It was towards noon of the very next day that Bryce made a forward step
in the matter of solving the problem of Richard Jenkins and his tomb
in Paradise. Ever since his return from Barthorpe he had been making
attempts to get at the true meaning of this mystery. He had paid so
many visits to the Cathedral Library that Ambrose Campany had asked him
jestingly if he was going in for archaeology; Bryce had replied that
having nothing to do just then he saw no reason why he shouldn't improve
his knowledge of the antiquities of Wrychester. But he was scrupulously
careful not to let the librarian know the real object of his prying and
peeping into the old books and documents. Campany, as Bryce was very
well aware, was a walking encyclopaedia of information about Wrychester
Cathedral: he was, in fact, at that time, engaged in completing a
history of it. And it was through that history that Bryce accidentally
got his precious information. For on the day following the interview
with Mary Bewery and Ransford, Bryce being in the library was treated
by Campany to an inspection of certain drawings which the librarian had
made for illustrating his work-drawings, most of them, of old brasses,
coats of arms, and the like,--And at the foot of one of these, a drawing
of a shield on which was sculptured three crows, Bryce saw the name
Richard Jenkins, armiger. It was all he could do to repress a start and
to check his tongue. But Campany, knowing nothing, quickly gave him the
information he wanted.
“All these drawings,” he said, “are of old things in and about the
Cathedral. Some of them, like that, for instance, that Jenkins shield,
are of ornamentations on tombs which are so old that the inscriptions
have completely disappeared--tombs in the Cloisters, and in Paradise.
Some of those tombs can only be identified by these sculptures and
ornaments.”
“How do you know, for instance, that any particular tomb or monument is,
we'll say, Jenkins's?” asked Bryce, feeling that he was on safe ground.
“Must be a matter of doubt if there's no inscription left, isn't it?”
“No!” replied Campany. “No doubt at all. In that particular case,
there's no doubt that a certain tomb out there in the corner of
Paradise, near the east wall of the south porch, is that of one Richard
Jenkins, because it bears his coat-of-arms, which, as you see, bore
these birds--intended either as crows or ravens. The inscription's clean
gone from that tomb--which is why it isn't particularized in that chart
of burials in Paradise--the man who prepared that chart didn't know
how to trace things as we do nowadays. Richard Jenkins was, as you may
guess, a Welshman, who settled here in Wrychester in the seventeenth
century: he left some money to St. Hedwige's Church, outside the
walls, but he was buried here. There are more instances--look at this,
now--this coat-of-arms--that's the only means there is of identifying
another tomb in Paradise--that of Gervase Tyrrwhit. You see his armorial
bearings in this drawing? Now those--”
Bryce let the librarian go on talking and explaining, and heard all he
had to say as a man hears things in a dream--what was really active in
his own mind was joy at this unexpected stroke of luck: he himself might
have searched for many a year and never found the last resting-place of
Richard Jenkins. And when, soon after the great clock of the Cathedral
had struck the hour of noon, he left Campany and quitted the Library, he
walked over to Paradise and plunged in amongst its yews and cypresses,
intent on seeing the Jenkins tomb for himself. No one could suspect
anything from merely seeing him there, and all he wanted was one glance
at the ancient monument.
But Bryce was not to give even one look at Richard Jenkins's tomb that
day, nor the next, nor for many days--death met him in another form
before he had taken many steps in the quiet enclosure where so much of
Wrychester mortality lay sleeping.
From over the topmost branches of the old yew trees a great shaft
of noontide sunlight fell full on a patch of the grey walls of the
high-roofed nave. At the foot of it, his back comfortably planted
against the angle of a projecting buttress, sat a man, evidently fast
asleep in the warmth of those powerful rays. His head leaned down and
forward over his chest, his hands were folded across his waist, his
whole attitude was that of a man who, having eaten and drunken in the
open air, has dropped off to sleep. That he had so dropped off while
in the very act of smoking was evident from the presence of a short,
well-blackened clay pipe which had fallen from his lips and lay in the
grass beside him. Near the pipe, spread on a coloured handkerchief, were
the remains of his dinner--Bryce's quick eye noticed fragments of bread,
cheese, onions. And close by stood one of those tin bottles in which
labouring men carry their drink; its cork, tied to the neck by a piece
of string, dangled against the side. A few yards away, a mass of fallen
rubbish and a shovel and wheelbarrow showed at what the sleeper had been
working when his dinner-hour and time for rest had arrived.
Something unusual, something curiously noticeable--yet he could not
exactly tell what--made Bryce go closer to the sleeping man. There was
a strange stillness about him--a rigidity which seemed to suggest
something more than sleep. And suddenly, with a stifled exclamation,
he bent forward and lifted one of the folded hands. It dropped like a
leaden weight when Bryce released it, and he pushed back the man's face
and looked searchingly into it. And in that instant he knew that for
the second time within a fortnight he had found a dead man in Wrychester
Paradise.
There was no doubt whatever that the man was dead. His hands and body
were warm enough--but there was not a flicker of breath; he was as dead
as any of the folk who lay six feet beneath the old gravestones around
him. And Bryce's practised touch and eye knew that he was only just
dead--and that he had died in his sleep. Everything there pointed
unmistakably to what had happened. The man had eaten his frugal dinner,
washed it down from his tin bottle, lighted his pipe, leaned back in the
warm sunlight, dropped asleep--and died as quietly as a child taken from
its play to its slumbers.
After one more careful look, Bryce turned and made through the trees
to the path which crossed the old graveyard. And there, going leisurely
home to lunch, was Dick Bewery, who glanced at the young doctor
inquisitively.
“Hullo!” he exclaimed with the freedom of youth towards something not
much older. “You there? Anything on?”
Then he looked more clearly, seeing Bryce to be pale and excited. Bryce
laid a hand on the lad's arm.
“Look here!” he said. “There's something wrong--again!--in here. Run
down to the police-station--get hold of Mitchington--quietly, you
understand!--bring him here at once. If he's not there, bring somebody
else--any of the police. But--say nothing to anybody but them.”
Dick gave him another swift look, turned, and ran. And Bryce went back
to the dead man--and picked up the tin bottle, and making a cup of his
left hand poured out a trickle of the contents. Cold tea!--and, as far
as he could judge, nothing else. He put the tip of his little finger
into the weak-looking stuff, and tasted--it tasted of nothing but a
super-abundance of sugar.
He stood there, watching the dead man until the sound of footsteps
behind him gave warning of the return of Dick Bewery, who, in another
minute, hurried through the bushes, followed by Mitchington. The boy
stared in silence at the still figure, but the inspector, after a hasty
glance, turned a horrified face on Bryce.
“Good Lord!” he gasped. “It's Collishaw!”
Bryce for the moment failed to comprehend this, and Mitchington shook
his head.
“Collishaw!” he repeated. “Collishaw, you know! The man I told you about
yesterday afternoon. The man that said--”
Mitchington suddenly checked himself, with a glance at Dick Bewery.
“I remember--now,” said Bryce. “The mason's labourer! So--this is the
man, eh? Well, Mitchington, he's dead!--I found him dead, just now. I
should say he'd been dead five to ten minutes--not more. You'd better
get help--and I'd like another medical man to see him before he's
removed.”
Mitchington looked again at Dick.
“Perhaps you'd fetch Dr. Ransford, Mr--Richard?” he asked. “He's
nearest.”
“Dr. Ransford's not at home,” said Dick. “He went to Highminster--some
County Council business or other--at ten this morning, and he won't be
back until four--I happen to know that. Shall I run for Dr. Coates?”
“If you wouldn't mind,” said Mitchington, “and as it's close by, drop in
at the station again and tell the sergeant to come here with a couple of
men. I say!” he went on, when the boy had hurried off, “this is a queer
business, Dr. Bryce! What do you think?”
“I think this,” answered Bryce. “That man!--look at him!--a strong,
healthy-looking fellow, in the very prime of life--that man has met his
death by foul means. You take particular care of those dinner things
of his--the remains of his dinner, every scrap--and of that tin bottle.
That, especially. Take all these things yourself, Mitchington, and lock
them up--they'll be wanted for examination.”
Mitchington glanced at the simple matters which Bryce indicated. And
suddenly he turned a half-frightened glance on his companion.
“You don't mean to say that--that you suspect he's been poisoned?” he
asked. “Good Lord, if that is so--”
“I don't think you'll find that there's much doubt about it,” answered
Bryce. “But that's a point that will soon be settled. You'd better tell
the Coroner at once, Mitchington, and he'll issue a formal order to Dr.
Coates to make a post-mortem. And,” he added significantly, “I shall be
surprised if it isn't as I say--poison!”
“If that's so,” observed Mitchington, with a grim shake of his head, “if
that really is so, then I know what I shall think! This!” he went
on, pointing to the dead man, “this is--a sort of sequel to the other
affair. There's been something in what the poor chap said--he did know
something against somebody, and that somebody's got to hear of it--and
silenced him. But, Lord, doctor, how can it have been done?”
“I can see how it can have been done, easy enough,” said Bryce. “This
man has evidently been at work here, by himself, all the morning. He of
course brought his dinner with him. He no doubt put his basket and his
bottle down somewhere, while he did his work. What easier than for some
one to approach through these trees and shrubs while the man's back was
turned, or he was busy round one of these corners, and put some deadly
poison into that bottle? Nothing!”
“Well,” remarked Mitchington, “if that's so, it proves something
else--to my mind.”
“What!” asked Bryce.
“Why, that whoever it was who did it was somebody who had a knowledge
of poison!” answered Mitchington. “And I should say there aren't many
people in Wrychester who have such knowledge outside yourselves and the
chemists. It's a black business, this!”
Bryce nodded silently. He waited until Dr. Coates, an elderly man who
was the leading practitioner in the town, arrived, and to him he gave
a careful account of his discovery. And after the police had taken the
body away, and he had accompanied Mitchington to the police-station and
seen the tin bottle and the remains of Collishaw's dinner safely locked
up, he went home to lunch, and to wonder at this strange development.
The inspector was doubtless right in saying that Collishaw had been
done to death by somebody who wanted to silence him--but who could
that somebody be? Bryce's thoughts immediately turned to the fact that
Ransford had overheard all that Mitchington had said, in that very room
in which he, Bryce, was then lunching--Ransford! Was it possible that
Ransford had realized a danger in Collishaw's knowledge, and had--
He was interrupted at this stage by Mitchington, who came hurriedly in
with a scared face.
“I say, I say!” he whispered as soon as Bryce's landlady had shut the
door on them. “Here's a fine business! I've heard something--something
I can hardly credit--but it's true. I've been to tell Collishaw's family
what's happened. And--I'm fairly dazed by it--yet it's there--it is so!”
“What's so?” demanded Bryce. “What is it that's true?”
Mitchington bent closer over the table.
“Dr. Ransford was fetched to Collishaw's cottage at six o'clock this
morning!” he said. “It seems that Collishaw's wife has been in a poor
way about her health of late, and Dr. Ransford has attended her, off and
on. She had some sort of a seizure this morning--early--and Ransford
was sent for. He was there some little time--and I've heard some queer
things.”
“What sort of queer things?” demanded Bryce. “Don't be afraid of
speaking out, man!--there's no one to hear but myself.”
“Well, things that look suspicious, on the face of it,” continued
Mitchington, who was obviously much upset. “As you'll acknowledge when
you hear them. I got my information from the next-door neighbour, Mrs.
Batts. Mrs. Batts says that when Ransford--who'd been fetched by Mrs.
Batts's eldest lad--came to Collishaw's house, Collishaw was putting up
his dinner to take to his work--”
“What on earth made Mrs. Batts tell you that?” interrupted Bryce.
“Oh, well, to tell you the truth, I put a few questions to her as to
what went on while Ransford was in the house,” answered Mitchington.
“When I'd once found that he had been there, you know, I naturally
wanted to know all I could.”
“Well?” asked Bryce.
“Collishaw, I say, was putting up his dinner to take to his work,”
continued Mitchington. “Mrs. Batts was doing a thing or two about the
house. Ransford went upstairs to see Mrs. Collishaw. After a while he
came down and said he would have to remain a little. Collishaw went
up to speak to his wife before going out. And then Ransford asked
Mrs. Batts for something--I forget what--some small matter which the
Collishaw's hadn't got and she had, and she went next door to fetch it.
Therefore--do you see?--Ransford was left alone with--Collishaw's tin
bottle!”
Bryce, who had been listening attentively, looked steadily at the
inspector.
“You're suspecting Ransford already!” he said.
Mitchington shook his head.
“What's it look like?” he answered, almost appealingly. “I put it to
you, now!--what does it look like? Here's this man been poisoned without
a doubt--I'm certain of it. And--there were those rumours--it's idle to
deny that they centred in Ransford. And--this morning Ransford had the
chance!”
“That's arguing that Ransford purposely carried a dose of poison to
put into Collishaw's tin bottle!” said Bryce half-sneeringly. “Not very
probable, you know, Mitchington.”
Mitchington spread out his hands.
“Well, there it is!” he said. “As I say, there's no denying the
suspicious look of it. If I were only certain that those rumours about
what Collishaw hinted he could say had got to Ransford's ears!--why,
then--”
“What's being done about that post-mortem?” asked Bryce.
“Dr. Coates and Dr. Everest are going to do it this afternoon,” replied
Mitchington. “The Coroner went to them at once, as soon as I told him.”
“They'll probably have to call in an expert from London,” said Bryce.
“However, you can't do anything definite, you know, until the result's
known. Don't say anything of this to anybody. I'll drop in at your place
later and hear if Coates can say anything really certain.”
Mitchington went away, and Bryce spent the rest of the afternoon
wondering, speculating and scheming. If Ransford had really got rid of
this man who knew something--why, then, it was certainly Ransford who
killed Braden.
He went round to the police-station at five o'clock. Mitchington drew
him aside.
“Coates says there's no doubt about it!” he whispered. “Poisoned!
Hydrocyanic acid!”