CHAPTER VIGOD—OR DEVIL?
THE THING on the table was a diminutive image, about three and a half inches high. It was carved, apparently, from a single block of the most perfect jade, and when the sergeant, fingering it delicately, held it toward the window, the light filtered through it, illuminating it with striking translucency. The base was perhaps two and a half inches square, supporting a tiny throne, on which sat a figure clothed in flowing robes. Each individual drape and fold was produced with absolute fidelity. The hands of the figure were folded, showing narrow finger-nails of extreme length; and though the general suggestion was that of the god Buddha, Derrick remembered that in such images as he had seen the right hand was raised in benediction.
But there was no benediction here. The head was bent slightly forward, the slits of Oriental eyes were represented as half closed, and over the whole face rested an expression of utter and fiendish malignity. One could not imagine anything more devilish and cruel. There was power in the face, an abysmal knowledge that penetrated all human frailty and disguise, and a certain fixed, implacable purpose. Derrick had spent hours in secret scrutiny of the thing, and it seemed to him that here was the presentment of the embodiment of evil, and, fixed with an infinity of patient art, there had been transmitted to this opaque and precious stone the picture of some soul, wicked and irretrievably damned. Even now as he stared a chill ran through his body, and he glanced at the sergeant to determine whether he, too, were not susceptible to this malign emanation.
“I don’t know that I ever saw a more ugly thing in my life,” said the latter slowly. “Where did you find it, sir?”
“It’s not much use at the moment to try and tell you what led up to that. I can only say that ever since going into the house I have been conscious of something. I had no reason to believe that anything of this kind existed there, and in spite of what you have said I can’t quite see that this is really evidence, as yet. All we know is that it used to stand on Millicent’s desk and was missed after the murder. It may be the thing that both Martin and Perkins were seeking, but it was removed during that half-hour of which we spoke.”
“My first move would be to confront them both with this thing when they didn’t expect it, and watch what happened.”
“I’m afraid I can’t agree with you there. I’ve never studied your profession but fancy you’d get as much out of them as out of the image itself. Perkins has been under very close observation for weeks without knowing it, and her face is a mask. Martin is much the same. The minds of both of them are foreign countries, so far as we are concerned.”
The sergeant leaned forward. There was no doubt about his attitude now. “Perhaps you’re right, sir, but what is in your mind as to the next move?”
“I haven’t gone far enough to say, and there’s an old proverb about hurrying slowly. Meantime I’d like to know whether you agree that to-day there are aspects of the case that so far have not been considered at all?”
“In fairness to you, sir, I must admit that.”
“Then you’ll also agree that of the two ways of approaching it the inductive method is the only one to be considered?”
Burke was genuinely puzzled and showed it. “I’m afraid I don’t quite follow you there, Mr. Derrick. It sounds like one of those magazine stories where the police always fall down and the amateur pulls the thing off.”
Derrick laughed. “I’ve an idea the police won’t fall down this time if they adopt the right method—at least the method that I would follow myself.”
The sergeant looked at him curiously. “And how would you start in this case, may I ask?”
“Not knowing who the murderer is, let us assume one and proceed on that assumption. We can safely say that he did his work between nine and ten at night. We assume also that he did not come with any murderous intent, unless, and this is a point that must be carefully considered, unless he knew that there was on Mr. Millicent’s desk a weapon suitable for his purpose. We also assume that he knew about the image, though for some reason he denied this, and, more than that, believed that it had something to do with some act that weighed against him—say, in the Orient. Mr. Millicent also knew this, and therefore concealed it, and thereby maintained his hold over the criminal—or the man who finally became the criminal. That the image should have remained undisturbed for two years points to the absence of the criminal for that period.”
Derrick paused for a moment and looked hard at the sergeant. “Are you with me thus far?”
“Yes, go on, sir,” was the tense answer.
“Well, add to that the characteristics of Perkins and Martin, and there remains the doubt as to whether the woman actually did run to Mrs. Millicent’s room the minute she made the discovery. Admit the possibility that she actually saw the murder committed, and, having secret reasons for sparing Martin, allowed him to return to the cottage before giving the alarm. Assume, for instance, that she was terrified by Martin into doing this.”
The sergeant struck his clenched fist into his palm. “By God, sir! but that’s more than likely.”
“There’s nothing in the evidence to prevent it being the case except the testimony of two persons who you believe know more than was drawn out. It simply involves the reversal of the sequence of two actions to both of which Perkins was sworn. To-day she is to all appearances a broken-hearted woman. Why? Two reasons; one that the master to whom she was so undoubtedly devoted was killed; the other that for fear of her own life she has committed herself to the protection of the criminal. In this connection there’s a very interesting point. When Martin came to me and asked for a job, I made a point of privately inquiring from Perkins whether, from all she knew of him, and under all the circumstances, I would do well to take him on. Her answer was that if I wanted a garden like Mr. Millicent’s I should take him. It seems to me now that she was afraid of what would happen if she said anything else.”
“Yes, sir, that fits in perfectly.”
Derrick got up and relit his pipe. “Then, I think we might let the matter rest there for a while, and I won’t trouble you any further this morning. If it is decided to do anything later on, it will all be done through you, as I do not wish to appear in the thing at all.”
“Very good, sir, and if I can help, which I’d like to, I’ll go as far as my duties permit, and maybe”—here the sergeant grinned meaningly—“a bit further.” He pointed to the jade god. “Had I better keep this thing here?”
Derrick shook his head, picked up the image gingerly, and slipped it in his pocket.
“No, thanks, I want to use it for a while. By the way, do you know whether I can get a couple of pounds of green wax in Bamberley?”
Jean Millicent’s unpremeditated visit to Beech Lodge had marked a turning-point in the long, gray months that followed her father’s death. The violence and brutality of this had shocked her beyond words, while to her sense of loss was added the numbing knowledge that on the very threshold of life she had been confronted with the worst that life had to exhibit. Millicent himself had had no surviving relations; her mother’s people, after the first horrified sympathy, did not allow the matter to burden them further; and, as the girl impulsively told Derrick, she felt tremendously alone.
Between mother and daughter there was complete love—and a limited understanding. The real link had been with Millicent, from whom Jean inherited the subjective side of her nature. She had a profound belief in mysterious influences, incapable of analysis, but controlling nevertheless the world of unseen things. She realized that she moved among these, swaying unconsciously to their faint pressure, the recipient of distant and unmistakable signals that flicked over the horizon of existence. She had never talked much about this with her father. His own belief had of late been too burdened with an apprehension she never fathomed. But she understood where her mother often failed to understand, silently completing the sentences he sometimes left unfinished, putting her mind parallel with his, and building up a queer unexplainable union that expressed itself not so much in speech as in those fleeting glances of comprehension that are more eloquent than any words.
Something of this she recognized in Derrick, and the psychology of the moment was such that it meant more than she could well express. While she was with her mother, her heart needed no other companion, though her spirit was lonely. But she had not been lonely during her visit to Beech Lodge, however strange the circumstances. She knew now that the visit was intended. For the first time she had been in touch with another intelligence that acknowledged what she acknowledged but remained poised and unafraid. It was like traveling through an unknown and threatening country, and meeting one to whom all its roads are familiar and who traverses them without fear.
A few days after Derrick’s visit to the sergeant, he and his sister walked two lovely miles to the Millicents’. Edith was glad of it for several reasons. She admitted being lonely, and also welcomed anything that lifted her brother out of himself. For the past few weeks she had watched him closely, saying nothing. He was less distrait and more like his old self, but she knew that the novel progressed not at all. He was busy in his own peculiar way, and she asked no questions.
She was charmed with Mrs. Millicent, found they had much in common, and noted with contentment that Jean and her brother seemed like old friends. While all four were together, the subject of Beech Lodge was instinctively avoided, but a little later Derrick found himself in the cottage garden with Jean. It was after a pause that she sent him a straight questioning look.
“Well, I’m waiting. Something tells me you’ve been very busy and, I think, successful.”
“Busy, yes,” he smiled, “but I don’t know how successful.”
“Did you have a long talk at the police station?”
“Fairly long. The sergeant regarded me at first as most officials regard the amateur, but he was interested before I left. It seems that he regards your father’s case as the one unsatisfactory spot on his record. It’s odd to talk to a man who is so blunt and at the same time has to admit that he’s beaten.”
“But you haven’t told me yet. I know by your face there’s something.”
“Yes,” he admitted, “there is. Will you let me know what you can about a small image that came from Burma?”
“The jade god?” she said swiftly.
“Yes—or devil.”
“How extraordinary! Have you come to that, too?”
“Or else it came to me. Look!”
She shrank involuntarily, then, without touching the thing he had taken from his pocket, stared at it closely.
“Are there two? Where did you find that?”
“No,” he smiled, “this is a cast in green wax made from a mold I took of the image itself. I—” he hesitated—“I did not like to carry the original about with me.”
“I think you are very wise, but where did you find the original?” Her eyes were full of wonder.
“It happened a week ago, the day before I went to see Sergeant Burke. I was in the study, looking at your father’s portrait as I often do, when it seemed more than ever that he was trying to tell me something. That has often been the case before, but never as vividly. He wanted to speak, and I believe he was speaking, but not in a language I could understand. Then I got up and stood in front of him and could have sworn the expression of his eyes changed. They appeared to be looking down at something below himself and not far away. Without knowing it I put out my hand as though to meet an invisible one held out to me, and touched the oak frame on the side of the mantel. You know those old carvings?”
“Yes,” she said breathlessly.
“It was just under the upper one. Then I heard a click, and a small panel fell forward, opening a tiny cupboard about six inches square. The original of this thing was inside, as though it had been waiting for me. I did not touch it at once but looked up, and there was a sort of relief in the painted eyes.”
“Go on; please go on!”
“I haven’t much more to say, as yet, except that to my knowledge both Perkins and Martin have searched the study for something I take to be the original of this. There’s one other thing to be found now. Evidence was given that it was there that evening and has not been seen since.”
“I know what that is.”
“Well, I have an idea it’s not far away.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I don’t know, but I feel it. Meantime will you tell me what you know of the image?”
“Father brought it back from Burma about seven years ago,” she said slowly, “and seemed both to love and fear it. I have always thought it terrible, as though half the evil in the world had been captured in that bit of green stone. From the time he brought it back he himself appeared to change. I felt that the more because we were very near each other, he and I, and he believed what you believe. We never talked much about it, as that didn’t seem necessary. As to the image, I knew it was somewhere in the study but didn’t know where. No one did. All he ever said about it was that he got it up country. I have seen Perkins come in when it was on the desk, try not to look at it, then stare as though fascinated.”
“Did Martin ever see it?” put in Derrick.
“Yes, and it had the same effect on him. I often wanted to smile at grown people feeling like that, but somehow I couldn’t.”
“Then, if either Perkins or Martin wanted it there would have been no great difficulty in stealing it?”
“Perhaps not, but I had a queer idea that though their fingers itched for it they were afraid to touch it.”
“Yet it kept Perkins at Beech Lodge, and brought Martin back half round the world. It sent out vibrations to which they had to respond.”
“You believe that?”
He nodded.
“It all fits in,” she admitted slowly. “Always in the study I’ve felt some kind of war going on between influences; good fighting with evil. Father used to feel that, too. The room found its own voice and spoke, and against that was the voice of the jade god, confusing and confounding everything with threatening messages.”
“And you are satisfied there was no common interest between Perkins and Martin?”
“I don’t see how that could be. She never had anything to do with him and didn’t even like having him about the house. I never saw them together.”
“May I ask if you know what your father actually did in Burma?”
“No, sometimes he talked about the Mong Hills, but he never made any money in the Orient and used to come back saying that he had been in touch with strange things and people. That used to content him, but latterly he sometimes used to look desperate. As to money, we have always had enough to live quietly.”
“Do you think he had any premonitions of death?”
“No, I’m sure of that. Once he said that it was harder to live than die, so he expected to live a long time.”
“Was that after his last trip?”
“Yes.”
Derrick was silent for a moment. “Does Mrs. Millicent know that I’m working on this?” he asked presently.
She sent him a quick smile. “Yes, and she thinks it’s tremendously kind of you but that it can’t come to anything.”
“My sister knows, too, and can’t see the point, either.”
“She would feel that it is interfering with your work. I feel it, too, and it may prevent a splendid book from being written. Am I tremendously selfish?”
He looked at her steadily, and her eyes met his without flinching. She stood, tall, slim, and straight, with a proud carriage to her head and a broad serenity of brow. Imagination was in her face, the beauty of whose contour filled him with a sort of comforting satisfaction. It was firm but gentle, courageous but sweet. Her eyes were a little wistful, and charged with changing lights and shadows that he found infinitely appealing. She awakened both heart and spirit, and he knew she could awaken his soul. What would it be like to be cared for by such a girl? He felt that already there existed between them something more than friendship.
“Will you forgive me for putting you through such an inquisition?” he asked.
“There is nothing to forgive, and everything to thank you for.”
“I think you are very brave.”
“Brave! It is you who are brave. We have no claim, no reason why you should be involved in all this.”
“And yet,” he said thoughtfully, “I was involved before we two ever met.” He made a sudden impulsive gesture, but it was his eyes that spoke next.
She smiled gravely, and at that smile he knew that another voice had reached him from the unknown. It carried no mysterious threat; it was unburdened with tragedy; it emanated neither from wood nor stone nor a jade devil. It was part of the rest, but all grace and purity and joy; a whisper of life, not death. What sped between them then he could never tell, but some echo of that whisper must have reached Jean, for her glance, strange and lingering and perhaps prophetic, met his own for a memorable instant while the color climbed delicately to her smooth cheeks.
“You see,” she said softly, “unless I can think of myself as having shaken all this off, and laid the ghost of uncertainty and, yes, fear, I can never have any real future.”
He pressed her slim fingers. “Don’t worry about the future,” he whispered.
Edith was very cheerful on the way home. She had had a long talk with Mrs. Millicent, promised her Derrick’s last book, found they had mutual friends, and in general enjoyed herself. It was a relief to be with some one professedly practical. Also she was beginning to entertain a shrewd suspicion that her brother was rather more than interested in Jean and turned the conversation in that direction before long. She chatted away, swinging her stick and feeling more at peace with herself than for some time past.
“I don’t think they’ll stay there very long,” she hazarded. “It’s too lonely. Mrs. Millicent spoke of France for the summer and feels that Jean should have a change. It’s no place for a girl like that.”
“Oh!” said Derrick uncomfortably.
“From what I gathered she blames herself for having stayed there at all. It seems she wanted to move away altogether, but Jean wouldn’t have it. She’s worried about the child and says that she cannot shake the dreadful thing off, which isn’t a healthy state of affairs at that age. You two hit it off very well, Jack, from what I saw. You had a regular conference.”
He laughed. “Did we?”
“Didn’t you? You ought to know. I never realized fully before what a variety of interests you seem to demand. First you come into the country to write a novel—and, by the way, you’ll notice I’ve said nothing about the novel recently—then you switch off to a murder case, and I haven’t mentioned that either recently, and the latest development is a perfectly new young woman of undoubted charm, of whom I begin to have suspicions.”
“And of whom perhaps you won’t say anything at all,” he parried.
Edith nodded. “Nothing could arouse feminine intuition more than that remark. However, she’s awfully attractive.”
Derrick grinned. “Suppose we leave it at that.”
“All right, brother, but just in case my feminine intuition happens to be right, I wouldn’t take Miss Millicent too seriously.”
“You’re very oracular to-day, Edith. What is it?”
“Her mother practically said that she didn’t understand that girl, but did know that she still felt very strangely about her father’s death.”
“One can imagine that.”
“Yes, of course, but it works in a curious way on her mind. She imagines herself linked with it in some odd fashion and won’t think of marrying till the thing is cleared up, which, of course, it never will be now. She argues that she has her father’s blood and all that, and she may have inherited some kind of threat or danger or whatever it was that killed him. The very idea seems grotesque to me, but there you are.”
“What else did Mrs. Millicent say?”
“Very little more about Jean, and nothing of her husband, but she did talk about Perkins and Martin. I suppose she wanted to reassure me.”
“Anything new about them?”
“Nothing much. Perkins seems to have been just as invaluable to them as she is to me. You know, Jack, I’ve rather changed my mind about that woman.”
“In what way? Perkins hasn’t changed that I can see.”
“Not a fraction. She looks just as forbidding and severe and wet-blankety as ever, and that used to worry me more than you ever knew. Also I was puzzled about you, and the influence the place seemed to be getting over you, upsetting your work. I’ve got over that now, and Perkins has turned out a regular trump. I’m beginning to see what’s behind that manner of hers.”
“I wish I could.”
“Jack, it’s only that of a broken-hearted woman, her way of expressing it, and nothing else. Yet in spite of that she’s a household treasure. Things do themselves; there’s no lost energy and no lost time. If Perkins could be duplicated in sufficient quantities she’d revolutionize domestic life in England.”
“It’s a pity she’s never married and started a new breed.”
Edith decapitated a surviving thistle. “That kind doesn’t marry very often. They’re born into the world without any desire for marriage, and perhaps it’s just as well in this case. She’d be working for her husband and not for us. Marriage,” she added quizzically, “isn’t the solution for everything.”
“But why do you say she’s broken-hearted?”
“Because of a queer thing that happened last night. I wasn’t going to say anything about it, but you’re so unusually sensible to-day that it doesn’t matter. I was lying half awake last night, and seemed to hear some one talking at a little distance with no attempt at concealment, and quite loud, so I wasn’t nervous. It was a woman’s voice. I got up and prowled about and found it came from Perkins’s room. She was talking in her sleep in a queer, flat tone, talking very fast, apparently arguing with some one, greatly excited and rather desperate.”
“What was she saying?” put in Derrick sharply.
“That’s the strange part of it; I couldn’t understand a word. It was all in some strange liquid sort of language, ending in ‘ong’ and ‘yang’ and ‘ing,’ and sounds like that. Three or four times she said, ‘Master, master.’ That must have meant Mr. Millicent, to whom she was so devoted. All of a sudden it stopped, as though her brain had come back from its travels, and I heard nothing more. This morning I looked at her very closely, but not a line of her face had changed, and her eyes were just the same as ever. She had evidently been dreaming about Mr. Millicent’s death, and, Jack, that’s the biggest thing in her life now. She was dour and silent before; Mrs. Millicent said so to-day; and one can imagine what a tragedy like that must mean to a queer locked-up nature like hers.”
“Can’t you remember any of the foreign words she used?” he asked casually.
She frowned a little, thinking hard. “There were two that came quite often, more than any others, one something like ‘rumah,’ ‘sambayüng,’ and the other like ‘santari.’ That’s as near as I can get to it. Why do you ask?”
“No particular reason, except that I’d like to identify the language.”
“You’re not going to speak to Perkins herself, are you?”
“No,” he smiled. “Far be it from me to put my finger into the wheels of domestic comfort. Anything more about her?”
“Nothing except that I’m going to try and cheer her up, and coax out a smile or two. As it is she smiles about once a week. Then there’s Martin.”
“And what of him?”
“I don’t quite know. I’ve been watching him at work and talking to him occasionally, and what strikes me is that here at Beech Lodge are two of the loneliest souls imaginable. I’ve got it now!” she added suddenly. “Why shouldn’t they marry?”
“Oh!” said Derrick, startled.
“Well, just think a minute. It might work splendidly for all concerned,” continued Edith, warming to the idea. “Martin, in spite of his appearance, is as faithful as a dog, and he absolutely loves flowers. This place is going to be a picture next summer. He’s had some sort of a blow, too, and his eyes are often more sad than I can describe, and not a bit shifty or furtive. And he’s beginning to like you just as he used to like Mr. Millicent from all accounts. Jack, why shouldn’t they marry? Don’t you suppose it’s possible that that’s what brought him back, looking for Perkins?”
Derrick did not answer at once. The idea was too fantastic. It was not Perkins that Martin sought when he returned, nor was she the type of woman to bring a suspected man round the world to a place which for every reason he should avoid. They shared something; he was sure of that; but whatever it was it had dug a gulf between them, and to discover a bridge to span that gulf was Derrick’s aim.
“If I were you I’d put that idea out of my head,” he said quietly.
Edith was a little disappointed. “Why? Stranger things have happened before this.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to say that stranger things would probably happen, but he only laughed.
“We know nothing of their past—that is, before they came to Beech Lodge—and their future is their own. It’s too delicate a business. Perkins doesn’t like Martin, though she was bound to recommend him as an excellent gardener, and it would be stretching the point a good deal to imagine that she is anything to him. She hardly speaks to him as it is. Didn’t you say just now that she was not the marrying kind?”
“Yes, I did; but since there’s no probability of my arranging my own wedding, I rather like to potter about with other people’s. That may be useful to you, Jack, later on. As to Perkins, I dare say you’re right, and after all, if they did ultimately come together, it couldn’t be utterly festive, could it?”
“No,” he laughed, “it couldn’t. What else is there in the mind of the thoughtful Martha?”
“Nothing except that I’d like to make those two lives a bit more cheery, if I could; and naturally one’s mind pitches ahead.”
“It does,” he admitted. “Do you feel prophetic at the moment?”
She sent him a keen glance, at which he colored in spite of himself.
“I don’t believe, old boy, you’re quite ready for me to go on yet.”
Now, if one takes the case of a highly sensitive and imaginative young man, whose mind is continually exploring for new sensations, and plunges him into a situation that is clothed with grimness and mystery, there will inevitably be set up a series of reactions such as Derrick had been experiencing for weeks past. And if, further, he then comes into touch with the girl whom he desires for his own, discovers her to be involved in the mystery, and realizes that she will remain out of reach till the problem is solved and her spirit set free, there will be added to his efforts the greatest incentive of all.
So it was with Derrick. Both from Jean herself and from Jean’s mother he now knew exactly where he stood. Though not told in so many words, he was under no misapprehension. All thought of his own work disappeared. This was his work, and the call of it was irresistible. As for Edith, and he smiled when he thought of her, she was in no danger. She stood too far outside the sweep of the drama, and it would be an error in tactics to tell her too much. He believed he would need her help at the end, but the end was not yet.
He was returning from a long and solitary walk when, nearing Beech Lodge, he noted on the road ahead a curious figure. It was that of an elderly-looking man who tramped some hundred yards in advance. His clothing was loose and weather-beaten. He stooped a little forward as he walked, and supported himself on a staff which he had evidently cut by the way. As Derrick drew abreast he took a sidelong glance and at once remarked the brightness of the stranger’s eyes. Physically he did not seem more than fifty years old. A first impression of age was given by the whiteness of his beard, but in spite of both stoop and stick he moved with an agility that belied his apparent years. His skin was a dark olive shade, his nose hooked like a raven’s beak, and his cotton shirt was open at the neck, showing where a thin gold chain lay yellow against the swarthy flesh.
Derrick, meeting a swift look, experienced a sudden thrill. What manner of man was this to find in a Sussex lane? It seemed that something invisible but enormously potent moved down the road beside him. Then, instinctively, he halted at the gate of Beech Lodge and waited till the stranger came up. The latter made a sweeping gesture of salutation, and swung forward the pack that had been balanced on his shoulders.
“Good morning, sir. Will you buy a trinket and help an old man on his way? Cheap, sir, cheap, so cheap that they’re nothing short of presents, trade is that bad. Worse than I ever saw it in this country before.”
He spoke in a thin singsong voice that carried with it a sort of outlandish lilt. No British peddler this, but one from foreign parts. Derrick felt a now familiar thrill, and the spirit of him scented the Orient.
“What part of the world do you hail from?”
“Any and every part, sir. So long as it’s south of the line it makes no difference to me. Central America, Bengal, Borneo, the Cape, Cochîn, and Singapore, they’re all the same.” He shivered a little. “Time was when I thought the old country was the only place in the world, but I’ve got over that now, specially in winter.”
“Have you been here long this time?”
“A matter of a few months, but I’m going back East. This wind is too much for my bones.”
“What have you got?”
The pack was unrolled deftly on the wet grass, and inside lay a long strip of raw silk. Opening this after a swift glance down the road, the stranger revealed a medley of things, some beautiful, many valuable, and none of them ordinary. No Manchester stock was this. He had chains of native workmanship, hammered bangles of gold and silver, semi-precious stones carved with amazing cleverness, bits of oddly shaped ivory, all the paraphernalia of the peddler of the Far East. These he showed with obvious and lingering interest as though he loved them, pattering meantime of the Sunda Islands, the Moluccas, Bali, Lombok, and a host of Eastern ports and places whose accustomed names fell from his lips with glib fluency. There was no doubt about his knowing the East.
“This, sir, is a bit of hammered tin from Kuantan in Pahang, and you don’t get much of that kind of work nowadays. They wash the tin out of the gravel on the hillsides, and there are only three men in Malaysia who turn out this grade of art. This gold bangle is from Berak—all Chinese labor there—and you can have it for ten shillings. Better take it, sir, for it weighs twenty pennyweight and is worth a sovereign for the gold alone.”
“Then why not sell it as gold?”
“I wouldn’t offer it unless I were footsore and had to have somewhere to sleep. Can’t sell this sort of thing in an English village. I’d get arrested for having it; that’s why I’m heading for London.”
His piercing eyes rested on Derrick while he spoke, and in them moved something more than a mere interested scrutiny. Then they roamed curiously about the neighborhood. A brain was working behind those eyes, and it occurred to Derrick that this man knew well where he was.
“Ever been in this part of England before?”
The lean brown fingers hung motionless over the trinkets. “No, sir, there’s nothing to bring my kind here unless it’s the June race meet. Won’t you take this bangle? There’s a good twenty pennyweight of fine gold in it. There isn’t a lady who would turn up her nose at it. I’ve seen a woman bought and sold for one not half as good.”
Derrick hesitated. Strange thoughts were coursing through his head and with them the growing conviction that this, like all the rest of it, was meant to be. Perhaps it was grotesque, but had not Perkins said weeks ago that others were coming to Beech Lodge, drawn by mysterious signals they could not withstand? Then Martin had come, and Jean Millicent, and who should say that here was not the last of the gathered company. It was not a bundle of trinkets that had brought this wanderer to these tragic gates.
“What’s your name? You speak good English, but you’re not English, are you?”
The peddler shook his head. “No, sir, my name is Blunt. My father was English and my mother a Malay woman. I was born out there and spent most of my time between the islands. Now I’m for getting back as soon as I can, so I’m heading for the East India Docks, where I’ll sign on. It’s too cold for me in this country. Couldn’t I spend the night in one of the outhouses, sir?”
“Well,” said Derrick thoughtfully, “I think perhaps my gardener might find a corner for you in his cottage. I’ve no objections. You can see him about it, if you like.”
The man’s dark eyes took on a sudden gleam. “That’s good of you, sir, and I won’t be a bit of trouble to any one. If there’s any work to be done, I’ll do it. Here, you’d better take this bangle now.”
He held out the yellow circlet. Derrick was about to refuse when something whispered to him to take it. Slipping it into his pocket, he was surprised at its weight.
“Why do you offer something worth a sovereign for a night’s lodging?” he queried.
The peddler sent him a curious glance. “That’s all right, sir. A few pennyweight of gold is neither here nor there in a lifetime.”
Derrick nodded. “Perhaps not—to either of us. If you turn in here I think you’ll find the gardener just on the other side of the cottage.”
The man rolled up his pack and moved along the drive toward the house. Derrick stood irresolute for a moment; then something impelled him to follow. Presently he stopped and, making no noise, slipped behind a sheltering tree. The peddler was now thirty yards ahead. At this moment Martin, who had been working among his rose-bushes, looked up and saw the stranger.
What happened next was all over in an instant. He made a swift involuntary gesture in which fear and astonishment were tensely blended. The spade slipped from his fingers, and his eyes protruded. He seemed to sway a little as he stood with an uncouth elephantine motion, and his lips trembled, but no sound came from them. Then, as Derrick emerged from behind the tree and came carelessly toward him, he made an extraordinary noise in his throat and turned again to his work. And, so far as the master of Beech Lodge could determine, the peddler had given no sign whatever.
Derrick lounged forward with a manner of complete indifference.
“Martin, this man has asked that he might sleep somewhere on the place to-night, and I told him I had no objection to his spending it in the cottage if you’re willing. His name is Blunt, and it’s for you to say. You will be responsible for him if he does stay, so you can settle it between you.”
The gardener’s face had become rigidly impassive, but there was no concealing the blood that surged into it. He glanced first at his master, then at the mysterious stranger, and moistened his dry lips.
“Name of Blunt, sir,” he said thickly. “That will be all right as far as I’m concerned. I’ll look after him.”
Derrick, fearing that his curiosity might become too apparent, nodded and strolled on toward the house. He was very deep in thought. Another factor was now added to the problem and had to be dealt with. In a way it was not unexpected. There had been built up a triangle with a dead man in the center and an undeciphered personality at each corner. Was this all coincidence, or was not destiny rather arranging the puppets of a great drama without any extraneous assistance?
His first instinct was to report the new arrival to Sergeant Burke, but on second thought he decided to say nothing at the moment. The sergeant’s methods were too heavy-handed, too likely to disturb whatever process was now at work. However vague to human eyes it might be, he was convinced that subtle causes were in motion, wheels of fate that revolved within other wheels, a mechanism that operated silently, mysteriously, and with some inflexible purpose. As to himself, he could only wait. Instructions would come, as they always had come, and in the appointed time, from the same imperceptible and unchanging source.
As though in search of these, he went into the study and gave himself up to thought, leaving the windows of his mind open to the lightest breath of influence. His vision embraced four divergent figures, all of them inextricably linked. Perkins, with the half-told tale of her life shrouded behind her sphinx-like face, a domestic automaton as imperturbable as the jade god itself, the rigid guardian of her own secret, who talked a strange language in her sleep, and in that sleep mourned the disappearance of her murdered master. Martin, new come from round the world, the recipient of viewless signals that reached and followed him through the rotting jungles, signals that worked and whispered till they penetrated his slow brain and he came back perforce ten thousand miles of land and sea, a suspect to the source of suspicion, to work within sight of the window of the dead man of whose violent passing he no doubt knew the secret.
Then the peddler, with restless intelligence in his ageless eyes, himself a traveler from the same land of strange peoples, tongues, and gods, tramping indomitably along the deep Sussex lanes till he arrived as though by chance at the door of one who apparently knew him not, yet regarded his advent with fear and astonishment. And, last of all, Jean Millicent, the shadow of tragedy clouding her bright youth, a creature made for love and tenderness and care but weighted with brooding apprehensions, toward whom his own spirit had begun to move, striving, seeking, and hoping.
Compassed with thoughts like these, he saw himself in relation to those profound forces which, whether acknowledged or not, dominate our lives. The winds of circumstance seemed to him no longer the winds of chance. There was purpose behind all, some high and remote goal to which we are led along roads that might seem strange and byways that wander apparently from the general direction. He knew now that it would be futile to attempt anything save the task that lay directly ahead, and till that task was discharged Jean Millicent could never be his.
He was still plunged in reflection when Edith’s entrance brought him sharply back to earth. She came into the study, noted that he was not working, seemed about to speak, then smiled at him inquiringly. He smiled back. She took a penny from her pocket and laid it silently on the desk. Derrick was feeling for another when his fingers closed round the gold bangle.
“Can you wear this?” he asked casually.
She examined it with delighted and intense interest. “It’s perfectly lovely, Jack; but where on earth did you get it? Not in Bamberley?”
“Not much,” he laughed. “I got it as a present a few minutes ago from my paying guest, or rather Martin’s.”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s a peddler down at the cottage now. He has a pack full of things like that.”
She shook her head. “Jack, you know you can’t afford it.”
“It’s all right and didn’t cost me anything. It’s the price of a night’s lodging with Martin.”
“Then why didn’t the man give it to Martin?”
“That never occurred to me. He was tired and footsore, wanted shelter for the night, and I suggested to Martin that he take him in and be responsible for him. The man insisted that I take this, so there you are. Cheap at the price, I call it. There’s a sovereign worth of gold in it.”
Edith pushed the bangle on her wrist and twisted it thoughtfully. “Why don’t you tell me the real truth, old boy?”
“I have. Want to see him? Interesting sort of person, white beard, bright eyes, and been everywhere. You’ll never guess where he’s come from now.”
“Where?”
“Burma,” said Derrick meaningly.
“Isn’t that where you told me Martin had come from when he turned up here?” she asked slowly.
“Yes.”
She was silent for a moment. “Well, Jack?”
He glanced at her thoughtfully. “It’s all part of the rest of it. I’m caught up in something stronger than myself. I can’t help it.”
She took off the bangle and laid it on the desk. “Do you know where it’s leading you?”
He nodded, smiling. “Yes, I think so.”
“To Jean Millicent?”
“I believe that,” he said gravely. “It seems now that it was meant I should find her like this. It was all meant.”
Edith nodded. “When I saw you two together the other day I felt the same thing, so you’d better give her this. It’s more appropriate. You see, Jack,” she went on with a smile that was rather sober, “I’m not the marrying kind.”
“Nonsense,” he expostulated.
“It’s quite true, and girls know it by instinct rather early in life. Then they try to forget it, and settle down in a sort of way to making other people comfortable. But they can’t help seeing what’s going on all round them—I mean other girls with their men—and feeling a bit out of it. It’s a bit solemn for a woman to realize that she’ll never waken the biggest thing in the world in the heart of a man, because she lacks the indescribable something that is necessary, and it makes a good many of us queer and cantankerous. You see we don’t possess what every woman longs for.
“Sometimes, too, she has a sort of perception about others. I had it when I saw you with Jean; and, Jack, it made me happier than in a long time. That’s why I want you to give her this bangle, which is really lovely, and also tell me just what I can do to help. You needn’t make any bones about that. It’s my job, and I’m thankful for it. And for goodness’ sake, old boy, don’t think of me as being down in the mouth. I’m not. I understand about you and Jean, and nothing would make me happier, but as for all the rest of this queer affair I don’t understand it at all. So tell me what I can do, and I’ll do it. And don’t you ever think of me as a good-hearted and deserving spinster, or I’ll never forgive you.”
It was a long speech for Edith, who but seldom let herself go. Derrick was oddly touched and patted her arm affectionately. He knew she wanted no thanks and felt that in the next few days he might need her more than ever before.
“I’d like to tell you something. You probably won’t accept it as I do, but you ought to know, and somehow I’m glad you don’t believe in the occult.”
“I don’t,” she said frankly.
“Well,” he laughed, “please carry on. Nothing could help me more. I’ve no desire to spend the rest of my life in criminal investigation. I know you think I’m being carried too far by this one and am collecting a lot of unimportant data that I anticipate will produce something remarkable later on. Perhaps I am, but I’m going to see it through, and you know what I’m working for.”
“She’s a darling,” murmured Edith, thoughtfully.
“It means everything to have you say that.” He looked at her keenly and, deliberating how much to tell her of what was in his mind, decided to leave the matter where it stood and disclose only what was necessary.
“You’ll think it wild of me to associate the coming of this peddler with Millicent’s murder, but I do. I want to keep him here a few days if I can. There’s something, I don’t know what, in the air; but the thing that brought him is probably what brought Martin. I’ll talk with him later on. Would you like to go up to town for a few days?”
“Why?” she asked, puzzled.
“I’ve been thinking it’s rather unfeeling of me to expect you to be here at present under the circumstances. A good many women would not like it.”
Edith smiled and shook her head. “My dear, I can’t take it as seriously as you do, and I’m not nervous. Do anything you like that you believe will bring you nearer Jean. Be as mysterious and occult as you please. It won’t worry me a bit. But the house must be looked after, and that’s for me. I hope this won’t upset Perkins, as things are going very smoothly in her domain, and don’t forget that it will imperil next year’s roses if you demoralize Martin. Now it’s time for lunch.”