Moris Klaw’s sanctum is certainly one of the most remarkable
apartments in London. It is lined with shelves, which contain what I
believe to be a unique library of works dealing with criminology--from
Moris Klaw’s point of view. Strange relics are there, too; and all of
them have histories. A neat desk, with flowers in a silver vase, and a
revolving chair standing upon a fine tiger skin are the other notable
items of furniture.
The contrast on entering was startling. Moris Klaw placed his hat upon
the desk, and from it took out the scent spray without which he never
travels. He played the contents upon his high, yellow
forehead--filling the air with the refreshing odour of verbena.
“That shop!” he said, “it smell very strong this morning. It is not so
much the canaries as the rats!”
“I trust,” began Grimsby, respectfully, “that Miss Klaw is quite
well?”
“Isis will presently be here to say for herself,” was the reply. “And
now--this bad business of Cresping. It seems I am just back in time,
but, ah! it is a fortnight old!”
Grimsby cleared his throat. “You will have read----”
“Ah, my friend!” Moris Klaw held up a long, tapering white hand. “As
though you do not know that I never confuse my poor brain with those
foolish papers. No, I have not read, my friend!”
“Oh!” said Grimsby, something taken aback. “Then I shall have to tell
you the family story----”
Isis Klaw entered.
From her small hat, with its flamingo-like plume, to her dainty shoes,
she was redolent of the Rue de la Paix. She wore an amazingly daring
toilette; I can only term it a study in flame tones. A less beautiful
woman could never have essayed such a scheme; but this superb
brunette, with her great flashing eyes and taunting smile, had the
lithe carriage of a Cleopatra, the indescribable diablerie of a
_ghaziyeh_.
Inspector Grimsby greeted her with embarrassed admiration. Greetings
over--
“We must hurry, Father!” said the girl.
Moris Klaw reclaimed his archaic bowler.
“Mr. Searles and Inspector Grimsby will perhaps be joining us?” he
suggested.
“Where?” began Grimsby.
“Where but by the 9:5 train for Uxley!” said Klaw. “Where but from
Uxley to Cresping! Do I waste time, then--I?”
“You have been retained?” suggested Grimsby.
“Ah, no!” was the reply. “But I shall receive my fee, nevertheless!”
At the end of the court a cab was waiting. Outside the cavernous door
a ramshackle man with a rosy nose bowed respectfully to the
proprietor.
“You hear me, William,” said Moris Klaw, to this derelict. “You are to
sell nothing--unless it is the washstand! Forget not to change the
canaries’ water. The Indian corn is for the white rats. If there is no
mouse in the trap by eight o’clock, give the owl a herring. And keep
from the drink; it will be your ruin, William!”
We entered the cab. My last impression of the place was derived from
the invisible parrot, who gave us Godspeed with:
“Moris Klaw! Moris Klaw! the devil’s come for you!”
As we drove stationward, Grimsby, his eyes rarely leaving the piquant
face of Isis Klaw, outlined the history of the Crespie family to the
silent Moris. In brief it was this:
The late Sir Richard Crespie, having become involved in serious
monetary difficulties, employed such methods of drowning his sorrows
as were far from conducive to domestic felicity; and after a certain
unusually violent outburst the home was broken up. His son, Roland,
was the first to go; and he took little with him but his mother’s
blessing and his father’s curses. Then Lady Crespie went away to her
sister in London, only surviving her departure from the Hall by two
years. Alone, and deserted, first by son and then by wife, the
debauched old baronet continued on his course of heavy drinking for
some years longer. The servants left him, one by one, so that in the
end, save for faithful old Ryder, the butler, whose family had served
the Crespies for time immemorial, he had the huge mansion to himself.
Apoplexy closed his unfortunate career; and, since nothing had been
heard of him for years, it was generally supposed that the son had met
his death in Africa, whither he had gone on leaving home.
With the passing of Sir Richard came Mr. Isaac Heidelberger, and he
wasted no time in impressing his noxious personality upon the folks of
Cresping. He was a German Jew, large and oily, with huge coarse
features and a little black moustache that had been assiduously
trained in a futile attempt to hide a mouth that had well befitted
Nero. A week after Sir Richard’s burial, Mr. Heidelberger took
possession of the Hall.
The new occupant brought with him one Heimer, a kind of confidential
clerk, and, old Ryder the butler having been sent about his business,
the two Jewish gentlemen proceeded to make themselves comfortable. The
nature of their business was soon public property; the grand old Hall
was to be turned into a “country mansion for paying guests.”
Very strained relations existed between the big Jew and the ex-butler,
who, having a little money saved, had settled down in Cresping. One
night, at the Goblets--the historic village inn--Heidelberger having
swaggered into the place, there arose an open quarrel. Said Ryder:
“Sir Richard, with all his faults, was once a good English gentleman,
and, but for such as you, a good English gentleman he might have
died!”
It was exactly a week later that the tragedy occurred.
“We come to it now, eh?” interrupted Moris Klaw at this point. “So--we
also come to the station! I will ask you to reserve us a first-class
carriage!”
Grimsby made arrangements to that end. And, as the train moved out of
the station, resumed his story.
“What I gather is this,” he said.
[I condense his statement and append it in my own words.]
The Goblets was just closing its doors, and the villagers who nightly
met there were standing in a group under the swinging sign, when a man
came running down the street from the direction of the Hall, and,
observing the gathering, ran up. It was Heimer, Isaac Heidelberger’s
secretary. He was hatless and his flabby face, in the dim light, was
ghastly.
“Quick!” he rasped, hoarsely. “Where does the doctor live?”
“Last house but one,” somebody said. “What’s the matter?”
“Murder!” cried Heimer, as he rushed off down the village street.
Such was the dramatic manner in which the news of the subsequently
notorious case was first carried to the outside world. The facts, as
soon made known throughout the length and breadth of the land, were,
briefly, as follows:
Heidelberger and his secretary, who were engaged in making an
inventory of the contents of the Hall and in arranging for such
alterations of the rooms and laying out of the neglected grounds as
they considered necessary, had practically reached the end of their
task. In fact, had nothing intervened, Cresping would, on the
following day, have seen the old mansion in the hands of an army of
London workmen.
At about half-past seven in the evening, Heidelberger had entered the
room occupied by Heimer and had mentioned that he expected a visitor.
The secretary, who had more work than he could well accomplish, did
not pause to inquire concerning him, believing the other to allude
either to the architect or to Heidelberger’s man, who was coming down
from London. Heidelberger had then gone up to the library, saying that
he should not require Heimer again that night.
Between eight and half-past--Heimer was not sure of the time--there
was a ring at the bell (that of the tradesmen’s entrance). Knowing
that Heidelberger could admit the visitor directly to the library,
Heimer, hearing nothing more, concluded that the two were closeted
there.
The first intimation that he received of anything amiss was a loud and
angry cry, apparently proceeding from the old banqueting hall directly
overhead, and unmistakably in the voice of Heidelberger. Springing
from his chair, he took a step toward the door, and then paused in
doubt. There was an angry murmur from above, the tones of the Jew
being clearly distinguishable; then a sudden scuffle and an
oscillation of the floor as though two heavy men were at hand grips;
next, a crash that shook the room, and a high-pitched cry of which he
only partially comprehended the last word. This he asserted to be
“holy.”
That Heimer stood transfixed at the open door throughout all this,
suffices to brand him a coward. It was, in fact, only his stories of
shadowy figures in the picture gallery and his general disinclination
to leave his room after dusk that had prompted Heidelberger--a man of
different mettle--to wire to London for the servant.
At this juncture, however, moved as much by a fear of the sudden
silence as by any higher motive, he took a revolver from the table
drawer, and, holding it cocked in one hand and seizing the lamp in the
other, he crept, trembling, up a narrow little stair that led to a
door beneath the minstrel’s gallery. To open it he had to place the
lamp on the floor, and, at the moment of doing so, he heard a sound
inside the hall like the grating of a badly oiled lock.
Then, with the lamp held high above his head, he peered inside; and,
considering the character of the man, it is worthy of note that he did
not faint on the spot, for the feeble light, but serving, as it did,
to intensify the gloom of the long and shadowy place, revealed a scene
well calculated to shake the nerves of a stouter man than Heimer.
Less than six feet from where he stood, and lying flat on his back
with his head toward the light, was Heidelberger in a perfect pool of
blood, his skull cleft almost to the chine! Beside him on the floor
lay the fearful weapon that had wrought his end--an enormous
battle-ax, a relic of the Crusades such as none but a man of Herculean
strength could possibly wield.
Sick with terror, and scarcely capable of keeping his feet, Heimer
gave one glance around the gloomy place, which showed him that, save
for the murdered man, it was empty; then he staggered down the narrow
stairs and let himself out into the grounds. Slightly revived by the
fresh night air, but fearful of pursuit by the unknown assassin, he
ran, as fast as his condition would allow, into the village.
“Here it is--Uxley!” jerked Moris Klaw.