pinch to do without it is that in this way I escape the doom of having to pr

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VIII

VIII

A slightly embarrassing little scene next took place in that breakfast-room in Lennox Street, Chelsea. Rooke had put down the Time Table, and Mollie Esdaile's face wore an expression of exasperation. It appeared that Philip wanted to pack his family off according to program but wished to remain behind himself. For this he gave no reason—or rather he gave several reasons, all of the thinnest description. "But how tiresome!" broke from Mollie. "Why on earth do you want to upset everything like thi

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PART II WHAT HAPPENED OUTSIDE

PART II WHAT HAPPENED OUTSIDE

[Pg 38] [Pg 39]...

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I

I

It may have already struck you that while Esdaile, a responsible householder directly interested in any unusual occurrence on his premises, had not once been into his garden to see what the trouble was, I myself, a journalist with quite a good "news story" in the wind, had shown little more eagerness. Well, I will explain that. In the first place, we have our own reporters, who do that kind of thing far better than I can. Next, however interesting things outside might have been, I had found them

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II

II

I will venture to say that the man I followed was never shut out of a tube-lift in his life, however crowded it was. He jostled through the throng about the counter as if it had been so much water. I learned presently that he had had no sort of interest or proprietorship whatever in that ladder that had been passed along Lennox Street. Seeing a ladder approaching he had merely pushed himself forward, had placed himself at the head of it, and, with energetic elbowings and loud cries of "Make way

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III

III

Musingly I mounted an eastward-bound bus and sought my office. The more I thought things over the less able I became to shake off the sense of accumulating trifles, of gathering events. And it was as I passed through Pimlico that yet another incident, temporarily forgotten, came back into my mind. This was the curious way in which Esdaile had snapped—it had been a snap—when Rooke had wanted to sweep up the broken picture-glass, to draw the studio blinds back again, and to return the bottle of cu

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IV

IV

The moment I reached the office I rang up the Record , our evening sheet. But their reporters were still out, and nobody could yet tell me anything about the accident I didn't already know. Willett, my young colleague on the Circus , did not propose to give the story exceptional treatment. "If the thing caught fire in the air we'll let it alone," he said. "Fire's too much of a bugbear. We want the joy-riding idiot and the lunatic who stunts over towns. I'm for letting it alone, but we'll wait an

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V

V

However, we went, and at a little after eight o'clock rang the bell we had rung under such very different circumstances at breakfast-time that morning. The parachute still waved in the mulberry, and a few policemen were unobtrusively hanging about the street. Two of these did not move very far from the gate. I supposed that in view of pending inquiries it was important that the parachute should not be touched. We waited so long for an answer after ringing the bell that I had almost concluded the

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VI

VI

I know now the exact point up to which I was right, and also where I ceased to be right. Mollie Esdaile made a clean breast of the whole guileful conspiracy of their courtship afterwards. Here it is, for your edification and warning. Mollie had several times been down to visit Philip in his billet at the Helmsea Station. There it was that she had first seen Chummy. At first she had not been able to single out Chummy from the rest of the uniformed mob that led such a mysterious existence down the

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VII

VII

The lights he had switched on were a couple of standard lamps only, that worked from plugs in the wall. Both had mignonette-colored shades, and while one shade stood a-tilt near the syphon and glasses, the other threw a soft light on Philip's little escritoire. As he sat the light crossed his breast only, leaving his face in a half-transparent obscurity. A few yards away the entrance to the studio made a dead black oblong, so completely without trace of the evening light that must still be linge

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VIII

VIII

Honestly, I don't know whether I was surprised or not. On the whole I hardly think I was. If he had produced another candlestick or jar of liqueur I think I should have felt like getting up and walking out; but here at last was something on the fuller scale. Thank heaven, we had done with broken glass and sweeping-brushes and dark blue linen blinds. We might now hope to get a little farther. For a pistol is a pistol at all times and all the world over. No other weapon has quite so exclusively si

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IX

IX

At first Monty had tried to get out of it by saying it was the keys. Esdaile's is not a modern house; its keys are not of the Yale kind, of which you can carry a dozen in one pocket; each of them is anything from three to five inches long, and they weigh very few to the pound. In handing over the house to Monty, Philip had given him eight or ten of these; and so at first (Esdaile said) Rooke had wanted to say it was the keys. "I don't mean the keys," Philip had replied. "I mean the pocket on the

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X

X

Philip had described Rooke quite well when he had said that he had the air of a naughty boy caught robbing an orchard. He had a hang-dog yet defiant look as he entered, shepherded in by Philip as if we had been a tribunal empaneled for his condemnation. But there was relief in his face too—the relief of one who has got the worst over and hardly fears the rest. And, as he threw his hat on the table and looked round in search of a chair, he unconsciously emphasized his air of boyish guilt by sitti

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XI

XI

It is not for me to draw the hair-line that divides the heart's wish from the conviction of the rightness of the act that follows it. We are all prone to do what we want to do and to look for reasons afterwards. That was for Esdaile and Hubbard to consider. I am merely stating the Case. Personally you will always find me the broadest-minded and most tolerant of men until these lofty qualities begin to react on my own private affairs; after that I become a pattern of the narrow and the hidebound.

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XII

XII

For, if he had realized, he could hardly have overlooked the immensely important point he did overlook. It was left to me to draw his attention to this point. For when one man kills another, it necessarily follows that one man has been, killed by another. And it further follows that, if you decide to shield the killer because he is your friend, you are inevitably forced into an unfriendly attitude towards the victim. What about the victim and his rights in the matter? You may believe it or not,

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PART III WHAT THE WOMEN DID

PART III WHAT THE WOMEN DID

[Pg 80] [Pg 81]...

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I

I

For a great number of years past, innumerable reviewers have been so kind as to class me as "one of the younger novelists," and with the passing of time I have acquired a certain affection for the status. But I have to confess myself unlike my brethren in this—I don't know all about women. Indeed, twenty Philip Esdailes poking about twenty cellars are clearer to me than some of the mental processes of such a person as (say) Miss Joan Merrow. For instance, she once told me that she would be terri

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II

II

Since it was I who discovered Philip Esdaile's painting-cottage for him I think I may claim that I know the Santon country fairly well. It is a vast and skyey upland east of the Wolds, and its edge drops in four hundred feet of glorious white cliff sheer to the sea. Everything there is on the amplest and most bountiful scale, from the enormous stretches of wheat and barley to the giant barns and huge horses and the very poultry of its farmyards. The only tiny thing about it is its church, and th

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III

III

They had arrived at Santon at half-past eight on a Thursday night, and after tea on the Saturday Joan walked up to the little coastguard-station on the hill. Aeroplanes were not unknown on that wide uplifted promontory, and it would not in the least surprise her if presently, say in another week or so, Chummy, finding himself within a mere fifty miles, were to drop in unannounced. He had in fact said so, in the last letter but four. He had not been able to see her off at the station because he h

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IV

IV

I hope you haven't got the impression that I didn't like Mrs. Cunningham. Indeed, if half I presently learned about her was true, it would have been a hard heart that had not shown a very real and compassionate consideration for her. Young as she was, she had had a wretched story. As far as I know it it was this:— The late George Cunningham, having contracted the dangerous habit of going to bed every night comparatively sober and waking up in the morning very drunk, had one day arrived at the po

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V

V

And so we come to the episode of the wardrobe that Audrey Cunningham had bought in from the St. John's Wood sale. This wardrobe, with a number of dress-baskets and other articles, formed part of the furniture of the bed-sitting-room in Oakley Street that she was now on the point of leaving, and it had been Philip Esdaile himself who had suggested, some time ago, that there was plenty of room for these belongings in his cellar. Nothing had since been said about it; Philip says that the matter had

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VI

VI

"Was he drunk?" Esdaile asked. He was walking about, head down, frowning. The old man stroked his grizzled beard. "Well, I won't say he hadn't had a few. I saw him have two or three liqueur brandies. And he's a crossish sort of man when he's at home, especially when it's wearing off a bit, but he isn't easily bowled over, isn't Harry. Well, as I was telling you. He gets home about tea-time that day, and the first thing he sees is one of the children playing with something or other in his mouth.

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VII

VII

A few minutes' reflection would have shown Esdaile that there was no immediate reason why he should have hesitated to have that wardrobe carried down into his cellar. He himself admits this. But it is easy to think of these things afterwards, and he was caught off his guard. He did allow reluctance to appear. "Why not move this desk and let it stand here?" he said, pointing to the writing-table with the mignonette-shaded lamp on it. "It's not a bad-looking piece at all. Pity to hide it. What is

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VIII

VIII

Of the four of us sitting there I alone had instantly realized what must have happened. Our Nosey Parker of a Westbury had been at work already. I remembered the dull insistence of the man and how he had said in my hearing that he and Inspector Webster "would be having a bit of a talk that evening." I recalled also the stupid but dangerous cunning with which he had repeated over and over again that Rooke had been the first on the scene of the accident. Well, he hadn't lost very much time. The In

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IX

IX

And now (to come out of this winding of the story into the open again) here was Audrey Cunningham with dress-baskets and a wardrobe for which the most suitable place was certainly the cellar. "All right," Esdaile said suddenly. "Let's do it now. Monty and I can manage it if you'll hold a candle for us." And he lighted and put into Audrey's hand the same candle he had himself used when he had gone down into the cellar to fetch the orange curaçao. He was still kicking himself that he had made such

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X

X

The letter she wrote crossed Mollie Esdaile's Sunday morning one. It was written on Saturday, and missed the Santon Sunday morning delivery by a post, arriving there on Monday. "Please don't think me ungrateful," Mollie read, "but all sorts of things seem to be happening, and I'm so afraid of hurting you after all your kindness. Perhaps I'd better come to the point straight away and explain afterwards. I don't think I can accept your offer of Lennox Street for Monty and myself after all." Mollie

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XI

XI

"But, darling—oh, don't go on like this! Can't you see that if I go I can clear up everything in half an hour? It's much the best!" Joan's manner was stony and impregnable. She stared straight before her. "I don't mind being left quite, quite alone," was her reply. "But I shall be back again on Wednesday, foolish child, and I'll wire you everything immediately if it costs me the whole of my quarter's pocket-money. Anything's better than this!" "Just as you like," came the expressionless response

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XII

XII

There was no help for it, Philip has since told me. He simply had to tell her everything. She was, in fact, in possession of the whole story long before any of the rest of us. But even she had to wait yet a little longer. When, at half-past nine that Monday night her taxi drew up at the wrought-iron gate in Lennox Street, Philip was out and the place was in darkness. She had no key. "Go on to Oakley Street," she ordered the driver. Audrey Cunningham was at home. Mollie found her, alone, in her f

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XIII

XIII

Philip himself opened the door to her. She gave her cheek to be kissed and then walked straight in. "Is Monty here?" were her first words. "No. I think he's gone out for a walk." "A walk, at this time of night!" Philip shrugged his shoulders. "What brings you here, Mollie?" he said. She was busy untying her veil. "What do you suppose? Everything, of course." "Have you had dinner or supper?" "I had a cup of cocoa at Audrey Cunningham's, and don't want anything else. Now why didn't you answer my t

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PART IV THE MAN IN THE PUBLIC-HOUSE

PART IV THE MAN IN THE PUBLIC-HOUSE

[Pg 128] [Pg 129]...

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I

I

As an eager and passionate student of the Life of my day there are, within limits, few places that I don't visit and few people I don't on occasion talk to. I say "within limits," since I admit that there may be grades at one end of the scale at which I draw the line, while at the other end there may conceivably be those who draw the line at me. But within these extremes, if not always familiarly, yet on the whole without constraint, I sup at coffee-stalls or dine in quite good company more or l

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II

II

The first that Esdaile knew of all this was from the younger of Mollie's two maids. Monty and Audrey had arranged to dispense with the services of these two domestics, but Philip, still lingering on, had wanted the younger one at least back. She had promised to come, but had not done so, and Philip had sought her out. Thereupon she had said that she would rather not come. "Why?" Philip had asked; but she had given no satisfactory reason. He had then turned to the second maid, but with no better

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III

III

The flat in which I live with the old housekeeper who looks after me is not in Chelsea at all, but a quarter of an hour's walk away, just round the corner from Queen's Gate. It is exceedingly comfortable (as indeed it should be considering the rent I am made to pay for it), I have my own furniture, and on the whole I don't ask for a much better place to work in. For, quite apart from my paper, I do work, and I don't want to give you the impression that the whole of my leisure time is given over

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IV

IV

While I spoke Billy had risen, and was pretending to examine the prints on my walls. I continued to talk; talking was, in fact, my morning's work that day. I finished, and there was a long silence. I thought my barrister-friend would never have done looking at those prints. Then suddenly he crossed over to my table and stood leaning lightly on his fingertips. "Why wasn't I told this sooner?" he asked, his eyes brightly on mine. For a moment I thought he meant that our neglect to inform him had l

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V

V

The surface indications were of course of the very slightest. So far they consisted merely of the photograph in the Roundabout , my speculations whether Hodgson had anything up his sleeve, and similar trifles. But others were pending. The danger of the coroner's inquest might be safely past, but at least half a dozen other rocks loomed immediately ahead. The Aiglon Company, for example, would want to know what had gone wrong with their machine, and the manufacturers would be even more interested

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VI

VI

"Foreman? You may well say foreman! But he hasn't finished with me yet! You've seen what it says in to-day's Roundabout , haven't you? Very well, young-fellow-me-lad; you watch it! They laugh best that laugh last. It isn't over yet!" I was grinding my teeth behind my copy of the paper he had just mentioned. The thick-headed fool had done it. I was not reading the paper; I was merely using it to hide behind as I stood at the Public-house counter with one foot on the brass rail. "Over? It hasn't b

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VII

VII

I had bought that copy of the Roundabout myself, but I knew that that was in no sense the point. Without a word I handed it to Mr. Westbury. My second glass of beer was placed before me, and as I half turned to get a coin from my pocket I felt, positively felt, their eyes on me. I also felt their removal as I took up my change and resumed my former attitude. Westbury had taken the paper with a "Thank you, sir." "Ah, it's open at the very page. Begin here, Tom," he said. "'If civil aviation is to

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VIII

VIII

I ask you to notice several untenable points about the position I had taken up. Twice at least I had flatly lied, once when I had told him that I had not seen Mackwith since the morning of the accident, and once when I had given him to understand that I knew nothing of the police search of Esdaile's premises. I say nothing of the greater lie, that we were all ready to help him in his efforts to get to the bottom of the Case. I count that as more the natural momentum the Case itself had now acqui

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PART V SOME BYWAYS OF THE CASE

PART V SOME BYWAYS OF THE CASE

[Pg 170] [Pg 171]...

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I

I

Strictly speaking, it is not on the Santon headland that Charles Valentine ("Chummy") Smith ought to make his first appearance in this story; but it was there that I myself first saw him, and I want to give you my impression of him as I received it, if at the cost of taking a slight liberty with time. So I first set these eyes on him during a month I spent with the Esdailes somewhat later in that year. I may say to begin with that he would probably have passed unnoticed among the innumerable oth

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II

II

I repeat, at a first glance he was very like the rest of the young fellows of his day; but I admit there was something about him that grew on you. After watching him for a while I decided that this ascendancy was principally in his eyes. I do not wish to overwork the popular clichés of fire and flash and smolder; Smith's eyes certainly had something of this quality; but it was combined with an expression that, until I can define it better, I will risk calling discontent. I don't mean by this the

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III

III

To look at, he had not in the very least the air of a man over whose head a terrible menace hung. Indeed, I have rarely sat down at a table with a less personally odious young murderer. He was lithe and of a darkish brown complexion, a perfect anatomy of graven and incised muscle when later I saw him bathe, and with hands the movements of which were full of power and grace. Then there were his eyes. Of all his features his mouth was that which communicated the least, except when he smiled. With

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IV

IV

But as you were. The peep-hole must be closed again. From the point of view of the unities Charles Valentine Smith is still lying in a hospital cot, writing daily but brief notes to Joan, forbidding her to come up, and receiving countless boxes of tightly-packed Santon flowers. We are in London again, during the last days of May. One morning I had knocked off my private work rather earlier than usual (I had, in fact, been quite unable to settle down properly to it), and, to fill in the time befo

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V

V

On that day when I called at Lennox Street and received no answer to my ringing I stepped back from the door and looked up at the house again. Little trace of the accident now remained. The broken mulberry branch had been neatly sawn off and the smaller branches trimmed. The blinds were drawn, the French window clamped up, and quite obviously there was nobody there. This, as I have said, surprised me, since, even if Esdaile had gone away without letting me know, I had certainly expected to find

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VI

VI

He did. His face did so before ever he spoke. In a moment I knew that something had happened about that wedding—certainly that it had been put off, possibly worse. Still without speaking he showed me in. He was lunching, or rather making a combination meal of lunch and breakfast in one. A single glance round the room told me a good deal about the state of mind of its occupant. I have been hard-up myself, and know these symptoms of negligence of body, mind and surroundings. He was fully dressed,

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VII

VII

In my anxiety to set him talking after his own fashion I had not yet asked him anything about what had passed between Esdaile and Smith; but I intended to do so. For, just as Monty himself had been the first obstacle to Philip's letting us into the heart of his mystery straight away, so Smith, you will remember, had since blocked the current of disclosure. Philip had had to see Smith before taking the next step, and, as I had pre-figured the matter, he would go to the hospital one day as soon as

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VIII

VIII

I recognized the more readily the separate and inhuman vitality this Case of ours was beginning to assume when I carefully considered its action upon myself. My connection with it was slight by comparison with that of some of the others, but I was aware of its operation. The attitudes into which it began to constrain me were not quite natural attitudes. It exercised pressure. What pressure? Well, to begin with, this pressure—that I began to find it difficult to leave it alone. Both at home and a

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IX

IX

It was a little later, when we came to speak of the optophone, that I found him to be still firmly rooted in the conviction that Esdaile's cellar contained the solution of at least a portion of our mystery. He was quite unshakable on this point. I will not trouble to re-state his recapitulation of the events of the morning of the farewell breakfast. Of subsequent events, I may say, he knew little. "Well, I won't pretend to understand you," I said at last. "If you seriously think that Esdaile's g

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X

X

Then one morning I had a letter from Joan Merrow, which I give you without the alteration of a single word. If you yourself have a modern young Anthea who may command you anything and does not hesitate to do so I accept your sympathy in advance. The letter ran:— " Dear Old Thing , "Do be an angel and do one or two little things for me. I'd rather ask you than anybody else because you're the kindest person I know. If you're too busy of course you'll say so straight out, but what I want first of a

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PART VI THE MAN IN THE CLUB

PART VI THE MAN IN THE CLUB

[Pg 210] [Pg 211]...

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I

I

I always have the lurking feeling that Democracy would be all right but for its numbers. I am aware that this sounds paradoxical, and that in its numbers is supposed to lie its strength, but I do not see how that can ever be a properly directed executive strength. There are too many cooks. Taken one at a time, how admirable are its impulses, how just in the main its judgments! But block-vote it——! Take away its trust in Princes and put it in Polls——! Convert its votes, not into effective action,

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II

II

Whitaker, in its "list of London Clubs," describes my own as "Social": that is to say, that I and my fellow-members have no common bond of occupation or interest other than that of pleasant good-fellowship. We are drawn from all professions, and this gives me an opportunity I value highly, namely, that of hearing scraps of the "shop" of other men when I am bored to death with my own. Saturday nights, when there is no morrow's issue of my paper to "put to bed," usually find me in the smoking-room

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III

III

For a time nothing was heard in the smoking-room but the rustle of the turning papers and the clink of a coffee-cup in a saucer. Sluggishly—for the idleness that had latterly overmastered me tired me to my very marrow—I was comparing Hay's words with what Cecil Hubbard had said on the same subject. "Continuity of manufacture and the training of men"—you might call this "civil" aviation if you liked, but according to both men it was indistinguishable from the question of national defense. And, fu

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IV

IV

Besides being Ringmaster-in-Chief of the Daily Circus and of a good many other journals, Lord Glenfield is a very good friend of mine; but he had never rung me up at my Club before. He was speaking from his house in Portman Square, and he wanted to know whether I was leaving the Club immediately, and if not whether he might come round. I was a little surprised, but told him to come by all means; and he said he would be along in twenty minutes. Now Glenfield is a very much feared man, and with re

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V

V

Let me see, how many does that make—I mean when, half an hour later, I had given him as much as I then knew of the outline of this story? How many people were parties in greater or less degree to the highly important public matter that we were struggling to keep from the light of day? There were the five men at our breakfast-party: Esdaile, Rooke, Mackwith, Hubbard and myself. And the three women: Mrs. Esdaile, Mrs. Cunningham and Joan. Westbury, and an unknown number of his associates; and Insp

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VI

VI

I quite realize that we can't all be Glenfields. I don't suppose it would do to have the world so over-oxygenated—for he is the oxygen as against the democratic nitrogen of our modern atmosphere. He was probably right in calling my scrupulous objections pedantic, but I confess that his power would affright me did I not trust him in the main to use it rightly. If he chose to send a note to a Secretary of State requesting that special permission for a civilian to be excepted from the Regulations s

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VII

VII

As I walked along the Cromwell Road I could not but be put in mind of the last occasion when I had called at Esdaile's studio—that midday when I had found all locked up, Rooke departed, and had run him to earth in his old quarters in Jubilee Place. I have spoken of Mrs. Cunningham as an enigmatic sort of person, possibly as much an enigma to herself as to others, and inspiring more of compassion and kindness than of that other feeling that is supposed to be akin to these. Now I could not help wo

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VIII

VIII

Fantastic as had been the thoughts that during that fraction of time had whirled through my brain, the little gold circlet lying in my palm seemed to propound questions more fantastic still. How in the name of all that was inexplicable had Mrs. Cunningham's engagement-ring come to be there? Each momentary explanation at which I grasped seemed more lunatic than the rest. Had she simply lost it, sought for it and been unable to find it? Had it rolled of itself into that little five-eighths hole? A

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IX

IX

And yet, approaching the truth as I felt myself to be, I had a deep-down feeling that at the same time I was wrong. Carefully I begun to examine the objections to my suddenly-formed theory, and instantly I was impressed by them. In the first place, take an inch board with a five-eighths hole in it, peep through, and see how much, or rather how little, of a field of vision your eye commands. Next, consider the awkwardness of peering through that hole, not in a vertical wall or door, but in horizo

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PART VII THE KING'S ROAD

PART VII THE KING'S ROAD

[Pg 242] [Pg 243]...

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I

I

When Philip Esdaile had put into old William Dadley's hands the framing of two of his pictures I think he had done so largely on compassionate grounds. As you have seen, his real reason for having the old man round to Lennox Street that afternoon a few weeks ago had had remarkably little to do with pictures, but quite a lot to do with a bullet that a child had been found popping in and out of his mouth. But having made framing his pretext, I suppose he felt bound to give Dadley a job. I became s

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II

II

From the point of view of my profession the story he told me was not without interest. I give it for what it may be worth, not as an instance of mental abnormality, but merely as it bore on our Case. I have said that Westbury was about thirty-five, which means that he was still under thirty when the war broke out. It is no man's business, certainly not mine, to enter into the question whether he should or could have joined up, nor whether he would have been of much use if he had. His interest to

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III

III

One thing at any rate now seemed fairly certain, namely, that if what Dadley told me was true it was not likely that a man of Inspector Webster's penetration would pay much attention to the mutterings of an incipient megalomaniac. For, if I could guess at the signs at all, it was megalomania. I have not made a systematic analysis of those infinitely intricate mental states that we speak of conglomerately as "war nerves." I am not prepared to say that one man may bitterly grudge another something

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IV

IV

What a change for the better! He had shaved, his boots shone, the soft collar round his neck was a clean one and his gray tie was fastidiously tied. His face had a brightness again, he was engaged in the pleasant ordinary task of buying groceries, and Dadley had just told me that he was framing "paspertoos" for him. Was another of the clouds of the Case breaking up?... On the spot I decided to lunch with him, and told him so. "All right, but the eggs are up to you," he said. Inside his little de

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V

V

"Now what was his game, do you think?" Monty asked again. "He was giving you a piece of wholesome advice," I answered promptly. "But 'You stop adopting things; you might—ahem!—blow your fingers off.' He said it like that. I haven't put in the 'ahem.' That was his. It looks to me as if he knew about that pistol." "It has very much that look," I agreed blandly. "But how? I can't understand yet how Esdaile knew, but this Police Inspector——!" "'Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice

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VI

VI

To tell the truth, that ring was beginning to worry me a little. I don't mean my possession of it, since I had no intention of pawning it, and was prepared to hand it over to its rightful owner as soon as I felt that that course would not do more harm than good. My concern was about the severed relation of which it had been a symbol. I wondered whether I was not perhaps a little excessively delicate on Monty's behalf. If my eyes, wandering round his tidy room, had encountered a copy of the Era o

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PART VIII AT SANTON

PART VIII AT SANTON

[Pg 266] [Pg 267]...

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I

I

"For goodness' sake, Joan, stop chattering just for a few minutes!" Philip broke out testily. "If you don't want to sit, say so and have done with it. This is enough to drive anybody mad!" I had been wondering how much longer his patience would hold out. When an artist is in difficulties with his canvas, motor-bicycle talk for an hour on end can be extremely wearing. Joan looked up with aggravating sweetness. "What, Philip?" she inquired. "I say if you don't want to sit, off you go on the confou

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II

II

Ordinarily I do not find it easy to talk to very young men. I have been as young as they, but they have not been as old as I, and I know this but they do not. Young women—that is another matter, and I will make a very candid confession. I now envy these youngsters their youth. I envied Smith his youth. Despite his limp, I was conscious of his tallness and lissomness as he hobbled by my side. And I will add that it is not an unmixed joy to be asked to do a young goddess's shopping for her because

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III

III

He spoke the name with the most perfect readiness and simplicity; there was neither tremor in his voice nor the faintest sign of pain in his dark and steady eyes. He was not even self-conscious under my (I admit) prolonged and deliberate gaze. By what mystery of self-absolution he had expunged the sinister fact for which Esdaile vouched I could not tell. He repeated Bobby's name. "Yes, Bobby was your man for all that. Fearfully hot stuff. When Bobby opened his mouth I used to dry up." Then, stil

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IV

IV

He knew very little about himself—hardly seemed aware that there was anything of importance to know. It was all Maxwell—"Bobby was the whole show." And I had a very keen sense of the honor the dead man had done himself in denying this. "Frightfully hot stuff on maths," said Smith; and the world is full of men who are "frightfully hot stuff on maths," in that sense; but it is rarely that you find one of these not too absorbed in the technique and detail of his own activi ties to be aware of a vis

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V

V

Why did I not say straight out to him, "Look here, my young friend, this is all extremely interesting, but what I don't understand is why you shoot a man and then carry his picture on your wrist. In plain English, now, why did you shoot him—always supposing you did?" Well, I was trying to put myself in his place—trying to picture a friendship such as he had had with this wistful, self-effacing young fatalist whose picture I had just handed back to him. I have told you how the more poignant of th

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VI

VI

Her start could hardly have been more sudden had I asked her where Alan was a few moments after he had been seen playing at the cliff's edge. "Audrey Cunningham? She was at Harrogate last, I think—or Scarboro—why?" "Why was her engagement broken off?" She made an abrupt, impatient gesture. Evidently I had plunged her back into an older mood. "Oh, I don't know! I'm tired to death of—of everything! Why do you want to remind me of it? I was just beginning to forget a little. Oh, why didn't we leave

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VII

VII

On the hot loose sand above the highest seaweed I made her sit down. Presently she had recovered a little. Her manner was now undoubtedly that of a person on whose back a half-withdrawn burden is reimposed. But she shouldered it. "Where did you get it?" she asked, her eyes on the ring in my palm. "Do you remember Philip asking me to pack up some sketches for him and sending me his key?" "He did say something about it. Monty had left." "I found the ring on the Sunday afternoon I went for the sket

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VIII

VIII

It struck me even then that the moment Mrs. Cunningham's name was introduced there was introduced also something of that sex-antagonism—perhaps I had better modify that and say sex-difference—for which her personal story had given her such bitter reason. Here now was Mollie, suddenly and in the middle of our tête-à-tête , abolishing me as an individual and saddling me with the collective qualities of men in general. And I must remind you once more that as a matter of mere historical sequence I w

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PART IX WHAT PHILIP KNEW

PART IX WHAT PHILIP KNEW

[Pg 294] [Pg 295]...

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I

I

The other day, accompanied by an engineer acquaintance, I was pottering about certain new excavations in the heart of London, and came upon a number of heaps of crushed and broken-up concrete, evidently the remains of old foundations. Yet those foundations could not have been very old, since I myself could remember the buildings of which they had been the support, and these had been old-fashioned rather than old. One of them had been a theater, another an hotel; and I stood there with my friend,

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II

II

So that conjuror's passion-flower to which I have likened this case all but folded itself up into its original pilule again. That it did not do so was due to a series of small happenings which I will now relate. The first of these was my leaving Santon before Mrs. Cunningham arrived there. Mollie, despite her energy, did not discover her friend's whereabouts so easily as she had anticipated. It took her, to be precise, a fortnight, at the end of which time I had to leave. But so narrowly did I m

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III

III

Instead of going straight to the office that morning I waited in some ante-room or other while Monty took in his drawing. Somebody else waiting there, who may or may not have known me, observed that it was a fine morning, but I am not sure that I replied. I was in no mood for exchanging casual remarks about the weather. For while I still marveled—and I need hardly say rejoiced—admiration and joy must wait for the present. It might be some little time before I saw Monty again (he had told me he w

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IV

IV

This record has already taken so many turns and windings, anticipations and doublings back upon itself, that I cannot see that one more excursion will either make or mar it. Many pages ago I wrote that the Case was a Case, complete, self-contained, and independent of the larger issues and forces in which it is nevertheless paradoxically rooted and involved. And though the Case as an entity is approaching its close, the outside influences continue. The Scepter decision, for example, is being appe

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V

V

Again the breakfast recess was full of charming light. About the walls the love-making butterflies danced when carafes were moved, and only the flowers on the table were different—for it was early in a halcyon autumn, and the mulberry outside had already begun to turn. The faces of the Esdailes and the Rookes were enviably brown, for Monty and Audrey had spent three weeks at Santon and the whole party had returned together; and Joan, who knows perfectly well that I adore her, had very simply and

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VI

VI

"Well, you know what the first question is," said Hubbard. "Let's have it," Philip replied. "Better not take anything for granted." "Very well. About that other morning. What were you doing down below all that time?" "Moving furniture," Philip replied. "Moving ... what for?" "I'll show you that presently." "Good.... Next, when you did come up again, what made you march straight up to Rooke in the way you did?" "Because he had that pistol in his pocket." "How did you know he had a pistol in his p

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VII

VII

"Why, you've changed it all!" was Monty Rooke's first exclamation as Philip stood there with the candle held at arm's-length. As for myself, I was looking round the dark, clammy place with a positive passion of curiosity. That it had been rearranged I knew at once from Monty's former description of it. The dust-sheeted furniture and packing-cases had been pushed back against the walls, leaving the middle of the floor clear, and once more the candlelight barely penetrated into the gloomy recesses

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VIII

VIII

On the floor? Rather on the roof itself, for, spread out over the floor, was a perfect image of that glazed studio roof high above us. The divisions between the panes were marvelously penciled there, and about one of them, though not the one I had expected, the browning branches of the mulberry crept and played. Something darted across and was gone—a bird. And it was too late to bet now, for the book was closed. By merely seeing that the roof-blinds were open, and then pushing away a rug with hi

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IX

IX

He had a taxi waiting, and the driver was getting the boxes on as we reached the annexe again. Philip carried in his hand the jar of orange curaçao. "Get the liqueur-glasses out, Monty," he said, and the words sounded remotely familiar. "Where are my darling babies?" Joan cried, darting out into the garden where the Esdaile boys played beneath the mulberry. Philip and Mollie had decided that the best and cheapest thing to do with them was to pack them off to a preparatory school, and for a month

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