THE HAUNTED VILLAGE
It was more than twenty-four hours later, and Superintendent Narkom,
fully recovered from the effects of the awful night in the cellar of the
Apaches at the Coq d'Or, was now in fine feather. Anything that had to
do with what certain of his men were wont to allude to as "the hupper
clarses" possessed an especial interest for him, and to-day's affair was
flying high in the social scale indeed.
"A duke, I think you said?"
The inquiry came from beside him, from Cleek, as they both sat in the
Superintendent's limousine, in which they were skimming onward in the
direction of the Carlton, where they were due at half-past two.
"A duke--yes," agreed Mr. Narkom.
"But there are so many. And you whisked me off in such hot haste that
there was no time to inquire which. Now, however, if you don't mind
satisfying a natural curiosity----"
"The Duke of Essex. He came up to town this morning and called me to a
private interview at his hotel. It was a corroboration of what he told
the Chief the other day."
"Ah!" said Cleek, with something like a twinkle in his eye. "That will
be a pleasant little bit of news to tell Mrs. Narkom over the dinner
table to-night. The Duke of Essex, eh? Well, well! That is the
illustrious personage, is it not, who is famous for having a castle
whose underground dungeons have been converted into a vast banqueting
hall, and who is said to possess a service of gold plate which is the
equal, if not the superior, of that which adorns the royal table on
State occasions? That's the Johnnie, isn't it?"
"Yes, that's the---- My dear Cleek, you are hardly respectful, are you?"
"No, I am not. But you see, there must be something of the--er--well,
fashionably democratic strain in my blood, and I'm never quite so
overcome by the importance of dukes as a policeman ought to be. But we
will stick to our--duke, if you please. Will his call upon us have
something to do with guarding that gold plate and the very remarkable
array of wedding presents which is sure to be an accompaniment to the
marriage of his only child, Lady Adela Fulgarney?"
"Nothing whatsoever. It is an affair of a totally different kind."
"H'm! That is both disappointing and gratifying, Mr. Narkom.
Disappointing, because I see by the papers that Lady Adela's wedding is
set for Thursday, the day after to-morrow; and gratifying, because to
tell you the truth, I shouldn't much care to play the role of plain
clothes man and special guard over the wedding gifts of even so
important a lady as a duke's daughter."
"As if I would have brought the case to _you_ had it been anything of
the sort!" came reproachfully from Mr. Narkom.
"I think my only reason for imagining that the duke's call would be
something in connection with Lady Adela's approaching marriage lay in
the fact that a good many of the guests have, according to the
newspapers, already arrived in Valehampton and either become domiciled
at Essex Castle or at some of the neighbouring estates. At such a period
one would naturally expect the duke to feel an interest in nothing but
the forthcoming event--or, at least, not sufficient interest in anything
else to cause him to leave his guests and make a flying trip up to
London within forty-eight hours of the ceremony. It must be something of
very serious importance, I take it, Mr. Narkom, to impel him to make
this sudden visit to town and this urgent appeal to the Yard at such a
time as this."
"It is. Wait until you hear the full details, old chap. I've had only a
mere outline of them, but even that was sufficient to make me sit up.
It's the devil's own business. And if Old Nick himself isn't at the
bottom of it I'm blest if I can imagine who in the world can be. You've
tackled about all sorts in your day, but I don't think you ever went
spook hunting before."
"Went _what_!"
"Spook hunting, ghost tracking, spirit laying--that sort of thing. That
blessed village of Valehampton is haunted. The country folk are leaving
it by the dozen. Half the duke's tenants have flown the place already,
and the other half are getting ready to follow suit. That's what he's
come up here for, that's what he wants you to do: Lay the ghost that's
making life in the place a nightmare and driving people almost insane
with fright."
"Tommyrot!"
"No, it isn't, Cleek--it's facts. The place seems under a curse on
account of some infernal dead man who was buried there. The duke will
give you the particulars--I can't--and the beggar's making life a burden
to the village folk. Somebody or other said that a curse would follow
wherever that dead Johnnie's body rested, and it has, too. One of the
duke's tenants let it be buried from his house, and since that time
nobody can live in the blessed place. And as for the church bells--lord!
They make a perfect pandemonium of the neighbourhood at night--ring,
bang, slam, without rhyme or reason, until people are silly with terror
over the peal of them."
"Who rings them?"
"Nobody--that's the devil of it. The duke thought it was the work of
somebody who was doing the thing for a lark, and he and the vicar had
all the ropes removed. It didn't make any difference. The bells rang
just the same the next night, and they've rung pretty nearly every night
since. But that's not the worst of it. People have begun to be spirited
away--out of their own houses, in the dead of night, without a blessed
sign of where or how they went, and not a trace of them since. Last
night, as if to cap the climax---- Hello! here we are at the Carlton at
last. Jump out, old chap. We'll soon be with the duke now, and he will
tell you."
The limousine had come to a halt. Mr. Narkom, opening the door, got out,
dapper and sleek as always--doing the gentlemanly part of the Yard's
business in a gentlemanly way--and Cleek, silk-hatted and
morning-coated, the very antithesis of the professional detective,
followed him, crossing the pavement and entering the hotel with an easy
grace and repose of manner.
It was at once the envy and despair of his associates, that "way of
carrying himself," as they expressed it, "like as if the earth wasn't
none too good for him to walk upon, and he was sort of expecting a red
carpet." And it was a curious fact that men of all classes on coming
into contact with him were conscious of an indefinable something about
the man which commanded rather than asked for respect.
And yet the man seemed, as a general thing, inclined to efface himself
when in public. He did so now. Keeping in the background, he neither
spoke nor asserted himself in any way; simply stood there and waited
passively while Mr. Narkom sent up a card to the duke, and was wholly
unperturbed when, a few minutes later, the messenger returned and stated
that "His Grace would be pleased to see the gentlemen at once if they
would kindly go up."
They went up forthwith, and were shown without delay into the presence
of the Duke of Essex.
"Your fame is world-wide, Mr. Cleek, and I hold myself most fortunate in
being able to have a man so ably equipped for taking up this amazing
case," began the duke as Narkom introduced his famous ally. "I wish to
enlist your services in ferreting out a very remarkable affair--in fact,
one of the most unbelievable mysteries which even the fictionists could
possibly evolve."
"Mr. Narkom has been giving me a hint of the case," said Cleek, as he
seated himself upon the chair which the duke indicated. "It is about the
reputed 'haunting' of the village where your country seat is located, I
believe? I am told that you desire me to discover the mysterious agency
which causes the church bells to ring without ropes or hands and is
supposed to be accountable for the mysterious disappearance of certain
persons."
"That's it precisely. I do not wonder at your smiling, Mr. Cleek. At
first the affair appears so utterly absurd that it is difficult to
imagine anybody with an ounce of brains regarding it seriously. Let me
tell you the facts, however, and you will, I am sure, change your views
upon that point as completely as I have been compelled to change mine. I
may say, however, that it is an exaggeration to state that 'persons'
have disappeared. Two have come to an untimely end because of the
mysterious visitation, but only one can be said to have disappeared. The
body of the second victim has been discovered. It was found this morning
at daybreak lying at the foot of the church belfry. The poor fellow's
skull had been battered in by some implement of which no trace is to be
found. The other victim--the one who disappeared--was a girl of
thirteen. She vanished from her father's cottage in the dead of night
one week ago. Every door and window was found locked on the inside in
the morning, and whatever the diabolical power may have been that
spirited her away, it did so effectually; for not the faintest shadow of
a clue to her whereabouts has been discovered from that hour to this."
Cleek's brows gathered, and his direct eyes lost something of their
placid expression.
"This would seem to be something more serious than I had at first
imagined," he said. "Would you mind giving me the full details as
explicitly as possible, and from the very beginning, please?"
The duke did so with as little divergence from the direct line of
evidence as was consistent with the narration of a story so amazing.