A NORMAL CASE
When Captain Alec brought his _fiancée_ home after the dinner of welcome
and congratulation at Old Place, it was nearly twelve o'clock. Jeanne,
however--in these days a radiant Jeanne, very different from the mournful
creature who had accompanied Captain Cranster's victim to Inkston a few
weeks before--was sitting up for her mistress and, since she had to
perform this duty--which was sweetened by the hope of receiving exciting
confidences, for surely that affair was "marching?"--it had been agreed
between her and the other maids that she should sit up for the Doctor
also. She told the lovers that Doctor Mary had been called for by Mr.
Beaumaroy, and had gone out with him, presumably to visit his friend Mr.
Saffron. It did not occur to either of them to ask when Mary had set
out; they contented themselves with exchanging a glance of disapproval.
What a pity that Mary should have anything more to do with this Mr.
Saffron and his Beaumaroy!
However there was a bright side to it this time. It would be kind of
Cynthia to sit up for Mary, and minister to her a cup of tea which
Jeanne should prepare; and it would be pleasant--and quite
permissible--for Captain Alec to bear her company. Mary could not be
long, surely; it grew late.
So for a while they thought no more of Mary--as was natural enough. They
had so much to talk about, the whole of a new and very wonderful life to
speculate about and to plan, the whole of their past acquaintance to
review; old doubts had to be confessed and laughed at; the inevitability
of the whole thing from the first beginnings had to be recognized,
proved, and exhibited. In this sweet discourse the minutes flew by
unmarked, and would have gone on flying, had not Jeanne reappeared of her
own accord, to remark that it really was very late now; did mademoiselle
think that possibly anything could have happened to Doctor Arkroyd?
"By Jove, it is late!" cried the Captain, looking at his watch. "It's
past one!"
Cynthia was amazed to hear that.
"He must be very ill, that old gentleman," Jeanne opined. "And poor
Doctor Arkroyd will be very tired. She will find the walk across the
heath very fatiguing."
"Walk, Jeanne? Didn't she take the car?" cried Cynthia, surprised.
No, the Doctor had not taken the car; she had started to walk with Mr.
Beaumaroy; the parlormaid had certainly told Jeanne that.
"I tell you what," said the Captain. "I'll just tool along to Tower
Cottage. I'll look out for Doctor Mary on the road, and give her a lift
back if I meet her. If I don't, I can stop at the cottage and get
Beaumaroy to tell her that I'm there, and can wait to bring her home as
soon as she's ready. You'd better go to bed, Cynthia."
Jeanne tactfully disappeared, and the lovers said good-night. After
Alec's departure, Jeanne received the anticipated confidence.
That departure almost synchronized with two events at Tower Cottage. The
first was Beaumaroy's exit from the front door, leaving Mary in charge
of his prisoner who, consequently, was unable to keep any watch on the
road or to warn his principals of approaching danger. The second was big
Neddy's declaration that, in his opinion, the sack now held about as
much as he could carry. He raised it from the floor in his two hands.
"Must weight a 'undred pound or more!" he reckoned. That meant a lot of
money, a fat lot of money. His terrors had begun to wear off, since
nothing of a supernatural or even creepy order had actually happened. He
had, at last, even agreed to the candles being put out. Still he would
be glad to be off. "Enough's as good as a feast, as the sayin' goes,
Mike," he chuckled.
Mike had fitted a new battery into his torch. It shone brightly on Neddy
and on the sack, whose mouth Neddy was now tying up, "I might fill my
pockets too," he suggested, eyeing the very respectable amount of
sovereigns which still remained in Captain Duggle's tomb.
"Don't do it, old lad," Neddy advised. "If we 'ave to get out, or
anything of that kind, you don't want to jingle as if you was a glass
chandelier, do you?"
Mike admitted the cogency of the objection, and they agreed to be off.
Mike started for the window. "I'll just pick up the Sergeant," he said,
"and signal you 'All clear.' Then you follow out."
"No, Mike," said Neddy slowly, but very decisively. "If you don't mind,
it's going to be me as gets out of that window first. I ain't a man of
your eddication, and--well, blast me if I'm going to be left in this
place alone with--that there!" He motioned with his head, back over his
shoulder, towards where silent Mr. Saffron sat.
"You're a blooming ass, Neddy, but have it your own way. Only let me see
the coast's clear first."
He stole to the window and looked around. He assumed that the Sergeant
was at his post, but all the same he wanted to have a look at the road
himself. So he had, and the result was satisfactory. It was hardly to be
expected that he should scrutinize the ground immediately under the
window; at any rate he did not think of that. It was, as Beaumaroy had
conjectured, from another direction, from the parlor, that he anticipated
a possible attack. There all was quiet. He came back and reported to
Neddy that the moment was favorable. "I'll switch off the torch, though,
just in case. You can feel your way; keep to the edge of the steps; don't
knock up against--"
"I'll take damned good care not to!" muttered Neddy, with a little
shiver.
He made his way to the window, through the darkness, having slung his
sack over his shoulder and holding it with his right hand, while with the
left he guided himself up the dais and along its outside edge, giving as
wide a berth as possible to the great chair and its encircling canopy.
With a sigh of relief he found the window, moved the sack from his
shoulder, and set it on the ledge for a moment. But it was awkward to get
down from the window, holding that heavy sack. He lowered it towards the
ground, so that it might land gently, and, just as he let it go, he
turned his head back and whispered to Mike, "All serene. Get a move on!"
"Half a minute!" answered Mike, as he in his turn set out to grope his
way to the window.
But he was not so cautious as his friend had been. In his progress he
kicked the tall footstool sharply with one of his feet. Neddy leant back
from the window, asking quickly, and again very nervously, "What the
devil's that?"
Beaumaroy could not resist the opportunity thus offered to him. He was
crouching on the ground, not exactly under the window, but just to the
right of it. Neddy's face was turned away; he threw himself on to the
bag, rose to his feet, raised it cautiously, and holding it in front of
him with both his hands--its weight was fully as much as he could
manage--was round the curve of the Tower and out of sight with it in
an instant.
At the back of the house there was a space of ground where Mrs. Wiles
grew a few vegetables for the household's use. It was a clearing made
from the heath, but it was not enclosed. Beaumaroy was able to reach the
back entrance, by which this patch of ground could be entered from the
kitchen. Just by the kitchen door stood that useful thing, a butt for
rainwater. It stood some three, or three-and-a-half, feet high; and it
was full to the brim almost. With a fresh effort Beaumaroy raised the
sack to the level of his breast. Then he lowered it into the water, not
dropping it, for fear of a splash, but immersing both his arms above the
elbow. Only when he felt the weight off them, as the sack touched
bottom, did he release his hold. Then with cautious steps he continued
his progress round the house and, coming to the other side, crouched
close by the wall again and waited. Where he was now, he could see the
fence that separated the front garden from the road, and he was not
more than ten or twelve feet from the front door on his left. As he
huddled down there, he could not repress a smile of amusement, even of
self-congratulation. However, he turned to the practical job of
squeezing the water out of his sleeves.
In thus congratulating himself, he was premature. His action had been
based on a miscalculation. He had heard only Neddy's last exclamation,
not the cautious whispers previously exchanged between him and Mike; he
thought that the man astride the window-sill himself had kicked something
and instinctively exclaimed, "What the devil's that?" He thought that the
sack was lowered from the window in order to be committed to the
temporary guardianship of the Sergeant, who was doubtless looking out for
it and, if he had his ears open, would hear its gentle thud. Perhaps the
man in the Tower was collecting a second instalment of booty; heavy as
the sack was, it did not contain all that he knew to be in Captain
Duggle's grave. Be that as it might, the man would climb out of the
window soon; and he would fail to find his sack.
What would he do then? He would signal or call to the Sergeant; or, if
they had a preconcerted rendezvous, he would betake himself there,
expecting to find his accomplice. He would neither get an answer from him
nor find him, of course. Equally, of course, he would look for him. But
the last place where he would expect to find him--the last place he would
search--would be where the Sergeant in fact was, the house itself. If, in
his search for Hooper, he found Beaumaroy, it would be man to man, and,
now again, Beaumaroy had no objection.
But, in fact, there were two men in the Tower--one of them big Neddy; and
the function, which Beaumaroy supposed to have been intrusted to the
Sergeant, had never been assigned to him at all; to guard the door and
the road had been his only tasks. When they found the bag gone, and the
Sergeant too, they might well think that the Sergeant had betrayed them;
that he had gone off on his own account, or that he had, at the last
moment, under an impulse of fear or a calculation of interest, changed
sides and joined the garrison in the house. If he had gone off with the
sack, he could not have gone fast or far with it. Failing to overtake
him, they might turn back to the cottage; for they knew themselves to be
in superior force. Beaumaroy was in greater danger than he knew--and so
was Doctor Mary in the house.
Big Neddy let himself down from the window, and put down his hand to lift
up the sack; he groped about for it for some seconds, during which time
Mike also climbed over the window-sill and dropped on to the ground
below. Neddy emitted a low but strenuous oath.
"The sack's gone, Mike!" he added in a whisper.
"Gone? Rot! Can't be! What do you mean, Neddy?"
"I dropped it straight 'ere. It's gone," Neddy persisted. "The Sergeant
must 'ave took it."
"No business of his! Where is the fool?" Mike's voice was already uneasy;
thieves themselves seldom believe in there being honor among them. "You
stay here. I'll go to the door and see if he's there."
He was just about to put this purpose into execution--in which event it
was quite likely that Beaumaroy, hearing his approach or his call to the
Sergeant, would have sprung out upon him, only to find himself assailed
the next instant by another and far more formidable antagonist in the
person of big Neddy, and thus in sore peril of his life--when the hum of
Captain Alec's engine became audible in the distance. The next moment,
the lights of his car became visible to all the men in the little front
garden of the cottage.
"Hist! Wait till that's gone by!" whispered Neddy.
"Yes, and get round to the back. Get out of sight round here." He drew
Neddy round the curve of the Tower wall till his big frame was hidden by
it; then he himself crouched down under the wall, with his head
cautiously protruded. The night had grown clearer; it was possible to
see figures at a distance of some yards now.
Beaumaroy also perceived the car. Whose it was and the explanation of its
appearance even occurred to his mind. But he kept still. He did not want
visitors; he conceived his hand to be a better one than it really was,
and preferred to play it by himself. If the car passed by, well and good.
Only if it stopped at the gate would he have to take action.
It did stop at the gate. Mike saw it stop. Then its engine was shut off,
and a man got out of it, and came up to the garden gate. Though the
watching Mike had never seen him before, he had little difficulty in
guessing who he was, and he remembered something that the Sergeant had
said about him. Of a certainty it was the redoubtable Captain Naylor.
Through the darkness he loomed enormous, as tall as big Neddy himself and
no whit less broad. A powerful reinforcement for the garrison!
And what would the Sergeant do, if he were still at his post by the
door--with or without that missing, that all-important, sack?
Another tall figure came into Mike's view--from where he could not
distinctly see; it hardly seemed to be from the door of the cottage, for
no light showed, and there was no sound of an opening door. But it
appeared from somewhere near there; it was on the path, and it moved
along to the gate in a leisurely unhurried approach. A man with his hands
in his pockets--that was what it looked like. This must be the garrison;
this must be the Sergeant's friend, master, protector, and _bête noire_,
his "Boomery."
But the Sergeant himself? Where was he? He could hardly be at his post;
or Beaumaroy and he must have seen one another, must have taken some heed
of one another; something must have passed between them, either friendly
or hostile. Mike turned round and whispered hastily, close into Neddy's
ear. Neddy crawled a little forward, and put his own bullet head far
enough round the curve of the wall to see the meeting between the
garrison and its unexpected reinforcement.
Beaumaroy, hands in pockets, lounged nonchalantly down to the gate. He
opened it; the Captain entered. The two shook hands and stood there,
apparently in conversation. The words did not reach the ears of the
listeners, but the sound of voices did--voices hushed in tone. Once
Beaumaroy pointed to the house; both Mike and Neddy marked the
outstretched hand. Was Beaumaroy telling his companion about something
that had been happening at the house? Were they concocting a plan of
defense--or of attack? With the disappearance, perhaps the treachery, of
the Sergeant, and the appearance of this new ally for the garrison, the
prospects of a fight took on a very different look. Neddy might tackle
the big stranger with an equal chance. How would Mike fare in an
encounter with Beaumaroy? He did not relish the idea of it.
And, while they fought, the traitor Sergeant might be on their backs!
Or--on the other hypothesis--he might be getting off with the swag!
Neither alternative was satisfactory.
"P'r'aps he's gone off to the car with the sack--in a fright, like,
thinking we'll guess that!" whispered Neddy.
Mike did not much think so, though he would much have liked to. But
he received the suggestion kindly. "We might as well have a look; we
can come back afterwards if--if we like. Perhaps that big brute'll
have gone."
"The thing as I want to do most is to wring that Sergeant's neck!"
Their whispers were checked by a new development. The cottage door opened
for a moment and then closed again; they could tell that, both by the
sound and by the momentary ray of light. Yet a light persisted after the
door was shut. It came from a candle, which burnt steadily in the
stillness of the night. It was carried by a woman, who came down the path
towards where Beaumaroy and the Captain stood in conversation. Both
turned towards her with eager attention.
"Now's our time, then! They aren't looking our way now. We can get
across the heath to where the car is."
They moved off very softly, keeping the Tower between them and the group
on the path. They gained the back of the house, and so the open heath,
and made off to their destination. They moved so softly that they escaped
unheard--unless Beaumaroy were right in the notion that his ear caught a
little rustle of the bracken. He took no heed of it, unless a passing
smile might be reckoned as such.
Doctor Mary joined him and the Captain on the path. Beaumaroy's smile
gave way to a look of expectant interest. He wondered what she was going
to say to Captain Alec. There was so much that she might say, or--just
conceivably--leave unsaid.
She spoke calmly and quietly. "It's you, Captain Alec! I thought so!
Cynthia got anxious? I'm all right. I suppose Mr. Beaumaroy has told you?
Poor Mr. Saffron is dead."
"I've told him," said Beaumaroy.
"Of heart disease," Mary added. "Quite painlessly, I think--and quite a
normal case, though, of course, it's distressing."
"I--I'm sorry," stammered Captain Alec.
Beaumaroy's eyes met Mary's in the candle's light with a swift glance of
surprise and inquiry.