* * * * * * *
He rose wearily, feeling fevered, and the worry on him increasingly intolerable. He stepped out into the hall; it was still fully lit. He rang, and when the servant came he asked him whether the offices were shut up. He was told that all had gone to bed but the man who had come at his summons. He bade him go in his turn, and put out all the lights. Then he himself switched out the bulbs in the hall and stared at the great window beside the door. It was singularly light outside, and the air was oppressive within. Cold as was the weather, he needed to feel the open. He thrust up the sash and drank in the rush of freezing air.
The moon must have just risen, but a slight mist was ascending. Half an hour's light fall of snow had again marked off the lawn, but evidently hours before, since the paths were swept round the house and along up the avenue to the left. He shut down the sash again, a little refreshed, but still most ill at ease.
With a sigh he turned towards the door of the library, within which room, alone, crouched the nightmare policeman. He forced himself in, and found the fellow there.
"We must go into the West Room, Mr. Collop," he said. "My daughter has gone to bed; the house is all shut up, and we can discuss matters undisturbed. It is in the West Room that the thing happened. Come."
In the West Room the Home Secretary opened fire on his guest.
"All these schemes of yours, Mr. Collop," he said firmly, "you must discard. Time is essential. I ask you for some immediate action. This very night. Mr. Collop, I beg you to proceed."
Mr. Collop needed no further invitation. Proceeding was his passion—I might almost say, his vice.
"Got to be done express?" he asked. "Right-o! Now I'll tell ye my way. I divide it," he continued, roaring powerfully, "into three heads." Then, much more loudly, "Head number one."
"Pray, pray, Mr. Collop," agonised the Home Secretary, with outstretched hands. "A little lower, please! We must not be overheard!"
"I'll tell you my express method—since ye want it express," said Mr. Collop, speaking now no louder than your ordinary street orator, railways guard or the cabinet minister at election. "First, to establish what I call negative evidence. This term," he added sententiously, "I will make clear in a moment. Two"—he ticked them off on his podgy fingers—"what I call the search, comparable to the experiment conducted by men of science; with no hypothetic bless you, none at all! Just random like. Now then, in the midst of that we shall find a clue. What then? Then number three. The hypothetic is formed, modified, readjusted, co-ordinated, and leads infallibly to the inevitable conclusion."
He coughed and spat in the fire. It was perhaps the thirty-seventh time in the last ten years that he had recited that piece. It had been written out for him by his nephew, who, he was proud to say, attended lectures at Manchester University, and he had it typewritten on a now rather dirty sheet of paper which he carried about with him all over England.
"So what do we do now?" he continued heartily. "Why, we begin by establishing our negative evidence. Chrm! Chrm! And how do we do that? Why, we make sure that it is not in this room."
"But how can one make sure of that?" said the Home Secretary, puzzled.
"Why, plain and straightforward, sir. I 'ave brought down my men and my apparatus. We'll want the floor taken up. But that won't take long."
"What?" said the Home Secretary, in alarm.
"The floor, sir. The floor," said Mr. Collop magisterially. "And I say again, it won't take long. My men will prise it up before you can say 'Sir Garnet'! And afore we do that another set of 'em will cut the furniture open to see if it's not in the cracks. Then I have got two with the new white light."
"What?" said the Home Secretary again.
"Why, this new dazzle I told you on," said Mr. Collop proudly.
"But my dear sir, my dear sir, when you say your men, what do you mean?"
"My men, Mr. Dee Boe Hun? Why, them men I ordered to come and 'elp me with this job. They're at the Lion now, waiting."
And without asking his host's leave, he sat down squarely at the little table by the telephone and rang up the Lion. When he had given his message, he waited, head in air, hands clasped behind his back, a monument of Induction and Deduction.
"Do I understand you to say," groaned Mr. de Bohun miserably, "that you mean to pull up the floor to-night?"
"That's it," nodded Mr. Collop. "That's right. And open the furniture. Only just enough to see it's not in any of the cracks. Then," he added, looking critically at the fine Empire looking-glass upon the wall, "we must have things down, of course. You never know what may lie concealed lurking behind."
"Really, Mr. Collop, really," groaned the Home Secretary, clasping and unclasping his hands, "I should think that ..."
"Job must be done thorough," frowned Mr. Collop, wagging his head. "I'd never undertake the responsibility of searching individuals till I'd made sure 'twasn't in the room where 'twas lost."
Even as he spoke there came an honest bang upon the outer door; shortly after another, still more honest, upon the door of the room, and the shuffling of many feet. Once more dispensing with the formality of consulting his host, the great Collop unbolted the door, and with a Napoleonic gesture introduced his merry men.
They were a sight, they were! Six of them seemed to have been chosen rather for strength than for intellectual power. Two staggered under an enormous iron tripod with heaven knows what contraption poised on its summit, and a cylinder of gas. Three more bore with them sundry instruments. And of all this little army Mr. Collop, with fine decision, took immediate charge.
"Now, then, lads!" he said; "hearty! The job's got to be done quick. All the rugs first, please. You two with the light, stand off! Stand on the window-sill. Then you won't be in the way." So they did, the marks of their heavy boots contrasting finely with the delicate woodwork of that Jane Austen room.
"Rugs all rolled?" said Mr. Collop. "Yes! That's right! Shake 'em first, yes! That's right! Pile 'em up on that other window. Now then, tables out of it! Smart!"
He opened the door, and behold! half a dozen willing pairs of hands pushed the small table, the middle table, the big desk, the little table, and the what-not, one after the other, vigorously into the hall—and the door was shut again.
"Now, me boys! up with the Austrians!"
His heart was in his work, and he inspired his command as all great leaders can. The sundry instruments so useful in work of this kind did their rapid work, lifting one large square after another, while the owner of the same danced with astonishing agility from spot to spot, remaining at last on one isolated island, which he was courteously bidden to abandon; taking refuge then upon the remaining low window-sill, while the five large lounge chairs in the room were laid carefully on their backs across the joists as the work proceeded.
"That's the style!" said Mr. Collop, cheerfully. "Pile 'em up, lads! Pile 'em up!"
And those sham-ancient polished parquet squares, their very base modern pitch pine reverse pitifully exposed—but, as Mr. Collop proudly pointed out, not one of them broken—were carefully laid against the wall, nicely missing the Cox and the Morland, but threatening in some degree, should they shift or slip, the large picture of Paulings in the early eighteenth century, which was the place's pride—and so it ought to be! Paulings belonged to gentlemen then. Two of them were to be seen riding horses which had done nothing but eat for years and yet walked on their hind legs. They were followed by four dogs....
But to my tale....
The two citizens with the tripod set it down between the old dusty joists upon which the floor boards had rested, and of a sudden a most abominable glare, like the white heat from molten iron, shot in a shaft upon a corner in the uncovered lower flooring. It was brilliant beyond the dreams of avarice. It revealed like remorse. Mr. Collop with an agility surprising in a man of his build, leaped down that little distance, and kept on shouting directions.
"That's right now! Sweep it along! Sweep it along! Sweep it along!" The blinding shaft of light slowly traversed the edges of the shallow void from end to end, from left to right. "Now back again!" said Mr. Collop. "Now back again!"
The intense beam travelled back in another band, slightly nearer, from right to left; and all the while the detective followed with keen eyes every patch which it successively illuminated.
It was not a long process. Three or four minutes at the most. And while it continued, the Home Secretary, perched in security on his window-sill, was interested in spite of himself: new science is always a toy.... And that was how they searched for the jewels in the flooring of the West Room.
Mr. Collop's hand went up, and the blinding shaft of light disappeared as suddenly as it had come.
"That'll do, lads!" he said. "We know one thing now, any'ow. It didn't get down through the flooring; that's certain. Now then, if you please, we'll open the furniture."
Mr. de Bohun did not please.
"Surely, surely it can be spared," he begged. "It's Victorian."
"Now, sir," protested Collop firmly, "I'll be responsible for nothing unless I'm pursuing my own method."
The Home Secretary sighed and surrendered. With deft fingers two of the three extras began picking out the stitching of the chairs after every loose cushion had been lifted, shaken, and put aside.
It was beautiful to see such expert work; at least, it was beautiful in Mr. Collop's eyes; but the Home Secretary almost shed tears. Those chairs were his father's! The Great Peal, the immortal Benjamin Israel, had graced them. And again—who was going to pay for all this? All the edges of the leather stood out; the secret places were revealed. There was no emerald.
Mr. Collop beamed with satisfaction.
"That, sir," he said triumphantly, "is the end of what we've called ourNegativeprocess. Hey! Number One!" And he ticked off on his thumb, as he had done before.
"We are now assured," he boomed, tucking his thumbs into the armholes of his waistcoat, "that wherever the Em'rald may be, it's not in this room. Stay a moment! I'd forgotten! The pictures down, please!"
Again the owner gave tongue. "Do youreallythink, Mr. Collop ..."
"Yes, I do," answered Mr. Collop with decision. "Come. Smartly, lads!"
No harm was done to the pictures; they knew their work. The Cox was lifted down and now leaned at a secure angle. The Morland turned its back canvas to the ceiling, pushed on a capsized armchair. I wish I could say as much for the Napoleonic looking-glass.
It was just too high for one of the men's hands; he slipped, and down it came: an omen of ill-fortune, smashed upon the floor—round gilded frame, Eagle of the Legions, and all.
"Well, well!" said Mr. Collop cheerfully. "No battle without losses, ye know—hey?"
"I really think...." urged the Home Secretary, with something as near anger as his temperament allowed.
"Never you fuss, sir," thrust in Mr. Collop genially. "It's all right now. We've proved our point. That's the 'sential. I say again, the Negative part is accomplished," and he smiled upon his chief with all the satisfaction of genius. "The em'rald's not in this room where it was lost. That's a cert. What's the conclusion? Why, sir, the conclusion is that it'ssomewhere else. And when I say somewhere else, what do I mean?"
"You mean...." began the Home Secretary nervously, stepping down gingerly from his perch and trying to make his way across the joists—"you mean that you must now consider which, if any, of my guests ..."
Again Mr. Collop's hand went up.
"Now, sir; pardon me! That's not the scientific spirit. I shall send these men back to the Lion, with your leave"—it was the first time he had asked it, and it was granted with enthusiasm—"and then I shall ask you, sir, to give me details, and I shall make notes. After that we'll sleep on it.... Before you go, men, get the Austrians down again. Hammer the clamps down: hammer 'em down good and strong at the corners; whang 'em in! You know how these Austrians buckle! We'll 'ave everything right again in a jiffy"—to his host—"and then we'll sleep sound on it. Like 'Ogs."
With clamouring echo which shook those ancient walls, square after square of Austrian antique was thrown back into its place; with Cyclopean noise the clamps were driven into their former holes, and the shattering bangs of the heavy iron hammers sounded like thunder through the silent night. Twenty yards away, in the small smoking-room, Victoria Mosel and Tommy Galton had remained to exchange a few insults after the others had gone off to bed. They started at the unusual din; she very slightly, he with a jerk.
"What are they doing?" said he suspiciously.
"Making your scaffold," shot Vic decidedly: then, more doubtfully. "It's a damned shame! For I don't suppose you did take it after all, Tommy? Eh?"
"If I thought there was room on you for that bloody stone," began Tommy viciously....
"Oh, search me!" said Vic, without sincerity.
"No, but, Vic, whatarethey doing?"
"Shifting the scenery, Tommy. Summoning the dead. Christ knows!" She yawned, to the peril of her agglutinative cigarette, but it held nobly. "It can't go on forever. I'm going to bed. By the time they've stopped I'll be asleep. So long! I'll come and look you up at Wormwood Scrubbs, never fear!" And the Virgin departed.
"Not while you're still in Holloway," fired the puller of horses after her as he got up in his turn, and went out to get his candle for bed.
A few moments later, when the Master of the House peeped out into the hall, he found all dark and deserted. He was pleased to think that his guests had suspected nothing.
When everything was accomplished, and the little army of Scotland Yard men had fallen back upon its billets at the Lion (Humphrey de Bohun himself let them out at the front door, on tiptoe and with agonised whispers entreating caution. He himself had locked and bolted these doors); when, I say, all this affair was over Mr. Collop, first making quite sure that his seat was secure, took out a notebook, shot a blot of ink on to the re-established polar bear, and gave tongue.
"Now, sir, fire away!"
"What do you want me to do?" said de Bohun doubtfully.
"Why, just give me details of what those coves 've been doing of," said Mr. Collop, relapsing into the vernacular.
"You mean my guests?" said the Home Secretary rather stiffly.
"That's right," said Mr. Collop cheerfully, "the toffs."
"Well, really.... I haven't played the spy on my guests, Mr. Collop."
"Oh, I'm looking after that," said Mr. Collop with another of his healthy winks. "Now, just you tell me all they did. I've got my first notes here. These three men what I've just met at dinner—and one of them's young McTaggart—I know 'im—they went down on their knees and they looked for it in that rug. Well and good. Then they got up, and they all swore they hadn't got it."
"McTaggart was the last," said de Bohun, defending the interests of the family.
"Ar? ... I didn't know that!" mused the modern Napoleon deeply. And he noted it down. "Well, what next?"
"Why, to tell you the truth—the full truth, and I beg you to keep it private—my cousin, Lord Galton, has told me that he has seen the emerald—seen it with his own eyes—in the Professor's hands."
"Ar!" said Mr. Collop again. "That's important, that is!" and down it went. "Saw it with 'is own eyes: where and 'ow?"
"Wait a moment, Mr. Collop, wait a moment. Not long after, the Professor told me he had infallible scientific proof that it was in McTaggart's pocket. He showed me the very instrument wherewith he had been able to discover its presence through the thickness of the coat."
"That's important too!" murmured Mr. Collop, intelligently noting it down. "An' what does McTaggart say?"
"McTaggart ..." The Home Secretary was about to blurt out the truth and tell him what McTaggart had singularly announced. But he checked himself. To insult his last remaining prop would be fatal. "Oh, McTaggart?" he evaded. "Why, McTaggart said he hadn't got it."
"Ar! just so. 'E did, did 'e? Now, that'sveryimportant," affirmed Mr. Collop, and he noted that down also.
"Now here," he continued, slipping an elastic band over the notebook and putting it back into his pocket—"here, Mr. Dee Boe Hun, we 'ave got three 'ypothetics." He again began ticking them off on the thumb and fingers of the left hand. "First 'ypothetic: Lord Galton stole the em'rald. Second 'ypothetic: Old Giglamps stole the em'rald ... Tortoise-shell specs, I mean: the schoolmaster," and he winked again. "Third 'ypothetic: McTaggart stole the em'rald. Now these three 'ypothetics," he went on, "lead to three totally different conclusions. Each of 'em has its conjunctions and conjugations. Mr. Dee Boe Hun," he concluded, rising and assuming hieratic tones, "I shall not sleep to-night." (There is many a true word spoken in lying.) "I shall bend all the energies of me mind in the ensuing hours of darkness, and on the morrow you shall 'ave my conclusions.... I'll trouble you, sir, to leave me a syphon and a drop o' something. Helps me to concentrate."
"I'm afraid," said the Home Secretary, "the servants will have cleared the drinks away from the library, and they have all gone to bed." Then, terrified lest the lack of sustenance should imperil victory, he added hurriedly: "Don't move! Pray don't move! I think I know where to find it."
He was away some time, going on tiptoe in the offices. When he returned it was with an unopened bottle of whiskey, a syphon and a glass. "I'm afraid I have no corkscrew," he apologised.
"I 'ave," said the imperturbable Collop, who had sat royally in his chair to receive this tribute. He pulled out the cork, smelt the brand, approved of it, poured himself out a dope and a most miserable little splash from the syphon.
"Here's luck!" he said. "Cheerio! Now you leave metoit!"
And de Bohun left him to it, ardently praying with what was left of his childhood's faith to a God in whom he still vaguely believed, that never again in the remaining years of his declining life should he be compelled to harbour under the roof of Paulings any unit from the mighty Secret Service which he commanded, and inwardly deciding that he would relinquish that command for India, Paris, South Africa—nay, New Zealand—anything rather than bear such a burden again.
It is a fascinating occupation to watch a powerful human brain at work upon some great problems—the face alive with mind, the tension of the muscles, the frowning eyes; and to feel behind it all that driving, compelling power of the intelligence wherein man is God-like.
But no one would have seen this sight in the case of Mr. Collop had he remained. What he would have seen was a hand pouring out whiskey for itself over and over again and adding smaller and smaller splashes of soda; and at last an obese body attempting sleep in the lounge chair which it filled.
He had comfortably made up his mind. He was going to stay in the West Room and sleep as he could, leaving his bed untouched by way of giving the impression of a long night's intellectual wrestling. Next morning he would take every one of the three in turn, tell each separately that he was from the Yard, tax them brutally with the theft, and terrify and bully the culprit, whichever of the three it might turn out to be, into confession. So decided, he chose a good chair among the mutilated victims, wheeled it close to the electric switches by the fire, settled himself down, turned off the light and shut his eyes for sleep.
Now it is paradoxically true of the substantial more than it is of the insufficient, that they must shift and turn to find that posture in which their persons can best repose, especially in chairs. Nor could Mr. Collop at once and easily fall into the arms of Morpheus. He shifted and turned, and wedged in and re-wedged in and out, and moved again and replaced those various muscles and anatomical names of which escape me—or rather I never knew them, though the things themselves I know well enough—when all of a sudden he gave a loud and piercing cry and leapt up broad awake. Something had stuck into him—something abominably sharp. His reaction had been instantaneous. He struck a match. He switched on the light.
He groped in the offending tail-coat pocket and—not the first to do so!—stared at what he found in his hand—the emerald! Its brooch setting was unclasped, the wicked steel pin of it was pointing at a challenging angle in the air. He glared viciously at the offending point which had wounded his innocent person; then his eyebrows relaxed into a stupefied stare at the stone itself.
"Great God!" he said three times, "Great God! Great God!"
Birds of the Empire.I.—The Parrot Attaboy, in action.
Birds of the Empire.I.—The Parrot Attaboy, in action.
Birds of the Empire.I.—The Parrot Attaboy, in action.
There is a current impression, taken I think from the great spate of detective stories upon which we are all fed, that your professional detective has no brains whatsoever and would be no match for the sloth of the Andes, or the sluggish waddle-duck of Australian and Imperial fame. It is an error. They are men as we are and their intelligences, such as they are, work more or less under the spur of prospective advantage. Within three minutes Mr. Collop had grasped the fact that fame, security, promotion, a permanent, good, appreciated, livelihood lay in his outstretched palm. Had he not found the emerald?Howhe had found it, why it was there at all, he knew not. But he had quickly seen how its possession might be used.
"There you are, you great blighter," he murmured, addressing the charming gem. "Damn your green eyes! I'll make you work, I will! William, my boy, here's something that's got to be thought out!"
For the first time for many months, Mr. Collop thought, really thought; "concentrated" as he would have put it.
He would have done it better perhaps if he had not been so full of whiskey. But shock is a powerful stimulus. And he was already three-quarters sober and coming to conclusions.
For a long time the effect of this unusual exercise was a blank and a confusion of mind; then there broke in upon the silence a sound which startled him horribly. A voice, somewhat muffled, uncertain, had spoken in that silence where none but him could be. He had heard it! Or was he mad?
"Attaboy!"
Was it a divine command? Had some dear wraith of the dead—his sainted mother perhaps, who could tell—come to comfort him in this dread hour of his fate? All was dead still. His hand trembled a little as he pulled out his watch. It was a quarter past two, and the silence was enormous.
Most awfully it came again.
"Attaboy!"
He hardly dared to look around. Look round he did and there he saw what he had not before grasped—that the dome of black cloth, suspended, covered a cage; thence it was that once again, but this time in a failing, drowsy manner, came the unearthly summons:
"Attaboy!"
A revelation burst upon his mind. It was a revelation indeed! The whole scheme blazed suddenly before him.
He walked boldly to the cage, took off the cover and saw what may very properly be called the blinking bird, for the sudden light had dazzled it.
"Attaboy!" croaked the parrot again in a rather peevish fashion.
"I'll Attaboy you!" hissed Mr. Collop through his teeth.
He made his preparations to capture that innocent accomplice; his scheme was now fully developed.
He had heard that this kind of fowl was of a very fierce and dangerous sort; but the plan must be pursued at all risks. He took his handkerchief from his pocket—a large bandanna of the noblest—and with a decision worthy of a better cause, whipped it round the gaudy coloured neck after the fashion of a cravat. A muffled protest proceeded from that insulted organ.
"You wait!" muttered Mr. Collop vindictively, as though the poor bird were his enemy. He looked about him. There was a large square of black cloth on his host's writing-table. With that he made a second deadener, hoodlike, entirely covering the animal's head, and tied it securely on; all that now penetrated from within was a faint, varying sound which one had to be in the closest neighbourhood to hear. Next he cut off a piece of tape from the coil neatly disposed by the side of the official papers, and bound the fierce talons securely. Then with infinite precaution he slipped off the chain from its ring, and held the exotic biped firmly in both hands.
The clipped wings fluttered a little, but they were contained by strong hands. Mr. Collop made for the window. He laid his living parcel down, where it struggled in vain; opened the shutters with infinite precautions for avoiding sound—above, Aunt Amelia, happily deaf, was deep in slumber; pulled up the sash so slowly that it seemed an age; went back on tiptoe, extinguished the light and—a stroke of genius—went noisily upstairs, bearing the parrot, to give full warning to anyone who might be still awake that he had gone to bed, after all. He tumbled his bed about. He returned.
He came down gingerly in shoeless feet, and stepped out into the night.
The stillness was awful, but all propitious to his plan. The thin snow lay even and spotless on the grass on either side of the avenue. The nearer trees were clear in the half light. The gravel walk, though well swept and clear of snow, leaving no trace of his passage, was bitterly cold to his thinly clad feet—for his socks were of silk, I am glad to say.
There was a wintry mist and beyond it the white suffused radiance of the moon.
He looked up cautiously. There was not a chink of light in any window. All slept, and the Holy One presided in the heavens above, beyond the fog in her blurred aureole of light. It was the hour for great deeds. And a great deed was done.
Mr. Collop, with infinite precautions, lifted up his captive and planted its two talons firmly upon the snow to the side of the swept alleyway and pointing at a small, most aged and somewhat stunted oak about thirty yards ahead of him on the edge of the swept path. He himself kept crouching on the swept gravel and holding poor Attaboy to the side above the snow. Then, still creeping noiselessly along, he planted the bird's claws down again about six inches further. And so on, hop by hop.
It was merciful in Providence to have spared that tropical exile any too sensitive nerves in its claws; but it protested. It thought the march an indignity, and it was abominably cold. The parrot squirmed. The parrot resisted. But the parrot was for it.
Six inches by six inches the double imprint of the claws appeared in a lengthening chain upon the thin snow until they had come to within ten feet of the oak. Then did Mr. Collop most cautiously rise from his stoop and, taking the bird under his left arm and standing upon tiptoe, stretch his right hand up to a small hollow in the stump of a branch that had decayed long ago: he felt its concavity. It would do. He carefully felt for the emerald in (now) his waistcoat pocket. It was safe. He turned back swiftly towards the great dark house in the moonlight.
The thing was accomplished.
As stealthily as he had come, but far more rapidly, thanking Heaven that still no light showed through any cranny of the mansion, he loped back, shut the window down again with infinite precautions and even then dreaded a slight sound, put his dumb confederate back, released it of its bandages, slipped on the cover of the cage, and crept up to bed.
* * * * * * *
So true it is that once in every man's life comes an opportunity and that in every man some talent, however unsuspected, lurks.
Sunday morning had dawned brilliant, had grown in splendour. The mist had gone. A low but clear and even glorious sun flashed heaven athwart the snowy levels and transfigured the winter sky.
The Home Secretary came down to breakfast late, and no wonder! Marjorie came down to breakfast late, and no wonder! Tommy and Vic came down late, and no wonder! The Professor and Aunt Amelia had met at the table before anyone else was about. If she expected a flirtation, she was disappointed. If he expected a quiet reading of the Sunday newspaper, he was more bitterly disappointed still. The advent of the late comers was a relief.
Last of all drifted in, heavy-eyed but big with mastery achieved, the Collop.
At that breakfast very little was said. McTaggart was getting used to the rich. He lit a pipe. But he stood mum.
Victoria Mosel and Tom Galton met in Marking Room.
"Vic," said Tommy Galton, "who do you think has got it?" He lounged back in the absurdly low, fat chair, letting himself go all loose, as is the habit of your hard-riding man—especially those who pull horses—and looking down at her calves after the admirable breeding of our day.
"You haven't, anyhow, Tommy!" lisped Victoria Mosel, in spite of the hanging cigarette. "I've got that much!"
"Thank God for that! Spread it!" said Galton.
"Thank me, too," said Vic.
"All right. Thankyou, too. Damn you! Who's got it?"
Victoria Mosel turned round, spat the fragment of the cigarette into the fire, and lit another one.
"I'm thinking," she said.
"The natural thing," said Galton, shutting his eyes, "would be that putrid fellah McTaggart: the journalist fellah!"
"Hehasn't got it," said Vic decidedly. "And he's not so putrid, either. Nothin' like as putrid as you are!"
"That's neither here nor there. He's putrid, all right. Shall I tell you who's got it?"
"You don't know," said Vic. "Lie away."
"Old Footle's got it," said Tommy, with decision. "Cousin Bill. It may be sewn into his sagging skin: but he's got it."
Victoria Mosel looked at him curiously through her half-closed buttonhole eyes.
"Go on!" she said.
"I saw him take it," said Galton. "I saw him with my own eyes."
"And you told the chief, I suppose?" said Vic, with a sneer.
"Yes, I told him," answered Tommy determinedly.
"More fool you!" said Vic, sighing. "He hasn't. Old Bill hasn't got it, Tommy.... I've been watching you all since Collop came under this accursed roof. The Don's not oppressed. It's not withhim.Hehasn't got it."
"Well, then, whohas, Vic? Damn it, whohas?" savagely.
Then did Victoria Mosel open her eyes wide, as wide as cigar-shaped eyes can open, and look at the questioner; next she folded her lids into a most natural slit of repose, and turned her gaze to the ceiling, saying:
"Look here, Tommy, I've told you already thatyouhaven't got it, and that ought to be enough for you.Youought to be grateful. In fact, youweregrateful just now. Only gratitude's short-lived."
"I believe you've got the stinking brooch, Vic," said her cousin (by marriage) surlily.
"You said that before—and I said, search me! I wish to Christ I had," said Vic. "I'd hand it on through Baba to the van Burens next time Archie went to Amsterdam. They'd know what to do with it! I should get it back in four pieces. They'd keep the fifth—but I'd net a bellyful!"
The young man got up from his lounge and stood surlily with his hands in his pockets.
"It's got to be found!" he said.
"It'll be found all right," assured Vic deliberately. "And who'll be relieved then, my boy?" And she dug a lean elbow with maidenly modesty under his fifth rib.
"Go to hell!" shouted the goaded Tommy. He intended to convey, after his fashion, that the conversation was closed.
He sauntered out of the room and Victoria Mosel, who always liked a warm chair in winter, sank back into the seat he had abandoned. She lit her third cigarette, the fifteenth of that morning, and shut her eyes to think over the matter fully. She had been up late the night before and Sunday morning is a good time for repose. She fell into a lounging little self-sufficient sleep, and snored in a gentle fashion, not unmusical ... dear Victoria!
And that was the end of the judgment passed by one select—and small—section of the governing classes upon a problem so closely concerning them all.
* * * * * * *
But the moment of revelation had come. Mr. Collop dared not stay, lest sure steps should obliterate the unwilling traces of Attaboy across the snow.
"None of 'em going to church, I hopes?" said he to his host after breakfast.
"Surely! Surely some one," was all the Victorian could say.
"Well," brutally, "none of 'em can. They've all got to be here together. We want every witness, sir; every one....I've found the emerald!"
"What? Eh! What!" staggered Humphrey de Bohun.
"I've found the emerald!" repeated the policeman enormously. "... Leastways, I've found where it is."
"What am I to do?" begged the statesman, all of a flutter. "What are your plans? It's urgent! Innocent men must be cleared!"
"Orl in good time!" pronounced the majestic Collop. "Orl in good time! First tell 'em there's no church this morning. Go and tell 'em that. Soak into 'em all. I've got to 'ave my witnesses—and you'll be glad, too, when it's over."
In his heart the Victorian relic, bleeding though he was from such a manner, felt that he would.... Anything to get it over!
"I've got a word to say to you, Sir Humphrey"—it was no longer "My lord"—"afore we summons 'em, and then you shall see what you shall see. Meanwhile, you go and tell 'em to stand by. I'll bide 'ere."
And he bided, while the far wealthier and therefore greater man trotted round on his errand.
"I'm sorry," he said to each couple, as he ferreted it out, "but I must ask you not to go out.The emerald's found; at least ... you'll see. Only wait where you are just a moment. I'll send for you all."
He repeated that phrase three times and fixed them to their stations; then he ran back to the deliverer.
He found the deliverer at the door of the West Room.
"Come in here, Mr. Dee Boe Hun," he said. "Look round, Sir Humphrey—what do you perceive?"
"Nothing," said the Home Secretary. Then he found the manhood to add, "Hurry up!"
"Ar! 'Urry up, is it?" said the masterful policeman deliberately. "Now there's a little point to be settled first." He compressed his lips, as though for a reprimand to an inferior. "The first thing that's got to be proved—and that's simple—is, was there a winder left open here the night o' the great disaster?"
"You mean on Friday night? The day before yesterday? The night the jewel was dropped?"
"Yep!" answered Mr. Collop. "I do."
"A window?" repeated the statesman, remembering the shutters, the curtains, the fire, all the scene.
"A winder was left open," insisted bovinely Mr. Collop. "I'll lay to that. And if you'll settle that p'int you'll see 'ow the rest'll follow. I tell you I 'ave me clue; it's more than a clue; it's a find. Ye'll see!"
The mechanism of a great house (delightful thought!) involves a hierarchy. The Home Secretary rang, and asked for the butler. An underling sought Mr. George Whaley, and Mr. George Whaley arrived. There was that in his eye which might have alarmed or warned the Head of the de Bohuns; but the Head of the de Bohuns was passing weary in the head just now, and he noted nothing.
"Oh!" he said, "I wanted you, Whaley ... to ask you—er—whether ... yes, to ask you who it is who does the room here in the early morning? Who, for instance, would be in the room here, say, well, before anybody else?"
George Whaley coughed discreetly.
"By rights, sir," he said, "it ought to be Annie. But it is possible, of course, that the Boy——"
"Ah! yes," said the Home Secretary. "The Boy. Of course!" He had vaguely heard that the Boy was the servant of the servants of the gods. "Well then, you think it would be the Boy? Send me the Boy!"
"Very good, sir," said George Whaley. But as there had been that in his eyes, so there was now that in his more manly gesture, as he turned round to pass majestically through the door, which might have warned once more, his master that he, George Whaley, had acquired new powers. There was a sense of approaching equality with the Great in George Whaley's waddle as he went through the door. From the mere dependent he was attaining the higher and political rank of blackmailer. But all these indications fell without effect upon the jaded de Bohun.
The Boy appeared. He stood at attention, after a fashion he had seen at the pictures. He stared with gooseberry eyes at his employer. The head of the de Bohuns was kind to him.
"Look here, boy," he said. "Look here. I've got to ask you something. Did you open a window in this room, or leave it open, or find it open, yesterday, Saturday morning—eh? Were you here before anybody else—eh? You understand what I mean. Did you open a window, or any window, or find one open—eh?"
The boy Ethelbert, standing as stiff as a poker and on the verge of tears, gave tongue.
"I ain't done nuthin'!" he said. "Don't yer say I took that em'ral'! I never did! I never set eyes on it. Don't you say that. It ain't true. I knows no more about it than the child unborn, what's in the Good Book."
The Head of the House was annoyed.
"Who's saying you did, you little fool? All I want to know is, whether the window was open?"
"I never touched it!" complained the youth more loudly still, and stiffer than ever, but with tears already gathering in his eyes. "I never did! So 'elp me Gawd! I couldn't tell it from a chunk o' cheese. I don't know what it looks like. I wish I may die. I wish I may drop down dead 'ere an' now!"
Collop, the policeman, took charge.
"Look 'ere, me lad," he said in the fine bullying voice of his noble trade, "none o' that! Did yer leave the window open, or 'ave yer seen it open?"
"Oo're you?" perked Ethelbert, stunned to boldness by terror, though still at attention. "Mr. de Bones 'e's my master; not you!" Then turning to that master, he continued, "I tell you, sir, straight honest from the shoulder, I'm a British lad, I am, so help me Gawd as made me own sweet self and little apples, I swear I never seen the thing."
"Look here, child," said Mr. de Bohun in a final sort of fashion, "was there a window open or was there not?"
"No, sir, there was nawt."
"Why the hell couldn't you say that before?" muttered the politician. "You're sure there was not?" he added. "Was there a catch undone?"
"Never mind about the catch," broke in Collop. "Time'll show that doesn't matter."
"There wasn't a window open, sir, at all, till I opened one, sir," said the Boy, "to let in Gawd's fresh air—which is orders."
"Oh, youdidopen one then?" said his master.
"Yes, sir!" said Ethelbert, still at attention.
"Ah!Nowwe're getting on!" said Collop. "That's what I always said. A winder was opened! Eh? A winder was opened! Now you mark me," he went on, turning to his host and tapping the palm of his round left hand with the stubby forefinger of his right. "That's another clue. A winder was open."
"Don't you dare say I touched it!" from the distraught Ethelbert.
"You shut yer mouth, boy," answered Collop without courtesy. "Tell him to shut his mouth, sir—tell him plain. He's distracting me."
"But there's some on us," went on Ethelbert desperately, refusing to shut that mouth, "as might speak if we knew...."
"Ah, now," said de Bohun eagerly. "Do you hear that, Mr. Collop? Do you hear that? The Boy may reveal ..."
Collop stepped in between. "Pay no attention, Mr. Dee Boe Hun. I got my clue, and we mustn't 'ave no cross scents. You take me?"
"Well," said his host, legitimately nettled, "I don't see any harm in getting whatever evidence we can."
"Ah, and you're right there," said young Ethelbert, still at attention. "And what's that sime hevidence, eh? That's what I say, sir. Hevidence—as clear as daylight, from them as knows. There's some as could speak if they would, and some as knows what others doesn't know. It isn't always them as needs things most as pinches 'em. And maybe, times, it's them as needs 'em least as pinches 'em!" He lowered his voice and mysteriously added, "The 'ighest!"
"Look here, Boy," said de Bohun, fatigued with such recitals: "if you've got anything to say, say it. Mr. Collop and I are pressed."
"What I've got to say," answered Ethelbert, with a solemnity beyond his years, "is plain enough, I tike it. 'Oo's to blame? Mum's the word. But there's some in this house that's 'igher than others. And 'oo's the 'ighest? A lord, I tike it?"
"Do you mean Lord Galton, child?" said the peer's cousin, sharply. "Are you saying Lord Galton took the Emerald?"
"I've named no names," said Ethelbert, trembling between fear and importance. "But this I do say, and it is ..."
"Have you any evidence against Lord Galton?"
"Now, Mr. Dee Boe Hun," urged Mr. Collop with decisive hands. "Now, please don't let's 'ave a cross scent."
The Home Secretary waved him aside. The family was concerned.
"What have you got against—or about—Lord Galton? Say what you have to say, and let's have it over."
"What I've got to say," said the Boy, "is what is but my plain duty to say. I names no names. I asks no questions and I don't get told no lies!"
"Upon my word!" cried his master angrily, almost moved to action. The boy Ethelbert at the end of so long a tension gave a loud cry of terror and suddenly whipped round and fled through the open door.
They were disconcerted.
"Well, Mr. Collop," said Mr. de Bohun on the child's vanishing, "that's another complication. It's Lord Galton now!" and he sank into a chair. Things were becoming too much for him.
"Don't you believe 'im," said Mr. Collop firmly. "What I say is, no cross scents. What do 'ounds do when they find a cross scent?"
Mr. de Bohun would have been only too happy to tell him, but he had never hunted.
"Why, they miss the right one. That's wot they do. And do they catch the fox? No. A thousand times, no! Now," said he, again tapping that palm of his with that forefinger of his. "You mark! Forget all about Lord Galton. It's servant's romancing. I told you I already 'ad one clue. And 'ere I've gone and gotanotherclue! An' they both fit in.... And now," he added peculiarly, gazing out of the window as though he would admire the wintry morning with its clear scintillating skies, "I'd have you note another clue. Look there," he said—and with the gesture of Hannibal pointing out the plains of Italy, Mr. Collop extended his left arm and directed his somewhat too thick forefinger towards the avenue and the sheets of snow on either side of the great gravel walk. "What have we there?" he said.
De Bohun, weary after his sleepless night, had to get up again from his chair and look where he was bidden. "I ... I don't see anything, Mr. Collop," he said.
"No," said Mr. Collop indulgently. "You wouldn't. It wants a trained eye. Now, you'll excuse me, sir, but if you 'ad been in the Yard as I 'ave, and as long as I 'ave, you'd see something. It's only a fine indication, like, but your mind would leap to it. At least mine 'as. Do you notice any marks on that snow?"
Mr. de Bohun honestly said he could not—nor could any man have seen any from where he stood.
"I certainly see no footprints," he said.
"Footprints o' wot?" answered Mr. Collop. "Footprints o' 'uman beings? Man and woman? Leastways boots? Nah!" and he shook his head. "You want ... you want your eyes better skinned than that in our trade, if you'll excuse me saying it. Shall Itellyou what's there? I can see it."
His host was justly irritated. "Well, I can't," he exploded. "Whatisthere?"
Mr. Collop leant over, made a shell of his hand and whispered in a voice to wake the dead:
"Footprints of a fowl! Leastways," he added hurriedly, "not a domestic fowl, I mean. But a bird. A bird's been there!" he added, nodding solemnly.
"Well, what of it?" said the last of the de Bohuns, still more irritated.
"Ah! You'll see!" said Mr. Collop, in a tone of great equality.
He stepped back, pulled his waistcoat down over his paunch, passed his hand cavalierly over his abominable moustache, and gave an order—as though he were master—for he now felt himself securely in the saddle.
"Summon 'em here," he said, with a large wave of his right hand, "summon 'em all. It's accomplished!"
"Summon who?"
"Me feller guests," said Mr. Collop. "They shall witness thedaynoumongand their souls shall be eased."
"Mr. Collop," said the harassed Home Secretary, "what need is there for this?"
"Witnesses! Mr. Dee Boe Hun!" royally. "Record! You'll be astonished."
"Very well, Mr. Collop, if you require them."
He made a gesture as though again to ring; then thought better of it and went out himself, looking at his watch as he moved to the door. He had seen no one go out. It was not yet half past ten o'clock: no one would yet have started for church. He remembered with pleasure that for once in her life Victoria Mosel had come to breakfast. He ferreted them all out, McTaggart cowering as usual—and very sad—in the old smoking-room; Galton and Vic, whom he surprised in the very act of repeating the word "putrid," he found in the library, already stale with smoke; Aunt Amelia he dragged out, almost by force, from the corner of the little morning-room where she was sitting, half somnolent, like the good mutton she was, her knitting laid aside on the Holy Day and wondering by the clock whether it was time for her to put on her bonnet (help!) for church. The Professor he had the good luck to catch at the very last moment as he was making for the glass doors of the hall, all ready muffled up for a walk. As for Marjorie, he had to go and find her in her room where she was desperately locked in, miserable.
"Mr. Collop has got something to tell us, my dear. Won't you come down?"
"Blast him!" came in tearful, broken tones from within.
"No, my dear, but please do come down. He really wants us all."
"I don't believe it's any use—no use at all, the rotter!" broke out that tearful voice.
"Marjorie, dear, please come."
"Very well"—with a grunt from within—"but it's no use!"
So the shepherd got his flock together. He was in a strange mood that the occasion was ceremonial, and he felt a fool. He almost counted heads as he roped in his little herd. They were all there. They filtered into the West Room, expecting little, and annoyed in their various ways; Marjorie hideous with recent tears, Aunt Amelia almost baa-a-ing, the Professor inept, McTaggart desperately out of place, the puller of horses more sullen than ever, and ah! the triumphant Victoria Mosel, cool as the woodland goddess of old songs—but smoking.