the apparition of a coach and headless horses, I should choose a dark,
rainy night. Good! It was that kind of night. Now, if I took black
horses and painted their bodies white--poor devils! what a state they'd
be in. No. How do they do these Maskelyne-and-Devant stunts where
they cut off people's heads? White horses, of course--and black felt
clothing over their heads. Right! And luminous paint on the harness,
with a touch here and there on their bodies, to make good contrast and
ensure that the whole show wasn't invisible. No difficulty about that.
But they must go silently. Well, why not? Four stout black cloth bags
filled with bran, drawn well up and tied round the fetlocks would make
any horse go quietly enough, especially if there was a bit of a wind
going. Rags round the bridle-rings to prevent clinking, and round the
ends of the traces to keep 'em from squeaking. Give 'em a coachman in
a white coat and a black mask, hitch 'em to a rubber-tyred fly, picked
out with phosphorus and well-oiled at the joints--and I swear I'd make
something quite ghostly enough to startle a rather well-irrigated
gentleman on a lonely road at half-past two in the morning."
He was pleased with this thought, and tapped his boot cheerfully with
his whip.
"But damn it all! They never passed me again. Where did they go to? A
coach-and-horses can't vanish into thin air, you know. There must be a
side-road after all--or else, Polly Flinders, you've been pulling my
leg all the time."
The bridle-path eventually debouched upon the highway at the now
familiar fork where Wimsey had met the policeman. As he slowly ambled
homewards, his lordship scanned the left-hand hedgerow, looking for the
lane which surely must exist. But nothing rewarded his search. Enclosed
fields with padlocked gates presented the only breaks in the hedge,
till he again found himself looking down the avenue of trees up which
the death-coach had come galloping two nights before.
"Damn!" said Wimsey.
It occurred to him for the first time that the coach might perhaps
have turned round and gone back through Little Doddering. Certainly
it had been seen by Little Doddering Church on Wednesday. But on that
occasion, also, it had galloped off in the direction of Frimpton. In
fact, thinking it over, Wimsey concluded that it had approached from
Frimpton, gone round the church--widdershins, naturally--by the Back
Lane, and returned by the high-road whence it came. But in that case----
"Turn again, Whittington," said Wimsey, and Polly Flinders rotated
obediently in the road. "Through one of those fields it went, or I'm a
Dutchman."
He pulled Polly into a slow walk, and passed along the strip of grass
at the right-hand side, staring at the ground as though he were an
Aberdonian who had lost a sixpence.
The first gate led into a ploughed field, harrowed smooth and sown with
autumn wheat. It was clear that no wheeled thing had been across it for
many weeks. The second gate looked more promising. It gave upon fallow
ground, and the entrance was seamed with innumerable wheel-ruts. On
further examination, however, it was clear that this was the one and
only gate. It seemed unlikely that the mysterious coach should have
been taken into a field from which there was no way out. Wimsey decided
to seek farther.
The third gate was in bad repair. It sagged heavily from its hinges;
the hasp was gone, and gate and post had been secured with elaborate
twists of wire. Wimsey dismounted and examined these, convincing
himself that their rusty surface had not been recently disturbed.
There remained only two more gates before he came to the cross-roads.
One led into plough again, where the dark ridge-and-furrow showed no
sign of disturbance, but at sight of the last gate Wimsey's heart gave
a leap.
There was plough-land here also, but round the edge of the field ran a
wide, beaten path, rutted and water-logged. The gate was not locked,
but opened simply with a spring catch. Wimsey examined the approach.
Among the wide ruts made by farm-wagons was the track of four narrow
wheels--the unmistakable prints of rubber tyres. He pushed the gate
open and passed through.
The path skirted two sides of the plough; then came another gate and
another field, containing a long barrow of mangold wurzels and a
couple of barns. At the sound of Polly's hoofs, a man emerged from
the nearest barn, with a paint-brush in his hand, and stood watching
Wimsey's approach.
"'Morning!" said the latter genially.
"'Morning, sir."
"Fine day after the rain."
"Yes, it is, sir."
"I hope I'm not trespassing?"
"Where was you wanting to go, sir?"
"I thought, as a matter of fact--hullo!"
"Anything wrong, sir?"
Wimsey shifted in the saddle.
"I fancy this girth's slipped a bit. It's a new one." (This was a
fact.) "Better have a look."
The man advanced to investigate, but Wimsey had dismounted and was
tugging at the strap, with his head under the mare's belly.
"Yes, it wants taking up a trifle. Oh! Thanks most awfully. Is this a
short cut to Abbotts Bolton, by the way?"
"Not to the village, sir, though you can get through this way. It comes
out by Mr. Mortimer's stables."
"Ah, yes. This his land?"
"No, sir, it's Mr. Topham's land, but Mr. Mortimer rents this field and
the next for fodder."
"Oh, yes." Wimsey peered across the hedge. "Lucerne, I suppose. Or
clover."
"Clover, sir. And the mangolds is for the cattle."
"Oh--Mr. Mortimer keeps cattle as well as horses?"
"Yes, sir."
"Very jolly. Have a gasper?" Wimsey had sidled across to the barn
in his interest, and was gazing absently into its dark interior. It
contained a number of farm implements and a black fly of antique
construction, which seemed to be undergoing renovation with black
varnish. Wimsey pulled some vestas from his pocket. The box was
apparently damp, for, after one or two vain attempts he abandoned it,
and struck a match on the wall of the barn. The flame, lighting up the
ancient fly, showed it to be incongruously fitted with rubber tyres.
"Very fine stud, Mr. Mortimer's, I understand," said Wimsey carelessly.
"Yes, sir, very fine indeed."
"I suppose he hasn't any greys, by any chance. My mother--queenly
woman, Victorian ideas, and all that--is rather keen on greys. Sports a
carriage and pay-ah, don't you know."
"Yes, sir? Well, Mr. Mortimer would be able to suit the lady, I think,
sir. He has several greys."
"No? has he though? I must really go over and see him. Is it far?"
"Matter of five or six mile by the fields, sir."
Wimsey looked at his watch.
"Oh, dear! I'm really afraid it's too far for this morning. I
absolutely promised to get back to lunch. I must come over another day.
Thanks _so_ much. Is that girth right now? Oh, really, I'm immensely
obliged. Get yourself a drink, won't you--and tell Mr. Mortimer not
to sell his greys till I've seen them. Well, _good_ morning, and many
thanks."
He set Polly Flinders on the homeward path and trotted gently away.
Not till he was out of sight of the barn did he pull up and, stooping
from the saddle, thoughtfully examine his boots. They were liberally
plastered with bran.
"I must have picked it up in the barn," said Wimsey. "Curious, if true.
Why should Mr. Mortimer be lashing the stuffing out of his greys in an
old fly at dead of night--and with muffled hoofs and no heads to boot?
It's not a kind thing to do. It frightened Plunkett very much. It made
me think I was drunk--a thought I hate to think. Ought I to tell the
police? Are Mr. Mortimer's jokes any business of mine? What do _you_
think, Polly?"
The mare, hearing her name, energetically shook her head.
"You think not? Perhaps you are right. Let us say that Mr. Mortimer
did it for a wager. Who am I to interfere with his amusements? All
the same," added his lordship, "I'm glad to know it wasn't Lumsden's
whisky."
* * * * *
"This is the library," said Haviland, ushering in his guests. "A fine
room--and a fine collection of books, I'm told, though literature isn't
much in my line. It wasn't much in the governor's line, either, I'm
afraid. The place wants doing up, as you see. I don't know whether
Martin will take it in hand. It's a job that'll cost money, of course."
Wimsey shivered a little as he gazed round--more from sympathy than
from cold, though a white November fog lay curled against the tall
windows and filtered damply through the frames.
A long, mouldering room, in the frigid neo-classical style, the library
was melancholy enough in the sunless grey afternoon, even without the
signs of neglect which wrung the book-collector's heart. The walls,
panelled to half their height with book-cases, ran up in plaster to
the moulded ceiling. Damp had blotched them into grotesque shapes, and
here and there were ugly cracks and squamous patches, from which the
plaster had fallen in yellowish flakes. A wet chill seemed to ooze
from the books, from the calf bindings peeling and perishing, from the
stains of greenish mildew which spread horridly from volume to volume.
The curious musty odour of decayed leather and damp paper added to the
general cheerlessness of the atmosphere.
"Oh, dear, dear!" said Wimsey, peering dismally into this sepulchre of
forgotten learning. With his shoulders hunched like the neck-feathers
of a chilly bird, with his long nose and half-shut eyes, he resembled a
dilapidated heron, brooding over the stagnation of a wintry pool.
"What a freezing-cold place!" exclaimed Mrs. Hancock. "You really
ought to scold Mrs. Lovall, Mr. Burdock. When she was put in here as
caretaker, I said to my husband--didn't I, Philip?--that your father
had chosen the laziest woman in Little Doddering. She ought to have
kept up big fires here, _at least_ twice a week! It's really shameful,
the way she has let things go."
"Yes, isn't it?" agreed Haviland.
Wimsey said nothing. He was nosing along the shelves, every now and
then taking a volume down and glancing at it.
"It was always rather a depressing room," went on Haviland. "I
remember, when I was a kid, it used to overawe me rather. Martin and
I used to browse about among the books, you know, but I think we were
always afraid that something or somebody would stalk out upon us from
the dark corners. What's that you've got there, Lord Peter? Oh, _Foxe's
Book of Martyrs_. Dear me! How those pictures did terrify me in the
old days! And there was a _Pilgrim's Progress_, with a most alarming
picture of Apollyon straddling over the whole breadth of the way, which
gave me many nightmares. Let me see. It used to live over in this bay,
I think. Yes, here it is. How it does bring it all back, to be sure! Is
it valuable, by the way?"
"No, not really. But this first edition of Burton is worth money; badly
spotted, though--you'd better send it to be cleaned. And this is an
extremely fine Boccaccio; take care of it."
"John Boccace--_The Dance of Machabree_. It's a good title, anyhow. Is
that the same Boccaccio that wrote the naughty stories?"
"Yes," said Wimsey, a little shortly. He resented this attitude towards
Boccaccio.
"Never read them," said Haviland, with a wink at his wife, "but I've
seen 'em in the windows of those surgical shops--so I suppose they're
naughty, eh? The vicar's looking shocked."
"Oh, not at all," said Mr. Hancock, with a conscientious assumption of
broad-mindedness. "_Et ego in Arcadia_--that is to say, one doesn't
enter the Church without undergoing a classical education, and making
the acquaintance of much more worldly authors even than Boccaccio.
Those wood-cuts are very fine, to my uninstructed eye."
"Very fine indeed," said Wimsey.
"There's another old book I remember, with jolly pictures," said
Haviland. "A chronicle of some sort--what's 'is name--place in
Germany--_you_ know--where that hangman came from. They published his
diary the other day. I read it, but it wasn't really exciting; not half
as gruesome as old Harrison Ainsworth. What's the name of the place?"
"Nüremberg?" suggested Wimsey.
"That's it, of course--the _Nüremberg Chronicle_. I wonder if that's
still in its old place. It was over here by the window, if I remember
rightly."
He led the way to the end of one of the bays, which ran up close
against a window. Here the damp seemed to have done its worst. A pane
of glass was broken, and rain had blown in.
"Now where has it gone to? A big book, it was, with a stamped leather
binding. I'd like to see the old _Chronicle_ again. I haven't set eyes
on it for donkey's years."
His glance roamed vaguely over the shelves. Wimsey, with the
book-lover's instinct, was the first to spot the _Chronicle_, wedged at
the extreme end of the shelf, against the outer wall. He hitched his
finger into the top edge of the spine, but finding that the rotting
leather was ready to crumble at a touch, he dislodged a neighbouring
book and drew the _Chronicle_ gently out, using his whole hand.
"Here he is--in pretty bad condition, I'm afraid. Hullo!"
As he drew the book away from the wall, a piece of folded parchment
came away with it and fell at his feet. He stooped and picked it up.
"I say, Burdock--isn't this what you've been looking for?"
Haviland Burdock, who had been rooting about on one of the lower
shelves, straightened himself quickly, his face red from stooping.
"By Jove!" he said, turning first redder and then pale with excitement.
"Look at this, Winnie. It's the governor's will. What an extraordinary
thing! Whoever would have thought of looking for it here, of all
places?"
"Is it really the will?" cried Mrs. Hancock.
"No doubt about it, I should say," observed Wimsey coolly. "Last Will
and Testament of Simon Burdock." He stood, turning the grimy document
over and over in his hands, looking from the endorsement to the plain
side of the folded parchment.
"Well, well!" said Mr. Hancock. "How strange! It seems almost
providential that you should have taken that book down."
"What does the will say?" demanded Mrs. Burdock, in some excitement.
"I beg your pardon," said Wimsey, handing it over to her. "Yes, as
you say, Mr. Hancock, it does almost seem as if I was meant to find
it." He glanced down again at the _Chronicle_, mournfully tracing with
his finger the outline of a damp stain which had rotted the cover and
spread to the inner pages, almost obliterating the colophon.
Haviland Burdock meanwhile had spread the will out on the nearest
table. His wife leaned over his shoulder. The Hancocks, barely
controlling their curiosity, stood near, awaiting the result. Wimsey,
with an elaborate pretence of non-interference in this family matter,
examined the wall against which the _Chronicle_ had stood, feeling its
moist surface and examining the damp-stains. They had assumed the
appearance of a grinning face. He compared them with the corresponding
mark on the book, and shook his head desolately over the damage.
Mr. Frobisher-Pym, who had wandered away some time before and was
absorbed in an ancient book of Farriery, now approached, and enquired
what the excitement was about.
"Listen to this!" cried Haviland. His voice was quiet, but a suppressed
triumph throbbed in it and glittered from his eyes.
"'I bequeath everything of which I die possessed'--there's a lot of
enumeration of properties here, which doesn't matter--'to my eldest
son, Martin'----"
Mr. Frobisher-Pym whistled.
"Listen! 'To my eldest son Martin, for so long as my body shall remain
above ground. But so soon as I am buried, I direct that the whole of
this property shall revert to my younger son Haviland absolutely'----"
"Good God!" said Mr. Frobisher-Pym.
"There's a lot more," said Haviland, "but that's the gist of it."
"Let me see," said the magistrate.
He took the will from Haviland, and read it through with a frowning
face.
"That's right," he said. "No possible doubt about it. Martin has had
his property and lost it again. How very curious. Up till yesterday
everything belonged to him, though nobody knew it. Now it is all yours,
Burdock. This certainly is the strangest will I ever saw. Just fancy
that. Martin the heir, up to the time of the funeral. And now--well,
Burdock, I must congratulate you."
"Thank you," said Haviland. "It is very unexpected." He laughed
unsteadily.
"But what a queer idea!" cried Mrs. Burdock. "Suppose Martin had been
at home. It almost seems a mercy that he wasn't, doesn't it? I mean,
it would all have been so awkward. What would have happened if he had
tried to stop the funeral, for instance?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Hancock. "Could he have done anything? Who decides
about funerals?"
"The executors, as a rule," said Mr. Frobisher-Pym.
"Who are the executors in this case?" enquired Wimsey.
"I don't know. Let me see." Mr. Frobisher-Pym examined the document
again. "Ah, yes! Here we are. 'I appoint my two sons, Martin and
Haviland, joint executors of this my will.' What an extraordinary
arrangement."
"I call it a wicked, un-Christian arrangement," cried Mrs. Hancock.
"It might have caused dreadful mischief if the will hadn't been--quite
providentially--lost!"
"Hush, my dear!" said her husband.
"I'm afraid," said Haviland grimly, "that that was my father's idea.
It's no use my pretending he wasn't spiteful; he was, and I believe he
hated both Martin and me like poison."
"Don't say that," pleaded the vicar.
"I do say it. He made our lives a burden to us, and he obviously wanted
to go on making them a burden after he was dead. If he'd seen us
cutting each other's throats, he'd only have been too pleased. Come,
vicar, it's no use pretending. He hated our mother and was jealous of
us. Everybody knows that. It probably pleased his unpleasant sense
of humour to think of us squabbling over his body. Fortunately, he
over-reached himself when he hid the will here. He's buried now, and
the problem settles itself."
"Are you quite sure of that?" said Wimsey.
"Why, of course," said the magistrate. "The property goes to Mr.
Haviland Burdock as soon as his father's body is underground. Well, his
father was buried yesterday."
"But are you sure of _that_?" repeated Wimsey. He looked from one to
the other quizzically, his long lips curling into something like a grin.
"Sure of that?" exclaimed the vicar. "My dear Lord Peter, you were
present at the funeral. You saw him buried yourself."
"I saw his coffin buried," said Wimsey mildly. "That the body was in it
is merely an unverified inference."
"I think," said Mr. Frobisher-Pym, "this is rather an unseemly kind
of jest. There is no reason to imagine that the body was not in the
coffin."
"I saw it in the coffin," said Haviland, "and so did my wife."
"And so did I," said the vicar. "I was present when it was transferred
from the temporary shell in which it crossed over from the States to
a permanent lead-and-oak coffin provided by Joliffe. And, if further
witnesses are necessary, you can easily get Joliffe himself and his
men, who put the body in and screwed it down."
"Just so," said Wimsey. "I'm not denying that the body was in the
coffin when the coffin was placed in the chapel. I only doubt whether
it was there when it was put in the ground."
"That is a most unheard-of suggestion to make, Lord Peter," said Mr.
Frobisher-Pym, with severity. "May I ask if you have anything to go
upon? And, if the body is not in the grave, perhaps you wouldn't mind
telling us where you imagine it to be?"
"Not at all," said Wimsey. He perched himself on the edge of the table
and sat, swinging his legs and looking down at his own hands, as he
ticked his points off on his fingers.
"I think," he said, "that this story begins with young Rawlinson. He
is a clerk in the office of Mr. Graham, who drew up this will, and I
fancy he knows something about its conditions. So, of course, does
Mr. Graham, but I don't somehow suspect _him_ of being mixed up in
this. From what I can hear, he is not a man to take sides--or not Mr.
Martin's side, at any rate.
"When the news of Mr. Burdock's death was cabled over from the
States, I think young Rawlinson remembered the terms of the will, and
considered that Mr. Martin--being abroad and all that--would be rather
at a disadvantage. Rawlinson must be rather attached to your brother,
by the way----"
"Martin always had a way of picking up good-for-nothing youths and
wasting his time with them," agreed Haviland sulkily.
The vicar seemed to feel that this statement needed some amendment, and
murmured that he had always heard how good Martin was with the village
lads.
"Quite so," said Wimsey. "Well, I think young Rawlinson wanted to give
Martin an equal chance of securing the legacy, don't you see. He didn't
like to say anything about the will--which might or might not turn
up--and possibly he thought that even if it did turn up there might be
difficulties. Well, anyway, he decided that the best thing to do was to
steal the body and keep it above-ground till Martin came home to see to
things himself."
"This is an extraordinary accusation," began Mr. Frobisher-Pym.
"I dare say I'm mistaken," said Wimsey, "but it's just my idea. It
makes a damn good story, anyhow--you see! Well, then, young Rawlinson
saw that this was too big a job to carry out alone, so he looked round
for somebody to help him. And he pitched on Mr. Mortimer."
"Mortimer?"
"I don't know Mr. Mortimer personally, but he seems to be a sportin'
sort of customer from what I can hear, with certain facilities which
everybody hasn't got. Young Rawlinson and Mortimer put their heads
together and worked out a plan of action. Of course, Mr. Hancock, you
helped them enormously with this lying-in-state idea of yours. Without
that, I don't know if they could have worked it."
Mr. Hancock made an embarrassed clucking sound.
"The idea was this. Mortimer was to provide an antique fly and four
white horses, made up with luminous paint and black cloth to represent
the Burdock death-coach. The advantage of that idea was that nobody
would feel inclined to inspect the turn-out too closely if they saw
it hangin' round the churchyard at unearthly hours. Meanwhile, young
Rawlinson had to get himself accepted as a watcher for the chapel, and
to find a sporting companion to watch with him and take a hand in the
game. He fixed things up with the publican-fellow, and spun a tale for
Mr. Hancock, so as to get the vigil from four to six. Didn't it strike
you as odd, Mr. Hancock, that he should be so keen to come all the way
from Herriotting?"
"I am accustomed to find keenness in my congregation," said Mr. Hancock
stiffly.
"Yes, but Rawlinson didn't belong to your congregation. Anyway it was
all worked out, and there was a dress-rehearsal on the Wednesday night,
which frightened your man Plunkett into fits, sir."
"If I thought this was true----" said Mr. Frobisher-Pym.
"On Thursday night," pursued Wimsey, "the conspirators were ready,
hidden in the chancel at two in the morning. They waited till Mrs. and
Miss Hancock had taken their places, and then made a row to attract
their attention. When the ladies courageously advanced to find out what
was up, they popped out and bundled 'em into the vestry."
"Good gracious!" said Mrs. Hancock.
"That was when the death-coach affair was timed to drive up to the
south door. It came round the Back Lane, I fancy, though I can't be
sure. Then Mortimer and the other two took the embalmed body out of
the coffin and filled its place up with bags of sawdust. I know it was
sawdust, because I found the remains of it on the Lady-chapel floor
in the morning. They put the body in the fly, and Mortimer drove off
with it. They passed me on the Herriotting Road at half-past two, so
they can't have wasted much time over the job. Mortimer may have been
alone, or possibly he had someone with him to see to the body while he
himself did the headless coachman business in a black mask. I'm not
certain about that. They drove through the last gate before you come to
the fork at Frimpton, and went across the fields to Mortimer's barn.
They left the fly there--I know that, because I saw it, and I saw the
bran they used to muffle the horses' hoofs, too. I expect they took it
on from there in a car, and fetched the horses up next day--but that's
a detail. I don't know, either, where they took the body to, but I
expect, if you went and asked Mortimer about it, he would be able to
assure you that it was still above ground."
Wimsey paused. Mr. Frobisher-Pym and the Hancocks were looking only
puzzled and angry, but Haviland's face was green. Mrs. Haviland
showed a red, painted spot on each cheek, and her mouth was haggard.
Wimsey picked up the _Nüremberg Chronicle_ and caressed its covers
thoughtfully as he went on.
"Meanwhile, of course, young Rawlinson and his companion were doing the
camouflage in the church, to give the idea of a Protestant outrage.
Having fixed everything up neat and pretty, all they had to do was to
lock themselves up in the furnace-house and chuck the key through the
window. You'll probably find it there, Mr. Hancock, if you care to
look. Didn't you think that story of an assault by two or three men was
a bit thin? Hubbard is a hefty great fellow, and Rawlinson's a sturdy
lad--and yet, on their own showing, they were bundled into a coal-hole
like helpless infants, without a scratch on either of 'em. Look for the
men in buckram, my dear sir, look for the men in buckram!"
"Look here, Wimsey, are you sure you're not romancing?" said Mr.
Frobisher-Pym. "One would need some very clear proof before----"