To men of business or wealth, accustomed to handle large sums of
money, bank-notes for large sums—such as £50 or £100—suggest nothing
but convenience of handling and counting. With those who never owned
£50 in their lives it is very different. The sum represented seems
fabulously great—a fortune in itself. And then the thing is so
small—a little oblong square of paper—so compressible—so thin—that
the second stage—that of temptation—easily follows. Fifty or a
hundred pounds in gold would be a good weight to carry, and a sum
difficult to conceal; but a slip of paper! how many cunning and
impenetrable places of hiding could be devised in a few minutes for
that?
I have to give here the adventures of three £50 bank-notes. These
notes had been paid to Mr George Lockyer, a builder, who dabbled a
little in money lending, by a friend in quittance of a bond on some
property. The payer of the money was but a working man, else the
transaction would probably have been settled with a cheque; and the
fact that this man was in working clothes had an important bearing
upon the whole case, apart from the absence of a cheque altogether.
The money had been drawn from the bank, but neither the teller who
paid over the notes nor the receiver of them thought of noting the
numbers.
Mr Lockyer, however, though anything but a careful or methodical man
in regard to money, chanced to notice the number of the top note,
from the fact that it was formed of two twenties, thus—“2020.”
The notes were scarcely opened out—they were quickly counted—the
necessary papers handed over to the payee, and the whole transaction,
and some friendly conversation as well, was all over in about fifteen
minutes.
When the payee was gone, Mr Lockyer lifted the lid of his desk, and
carelessly placed the notes, folded in three, on the top of some
papers, intending to take them out in a short time, and bank them
on his way home to dinner. He did not take them out or bank them—he
forgot all about them. About half an hour later he left the little
office, locking the door after him, and taking the key with him.
This little office was part of a small erection attached to the
building yard. That part which Mr Lockyer used as an office was not
above ten feet square. It was fitted up with two desks, as at times
the builder employed a clerk, but at that time was entered by no one
but himself, or any callers he might have to receive while there.
The remainder of the erection was used as a kind of tool-house, and
was fitted all round with shelves. This apartment entered from the
building yard, and at one time the door between the two places had
been open, but now it was not only closed and locked, but crossed on
the tool-house side by the shelves aforesaid. This door had not been
open for years, and the builder had not even a key for the lock. The
other door, and that now in use, entered from the street, close to
the gate of the yard.
Mr Lockyer remained away from his office during the whole afternoon,
the reason being that he found some friends waiting him, and had no
particular press of business to call him away. Late in the evening,
however, he remembered suddenly of the three £50 notes left so
carelessly in his desk at the office, and started up and whispered to
his wife that he would have to go out on business for half an hour.
“I have left some money in the place which should have been in the
bank or here,” was his explanation, “and I must go and get it,
for the place is a mere shed;” and as the word “money” rouses the
strongest instincts of some wives, he was suffered to depart in peace.
He reached his office in ten minutes, and found it to all appearance
exactly as he left it. It was then quite dark, but he was so sure
of the spot on which he had placed the three notes that he did not
trouble to strike a light, but merely raised the lid of the desk and
groped for the notes. His fingers did not touch the soft, greasy
papers, but the harder and smoother pile of accounts which had been
beneath them. He groped and groped; he struck a light—first only a
match, then the gas—but in vain. The three bank-notes were gone.
“Did I leave them here? Did I not put them in my pocket?” was his
first wild thought, followed by a hurried groping and searching for
his pocket-book.
The notes were not there. Then he distinctly remembered placing them
in the desk, and the fact that he had never removed them. He searched
the whole desk, turned out every scrap of paper and article that it
contained, carefully examined the room from floor to ceiling, turned
over everything in the other desk, and finally sat down with his
hands in his pockets, thoroughly baffled and puzzled. He had locked
the notes in that small apartment; the key had never been out of his
pocket, yet, on returning a few hours later, he found that they had
vanished.
The builder glared about him in a state of great excitement,
imprecating under his breath, and heartily abusing himself for his
carelessness, though he had done the same often before with impunity.
While he sat thus vainly seeking a solution his eye fell upon the
disused door. There was no key to it that he knew of, and the outer
door of the tool-house, entering from the yard, he felt sure was
locked. Still there was a possibility of entrance in that direction,
and that fact set the builder a-thinking. But one man had the entry
of that tool-house—a disabled mason, named John Morley, whom out of
charity he kept employed about the yard. Morley had injured himself
permanently by lifting a heavy weight, and could do little but
look after the things in the yard, and give them out as they were
wanted by the men. Mr Lockyer had known him nearly all his life, and
had never found him to do a dishonest action. Yet still the fact
remained that there was a man, very poorly paid—his wage was 12s. a
week—having a wife and two bairns to keep, and with a possible means
of access to the missing money. Might the money not have been taken
in a moment of strong temptation even by a man like John Morley,
reputed sterling and honest?
“If he has taken it, I can hardly blame him,” was the generous
reflection of the builder. “They have a sair struggle to make ends
meet, I’ve no doubt; and I was a fool to leave the money lying about.
But I never knew him to have a key for that door, and how could he
possibly knew that the money was there, even if he had a key? I had
better act cautiously, as much for my own sake as for his and his
family’s. I must say nothing to the police or any one till I see John
himself.”
Mr Lockyer had been kind to his yard-keeper; he had all but supported
the man and his family during Morley’s illness; then he had devised
how he could employ him at some nominal task by way of making the
man feel less dependent; and lastly, he had promised to assist him
and his family to join a brother abroad who was in a more flourishing
condition and had promised him work suited to his bodily strength.
The builder, therefore, could scarcely believe that the man he had
so helped and shielded could return the kindness by robbing him of
£150; and he locked up his office and turned in the direction of
the yard-keeper’s home, resolved to be as guarded in his words as
possible, so as not to hurt the man’s feelings. Mr Lockyer was a man
who had risen—a bluff, hearty, generous-hearted fellow—and had always
a lenient hand for a working man in difficulties.
Morley’s home was a cellar in Buccleuch Street—a dingy, damp hovel,
lighted by a grating under a shop window. The place was not far from
the yard, and therefore was speedily reached by the builder. Morley
was at home, smoking by the fire, and the bairns were playing in a
corner. The wife was out washing, as she often was, in order to eke
out their income.
Morley looked a good deal surprised at the visit, and scarcely asked
his employer to enter. Mr Lockyer, however, walked in and seated
himself, and, after a few preliminary words, said abruptly—
“John, was there anybody about the yard this afternoon?”
How Morley looked it is impossible to say, for the light was only
that of the fire, and his back was towards it.
“No, sir,” he answered very readily.
“Nor in the tool-house?” continued his employer.
“No; it’s been lockit a’ day,” said Morley, decidedly.
“You’re sure?”
“Quite sure, sir.”
There was an awkward pause, and then Morley, with a slight tremor in
his tones, said—
“Is there onything wrang?”
“Yes; I left three notes—bank-notes for £50—in my desk when I went
away to dinner, and they were gone when I got back half an hour ago.”
“Impossible!” The man looked shocked and astonished, but there was
nevertheless a something constrained or unusual in his manner which
the builder did not like. “Naebody could get into the office by the
tool-house,” Morley hastened to add; “that door hasna been open for
years, and the key’s lost. Besides, there’s the shelves in the road.”
“How could they get in, then?” cried Mr Lockyer. “The front door was
locked, and the key in my pocket; and it’s not likely that they would
pick the lock in broad daylight in the front street.”
“Oh, thieves are clever now-a-days,” observed Morley; “they’re fit
for onything.”
“They may be, but that’s a little beyond the ordinary,” drily
returned his master. “How were they to know I had left the money in
my desk, or how long I would be away?”
“Ah, that’s it!” said Morley.
“Do _you_ know anything about it?” said Mr Lockyer at last, with an
effort.
“Me! Do you think I’m a thief?” said Morley, flushing up. “If you do,
you’re welcome to search the house now.”
“Oh, I daresay!” sneeringly returned his master, liking his
yard-keeper’s manner less than ever. “It would be easy finding three
notes, wouldn’t it, if you liked to hide them well? I might as well
look for a needle in a haystack. No, no, Morley; I don’t say you
took them, or that you didn’t, but they’re to be found, and I’ll
leave that to the men that are bred to the trade—the police or the
detectives.”
“Yes, they’re the best hands at that,” said Morley feebly.
No strong and indignant protestations of innocence; no hot words, or
tears, or reproaches; nothing but that meaningless answer, and that
look of guilt and fear.
“The man’s a thief if looks are to be trusted,” thought the builder.
“If it turns out so, I’ll never be kind to mortal being again.”
Mr Lockyer had done a foolish thing; he had let the man know he was
suspected; but in the action he had been prompted by the best of
intentions. He had failed in these, and he now did the next best
thing to redeem the mistake—he came to us with news of the robbery.
He described the circumstances of the robbery and the position of the
place much as I have put them down, and concluded by stating it to
be his firm belief that Morley was either himself the thief, or knew
how the clever robbery had been accomplished. I agreed with him, but
blamed him strongly for going near the suspected man.
“It is the money you are most anxious to recover, and yet you go and
put the man on his guard. You may make up your mind now that you will
never see the notes again. They will either go into the fire, or be
put away in some hiding-place far beyond our reach.”
“That’s nice comfort to a fellow,” observed the builder ruefully. “Is
there anything you can do?”
“Oh, yes; we can do our best to make up for your blunder, by hunting
for both the thief and the notes; but I have told you what is most
likely to be the result.”
I had no expectation of making anything by a search in Morley’s
house, but I thought it advisable that the form should be gone
through, if only that I might study the man’s face the while. I could
have gone and done it there and then, but deemed it best to wait till
morning.
There was a possibility, as Mr Lockyer suggested, of Morley repenting
of his act and returning the plunder in the night time, and, besides,
by delaying till morning, we might take him unexpectedly. Of course I
afterwards regretted the delay; we always do when we find ourselves
disappointed in results.
Morley appeared as usual at the yard before six o’clock, and made
no allusion to the interview of the night before beyond asking his
master, when he appeared about eight o’clock, “if he had got any word
of the missing money.”
He got a very curt and ungracious answer, and spoke no more. At the
breakfast hour, when Morley locked up the yard and went home, I was
waiting near the spot with two assistants skilled in searching. We
just allowed John to enter his house and get comfortably seated at
his porridge, when we knocked and were admitted. He did not seem
greatly disturbed when I gave my name and showed the search warrant.
“You didna need a warrant to search my house,” he said boldly. “I
tellt the maister that he was welcome to search it whenever he liked.”
He sat down and finished his porridge with evident zest and appetite,
while we turned over every article in the little den of a house. The
place had not been disturbed so much for many a day. Morley’s wife
seemed much more distressed at the charge than he, and assisted us
with the greatest eagerness and anxious concern. We found no trace
of the notes, and Morley’s manner convinced me that they were not
in the house. He was too cool and careless. Had they been hidden
there—however securely or effectively—he could not have concealed
some perturbation when we came near the spot or grew “hot” in our
little game of “hide and seek.” Just once did I notice anything
like a change in his expression of face. When we had turned over
everything in the house, I chanced to say to Mrs Morley—
“These are all the things you have, I suppose?”
“Oh, yes, sir,” she earnestly answered. “Since John rackit himsel’
we’ve had to make shift with less and less.”
While she thus spoke, I saw her eye run round the room as if in
search of something; then she began poking about with the aid of one
of our lanterns, and finally she turned to her husband and said in a
kind of whisper—
“Where’s the famil——”
She did not get the sentence finished, nor even enough of it to be
intelligible to me. Morley was standing close to her, and whether
he kicked her on the leg, or trod on her toe, or merely gave her
a look, I cannot tell, but he checked her speech most suddenly
and effectually. I just saw enough and heard enough to make me
suspicious, for the den was dark, and I was not expecting the words
so unguardedly uttered by the wife. The last word sounded to me like
“fummel,” and I racked my brains for many an hour after to discover
what on earth a “fummel” was. I had no doubt at all _now_ of Morley’s
guilt, and, of course, I could have arrested him; but what good would
that have done? There was no evidence whatever to support the charge,
and likely to be none with Morley locked up in prison. Besides, I
now felt tolerably certain that the notes were not destroyed, but
concealed in the “fummel”—whatever that meant. I wanted badly to find
that “fummel,” and reasoned that I was more likely to do so with
Morley moving about in freedom than with him cooped up in prison. The
secret of the hiding-place was known to Morley alone; that was quite
evident to me from the eagerness of the wife to assist me, and help
to prove her husband’s innocence, and also by the simplicity with
which she had let out the remark about the “fummel.” I determined
to draw off my men, with so many apologies that Morley should think
himself quite safe from further trouble or suspicion. To confirm this
impression, I directed his master to take no further notice of the
matter, and to keep him in his employment as usual, which was done.
I now had Morley carefully watched during the hours he was free
from his work. I changed the men occasionally, and never watched
him myself, that he might not take alarm, but nothing came of the
watching. Morley never once attempted to change a fifty pound note,
never appeared a penny richer than before the robbery, and never
went near any place likely to be used for the concealment of the
notes. The only thing that concerned me was the fact that he was
preparing to leave the country, nor could I make that a ground for
suspicion, as he had begun those arrangements long before the date
of the robbery. At length I grew impatient, and took to relieving
the men watching him after dark, as then there was little chance of
him recognising me. Morley generally took a solitary stroll after
partaking of his frugal supper, and on one of these occasions he
stopped before a broker’s in the Potterrow, a place suspected to be
a kind of “wee pawn”—that is, an unlicensed pawnbroker’s. Morley
looked in at the window first, then all round him, and then walked
into the shop, and was soon engaged in a violent altercation with
the boy in charge. He stormed, and he threatened, and he swore, and
I could see his arms moving about more energetically than those of a
preacher “dingin’ the poopit cushion a’ to bits,” but I was afraid to
venture near enough to hear the words and understand their meaning.
At length he left the shop in a furious and excited state, volubly
threatening to “send the police” to them. I was strongly tempted
to offer my services, but, being curious to learn the cause of the
dispute, I allowed the blustering man to depart, and then entered the
shop. The boy was a smart young shaver named Tim Cordiner, and knew
me perfectly.
“What did Morley kick up such a row about?” I asked.