"A FOREIGNER."
I remained a long time attending to my damaged finger--which in reality
had been injured a week before--at the same time thoroughly
investigating the missing man's apartment. Except for the cupboard,
secured so mysteriously by those combination locks, there was nothing
extraordinary about it. The outlook was pleasant across the wide
undulating park, and the chairs with soft cushions and couch showed
plainly that Harvey Shaw loved to take his ease.
In no hurry to depart, I chatted affably to Mrs Howard, wandering about
the big, old-fashioned home, into regions I had never been before.
"Poor Mr Nicholson used to stay here sometimes, didn't he?" I inquired
presently, in a casual way.
"Oh yes, sir, the master used to delight in having the poor young
gentleman here, sir. He used to have the blue room, nearly opposite Mr
Shaw's--the one which looks out over the front drive. Poor Mr
Nicholson! We all liked him so much. Wasn't it sad, sir?"
"Very sad, indeed," I said. "The blow must nearly have broken Miss
Asta's heart."
"Ah! It did, sir. At first I thought the poor child would have gone
out of her mind. She was so devoted to him. Mr Shaw was also very
fond of him, I know, for I once heard him say that he was the only man
he would choose as Miss Asta's husband."
"When did he say that?"
"He was sitting in the smoking-room with a friend of his--one of the
justices--Sir Gilbert Campbell, one evening after dinner, about a
fortnight before the poor young gentleman died. I happened to be;
passing and overheard his words."
I pondered for a moment. Either Shaw was a past-master in the art of
preparing a _coup_, or else Guy's surmises were wrong. Here, in the
intimacy of the family, it was declared that Shaw was devoted to Asta.
Certainly my own observations went to confirm that supposition.
"I wonder who knows Mr Shaw's whereabouts?" I said presently. "I want
to communicate with him upon a very important matter."
"Well, sir, it's very funny that he hasn't written to me. He's never
been silent so long before."
"How long have you been with him?"
"Oh, about three years now, sir."
Then together we descended the broad oak staircase, and I went forth
into the beautiful gardens chatting with the old white-bearded
head-gardener, and going through the grape and peach houses, all of
which were most perfectly kept.
How strange, I reflected; what would this large staff of superior
servants think if they knew the truth--that their master, a man of
mystery, was a fugitive from justice--that he and Asta had crept down
the back stairs of an hotel and disappeared into the night while the
police had entered from the front.
As I drove back in the evening through those autumn-tinted lanes, with
smiling meadows everywhere, I calmly reviewed the situation. After all,
there was really no actually mysterious fact in Harvey Shaw having in
his bedroom a cupboard so securely locked. He, upon his own admission,
led a double life, therefore it was only to be supposed that he
possessed a good many papers, even articles of clothing, perhaps, which
he was compelled to hide from the prying eyes of his servants.
I recalled the whole of Guy's letter, and found that the chief point was
the fact that he had solved the weird mystery of that strange hand--that
shadowy Something which I myself had witnessed, and against which I had
been warned by Arnold.
What was it?
But I put aside the puzzle. My chief thought was of Asta. Where could
she be? Why had she not sent me word in secret of her hiding-place?
She had, by tacit agreement, accepted me as her friend, hence I was
disappointed at receiving no word from her.
That night, after reading my London paper over a cigar, as was my habit,
I left the library about eleven o'clock and retired to my room.
I must have been sound asleep when, of a sudden, the electrical alarm
which my father years ago had had placed upon the door of the big safe
in the library for greater security went off with a tremendous clatter,
and I jumped up, startled.
Taking my revolver from a drawer in the dressing-table, I rang the bell
in the servants' quarters and switched on my electric hand-lamp. But
already the household was alarmed, and the dogs were barking furiously
at the intruders, whoever they were.
Accompanied by my man Adams, I descended the front stairs and, revolver
in hand, entered the library, the window of which stood open, while
below the safe door there lay upon the carpet a cheap bull's-eye lantern
with two cylinders containing gas and some other paraphernalia, showing
that the thieves were men of scientific method, for their intention had,
I saw, been to use the oxy-hydrogen blow-pipe. The heads of some of the
rivets had been removed and a small hole drilled through the chilled
steel three-quarters of an inch thick.
All had gone well until they had touched the handle of the safe door,
which had set off the alarm, the existence of which they had never
suspected. Then their only safety lay in flight, and they had escaped,
leaving behind them the objects I have enumerated.
Adams telephoned for the police, while Tucker came up from the Lodge,
and I let loose the dogs and went outside into the drive. But,
unfortunately, the thieves were already safely away, and were not likely
to be caught, for in response to the telephonic message I was told that
the rural constable was out on his beat, and was not expected back for
another couple of hours.
We three men, with several of the maid-servants, stood outside on the
lawn discussing the affair with bated breath in the dead stillness of
the night when, of a sudden, we distinctly heard in the far distance
down in the valley beyond the King's Wood the starting of a motor-car
and the gradual faintness of the sound as it receded along the high
road.
"There they go!" I cried. "They came in a car, and it was awaiting
them at the foot of the hill near the Three Oaks crossways."
Then I rushed to the telephone instrument and spoke to the
police-sergeant on duty in Newport Pagnell, asking him to stop any car
approaching from my house, informing him what had occurred.
But half an hour later he rang up to tell me that no car had entered the
town from any direction; therefore it was apparent that in preference to
passing through Newport Pagnell it had been turned into one of the side
roads and taken a cross-country route to some unknown destination.
I said nothing, but to me it was quite apparent that the object of the
attempt upon my safe was the mysterious bronze cylinder, which I held in
trust from Melvill Arnold.
When alone in the room I opened the safe with my key, and to my
satisfaction saw the battered ancient object still reposing there,
together with the letters and the translation of the hieroglyphics.
Once again I took out the heavy cylinder, the greatest treasure of the
strange old fellow who had deliberately destroyed a fortune, and held it
in my hand filled with wonder and bewilderment. What could it contain
that would astonish the world? Surely nothing nowadays astonishes this
matter-of-fact world of ours. We have become used to the demonstrations
of wonders, from the use of steam to the development of aviation, the
telephonic discovery and the application of wireless telegraphy.
How I longed to call in a blacksmith, cut through the metal, and
ascertain what was therein contained. But I did not dare. I held the
thing in trust for some unknown person who, on Thursday, the third day
of November, would come to me and demand its possession.
All that I had been told of the misfortunes which had fallen upon its
possessor, and the mysterious fate which would overtake any who
attempted to tamper with it, flashed through my brain. Indeed, in such
train did my thoughts run that I began to wonder if possession of the
thing had any connection with the appearance of that mysterious hand.
Presently, however, I put the cylinder back into its place and relocked
the safe, for the police from Newport Pagnell had arrived, and I bade
them enter.
They made a minute examination of the room and took possession of the
objects left behind by the intruders, but upon them no finger-prints
could be found. My visitors were evidently expert thieves, for they had
worn gloves. And they had, no doubt, been in the house a full hour
before they had tried the safe handle and unconsciously set off the
alarm.
Had they applied the powerful jet to the steel door, and fused a hole
through it, then they might have accomplished their object without
disarranging the alarm at all.
Next day, however, packing the cylinder, the old newspaper, and the
letters in the bag, I took them up to London, where I placed them in a
box in the Safe Deposit Company's vaults in Chancery Lane. Afterwards I
lunched at my club and returned again to Upton End the same evening.
Suddenly it occurred to me while I sat alone eating my dinner that night
that if Harvey Shaw and Mrs Olliffe were actually friends then the
latter would probably be aware of his whereabouts.
The suggestion aroused me to activity, and it being a fine bright
evening with the prospect of a full moon later, I got out my thick
motor-coat, packed a small bag, and after tuning up the car set out on
the long run towards Bath.
My way lay through Fenny Stratford and Bicester, through Oxford, and
down to Newbury. When I passed the Jubilee clock in the latter town it
was a quarter-past two, while in the broad street of Marlborough,
eighteen miles farther on, I stopped to examine the near tyre. It had,
as I expected, a puncture. Therefore I leisurely put on my Stepney, and
with thirty odd miles before me drove out upon the old highway over the
hill through Calne, and up Black Dog Hill, to Chippenham, where in the
market-place stood a constable, with whom I exchanged greetings.
There is a certain weird charm in motoring at night, when every town and
village is dark and in slumber. Yet it is surprising how many people
are out at an early hour. Even ere the first flush of dawn one finds
sturdy men going to work with their day's food in the bag upon their
backs and teams of horses being driven to the fields.
It was nearly half-past five when I sped down the steep incline of Box
Hill, and, slipping through Box Village and Batheaston, found myself
winding round that leafy road with the city of Bath lying picturesquely
below.
At six I was once again at the York House Hotel, and after a wash went
for an early-morning stroll in the town. Then, after breakfast, I took
my hat and stick and strolled out for nearly three miles along the road
to the inn at Kelston, where I called for a glass of ale, and sat down
to chat with the white-bearded landlord, who at once recognised me as
having been a customer on a previous occasion.
For a long time, as I sat in the cosy little parlour, the table of which
was dark and polished with the ale of generations spilt upon it, we
chatted about the weather, the prospects of harvest, and the latest
iniquity of taxation, until in a careless way I remarked--
"I suppose in summer you have lots of visitors down from London.--I mean
the people who have big houses about here entertain a lot?"
"Oh, I dunno!" replied the old fellow, sipping his glass which he was
taking with me. "The Joiceys do have a lot o' visitors, and so do the
Strongs, but Mrs Olliffe's been away, an' has only just come back."
"And Mr King?"
"He's been away too. Ridgehill's been shut up and half the servants
away on 'oliday."
"And they are back now?"
"Yes; Mrs Olliffe's been abroad--so the butler told me yesterday. But
there--" and his lips closed suddenly, as though he had something to
say, but feared to utter it.
"Rather a funny lot--so I've heard, eh?" I remarked.
"Yes. Nobody can quite make 'em out--to tell the truth. Only the night
before last, or, rather, about a quarter to five in the morning, Mrs
Olliffe, her brother and another gentleman went by 'ere in a car on
their way 'ome. They'd been out all night, so the chauffeur told me
yesterday. Mr King drove the car."
"Out all night!" I echoed, in sudden wonder.
"Yes. And they'd been a long way, judging from the appearance of the
car. I 'appened to get up to see the time, and looked out o' my window
just as they came past. It isn't the first time either that they've
been out all night. The village knows it, and every one is asking where
they go to, and what takes 'em out o' their beds like that."
"Who was the gentleman with them?" I inquired eagerly.
"Ah! I couldn't see 'im very well. He was in a big frieze coat, and
wore a black-and-white check cap. I didn't catch his face, but, by his
clothes, he was a stranger to me."
"You've only seen him on that occasion."
"Only that once, sir. The chauffeur told me, however, that 'e isn't
staying at Ridgehill, and that nobody saw him. So 'e must 'ave got out
after passing through the village. Perhaps it was somebody they were
givin' a lift to. I've seen Mrs Olliffe a-takin' notice of some queer
people sometimes. And funnily enough, only yesterday a gentleman came
in 'ere and was a-making a lot of inquiries after her. 'E was a
foreigner--a Frenchman, I think."
"A Frenchman!" I cried. "What was he like?"
"Oh! Like most Frenchman. 'E 'ad finnikin' ways, was middle-aged, with
a brown beard which he seemed always a-strokin'. 'E 'ad lunch 'ere, and
stayed all the afternoon smokin' cigarettes and lookin' through this
window as though he hoped to see 'er pass. 'E was so inquisitive that I
was glad when 'e'd gone. I suppose," the man added, "'e's somebody
she's met abroad, eh?"
But I knew the truth. His inquisitive visitor was Victor Tramu!