mrs. jones was in her parlour, doing nothing: with the exception of dropping a tart observation from her lips occasionally. as the intelligent reader cannot have failed to observe, tartness in regard to tongue was essentially an element of mrs. jones's nature; when anything occurred to annoy her, its signs increased four-fold; and something had just happened to annoy her very exceedingly.
the parlour was not large, but convenient, and well fitted-up. a good fire burnt in the grate, throwing its ruddy light on the bright colours of the crimson carpet and hearthrug; on the small sideboard, with its array of glass; on the horsehair chairs, on the crimson cloth covering the centre table, and finally on mrs. jones herself and on her sister.
mrs. jones sat at the table, some work before her, in the shape of sundry packages of hosiery, brought in from the shop to be examined, sorted, and put to rights. but she was not doing it. miss rye sat on the other side the table, stitching the seams of a gown-body by the light of the moderator lamp. the shop was just closed.
it had happened that dicky jones, about tea-time that evening, had strayed into his next-door neighbour's to get a chat: of which light interludes to business dicky jones was uncommonly fond. the bent of the conversation fell, naturally enough, on the recent calamity in mr. jones's house: in fact, mr. jones found his neighbour devouring the full account of it in the friday evening weekly newspaper, just damp from the press. a few minutes, and back went dicky to his own parlour, his mouth full of news: the purport of which was that the lodger, godfrey pitman, who had been supposed to leave the house at half-past four, to take the birmingham train, did not really quit it until some two or three hours later.
it had not been mrs. jones if she had refrained from telling her husband to hold his tongue for a fool; and of asking furthermore whether he had been drinking or dreaming. upon which dicky gave his authority for what he said. their neighbour, thomas cause, had watched the lodger go away later, with his own eyes.
mr. cause, a quiet tradesman getting in years, was fetched in, and a skirmish ensued. he asserted that he had seen the lodger come out of the house and go up the street by lamplight, carrying his blue bag; and he persisted in the assertion, in spite of mrs. jones's tongue. she declared he had not seen anything of the sort; that either his spectacles or the street lights had deceived him. and neither of them would give in to the other.
leaving matters in this unsatisfactory state, the neighbour went out again. mrs. jones exploded a little, and then had leisure to look at her sister, who had sat still and silent during the discussion. still and silent she remained; but her face had turned white, and her eyes wore a wild, frightened expression.
"what on earth's the matter with you?" demanded mrs. jones.
"nothing," said miss rye, catching hold of her work with nervous, trembling fingers. "only i can't bear to hear it spoken of."
"if mr. pitman didn't go away till later, that accounts for the tallow-grease in his room," suddenly interposed susan marks, who, passing into the parlour, caught the thread of the matter in dispute.
mrs. jones turned upon her. "tallow-grease!"
"i didn't see it till this afternoon," explained the girl. "with all the commotion there has been in the house, i never as much as opened the room-door till today since mr. pitman went out of it. the first thing i see was the carpet covered in drops of tallow-grease; a whole colony of them: and i know they were not there on the monday afternoon. they be there still."
mrs. jones went upstairs at once, the maid following her. sure enough the grease drops were there. some lay on the square piece of carpet, some on the boarded floor; but all were very near together. the candlestick and candle, from which they had no doubt dropped, stood on the wash-hand-stand at mrs. jones's elbow, as she wrathfully gazed.
"he must have been lighting of his candle sideways," remarked the girl to her mistress; "or else have held it askew while hunting for something on the floor. if he stopped as late as old cause says, why in course he'd need a candle."
mrs. jones went down again, her temper by no means improved. she did not like to be deceived or treated as though she were nobody; neither did she choose that her house should be played with. if the lodger missed his train (as she now supposed he might have done) and came back to wait for a later one, his duty was to have announced himself, and asked leave to stay. in spite, however, of the tallow and of mr. cause, she put but little faith in the matter. shortly after this there came a ring at the side-door, and mr. butterby's voice was heard in the passage.
"don't say anything to him about it," said miss rye hastily, in a low tone.
"about what?" demanded mrs. jones, aloud.
"about that young man's not going away as soon as we thought he did. it's nothing to butterby."
there was no time for more. mr. butterby was shown in and came forward with a small present for mrs. jones. it was only a bunch of violets; but mrs. jones, in spite of her tartness, was fond of flowers, and received them graciously: calling to susan to bring a wine-glass of water.
"i passed a chap at the top of high street with a basketfull; he said he'd sold but two bunches all the evening, so i took a bunch," explained mr. butterby. "it was that gardener's man, reed, who met with the accident and has been unfit for work since. knowing you liked violets, mrs. jones, i thought i'd just call in with them."
he sat down in the chair, offered him, by the fire, putting his hat in the corner behind. miss rye, after saluting him, had resumed work, and sat with her face turned to the table, partially away from his view; mrs. jones, at the other side of the table, faced him.
"where's jones?" asked mr. butterby.
"jones is off, as usual," replied jones's wife. "no good to ask where he is after the shop's shut; often not before it."
it was an unlucky question, bringing back all the acrimony which the violets had partially soothed away. mr. butterby coughed, and began talking of recent events in a sociable, friendly manner, just as if he had been mrs. jones's brother, and never in his life heard of so rare an animal as a detective.
"it's an uncommon annoying thing to have had happen in your house, mrs. jones! as if it couldn't as well have took place in anybody else's! there's enough barristers lodging in the town at assize time, i hope. but there! luck's everything. i'd have given five shillings out of my pocket to have stopped it."
"so would i; for his sake as well as for mine," was mrs. jones's answer. and she seized one of the parcels of stockings and jerked off the string.
"have you had any more dreams, miss rye?"
"no," replied miss rye, holding her stitching closer to the light for a moment. "that one was enough."
"dreams is curious things; not to be despised," observed crafty mr. butterby; than whom there was not a man living despised dreams, as well as those who professed to have them, more than he. "but i've knowed so-called dreams to be nothing in the world but waking thoughts. are you sure that one of yours was a dream, miss rye?"
"i would rather not talk of it, if you please," she said. "talking cannot bring mr. ollivera back to life."
"what makes you persist in thinking he did not kill himself?"
mr. butterby had gradually edged his chair forward on the hearthrug, so as to obtain a side view of miss rye's face. perhaps he was surprised, perhaps not, to see it suddenly flush, and then become deadly pale.
"just look here, miss rye. if he did not do it, somebody else did. and i should like to glean a little insight as to whether or not there are grounds for that new light, if there's any to be gleaned."
"why, what on earth! are you taking up that crotchet, butterby?"
the interruption came from mrs. jones. that goes without telling, as the french say. mr. butterby turned to warm his hands at the blaze, speaking mildly enough to disarm an enemy.
"not i. i should like to show your sister that her suspicions are wrong: she'll worrit herself into a skeleton, else. see here: whatever happened, and however it happened, it must have been between half-past seven and eight. you were in the place part of that half-hour, miss rye, and heard nobody."
"i have already said so."
"shut up in your room at the top of the house; looking for--what was it?--a parcel?"
"a pattern--a pattern of a sleeve. but i had to open parcels, for i could not find it, and stayed searching. it had slipped between one drawer and another at the back."
"it must have took you some time," remarked mr. butterby, keeping his face on the genial fire and his eyes on miss rye.
"i suppose it did. susan says i was upstairs a quarter of an hour, but i don't think it was so long as that. eight o'clock struck after i got back to mrs. wilson's."
mr. butterby paused. miss rye resumed after a minute.
"i don't think any one could have come in legitimately without my hearing them on the stairs. my room is not at the top of the house, it is on the same floor as mrs. jones's; the back room immediately over the bedroom that was occupied by mr. ollivera. my door was open, and the drawers in which i was searching stood close to it. if any----"
"what d'ye mean by legitimate?" interrupted mr. butterby, turning to take a full look at the speaker.
"openly; with the noise one usually makes in coming upstairs. but if any one crept up secretly, of course i should not have heard it. susan persists in declaring she never lost sight of the front door at all; i don't believe her."
"nobody does believe her," snapped mrs. jones, with a fling at the socks. "she confesses now that she ran in twice or thrice to look at the fires."
"oh! she does, does she," cried mr. butterby. "leaving the door open, i suppose?"
"leaving it to take care of itself. she says she shut it; i say i know she didn't. put it at the best, it was not fastened; and anybody might have opened it and walked in that had a mind to and robbed the house."
the visitor, sitting so unobtrusively by the fire, thought he discerned a little glimmer of possibility breaking in amidst the utter darkness.
"but, as the house was not robbed, why we must conclude nobody did come in," he observed. "as to the verdict--i don't see yet any reason for miss rye's disputing it. mr. ollivera was a favourite, i suppose."
the remark did not please miss rye. her cheek flushed, her work fell, and she rose from her seat to turn on mr. butterby.
"the verdict was a wrong verdict. mr. ollivera was a good and brave and just man. never a better went out of the world."
"if i don't believe you were in love with him!" cried mr. butterby.
"perhaps i was," came the unexpected answer; but the speaker seemed to be in too much agitation to heed greatly what she said. "it would not have hurt either him or me."
gathering her work, cotton, scissors in her hands, she went out of the room. at the same moment there arrived an influx of female visitors, come, without ceremony, to get an hour's chat with mrs. jones. catching up his hat, mr. butterby dexterously slipped out and disappeared.
the street was tolerably empty. he took up his position at the edge of the facing pavement, and surveyed the house critically. as if he did not know all its aspects by heart! some few yards higher up, the dwellings of mr. cause and the linendraper alone intervening, there was a side opening, bearing the euphonious title of bear entry, which led right into an obscure part of the town. by taking this, and executing a few turnings and windings, the railway station might be approached without touching on the more public streets.
"yes," said the police agent to himself, calculating possibilities, "that's how it might have been done. not that it was, though: i'm only putting it. a fellow might have slipped out of the door while that girl was in at her fires, cut down bear entry, double back again along goose lane, and so gain the rail."
turning up the street with a brisk step, mr. butterby found himself face to face with thomas cause, who was standing within the shade of his side door. exceedingly affable when it suited him to be so, he stopped to say a good evening.
"how d'ye do cause? a fine night, isn't it?"
"lovely weather; shall pay for it later. has she recovered her temper yet?" continued mr. cause. "i saw you come out."
which was decidedly a rather mysterious addition to the answer. mr. butterby naturally inquired what it might mean, and had his ears gratified with the story of godfrey pitman's later departure, and of mrs. jones's angry disbelief in it. never had those ears listened more keenly.
"are you sure it was the man?" he asked cautiously.
"if it wasn't him it was his ghost," said mr. cause. "i was standing here on the monday night, just a step or two for'arder on the pavement, little thinking that a poor gentleman was shooting himself within a few yards of me, and saw a man come out of jones's side door. when he was close up, i knew him in a moment for the same traveller, with the same blue bag in his hand, that i saw go in with miss rye on the sunday week previous. he came out of the house cautiously, his head pushed forward first, looking up the street and down the street, and then turned out sharp, whisked past me as hard as he could walk, and went down bear entry. it seemed to me that he didn't care to be seen."
but that detectives' hearts are too hard for emotion, this one's might have beaten a little faster as he listened. it was so exactly what he had been fancifully tracing to himself as the imaginary course of a guilty man. stealing out of the house down bear entry, and so up to the railway station!
"what time was it?"
"what time is it now?" returned mr. cause: and the other took out his watch.
"five-and-thirty minutes past seven."
"then it was as nigh the same time on monday night, as nigh as nigh can be. i shut up my shop at the usual hour, and i'd stood here afterwards just about as long as i've stood here now. i like to take a breath of fresh air, mr. butterby, when the labours of the day are over."
"fresh air's good for all of us--that can get it," said mr. butterby, with a sniff at the air around him. "what sort of a looking man was this godfrey pitman?"
"a well-grown, straight man; got a lot of black hair about his face; whiskers, and beard, and moustachios."
"young?"
"thirty. perhaps not so much. in reading the account in the herald this evening, i saw jones's folks gave evidence that he had left at half-past four to catch the birmingham train. i told jones it was a mistake, and he told his wife; and didn't she fly out! as if she need have put herself in a tantrum over that! 'twas a matter of no consequence."
in common with the rest of the town, not a gleam of suspicion that the death was otherwise than the verdict pronounced it to be, had been admitted by mr. cause. he went on enlarging on the grievance of mrs. jones's attack upon him.
"she'd not hear a word: jones fetched me in there. she told me to my face that, between spectacles and the deceitful rays of street lamps, one, come to my age, was unable to distinguish black from white, round from square. she said i must have mistaken the gentleman, mr. greatorex, for godfrey pitman or else jones's nephew, both of them having gone out about the same time. i couldn't get in a word edgeways, i assure you mr. butterby, and dicky jones can bear me out that i couldn't. let it go, 'tis of no moment; i don't care to quarrel with my neighbours' wives."
mr. butterby thought it was of a great deal of moment. he changed the conversation to something else with apparent carelessness, and then took a leisurely departure. turning off at the top of high street, he increased his pace, and went direct to the railway station.
the most intelligent porter employed there was a man named hall. it was his duty to be on the platform when trains were starting and, as the detective had previous cause to know, few of those who departed by them escaped his observation. the eight o'clock train for london was on the point of departure. mr. butterby waited under some sheds until it had gone.
now for hall, thought he. as if to echo the words the first person to approach the sheds was hall himself. in a diplomatic way, mr. butterby, when he had made known his presence, began putting inquiries about a matter totally foreign to the one he had come upon.
"by the way, hall," he suddenly said, when the man thought he was done with, "there was a friend of mine went away last monday evening, but i'm not sure by which train. i wonder if you happened to see him here? a well-grown, straight man, with black beard and whiskers--about thirty."
hall considered, and shook his head. "i've no recollection of any one of that description, sir."
"got a blue bag in his hand. he might have went by the five o'clock train, or later. at eight most likely; this hour, you know."
"was he going to london, or the other way, sir?"
"can't tell you. try and recollect."
"monday?--monday?" cried hall, endeavouring to recal what he could. "i ought to remember that night, sir, the one of the calamity in high street; but the fact is, one day is so much like another here, it's hard to single out any in particular."
"were you on duty last sunday week, in the afternoon?"
"yes, sir; it was my sunday on."
"the man i speak of arrived by train that afternoon, then. you must have seen him."
"so i did," said the porter, suddenly. "just the man you describe, sir; and i remember that it struck me i had seen his face somewhere before. it might have been only fancy; i had not much of a look at him; he got mixed with the other passengers, and went away quickly. i recollect the blue bag."
"just so; all right. now then, hall: did you see him leave last monday evening?"
"i never saw him, to my recollection, since the time of his arrival. stop a bit. a blue bag? why, it was a blue bag that--and that was monday evening. wait an instant, sir. i'll fetch bill."
leaving the detective to make the most of these detached sentences, hall hurried off before he could be stopped. mr. butterby turned his face to the wall, and read the placards there.
when hall came back he had a lad with him. and possibly it might have been well for that lad's equanimity, that he was unconscious the spare man, studying the advertisements, was the city's renowned detective, jonas butterby.
"now then," said hall, "you tell this gentleman about your getting that there ticket, bill."
"'twas last monday evening," began the boy, thus enjoined, "and we was waiting to start the eight o'clock train. in that there dark corner, i comes upon a gentleman set down upon the bench; which he called to me, he did, and says, says he, 'this bag's heavy,' says he, 'and i don't care to carry it further nor i can help, nor yet to leave it,' says he, 'for it's got val'able papers in it,' says he; 'if you'll go and get my ticket for me,' says he, 'third class to oxford,' says he, 'i'll give you sixpence,' says he: which i did, and took it to him," concluded the speaker; "and he gave me the sixpence."
"did he leave by the train?"
"why in course he did," was the reply. "he got into the last third class at the tail o' the train, him and his bag; which were blue, it were."
"an old gentleman, with white hair, was it?" asked mr. butterby, carelessly.
the boy's round eyes opened. "white hair! why, 'twas black as ink. and his beard, too. he warn't old; he warn't."
mr. butterby walked home, ruminating; stirred up his fire when he arrived, lighted his candles, for he had a habit of waiting on himself, and sat down, ruminating still. sundry notes and bits of folded paper had been delivered for him from his confrères at the police-station--if mr. butterby will not be offended at our classing them with him as such--but he pushed them from him, never opening one. he did not even change his coat for the elegant green-tailed habit, economically adopted for home attire, and he was rather particular in doing so in general. no: mr. butterby's mind was ill at ease: not in the sense, be it understood, as applied to ordinary mortals; but things were puzzling him.
to give mr. butterby his due, he was sufficiently keen of judgment; though he had made mistakes occasionally. taking the surface of things only, he might have jumped to the conclusion that a certain evil deed had been committed by godfrey pitman; diving into them, and turning them about in his practised mind, he saw enough to cause him to doubt and hesitate.
"the man's name's as much pitman as mine is," quoth he, as he sat looking into the fire, a hand on each knee. "he arrives here on a sunday, accosts a stranger he meets accidentally in turning out of the station, which happened to be alletha rye, and gets her to accommodate him with a week's private lodgings. thought, she says, the house she was standing at was hers: and it's likely he did. the man was afraid of being seen, was flying from pursuit, and dare not risk the publicity of an inn. stays in the house nine days, and never stirs out all the mortal time. makes an excuse of a cold and relaxed throat for stopping in; which was an excuse," emphatically repeated the speaker. "takes leave on the monday at half-past four, and goes out to catch the birmingham train. is seen to go out. what brought him back?"
the question was not, apparently, easy to solve, for mr. butterby was a long while pondering it.
"he couldn't get back into the house up through the windows or down through the chimneys; not in anyway but through the door. and the chances were that he might have been seen going in and coming out. no: don't think he went back to harm mr. ollivera. rather inclined to say his announced intention of starting by the five o'clock train to birmingham was a blind: he meant to go by the one at eight t'other way, and went back to wait for it, afeared of hanging about the station itself or loitering in the streets. it don't quite wash, neither, that; chances were he might have been seen coming back," debated mr. butterby.
"wonder if he has anything to do with that little affair that has just turned up in birmingham?" resumed the speaker, deviating to another thought. "young man's wanted for that, george winter: might have been this very selfsame godfrey pitman; and of course might not. let's get on.
"it don't stand to reason that he'd come in any such way into a town and stop a whole week at the top of a house for the purpose of harming mr. ollivera. why 'twas not till the tuesday after pitman was in, that the joneses got the barrister's letter saying he was coming and would occupy his old rooms if they were vacant. no," decided mr. butterby; "pitman was in trouble on his own score, and his mysterious movements had reference to that: as i'm inclined to think."
one prominent quality in mr. butterby was pertinacity. let him take up an idea of his own accord, however faint, and it took a vast deal to get it out of him. an obstinate man was he in his self-conceit. anybody who knew mr. butterby well, and could have seen his thoughts as in a glass, might have known he would be slow to take up the doubts against godfrey pitman, because he had already them up against another.
"i don't like it," he presently resumed. "look at it in the best light, she knows something of the matter; more than she likes to be questioned about. put the case, jonas butterby. here's a sober, sensible, steady young woman, superior to half the women going, thinking only of her regular duties, nothing to conceal, open and cheerful as the day. that's how she was till this happened. and now? goes home on the monday night at nigh eleven o'clock (not to speak yet of what passed up to that hour), sits over the parlour-fire after other folks had went to bed, 'thinking,' as she puts it. goes up later; can't sleep; drops asleep towards morning, and dreams that mr. ollivera's dead. gets flurried at inquest (i saw it, though others mightn't); tramps to see him buried, stands on the fresh grave, and tells the public he did not commit suicide. how does she know he didn't? come. mrs. jones is ten times sharper-sighted, and she has no doubt. says, next, to her sister in confidence (and dicky repeats it to me as a choice bit of gossip) that she's haunted by ollivera's spirit.
"i don't like that," pursued mr. butterby, after a revolving pause. "when folks are haunted by dead men's spirits--leastways, fancy they are--it bodes a conscience not at rest in regard to the dead. to-night her face was pale and red by turns; her fingers shook so they had to clutch her work; she won't talk of it; she left the room to avoid me. and," continued mr. butterby, "she was the only one, so far as can be yet seen, that was for any length of time in the house between half-past seven and eight on monday evening. a quarter of an hour finding a sleeve-pattern!
"i don't say it was her; i've not got as far as that yet, by a long way. i don't yet say it was not as the jury brought it in. but she was in the house for that quarter of an hour, unaccounting for her stay in accordance with any probability; and i'm inclined to think that godfrey pitman must have been out of it before the harm was done. nevertheless, appearances is deceitful, deductions sometimes wrong, and while i keep a sharp eye on the lady, i shall look you up, mr. godfrey pitman."
one drawback against the "looking up" was--and mr. butterby felt slightly conscious of it as he rose from his seat before the fire--that he had never seen godfrey pitman in his life; and did not know whence he came or whither he might have gone.
prologue.
