MRS. RALSTON OF CRAIG
Mr. Lindsey made no remark on this answer, and for a minute or two he and
Mr. Portlethorpe sat looking at each other. Then Mr. Portlethorpe bent
forward a little, his hands on his knees, and gave Mr. Lindsey a sort of
quizzical but earnest glance.
"Now, why do you ask that last question?" he said quietly. "You've
some object?"
"It's like this," answered Mr. Lindsey. "Here's a man comes into these
parts to take up a title and estates, who certainly had been out of
them for thirty years. His recent conduct is something more than
suspicious--no one can deny that he left my clerk there to drown, without
possibility of help! That's intended murder! And so I ask, What do you,
his solicitor, know of him--his character, his doings during the thirty
years he was away? And you answer--nothing!"
"Just so!" assented Mr. Portlethorpe. "And nobody does hereabouts. Except
that he is Sir Gilbert Carstairs, nobody in these parts knows anything
about him--how should they? We, I suppose, know more than anybody--and we
know just a few bare facts."
"I think you'll have to let me know what these bare facts are," remarked
Mr. Lindsey. "And Moneylaws, too. Moneylaws has a definite charge to
bring against this man--and he'll bring it, if I've anything to do with
it! He shall press it!--if he can find Carstairs. And I think you'd
better tell us what you know, Portlethorpe. Things have got to come out."
"I've no objection to telling you and Mr. Moneylaws what we know,"
answered Mr. Portlethorpe. "After all, it is, in a way, common
knowledge--to some people, at any rate. And to begin with, you are
probably aware that the recent history of this Carstairs family is a
queer one. You know that old Sir Alexander had two sons and one
daughter--the daughter being very much younger than her brothers. When
the two sons, Michael and Gilbert, were about from twenty-one to
twenty-three, both quarrelled with their father, and cleared out of this
neighbourhood altogether; it's always believed that Sir Alexander gave
Michael a fair lot of money to go and do for himself, each hating the
other's society, and that Michael went off to America. As to Gilbert, he
got money at that time, too, and went south, and was understood to be
first a medical student and then a doctor, in London and abroad. There
is no doubt at all that both sons did get money--considerable
amounts,--because from the time they went away, no allowance was ever
paid to them, nor did Sir Alexander ever have any relations with them.
What the cause of the quarrel was, nobody knows; but the quarrel itself,
and the ensuing separation, were final--father and sons never resumed
relations. And when the daughter, now Mrs. Ralston of Craig, near here,
grew up and married, old Sir Alexander pursued a similar money policy
towards her--he presented her with thirty thousand pounds the day she was
married, and told her she'd never have another penny from him. I tell
you, he was a queer man."
"Queer lot altogether!" muttered Mr. Lindsey. "And interesting!"
"Oh, it's interesting enough!" agreed Mr. Portlethorpe, with a chuckle.
"Deeply so. Well, that's how things were until about a year before old
Sir Alexander died--which, as you know, is fourteen months since. As I
say, about six years before his death, formal notice came of the death of
Michael Carstairs, who, of course, was next in succession to the title.
It came from a solicitor in Havana, where Michael had died--there were
all the formal proofs. He had died unmarried and intestate, and his
estate amounted to about a thousand pounds. Sir Alexander put the affair
in our hands; and of course, as he was next-of-kin to his eldest son,
what there was came to him. And we then pointed out to him that now that
Mr. Michael Carstairs was dead, Mr. Gilbert came next--he would get the
title, in any case--and we earnestly pressed Sir Alexander to make a
will. And he was always going to, and he never did--and he died
intestate, as you know. And at that, of course, Sir Gilbert Carstairs
came forward, and--"
"A moment," interrupted Mr. Lindsey. "Did anybody know where he was at
the time of his father's death?"
"Nobody hereabouts, at any rate," replied Mr. Portlethorpe. "Neither
his father, nor his sister, nor ourselves had heard of him for many a
long year. But he called on us within twenty-four hours of his
father's death."
"With proof, of course, that he was the man he represented himself to
be?" asked Mr. Lindsey.
"Oh, of course--full proof!" answered Mr. Portlethorpe. "Papers, letters,
all that sort of thing--all in order. He had been living in London for a
year or two at that time; but, according to his own account, he had gone
pretty well all over the world during the thirty years' absence. He'd
been a ship's surgeon--he'd been attached to the medical staff of more
than one foreign army, and had seen service--he'd been on one or two
voyages of discovery--he'd lived in every continent--in fact, he'd had a
very adventurous life, and lately he'd married a rich American heiress."
"Oh, Lady Carstairs is an American, is she?" remarked Mr. Lindsey.
"Just so--haven't you met her?" asked Mr. Portlethorpe.
"Never set eyes on her that I know of," replied Mr. Lindsey. "But go on."
"Well, of course, there was no doubt of Sir Gilbert's identity,"
continued Mr. Portlethorpe; "and as there was also no doubt that Sir
Alexander had died intestate, we at once began to put matters right.
Sir Gilbert, of course, came into the whole of the real estate, and he
and Mrs. Ralston shared the personalty--which, by-the-by, was
considerable: they both got nearly a hundred thousand each, in cash.
And--there you are!"
"That all?" asked Mr. Lindsey.
Mr. Portlethorpe hesitated a moment--then he glanced at me.
"Moneylaws is safe at a secret," said Mr. Lindsey. "If it is a secret."
"Well, then," answered Mr. Portlethorpe, "it's not quite all. There is a
circumstance which has--I can't exactly say bothered--but has somewhat
disturbed me. Sir Gilbert Carstairs has now been in possession of his
estates for a little over a year, and during that time he has sold nearly
every yard of them except Hathercleugh!"
Mr. Lindsey whistled. It was the first symptom of astonishment that he
had manifested, and I glanced quickly at him and saw a look of
indescribable intelligence and almost undeniable cunning cross his
face. But it went as swiftly as it came, and he merely nodded, as if
in surprise.
"Aye!" he exclaimed. "Quick work, Portlethorpe."
"Oh, he gave good reasons!" answered Mr. Portlethorpe. "He said, from the
first, that he meant to do it--he wanted, and his wife wanted too, to get
rid of these small and detached Northern properties, and buy a really
fine one in the South of England, keeping Hathercleugh as a sort of
holiday seat. He'd no intention of selling that, at any time.
But--there's the fact!--he's sold pretty nearly everything else."
"I never heard of these sales of land," remarked Mr. Lindsey.
"Oh, they've all been sold by private treaty," replied Mr. Portlethorpe.
"The Carstairs property was in parcels, here and there--the last two
baronets before this one had bought considerably in other parts. It was
all valuable--there was no difficulty in selling to adjacent owners."
"Then, if he's been selling to that extent, Sir Gilbert must have large
sums of money at command--unless he's bought that new estate you're
talking of," said Mr. Lindsey.
"He has not bought anything--that I know of," answered Mr. Portlethorpe.
"And he must have a considerable--a very large--sum of money at his
bankers'. All of which," he continued, looking keenly at Mr. Lindsey,
"makes me absolutely amazed to hear what you've just told me. It's very
serious, this charge you're implying against him, Lindsey! Why should he
want to take men's lives in this fashion! A man of his position, his
great wealth--"
"Portlethorpe!" broke in Mr. Lindsey, "didn't you tell me just now that
this man, according to his own account, has lived a most adventurous
life, in all parts of the world? What more likely than that in the
course of such a life he made acquaintance with queer characters,
and--possibly--did some queer things himself? Isn't it a significant
thing that, within a year of his coming into the title and estates,
two highly mysterious individuals turn up here, and that all this foul
play ensues? It's impossible, now, to doubt that Gilverthwaite and
Phillips came into these parts because this man was already here! If
you've read all the stuff that's been in the papers, and add to it just
what we've told you about this last adventure with the yacht, you can't
doubt it, either."
"It's very, very strange--all of it," agreed Mr. Portlethorpe. "Have you
no theory, Lindsey?"
"I've a sort of one," answered Mr. Lindsey. "I think Gilverthwaite and
Phillips probably were in possession of some secret about Sir Gilbert
Carstairs, and that Crone may have somehow got an inkling of it. Now, as
we know, Gilverthwaite died, suddenly--and it's possible that Carstairs
killed both Phillips and Crone, as he certainly meant to kill this lad.
And what does it all look like?"
Before Mr. Portlethorpe could reply to that last question, and while he
was shaking his head over it, one of our junior clerks brought in Mrs.
Ralston of Craig, at the mention of whose name Mr. Lindsey immediately
bustled forward. She was a shrewd, clever-looking woman, well under
middle age, who had been a widow for the last four or five years, and
was celebrated in our parts for being a very managing and interfering
sort of body who chiefly occupied herself with works of charity and
philanthropy and was prominent on committees and boards. And she looked
over the two solicitors as if they were candidates for examination, and
she the examiner.
"I have been to the police, to find out what all this talk is about Sir
Gilbert Carstairs," she began at once. "They tell me you know more than
they do, Mr. Lindsey. Well, what have you to say? And what have you to
say, Mr. Portlethorpe? You ought to know more than anybody. What does it
all amount to!"
Mr. Portlethorpe, whose face had become very dismal at the sight of
Mrs. Ralston, turned, as if seeking help, to Mr. Lindsey. He was
obviously taken aback by Mrs. Ralston's questions, and a little afraid
of her; but Mr. Lindsey was never afraid of anybody, and he at once
turned on his visitor.
"Before we answer your questions, Mrs. Ralston," he said, "there's one
I'll take leave to ask you. When Sir Gilbert came back at your father's
death, did you recognize him?"
Mrs. Ralston tossed her head with obvious impatience.
"Now, what ridiculous nonsense, Mr. Lindsey!" she exclaimed. "How on
earth do you suppose that I could recognize a man whom I hadn't seen
since I was a child of seven--and certainly not for at least thirty
years? Of course I didn't!--impossible!"