“i must say that i feel very grateful to you, mr. crewe,” said detective gillett after a pause. “you have certainly got hold of some facts of which i was not aware. and your deductions are most interesting. what do you say, westaway?”
“most interesting,” said the sergeant. “i had heard a lot of mr. crewe before i met him, but i’d like to say that it’s a great privilege to listen to his deductions.”
“oh, i don’t go so far as to accept his theory and abandon my own,” interposed gillett hurriedly. “to my mind there is truth in both of them, and the whole truth will probably be found in a judicious combination of both.”
crewe could scarcely hide his impatience at gillett’s obstinacy, and his determination to claim at least an equal share in solving the mystery.
“my dear gillett,” he said, “let us abandon theories and keep to facts. the great danger in our work is in fitting facts to theories instead of letting the facts speak for themselves. if you still think you have a case against marsland, let us go into it. it is no part of my work to prove marsland innocent if he is guilty; i have no object in proving brett guilty if he is innocent. but as the guest of sir george granville, i want to save him and his nephew unnecessary distress and anxiety. by a full and frank discussion we can decide as man to man whether there is any real case for marsland to answer. i admit that you have justification for some suspicions in regard to him, but let us see if the fog of suspicion cannot be cleared away by a discussion of the facts.”
“it will take a great deal to convince me that he doesn’t know more about this tragedy than he has told us,” said gillett doggedly.
“but are we to find him guilty merely because he chooses to keep silence on certain points?”
“what is his object in keeping silence? what was his object in making a false statement? what is his object in putting obstacles in our way? is that the conduct of an innocent man?”
“it is not the conduct of a man anxious to help the police to the utmost of his power without regard to consequences,” said crewe. “but there is a wide gulf between being guilty of keeping something back and being guilty of murder.”
“when the thing kept back suggests a motive for getting the man who was murdered out of the way, it is natural to see a connection between the two,” returned gillett.
“and what was the thing that marsland kept back?”
“he kept back that he was an officer in the army—captain in the london rifle brigade. he kept back that this man lumsden was a private in his company.”
“but the discovery of these things did not present any great difficulty to a police official of your resources, gillett.”
“no, they did not,” the detective admitted. “but we should have been told of them in the first place.”
“true. but listen to the explanation why you were not told. marsland has been an invalid for some months. he was invalided out of the army because of wounds and nervous shock. he broke down as many others have broken down, under a long experience of the awful horrors of the front. in order to assist in his recovery the doctors ordered that as far as possible his mind should be kept from dwelling on the war. for this reason the war is never mentioned in his presence by those who know of his nervous condition. he is never addressed by them as an army officer, but as a civilian.”
“all that is very interesting, mr. crewe, but it does not dispose of the information in our possession. you see, the circumstances in which captain marsland came into this affair were so very extraordinary, that he might well have told westaway the truth about the military connection between himself and lumsden. it was an occasion when the whole truth should have been told. we could not have been long in learning from his relatives that he was suffering from nervous shock, and we would have shown him every consideration.”
“that is an excellent piece of special pleading,” said crewe. “but you do not take into consideration the fact that the evasion of everything that dealt with the army, and particularly with his old regiment, has become a habit with marsland.”
“our information,” said gillett slowly and impressively, “is that he believed lumsden was dead—that he had been killed in france. that in his capacity as an officer he sent lumsden and another man to their death. he had a grudge against this other man. lumsden’s companion was killed but lumsden was taken prisoner and subsequently escaped. if that is correct, it supplies a strong motive for getting lumsden out of the way when he discovered that lumsden was alive and in england.”
“when did marsland make this discovery?”
“that i don’t know. but he could easily have made it and obtained lumsden’s address from the headquarters of the london rifle brigade.”
“did he make such inquiries there?”
“i have not obtained positive proof that he did. but as a retired officer of the brigade, who knows his way about their headquarters, he could do it for himself in a way that would leave no proof.”
“who was the man that marsland sent out on a mission of death with lumsden?”
“i haven’t got the name.”
“can’t you get it?”
“i am afraid not. it is not a thing one could get from the regimental records.”
“but cannot you get it from your informant—from the person who is your authority for the story?”
“not very well.”
“what does that mean?”
“our informant is anonymous. he sent me a letter.”
“and since when have you begun to place implicit faith in anonymous letters, my dear gillett?”
the detective flushed under this gentle irony. “i don’t place implicit faith in it. but it fits in with other information in our possession. and you ought to know better than to despise anonymous information, mr. crewe. it is not difficult to conceive circumstances in which a man is willing to give the police very valuable information, but will not come into the open to do it.”
“but it is even less difficult,” replied crewe, “to conceive circumstances in which a man tries to divert suspicion from himself by directing the attentions of the police to some one else by means of an anonymous letter.”
“i haven’t overlooked that,” said gillett confidently.
“and this anonymous communication fits in with other information in your possession—other information that you have received from miss maynard?” crewe looked steadily at gillett, and then turned his gaze on westaway.
“so, you know about her?” was gillett’s comment.
“she did me the honour of asking my advice when i met her two days ago at cliff farm.”
“what was she doing there?”
“didn’t she tell you?”
“she did not.”
“i understood from her that it was her firm determination to tell you everything—to take you fully into her confidence, and throw all the light she could on the tragedy.”
“she told us that she was at the farm the night captain marsland was there,” said gillett. “she sought shelter there from the storm and went upstairs with captain marsland when the body was discovered. he said nothing whatever about this in his statement to westaway.”
“nothing whatever,” said westaway. “he led me to believe he was entirely and absolutely alone.”
“but why didn’t she come to the police station that night and make her own statement?” asked crewe. “why all this delay?”
“her first impulse was to keep her name out of it because of the way people would talk,” said sergeant westaway, who, as an old resident of ashlingsea, felt better qualified than detective gillett to interpret the mental process of one of the inhabitants of the little town.
“and so she asked marsland to say nothing about her presence at the farm?” asked crewe.
“she admits that,” was westaway’s reply.
“of course she had to admit it in order to clear the way for a statement implicating marsland in the crime,” said crewe.
“that was not her motive. after thinking over all that happened, she decided that by shielding herself from idle gossip she might be helping unconsciously to shield the murderer.”
“and she told you everything,” said crewe.
“everything,” said sergeant westaway emphatically.
“she told you why she was waiting at the farm on the night that lumsden’s dead body was brought there?”
“she went there for shelter from the storm,” explained the confident sergeant. “that would be after the body was brought there—if your theory is correct, mr. crewe; and after he was shot in the house—if our theory is correct. our theory is that captain marsland, after committing the crime, went outside the house to hide the traces of it—probably to get rid of these boots and revolver, which he threw down the well.”
“it hasn’t occurred to you, sergeant, that these things may have been placed in the well within the last few days in order that you might find them there?” said crewe.
“who would place them there?” asked gillett coming to the rescue of the sergeant with a poser.
“i think you asked me just now what miss maynard was doing at the farm two days ago,” said crewe.
“and you think that there may be some connection between her visit there and these things?”
“with all due deference to the sergeant as a judge of character, and particularly of the feminine character, i am quite convinced that she has not told you everything.”
“can you tell us anything she is keeping back?”
“she is keeping back the real reason why she went to cliff farm on the night the body was taken there.”
“you do not think she went there to shelter from the storm?”
“she had an appointment there,” said crewe.
“with whom?” asked gillett breathlessly.
“with brett—the man to whom she is engaged.”
“what!” exclaimed gillett.
“surely she explained to you the nature of her relations with brett?” said crewe maliciously. “except in regard to marsland she does not seem to have taken you into her confidence at all.”
“she may be playing a deep game,” said gillett, in a tone which indicated that although an attempt might be made to hoodwink them, it was not likely to prove successful.
“i think you will find that she is a very clever young woman,” was crewe’s comment.
“what was the nature of her appointment at cliff farm with brett? why not meet him at ashlingsea or at staveley?” asked gillett.
“as to the nature of the appointment, i will refer you for full details to mrs. grange. you know her, sergeant, of course?” crewe said, turning to westaway.
“the dwarf woman at staveley?” asked the sergeant.
“yes. if i am not much mistaken grange and his wife were in the vicinity of cliff farm when the dead body of the owner was brought there. what part they played in the tragedy i must leave you to find out from them. i am not certain myself of their part, but i have a fairly clear idea. you can let me know what admission you get from them. before they admit anything it may be necessary to frighten them with arrest, gillett. but i don’t suppose you mind doing that?”
“not in the least,” replied gillett with a smile that was free from embarrassment. “but what evidence can i produce to show that i know they know all about miss maynard’s presence at the farm? what evidence is there that this man and his wife were anywhere in the neighbourhood of the place?”
“they went over in the afternoon of october both in a motor-boat in charge of a boatman at staveley, who is called pedro, and wears a scarlet cloak. murchison told me that pedro is the father of mrs. grange, the dwarf woman—they are italians. but grange, the husband, is an englishman. he keeps a second-hand bookshop in curzon street, at staveley, and lives over the shop with his wife. is that not so, westaway?”
“yes, sir. that is quite correct.”
“they reached the landing-place at the foot of the cliffs, near the farm, before there was any appearance of the storm. the next morning, as i was descending the cliff by the secret path, i found an old felt hat on the rocks just before pedro, who had come over in his boat to look for it, reached the place. my impression is that the hat belonged to grange, and was blown off as he was descending the cliff by the path when the storm was abating. if it had been blown off in the afternoon, while he was ascending the cliff in daylight, he could have recovered it without much difficulty. the fact that he left it behind indicates that it was blown off in the dark and that he was too excited and upset to hunt for it. but on reaching staveley in pedro’s boat, after the storm had abated, he began to think that his old hat was a dangerous object to leave about in the vicinity of a house where there was the body of a murdered man awaiting discovery by the police, so he sent pedro back to the landing-place to recover the hat.”
“but, hang it all, crewe! some of your reasoning about the hat is merely surmise. you say it was blown off while grange was descending the cliff path. how do you arrive at that conclusion? it might have been blown off at any time—while he was crossing to the farm, or standing on the cliffs.”
“no,” replied crewe. “the gale was blowing in from the sea, and if grange’s hat had blown off while he was on the cliffs it would have blown inward—that is, across the downs.”
detective gillett nodded.
“i overlooked that point,” he said. “have you possession of the hat now?”
“yes. you can have it if you call for it at sir george granville’s, on your way to interview grange this afternoon or to-morrow. but the granges know that i have the hat. i went there with it just to convince myself that grange did own it.”
“did he admit that it was his?”
“he denied it. but he is not a good hand at dissimulation. i offered to hand over the hat to him in exchange for a truthful account of all he and his wife knew about the tragedy, but the offer was not entertained. they denied that they were there at all.”
“i’ll soon get them to alter that tune!” exclaimed the resourceful gillett. “i will put the screw on this man in the scarlet cloak until i squeeze something out of him.”
“i am afraid you will have a slight difficulty in making pedro reveal anything,” said crewe. “he is deaf and dumb.”
gillett looked somewhat confused at finding that his impetuous confidence had carried him beyond his resources.
“that is unfortunate,” he said.
“it is of no consequence,” returned crewe, “for you have evidence in your possession that mrs. grange was inside the farmhouse. the comb you found in the sitting-room downstairs belongs to her. when i went to see her she was wearing one exactly similar to it. apparently she had two of them. and she does not know where she lost the one the police have, or she would not wear its fellow.”
