Produced by Lionel G. Sear
THE DOINGS OF RAFFLES HAW
By Arthur Conan Doyle
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
1. A DOUBLE ENIGMA
2. THE TENANT OF THE NEW HALL.
3. A HOUSE OF WONDERS.
4. FROM CLIME TO CLIME.
5. LAURA'S REQUEST
6. A STRANGE VISITOR
7. THE WORKINGS OF WEALTH.
8. A BILLIONAIRE'S PLANS.
9. A NEW DEPARTURE
10. THE GREAT SECRET
11. A CHEMICAL DEMONSTRATION.
12. A FAMILY JAR.
13. A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE
14. THE SPREAD OF THE BLIGHT.
15. THE GREATER SECRET.
CHAPTER I. A DOUBLE ENIGMA.
“I'm afraid that he won't come,” said Laura McIntyre, in a disconsolate
voice.
“Why not?”
“Oh, look at the weather; it is something too awful.”
As she spoke a whirl of snow beat with a muffled patter against the cosy
red-curtained window, while a long blast of wind shrieked and whistled
through the branches of the great white-limbed elms which skirted the
garden.
Robert McIntyre rose from the sketch upon which he had been working, and
taking one of the lamps in his hand peered out into the darkness. The
long skeleton limbs of the bare trees tossed and quivered dimly amid the
whirling drift. His sister sat by the fire, her fancy-work in her lap,
and looked up at her brothers profile which showed against the brilliant
yellow light. It was a handsome face, young and fair and clear cut, with
wavy brown hair combed backwards and rippling down into that outward
curve at the ends which one associates with the artistic temperament.
There was refinement too in his slightly puckered eyes, his dainty
gold-rimmed _pince-nez_ glasses, and in the black velveteen coat which
caught the light so richly upon its shoulder. In his mouth only
there was something--a suspicion of coarseness, a possibility of
weakness--which in the eyes of some, and of his sister among them,
marred the grace and beauty of his features. Yet, as he was wont himself
to say, when one thinks that each poor mortal is heir to a legacy of
every evil trait or bodily taint of so vast a line of ancestors, lucky
indeed is the man who does not find that Nature has scored up some
long-owing family debt upon his features.
And indeed in this case the remorseless creditor had gone so far as to
exact a claim from the lady also, though in her case the extreme beauty
of the upper part of the face drew the eye away from any weakness which
might be found in the lower. She was darker than her brother--so dark
that her heavily coiled hair seemed to be black until the light shone
slantwise across it. The delicate, half-petulant features, the finely
traced brows, and the thoughtful, humorous eyes were all perfect in
their way, and yet the combination left something to be desired. There
was a vague sense of a flaw somewhere, in feature or in expression,
which resolved itself, when analysed, into a slight out-turning and
droop of the lower lip; small indeed, and yet pronounced enough to turn
what would have been a beautiful face into a merely pretty one. Very
despondent and somewhat cross she looked as she leaned back in the
armchair, the tangle of bright-coloured silks and of drab holland upon
her lap, her hands clasped behind her head, with her snowy forearms and
little pink elbows projecting on either side.
“I know he won't come,” she repeated.
“Nonsense, Laura! Of course he'll come. A sailor and afraid of the
weather!”
“Ha!” She raised her finger, and a smile of triumph played over her
face, only to die away again into a blank look of disappointment. “It is
only papa,” she murmured.
A shuffling step was heard in the hall, and a little peaky man, with his
slippers very much down at the heels, came shambling into the room. Mr.
McIntyre, sen., was pale and furtive-looking, with a thin straggling
red beard shot with grey, and a sunken downcast face. Ill-fortune and
ill-health had both left their marks upon him. Ten years before he had
been one of the largest and richest gunmakers in Birmingham, but a long
run of commercial bad luck had sapped his great fortune, and had finally
driven him into the Bankruptcy Court. The death of his wife on the very
day of his insolvency had filled his cup of sorrow, and he had gone
about since with a stunned, half-dazed expression upon his weak pallid
face which spoke of a mind unhinged. So complete had been his downfall
that the family would have been reduced to absolute poverty were it not
for a small legacy of two-hundred a year which both the children had
received from one of their uncles upon the mother's side who had amassed
a fortune in Australia. By combining their incomes, and by taking a
house in the quiet country district of Tamfield, some fourteen miles
from the great Midland city, they were still able to live with some
approach to comfort. The change, however, was a bitter one to all--to
Robert, who had to forego the luxuries dear to his artistic temperament,
and to think of turning what had been merely an overruling hobby into a
means of earning a living; and even more to Laura, who winced before
the pity of her old friends, and found the lanes and fields of
Tamfield intolerably dull after the life and bustle of Edgbaston. Their
discomfort was aggravated by the conduct of their father, whose life
now was one long wail over his misfortunes, and who alternately sought
comfort in the Prayer-book and in the decanter for the ills which had
befallen him.
To Laura, however, Tamfield presented one attraction, which was now
about to be taken from her. Their choice of the little country hamlet as
their residence had been determined by the fact of their old friend,
the Reverend John Spurling, having been nominated as the vicar. Hector
Spurling, the elder son, two months Laura's senior, had been engaged to
her for some years, and was, indeed, upon the point of marrying her when
the sudden financial crash had disarranged their plans. A sub-lieutenant
in the Navy, he was home on leave at present, and hardly an evening
passed without his making his way from the Vicarage to Elmdene, where
the McIntyres resided. To-day, however, a note had reached them to
the effect that he had been suddenly ordered on duty, and that he must
rejoin his ship at Portsmouth by the next evening. He would look in,
were it but for half-an-hour, to bid them adieu.
“Why, where's Hector?” asked Mr. McIntyre, blinking round from side to
side.
“He's not come, father. How could you expect him to come on such a night
as this? Why, there must be two feet of snow in the glebe field.”
“Not come, eh?” croaked the old man, throwing himself down upon the
sofa. “Well, well, it only wants him and his father to throw us over,
and the thing will be complete.”
“How can you even hint at such a thing, father?” cried Laura
indignantly. “They have been as true as steel. What would they think if
they heard you.”
“I think, Robert,” he said, disregarding his daughter's protest, “that
I will have a drop, just the very smallest possible drop, of brandy. A
mere thimbleful will do; but I rather think I have caught cold during
the snowstorm to-day.”
Robert went on sketching stolidly in his folding book, but Laura looked
up from her work.
“I'm afraid there is nothing in the house, father,” she said.
“Laura! Laura!” He shook his head as one more in sorrow than in anger.
“You are no longer a girl, Laura; you are a woman, the manager of a
household, Laura. We trust in you. We look entirely towards you. And yet
you leave your poor brother Robert without any brandy, to say nothing of
me, your father. Good heavens, Laura! what would your mother have said?
Think of accidents, think of sudden illness, think of apoplectic fits,
Laura. It is a very grave res--a very grave response--a very great risk
that you run.”
“I hardly touch the stuff,” said Robert curtly; “Laura need not provide
any for me.”
“As a medicine it is invaluable, Robert. To be used, you understand, and
not to be abused. That's the whole secret of it. But I'll step down to
the Three Pigeons for half an hour.”
“My dear father,” cried the young man “you surely are not going out upon
such a night. If you must have brandy could I not send Sarah for some?
Please let me send Sarah; or I would go myself, or--”
Pip! came a little paper pellet from his sister's chair on to the
sketch-book in front of him! He unrolled it and held it to the light.
“For Heaven's sake let him go!” was scrawled across it.
“Well, in any case, wrap yourself up warm,” he continued, laying bare
his sudden change of front with a masculine clumsiness which horrified
his sister. “Perhaps it is not so cold as it looks. You can't lose your
way, that is one blessing. And it is not more than a hundred yards.”
With many mumbles and grumbles at his daughter's want of foresight, old
McIntyre struggled into his great-coat and wrapped his scarf round his
long thin throat. A sharp gust of cold wind made the lamps flicker as he
threw open the hall-door. His two children listened to the dull fall of
his footsteps as he slowly picked out the winding garden path.
“He gets worse--he becomes intolerable,” said Robert at last. “We should
not have let him out; he may make a public exhibition of himself.”
“But it's Hector's last night,” pleaded Laura. “It would be dreadful if
they met and he noticed anything. That was why I wished him to go.”
“Then you were only just in time,” remarked her brother, “for I hear the
gate go, and--yes, you see.”
As he spoke a cheery hail came from outside, with a sharp rat-tat at the
window. Robert stepped out and threw open the door to admit a tall young
man, whose black frieze jacket was all mottled and glistening with snow
crystals. Laughing loudly he shook himself like a Newfoundland dog, and
kicked the snow from his boots before entering the little lamplit room.
Hector Spurling's profession was written in every line of his face.
The clean-shaven lip and chin, the little fringe of side whisker, the
straight decisive mouth, and the hard weather-tanned cheeks all spoke of
the Royal Navy. Fifty such faces may be seen any night of the year round
the mess-table of the Royal Naval College in Portsmouth Dockyard--faces
which bear a closer resemblance to each other than brother does commonly
to brother. They are all cast in a common mould, the products of a
system which teaches early self-reliance, hardihood, and manliness--a
fine type upon the whole; less refined and less intellectual, perhaps,
than their brothers of the land, but full of truth and energy and
heroism. In figure he was straight, tall, and well-knit, with keen grey
eyes, and the sharp prompt manner of a man who has been accustomed both
to command and to obey.
“You had my note?” he said, as he entered the room. “I have to go again,
Laura. Isn't it a bore? Old Smithers is short-handed, and wants me back
at once.” He sat down by the girl, and put his brown hand across her
white one. “It won't be a very large order this time,” he continued.
“It's the flying squadron business--Madeira, Gibraltar, Lisbon, and
home. I shouldn't wonder if we were back in March.”
“It seems only the other day that you landed.” she answered.
“Poor little girl! But it won't be long. Mind you take good care of her,
Robert when I am gone. And when I come again, Laura, it will be the last
time mind! Hang the money! There are plenty who manage on less. We need
not have a house. Why should we? You can get very nice rooms in Southsea
at 2 pounds a week. McDougall, our paymaster, has just married, and he
only gives thirty shillings. You would not be afraid, Laura?”
“No, indeed.”
“The dear old governor is so awfully cautious. Wait, wait, wait, that's
always his cry. I tell him that he ought to have been in the Government
Heavy Ordnance Department. But I'll speak to him tonight. I'll talk him
round. See if I don't. And you must speak to your own governor. Robert
here will back you up. And here are the ports and the dates that we are
due at each. Mind that you have a letter waiting for me at every one.”
He took a slip of paper from the side pocket of his coat, but, instead
of handing it to the young lady, he remained staring at it with the
utmost astonishment upon his face.
“Well, I never!” he exclaimed. “Look here, Robert; what do you call
this?”
“Hold it to the light. Why, it's a fifty-pound Bank of England note.
Nothing remarkable about it that I can see.”
“On the contrary. It's the queerest thing that ever happened to me. I
can't make head or tail of it.”
“Come, then, Hector,” cried Miss McIntyre with a challenge in her eyes.
“Something very queer happened to me also to-day. I'll bet a pair of
gloves that my adventure was more out of the common than yours, though I
have nothing so nice to show at the end of it.”
“Come, I'll take that, and Robert here shall be the judge.”
“State your cases.” The young artist shut up his sketch-book, and rested
his head upon his hands with a face of mock solemnity. “Ladies first! Go
along Laura, though I think I know something of your adventure already.”
“It was this morning, Hector,” she said. “Oh, by the way, the story will
make you wild. I had forgotten that. However, you mustn't mind, because,
really, the poor fellow was perfectly mad.”
“What on earth was it?” asked the young officer, his eyes travelling
from the bank-note to his _fiancee_.
“Oh, it was harmless enough, and yet you will confess it was very queer.
I had gone out for a walk, but as the snow began to fall I took shelter
under the shed which the workmen have built at the near end of the great
new house. The men have gone, you know, and the owner is supposed to be
coming to-morrow, but the shed is still standing. I was sitting there
upon a packing-case when a man came down the road and stopped under the
same shelter. He was a quiet, pale-faced man, very tall and thin, not
much more than thirty, I should think, poorly dressed, but with the look
and bearing of a gentleman. He asked me one or two questions about the
village and the people, which, of course, I answered, until at last we
found ourselves chatting away in the pleasantest and easiest fashion
about all sorts of things. The time passed so quickly that I forgot all
about the snow until he drew my attention to its having stopped for
the moment. Then, just as I was turning to go, what in the world do you
suppose that he did? He took a step towards me, looked in a sad pensive
way into my face, and said: `I wonder whether you could care for me if
I were without a penny.' Wasn't it strange? I was so frightened that I
whisked out of the shed, and was off down the road before he could add
another word. But really, Hector, you need not look so black, for when
I look back at it I can quite see from his tone and manner that he meant
no harm. He was thinking aloud, without the least intention of being
offensive. I am convinced that the poor fellow was mad.”
“Hum! There was some method in his madness, it seems to me,” remarked
her brother.
“There would have been some method in my kicking,” said the lieutenant
savagely. “I never heard of a more outrageous thing in my life.”
“Now, I said that you would be wild!” She laid her white hand upon the
sleeve of his rough frieze jacket. “It was nothing. I shall never see
the poor fellow again. He was evidently a stranger to this part of the
country. But that was my little adventure. Now let us have yours.”
The young man crackled the bank-note between his fingers and thumb,
while he passed his other hand over his hair with the action of a man
who strives to collect himself.
“It is some ridiculous mistake,” he said. “I must try and set it right.
Yet I don't know how to set about it either. I was going down to the
village from the Vicarage just after dusk when I found a fellow in a
trap who had got himself into broken water. One wheel had sunk into the
edge of the ditch which had been hidden by the snow, and the whole thing
was high and dry, with a list to starboard enough to slide him out of
his seat. I lent a hand, of course, and soon had the wheel in the road
again. It was quite dark, and I fancy that the fellow thought that I was
a bumpkin, for we did not exchange five words. As he drove off he shoved
this into my hand. It is the merest chance that I did not chuck it away,
for, feeling that it was a crumpled piece of paper, I imagined that it
must be a tradesman's advertisement or something of the kind. However,
as luck would have it, I put it in my pocket, and there I found it when
I looked for the dates of our cruise. Now you know as much of the matter
as I do.”
Brother and sister stared at the black and white crinkled note with
astonishment upon their faces.
“Why, your unknown traveller must have been Monte Cristo, or Rothschild
at the least!” said Robert. “I am bound to say, Laura, that I think you
have lost your bet.”
“Oh, I am quite content to lose it. I never heard of such a piece of
luck. What a perfectly delightful man this must be to know.”
“But I can't take his money,” said Hector Spurling, looking somewhat
ruefully at the note. “A little prize-money is all very well in its way,
but a Johnny must draw the line somewhere. Besides it must have been
a mistake. And yet he meant to give me something big, for he could not
mistake a note for a coin. I suppose I must advertise for the fellow.”
“It seems a pity too,” remarked Robert. “I must say that I don't quite
see it in the same light that you do.”
“Indeed I think that you are very Quixotic, Hector,” said Laura
McIntyre. “Why should you not accept it in the spirit in which it was
meant? You did this stranger a service--perhaps a greater service than
you know of--and he meant this as a little memento of the occasion. I do
not see that there is any possible reason against your keeping it.”
“Oh, come!” said the young sailor, with an embarrassed laugh, “it is not
quite the thing--not the sort of story one would care to tell at mess.”
“In any case you are off to-morrow morning,” observed Robert. “You have
no time to make inquiries about the mysterious Croesus. You must really
make the best of it.”
“Well, look here, Laura, you put it in your work-basket,” cried Hector
Spurling. “You shall be my banker, and if the rightful owner turns up
then I can refer him to you. If not, I suppose we must look on it as a
kind of salvage-money, though I am bound to say I don't feel entirely
comfortable about it.” He rose to his feet, and threw the note down into
the brown basket of coloured wools which stood beside her. “Now, Laura,
I must up anchor, for I promised the governor to be back by nine. It
won't be long this time, dear, and it shall be the last. Good-bye,
Robert! Good luck!”
“Good-bye, Hector! _Bon voyage!_”
The young artist remained by the table, while his sister followed her
lover to the door. In the dim light of the hall he could see their
figures and overhear their words.
“Next time, little girl?”
“Next time be it, Hector.”
“And nothing can part us?”
“Nothing.”
“In the whole world?”
“Nothing.”
Robert discreetly closed the door. A moment later a thud from without,
and the quick footsteps crunching on the snow told him that their
visitor had departed.