THE LETTER
But it was not Symonds. It was a messenger-boy--an impertinent young
rascal.
“Mr. John Ferguson? I thought every one was out, I’ve been knocking
for the last ten minutes.”
“Have you indeed? I trust the delay has caused you no serious
inconvenience. Yes, I am Mr. John Ferguson.”
“No answer.”
He thrust an envelope into my hand, and, turning on his heel, was
about to march away. I caught him by the shoulder.
“Pardon me--one second! From whom does this communication come?”
“I say there’s no answer.”
He wriggled in my grasp.
“I hear you--still, if you could manage to wait for a moment, I think
it might be worth your while. Let me beg of you to enter.”
Drawing him into the room, I shut the door. He surveyed me with
indignation.
“My orders are that when there’s no answer I’m not to wait.”
“Good boy! Always obey orders.”
The address on the envelope was typewritten; as were the sentences on
the sheet of paper it contained.
“Because Edwin Lawrence is dead, don’t suppose that the £1880 are
paid. You have not hit on a new way to pay old debts. A knife in the
back is not a quittance. You are wrong if you suppose it is. Have the
money ready; hard cash--notes and gold; all gold preferred. NO CHEQUE.
Edwin Lawrence has left an heir; to whom all that he had belongs, your
debt among the rest. Be prepared to pay when asked. If the request has
to be made a second time it will come in a different form.
“The Goddess.”
That was what the envelope contained--an anonymous letter.
“Who sent this?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t read it.”
“Possibly not; and yet you might know who was the sender.”
“I don’t see how. I’d just been on an errand right over to Finchley.
As soon as I came in that was given me. All I was told was that there
was no answer.”
The messenger spoke in a tone of resentment, as if suffering from a
grievance. He was a small youth, with crisp black hair and sharp black
eyes; combativeness writ large all over him.
“You didn’t see who brought this to the office?”
“I did not.”
“Where do you come from?”
“Victoria.”
“What’s your name?”
“George Smith. Though I don’t see what that’s got to do with you.”
“Then that only shows that your range of vision’s limited. Because,
Mr. George Smith, although there’s no answer to this little
communication, you’re likely to hear of it again. Good-day.”
The young gentleman withdrew with something like a sniff of scorn. I
read the letter through again. As Hume stood watching me, his
curiosity got the upper hand.
“What is it?”
“I was wondering if I should tell you. I don’t see why not.” I handed
him the sheet of paper. He scanned it with eager eyes. “What do you
make of it?”
“It is for me, rather, to put that question to you.”
“I’ll tell you one thing I make of it--that the typewriter, from the
anonymous letter-writer’s point of view, is an excellent invention. In
the case of a written letter, one can occasionally guess what kind of
person it is from whom it comes; but, when it’s typewritten, the Lord
alone can tell.”
“‘The Goddess.’ Does the signature convey no meaning to your mind?
Think.”
“I’m thinking. The Goddess? I certainly don’t know any one who’s
entitled to write herself down like that. Let me look at the thing
again.” He returned me the sheet of paper. “This seems to suggest that
some one else is disposed to take a hand in the game--some person at
present unknown.”
“But who knows that you owed Lawrence £1880? And--who knows how much
besides?”
“Just so. I wonder!”
Hume eyed me as if he were endeavouring to decipher, on my face, the
key to a riddle.
“If some one applies to you for the money what shall you do?”
“Hang him, or her, straight off. That is, I should hand the gentleman,
or lady, over to Symonds, with that end in view. Don’t you see what
such an application would imply? Lawrence was murdered within an hour
or two of our playing that game of cards. How comes any one to know
what was the amount he claimed to have won? No one saw him between the
finish of the game and his death, except the man who murdered him.”
“Miss Moore saw him--and you.”
“Are you suggesting that Miss Moore wrote this letter--or I?”
“I see your point. You infer that whoever did write it killed
Lawrence, because it discloses knowledge which could only be in
possession of his murderer. There is something in the inference. But,
if the thing’s so plain, isn’t it an act of rashness to have written
you at all--rashness which is almost inconceivable?”
“‘_De l’audace_’--you know the wise man’s aphorism. I don’t say the
thing is plain. On the contrary, I believe it’s more obscure than you
think. Granting that whoever wrote that letter killed Lawrence--and I
fancy you’ll find that is the case--the question is who wrote it. It’s
signed ‘The Goddess.’ I believe ‘The Goddess’ was the writer. Query,
who’s ‘The Goddess’? There’s the puzzle.”
“Are you intentionally speaking in cryptograms? May I ask what you
mean?”
“I’m not quite sure that I know myself. I don’t go so far as to say
that there is anything supernatural about the business, but--it’s
uncommonly queer.”
“Supernatural! You had better make that suggestion to the police. The
English law does not recognise the supernatural in crime.”
“Possibly not. You say it was a man, Symonds thinks it was a woman; I
believe both of you are wrong--that Lawrence was killed neither by a
man nor a woman. Who or what is ‘The Goddess’? Find that out, you’ll
have found the criminal!”
His lips curled in an ironic smile.
“I really wonder if you think that you can successfully play a game of
bluff with me.”
I laughed. The man was so full of verjuice that he could not resist an
opportunity of squirting a drop or two in my direction. His intentions
had not been over and above friendly before. Now that the shadow of a
woman had come between us, I felt that he would stop at little which
would help him hang me. That my innocence might be shown was a matter
which would concern him not at all--so long as he had hung me first.
While I hesitated what to answer, for, though, I hoped, at the proper
time, to take him by the neck and drop him from the window, my desire
was, in the mean time, to treat him with the utmost courtesy--some one
came rushing into the room. It was Turner, the night-porter. He seemed
to have been in the wars. He held his handkerchief to his nose, and
his uniform was disarranged as if he had just emerged from a
scrimmage.
“There’s Mr. Philip Lawrence just gone down the service stairs.”
We stared at him--not, at first, gathering what he meant. Our thoughts
had been occupied with other themes, as, for instance, our love for
one another. He, perceiving that we did not understand, went on, like
a man in a rage--
“Yes, he just went down the service stairs, did Mr. Philip Lawrence,
and a nice sort of a gentleman he is! I was standing in the doorway,
finishing my pipe, when I saw him coming. ‘Mr. Lawrence,’ I said,
‘this is a very sad thing about your brother. I’ve only just come, so
I’ve only just heard of it;’ which I had, and it had took me quite
aback. He never said a word; he gave me no warning, but, as soon as I
opened my mouth, he came at me like a mad bull, hit me right on the
nose, and sent me crashing down on to the back of my head in the road.
It’s a wonder he didn’t knock me senseless, I was so unprepared, and
he hit me so hard. As soon as I could pick myself together I saw him
rushing down the street, and tear round the corner as if he was
running for his dinner. And well he might run, for a nice sort of
gentleman he seems to be.”
Hume and I looked at Turner, then at each other.
“Are you sure that it was Mr. Philip Lawrence?”
Turner gazed at me resentfully.
“Am I sure? Do you think I’d say a thing like that of a gentleman if I
wasn’t sure that it was him? Not likely!”
Hume interposed.
“Do you wish us to understand that Mr. Philip Lawrence attacked you in
the manner you describe without having, first of all, received
provocation from you?”
“I don’t know what you call provocation. All I said to him I’ve said
to you. I don’t know what provocation there was in saying that it was
a sad thing about his brother.”
“You did not say, or do, anything else?”
“I didn’t do anything at all--he did all the doing; and what I’ve said
I’ve told you.”
“Turner, I know Mr. Philip Lawrence intimately. He is not a man to
commit an unprovoked assault. Either you have mistaken some one else
for him, or, consciously or unconsciously, you have kept back from us
something which appeared to him to be a sufficient justification for
what he did.”
In his surprise Turner removed his handkerchief from his nose. The
blood trickled on to his waistcoat.
“Well! That beats anything! I suppose my word’s worth nothing. If you
ask those who know me perhaps better than you do Mr. Philip Lawrence
they’ll tell you I’m no liar. I say that he hit me like a coward, for
nothing at all, and then took to his heels; and it was well for him he
did, for if I do get within reach of him I’ll perhaps give him as good
as he sent, though it’ll be after I’ve given him warning first. I’ll
let you know, Dr. Hume, that though I am a porter I’m not going to let
a gentleman knock me about as it suits him, even though he is a friend
of yours; and I don’t think any the better of you for taking his
part.”
Going up to Turner, I clapped him on the shoulder.
“That’s right! That’s how I like to hear a man speak out. Don’t think
that I doubt you in one little jot or tittle. Mr. Philip Lawrence hit
you like a coward because he was a coward. He was afraid of you; and
had good reason for his fear, as Dr. Hume knows very well.”
“You--you----”
Hume stopped; looking as if he were allowing “he dare not” to wait
upon “he would.”
“Well, Hume, go on. Your friend did not give Turner an opportunity to
punish him for his bad behaviour. If you behave badly, I assure you
that I shall avail myself of any chance which may offer to punish you.
Pray finish the remark you were about to make.”
Hume said nothing. He did not even glance in my direction. But he
looked at Turner, and walked out of the room.
“He looks like killing some one himself,” said Turner, when he was
gone.
“I shouldn’t be surprised.”
I wonder how much he would have given, at that moment, to have made
sure of killing me--for choice, upon the gallows.