“Well, go on—I’m listening,” I said, with a very bad grace, which,
however, he was too grief-stricken to notice.
“Well, I was swindled in buying the violin—regularly diddled,” he
said, with some exasperation.
“_You_ were swindled? I thought it was the other way?” I said,
stopping in surprise.
“So did I, but I was mistaken,” he answered, with a writhe. “This
was how it happened. I was playing at Newcastle last year, when a
man named John Mackintosh, who said he had a real Cremona violin,
or one that was said to be real, called upon me, and said he wanted
my opinion of it. I had nothing to do during the day, so I went to
his shop,—a little den down near the New Quay, in which he sold
ginger beer, sweets, and newspapers,—and saw at a glance that it was
a splendid instrument. It was of no use to him, for he is only a
wretched scraper, who would be as happy with a twelve-and-sixpenny
German fiddle, so I determined if possible to get him to sell it. He
asked what I thought of it, and I said indifferently that it might be
a real Cremona and it might not, but it was worth about £10.”
“That would be a lie, of course?” I quietly observed.
“Well, in a sense, yes,” he stammered, flushing a little. “You know I
was speaking professionally.”
“Oh, indeed? Professionals always lie, then?”
“No, no—you mistake. I mean that professionals can never afford to
give so much as ordinary buyers with lots of money. But the man was
deeper than I had expected—he’s a Scotchman, you know, and they’re
always cursed long-headed. He said, ‘Ah, but I wadna gie that fiddle
for twice £10.’ I laughed at him, but at length I said I would buy it
from him, and give him the £20. Blast him, then I found he wouldn’t
sell it at all!”
“And you came away without it?”
“I tried him every way—pointed out how much more useful the money
would be than the fiddle to him, but he only said dryly that ‘he
would think aboot it,’ and thus I left him. The next time I was in
Newcastle I called upon him again, and saw the violin, but this time
Mackintosh was not in the shop, but an uncle of his, who said he
could not sell the fiddle without the owner’s consent, but hinted
that if I made a reasonable offer for it he had no doubt I might make
a bargain the next time I came. Well, I did call on my next visit,
and saw the uncle, who said that Mackintosh had decided to sell it
if I would make the price £40, and I snapped at the offer at once. I
asked when I could see Mackintosh, but the uncle only said, ‘You can
get the fiddle frae me as weel as frae him—if ye hae the money wi’
ye?’ I had the money, and counted it out at once, while he wrote out
a receipt, put a stamp on it, and signed it ‘John Mackintosh.’ Then
I got the fiddle, and thought as I bore it off that I was happy for
life.”
“But you weren’t?”
“I wasn’t. I had not been home many days when I got a note, vilely
written and spelled, from Mackintosh, demanding back his fiddle,
and saying hotly that his uncle, the drunken beast, had no right to
_lend_ the fiddle to me, or even let it out of the shop. I replied
sharply that I had bought it, paid £40 for it, and held the receipt;
to which he replied that his uncle had left him, and gone no one knew
where, but the fiddle was never his uncle’s, nor had he power to sell
it, and that Mackintosh himself had never fingered a penny of the
price, and did not mean to, but insisted on getting back his Cremona.
Here was a nice swindle; yet what could I do? I offered him other £20
to let me keep it, but he laughed at the offer, and then brought an
action-at-law against me for the return of the fiddle.”
“And what was the result?”
“The result as yet is only that I’ve had to pay away nearly £20 in
lawyer’s fees; but, as I stick to the fiddle, and would burn it
sooner than give it up to him, I suspect that in desperation he has
planned this robbery, and now is making his escape to Newcastle with
the fiddle in his possession.”
“Oho! and that’s the end of it,” I exclaimed, now seeing the
awkwardness of the case he was putting into my hands. “Was it this
man Mackintosh who offered you £200 for the fiddle the other day?”
“No, no! That was another person altogether. But what has that got to
do with the case in hand?”
“Nothing, perhaps, but we’ll see. Who was he?”
“Oh, a curious, half-daft customer, who has a craze for buying
fiddles. He lives a mile or two out from this city, but heard me play
on mine at one of the concerts, and invited me out to try his and
compare them with mine.”
“Did he seem very anxious to buy yours?”
“Oh, fairly daft about it—offered me my pick of his selection of
fiddles and £200 down for it, but I only laughed at him. He doesn’t
play at all, so of what earthly use would it be to him? He has been
in an asylum, I understand, at one time, and I could believe it,
for none but a daft man would give the prices he has given for the
fiddles he has. One wretched thing, with no more tone in it than a
child’s sixpenny toy, cost him £180. He’s been beautifully swindled.”
“Swindling seems to be rather a prominent feature in fiddle-buying,”
was my comment; but while I made it I was thinking of something else.
It is a pity that he told me of the Newcastle affair, for from the
first I had caught the idea that the offerer of the £200 would
be found to have some connection with the theft. The bringing in
of another clue completely upset my first instincts, and made me
give them less prominence than I should otherwise have done. The
description of the surly, sham coachman, too, did not tally in any
particular with that of either Mackintosh or his uncle, though, as
Cleffton remarked, that did not go for much, as they might have
employed another to do the job for them.
There was little time for either thinking or further inquiries, for
on consulting the railway time tables I found that trains started by
both lines for Newcastle at a few minutes past seven, and as I could
not divide myself into two, I would have to rouse M^cSweeny—rather a
joyful task—and prime him with details and descriptions, and set him
on to watch one station, while I and Mr Cleffton took the other.
As the early train from the Waverley Station did not run farther
than Berwick without a break, I thought the Caledonian more likely
to be tried, and decided to take that one, while M^cSweeny took the
Waverley. There was no boat for Newcastle from Leith till next day,
so we were pretty safe in trying only the railway stations.
We got down to the Pleasance, roused M^cSweeny without compunction,
and then hurried off to our different posts of observation. I took up
my stand close to the booking-office, with Cleffton watching close
by, and there we stood till every passenger had been served with
tickets, and the train moved out of the station. Not one carried a
fiddle, or suspicious bundle, or had any appearance of having one
concealed about them, and not one answered the descriptions either of
Mackintosh, his uncle, or the sham coachman. Cleffton was manifestly
disappointed, and eager to know what I thought.
“Wait till we hear what M^cSweeny has to say,” was my reply, and we
drove along to the other station to find that my chum had actually
made a capture, and lugged him off to the Office, fiddle and all.
Cleffton was in high spirits, but swore horribly when he found that
the prisoner was only a harmless blind fiddler, with an instrument
having more patches and splices than his coat, and worth only
half-a-crown. Then I gave my opinion freely—
“I’m afraid we’re on the wrong scent.”
Cleffton, however, had formed his own theory, and insisted on all
the trains for Newcastle being watched that day; and this was done,
but without success. Even then he would have held out, but in the
course of the day I sent a telegram to a skilful man on the Newcastle
staff, asking him to find out if Mackintosh had been out of town, and
at night I had an answer giving a decided negative. Not only was he
at home, and serving his customers as usual, but he had even spoken
confidently of recovering his valuable Cremona, in a month or two at
the most, by the ordinary processes of law.
“Recover it, the cheating scoundrel!” cried Cleffton, when I read him
the message, “after me paying him forty pounds for it!”
“Not him—you did not pay him,” I quietly corrected.
“A regularly planned swindle!—all made up between them,” he hoarsely
iterated.
“I have little doubt it was,” I thoughtfully replied; “but did it
never strike you as curious that a man in his position should possess
such a valuable instrument. Did he never tell you how it came into
his possession? It is just possible that it was not really his to
sell.”
“Do you think so?” eagerly cried the excited victim. “By heavens, I
would give a ten pound note this minute if you could fasten a crime
of any kind on him. That would be revenge! He always declared to me
that he bought it in a disjointed state from a broker in Edinburgh
here for £3. Perhaps it was stolen.”
I said nothing, for either way Cleffton would lose his fiddle, and
probably the money he had paid for it. I had no doubt that the false
sale had been planned and arranged by Mackintosh; and was quite sure
that the man who could do so would not stick at trifles, but it did
not therefore follow that he had stolen the fiddle. I gave the
whole matter a night’s thought, and in the morning wished heartily
that the fiddle had been burned to ashes a year before I was born,
for I seemed to get deeper into troubles and difficulties the more I
studied and investigated.
I now put Cleffton and his theories aside, and began to work the case
in my own way. After getting from him the address of the gentleman
who had offered him £200 for the Cremona, I made my way out to the
mansion which had been the scene of the robbery. I then worked my
way in towards the city, and, after two days’ hard work, at length
discovered two persons who had seen a man answering the description
of the sham coachman at an early hour on the morning of the robbery.
One had seen him on the road, another had seen him in the city; but
neither seemed to have any suspicion that under the big coachman’s
coat there was concealed a bulky thing like a fiddle.
From some of the servants I had learned that the man was red-haired
and big boned—that he had a slight cast in the eye, and that he
undoubtedly knew something about horses and driving. I therefore
decided that if I should have the good fortune to discover him I
would find him to be some dodging groom or stableman of doubtful
reputation rather than one of my own family of recognised “bairns.”
My next step was naturally a visit to the eccentric connoisseur,
whom I shall call Mr Turner. It happened, however, that before I had
advanced to this stage Mr Cleffton had to leave the city for England
to fulfil several important engagements, and I was for a little
rather puzzled as to how I should be able to identify his violin, if
I were lucky enough to get my eyes on it. Fiddles, of course, are
all alike to me, and unless by some marked difference in the colour
I could not tell one from another. Mr Cleffton tried to prime me a
little by speaking of certain marks and printed tickets which I would
find about the fiddle, but when he admitted that some of the fiddles
already in Mr Turner’s possession had these very tickets and marks
I was more helpless than ever. At last a happy thought struck him
just as he was leaving town, and he dropped me a note directing me
to an old Edinburgh musician who had been playing second fiddle with
him on the night of the ball. This gentleman had seen and closely
examined the Cremona more than once, and, having a perfect knowledge
of all the peculiarities of such valuable instruments, would know
the missing one, I was assured, among dozens. To this gentleman,
therefore, I went, and we arranged that he should take me out to
Mr Turner’s as a friend wishing to see the rare collection of old
violins. We then set out for the nearest cab-stand, as the place was
three miles out of town, and on the way I chanced to say—
“But are you perfectly sure that you would know this fiddle so as to
be able to swear to it? It would be very awkward for us all if we
made a false accusation.”
“I’ll know it when I see it,” was the confident reply, “and I’ll
tell you why. I have a strong suspicion that I’ve seen the fiddle
before—ay, and played on it, too. If it’s not the £50 Cremona that
my old chum, M——, of the Theatre Royal, lost about ten years ago, it
must be its twin brother.”
“Lost? How could a fiddle be lost?” I faintly returned, as with a
sinking heart I anticipated fresh complications.
“Well, or stolen—it was never rightly known how it happened,”
promptly returned my companion. “I was there at the time myself, and
I’ll tell you all about it as we go out.”