E-text prepared by Sankar Viswanathan, Suzanne Shell, and the Project
Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)
RAVENSDENE COURT
by
J. S. FLETCHER
New York
Alfred A. Knopf
MCMXXII
Copyright, 1922, by
Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
Published July, 1922
CONTENTS
I THE INN ON THE CLIFF 9
II RAVENSDENE COURT 21
III THE MORNING TIDE 34
IV THE TOBACCO BOX 46
V THE NEWS FROM DEVONPORT 58
VI SECRET THEFT 71
VII YELLOWFACE 84
VIII WAS IT A WOMAN? 96
IX THE ENLARGED PHOTOGRAPH 108
X THE YELLOW SEA 120
XI THE FIVE CONCLUSIONS 133
XII NETHERFIELD BAXTER 145
XIII THE SPOILS OF SACRILEGE 157
XIV SOLOMON FISH 169
XV MR. JALLANBY--SHIP BROKER 181
XVI THE PATHLESS WOOD 193
XVII HUMFREY DE KNAYTHVILLE 206
XVIII THE PLUM CAKE 218
XIX BLACK MEMORIES 230
XX THE POSSIBLE REASON 242
XXI THE CHINESE GENTLEMAN 254
XXII RED DAWN 267
XXIII THE FOURTH CHINAMAN 279
XXIV THE SILK CAP 291
XXV CLEAR DECKS 304
RAVENSDENE COURT
CHAPTER I
THE INN ON THE CLIFF
According to an entry in my book of engagements, I left London for
Ravensdene Court on March 8th, 1912. Until about a fortnight earlier I
had never heard of the place, but there was nothing remarkable in my
ignorance of it, seeing that it stands on a remote part of the
Northumbrian coast, and at least three hundred miles from my usual
haunts. But then, towards the end of February, I received the
following letter which I may as well print in full: it serves as a
fitting and an explanatory introduction to a series of adventures, so
extraordinary, mysterious, and fraught with danger, that I am still
wondering how I, until then a man of peaceful and even dull life, ever
came safely through them.
"RAVENSDENE COURT, NEAR ALNWICK
NORTHUMBERLAND
February 24, 1912
"_Dear Sir_,
"I am told by my friend Mr. Gervase Witherby of Monks
Welborough, with whom I understand you to be well
acquainted, that you are one of our leading experts in
matters relating to old books, documents, and the like, and
the very man to inspect, value, and generally criticize the
contents of an ancient library. Accordingly, I should be
very glad to secure your valuable services. I have recently
entered into possession of this place, a very old
manor-house on the Northumbrian coast, wherein the senior
branch of my family has been settled for some four hundred
years. There are here many thousands of volumes, the
majority of considerable age; there are also large
collections of pamphlets, manuscripts, and broadsheets--my
immediate predecessor, my uncle, John Christopher Raven, was
a great collector; but, from what I have seen of his
collection up to now, I cannot say that he was a great
exponent of the art of order, or a devotee of system, for an
entire wing on this house is neither more nor less than a
museum, into which books, papers, antiques, and similar
things appear to have been dumped without regard to
classification or arrangement. I am not a bookman, nor an
antiquary; my life until recently has been spent in far
different fashion, as a Financial Commissioner in India. I
am, however, sincerely anxious that these new possessions of
mine should be properly cared for, and I should like an
expert to examine everything that is here, and to advise me
as to proper arrangement and provision for the future. I
should accordingly be greatly obliged to you if you could
make it convenient to come here as my guest, give me the
benefit of your expert knowledge, and charge me whatever fee
seems good to you. I cannot promise you anything very lively
in the way of amusement in your hours of relaxation, for
this is a lonely place, and my family consists of nothing
but myself and my niece, a girl of nineteen, just released
from the schoolroom; but you may find some more congenial
society in another guest of mine, Mr. Septimus Cazalette,
the eminent authority on numismatics, who is here for the
purpose of examining the vast collection of coins and medals
formed by the kinsman I have just referred to. I can also
promise you the advantages of a particularly bracing
climate, and assure you of a warm welcome and every possible
provision for your comfort. In the hope that you will be
able to come to me at an early date,
"I am, dear sir,
"Yours truly,
"FRANCIS RAVEN.
"Leonard Middlebrook, ESQ.,
"35M, Old Buildings, Lincoln's Inn, W. C."
Several matters referred to in this letter inclined me towards going
to Ravensdene Court--the old family mansion--the thousands of ancient
volumes--the prospect of unearthing something of real note--the
chance of examining a collector's harvest--and perhaps more than
anything, the genuinely courteous and polite tone of my invitation. I
was not particularly busy at that time, nor had I been out of London
for more than a few days now and then for several years: a change to
the far-different North had its attractions. And after a brief
correspondence with him, I arranged to go down to Mr. Raven early in
March, and remain under his roof until I had completed the task which
he desired me to undertake. As I have said already, I left London on
the 8th of March, journeying to Newcastle by the afternoon express
from King's Cross. I spent that night at Newcastle and went forward
next morning to Alnmouth, which according to a map with which I had
provided myself, was the nearest station to Ravensdene Court. And soon
after arriving at Alnmouth the first chapter of my adventures opened,
and came about by sheer luck. It was a particularly fine, bright,
sharply-bracing morning, and as I was under no particular obligation
to present myself at Ravensdene Court at any fixed time, I determined
to walk thither by way of the coast. The distance, according to my
map, was about nine or ten miles. Accordingly, sending on my luggage
by a conveyance, with a message to Mr. Raven that I should arrive
during the afternoon, I made through the village of Lesbury toward the
sea, and before long came in sight of it ... a glorious stretch of
blue, smooth that day as an island lake and shining like polished
steel in the light of the sun. There was not a sail in sight, north
or south or due east, nor a wisp of trailing smoke from any passing
steamer: I got an impression of silent, unbroken immensity which
seemed a fitting prelude to the solitudes into which my mission had
brought me.
I was at that time just thirty years of age, and though I had been
closely kept to London of late years, my youth had been spent in
lonely places, and I had an innate love of solitudes and wide spaces.
I saw at once that I should fall in love with this Northumbrian coast,
and once on its headlands I took my time, sauntering along at my
leisure: Mr. Raven, in one of his letters, had mentioned seven as his
dinner hour: therefore, I had the whole day before me. By noon the sun
had grown warm, even summer-like; warm enough, at any rate, to warrant
me in sitting down on a ledge of the cliffs while I smoked a pipe of
tobacco and stared lazily at the mighty stretch of water across which,
once upon a time, the vikings had swarmed from Norway. I must have
become absorbed in my meditations--certainly it was with a start of
surprise that I suddenly realized that somebody was near me, and
looked up to see, standing close by and eyeing me furtively, a man.
It was, perhaps, the utter loneliness of my immediate surroundings
just then that made me wonder to see any living thing so near. At that
point there was neither a sail on the sea, nor a human habitation on
the land; there was not even a sheep cropping the herbage of the
headlands. I think there were birds calling about the pinnacles of the
cliffs--yet it seemed to me that the man broke a complete stillness
when he spoke, as he quietly wished me a good morning.
The sound of his voice startled me; also, it brought me out of a
reverie and sharpened my wits, and as I replied to him, I took him in
from head to foot. A thick-set middle-aged man, tidily dressed in a
blue serge suit of nautical cut, the sort of thing that they sell,
ready-made, in sea-ports and naval stations. His clothes went with his
dark skin and grizzled hair and beard, and with the gold rings which
he wore in his ears. And there was that about him which suggested that
he was for that time an idler, lounging.
"A fine morning," I remarked, not at all averse to entering into
conversation, and already somewhat curious about him.
"A fine morning it is, master, and good weather, and likely to keep
so," he answered, glancing around at sea and sky. Then he looked
significantly at my knickerbockers and at a small satchel which I
carried over my shoulders. "The right sort o' weather," he added, "for
gentlemen walking about the country--pleasuring."
"You know these parts," I suggested.
"No!" he said, with a decisive shake of his head. "I don't, master,
and that's a fact. I'm from the south, I am--never been up this way
before, and, queerly enough, for I've seen most of the world in my
time, never sailed this here sea as lies before us. But I've a sort of
connection with this bit of country--mother's side came from
hereabouts. And me having nothing particular to do, I came down here
to take a cast round, like, seeing places as I've heard of--heard of,
you understand, but ain't never seen."
"Then you're stopping in the neighbourhood?" I asked.
He raised one of his brown, hairy hands, and jerked a thumb landwards.
"Stopped last night in a little place, inland," he answered. "Name of
Lesbury--a riverside spot. But that ain't what I want--what I want is
a churchyard, or it might be two, or it might be three, where there's
gravestones what bears a name. Only I don't know where that
churchyard--or, again, there may be more than one--is, d'ye see?
Except--somewhere between Alnmouth one way and Brandnell Bay,
t'other."
"I have a good map, if it's any use to you," I said. He took the map
with a word of thanks, and after spreading it out, traced places with
the end of his thick forefinger.
"Hereabouts we are, at this present, master," he said, "and here and
there is, to be sure, villages--mostly inland. And'll have graveyards
to 'em--folks must be laid away somewhere. And in one of them
graveyards there'll be a name, and if I see that name, I'll know where
I am, and I can ask further, aiming at to find out if any of that name
is still flourishing hereabouts. But till I get that name, I'm clear
off my course, so to speak."
"What is the name?" I asked him.
"Name of Netherfield," he answered, slowly. "Netherfield. Mother's
people--long since. So I've been told. And seen it--in old books, what
I have far away in Devonport. That's the name, right enough, only I
don't know where to look for it. You ain't seen it, master, in your
wanderings round these parts?"
"I've only come into these parts this morning," I replied. "But--if
you look closely at that map, you'll observe that there aren't many
villages along the coast, so your search ought not to be a lengthy
one. I should question if you'll find more than two or three
churchyards between here and Brandell Bay--judging by the map."
"Aye, well, Netherfield is the name," he repeated. "Netherfield,
mother's side. In some churchyards hereabouts. And there may be some
of 'em left--and again there mayn't be. My name being Quick--Salter
Quick. Of Devonport--when on land."
He folded up and handed back the map, with an old-fashioned bow. I
rose from the ledge of rock on which I had been resting, and made to
go forward.
"I hope you'll come across what you're seeking, Mr. Quick," I said.
"But I should say you won't have much difficulty. There can't be many
churchyards in this quarter, and not many gravestones in any of them."
"I found nothing in that one behind," he answered, jerking his thumb
towards Lesbury. "And it's a long time since my mother left these
parts. But here I am--for the purpose, d'ye see, master. Time's no
object--nor yet expense. A man must take a bit of a holiday some day
or other. Ain't had one--me--for thirty odd year."
* * * * *
We walked forward, northing our course, along the headlands. And
rounding a sharp corner, we suddenly came in sight of a little
settlement that lay half-way down the cliff. There was a bit of a
cottage or two, two or three boats drawn up on a strip of yellow sand,
a crumbling smithie, and above these things, on a shelf of rock, a
low-roofed, long-fronted inn, by the gable of which rose a mast,
wherefrom floated a battered flag. At the sight of this I saw a gleam
come into my companion's eye, and I was quick to understand it's
meaning.
"Do you feel disposed to a glass of ale?" I asked. "I should say we
could get one down there."
"Rum," he replied, laconically. "Rum is my drink, master. Used to
that--I ain't used to ale. Cold stuff! Give me something that warms a
man."
"It's poor ale that won't warm a man's belly," I said with a laugh.
"But every man to his taste. Come on, then."
He followed in silence down the path to the lonely inn; once, looking
back, I saw that he was turning a sharp eye round and about the new
stretch of country that had just opened before us. From the inn and
its surroundings a winding track, a merely rough cartway, wound off
and upward into the land; in the distance I saw the tower of a church.
Salter Quick saw it, too, and nodded significantly in its direction.
"That'll be where I'll make next," he observed. "But first--meat and
drink. I ate my breakfast before seven this morning, and this walking
about on dry land makes a man hungry."
"Drink you'll get here, no doubt," said I. "But as to meat--doubtful."
His reply to that was to point to the sign above the inn door, to
which we were now close. He read its announcement aloud, slowly.
"'The Mariner's Joy. By Hildebrand Claigue. Good Entertainment for Man
and Beast,'" he pronounced. "'Entertainment'--that means eating--meat
for man; hay for cattle. Not that there's much sign of either in these
parts, I think, master."
We walked into the Mariner's Joy side by side, turning into a
low-ceilinged, darkish room, neat and clean enough, wherein there was
a table, chairs, the model of a ship in a glass case on the
mantelpiece, and a small bar, furnished with bottles and glasses,
behind which stood a tall, middle-aged man, clean-shaven, spectacled,
reading a newspaper. He bade us good morning, with no sign of surprise
at the presence of strangers, and looked expectantly from one to the
other. I turned to my companion.
"Well?" I said. "You'll drink with me? What is it--rum?"
"Rum it is, master, thanking you," he replied. "But vittals, too, is
what I want." He glanced knowingly at the landlord. "You ain't got
such a thing as a plateful--a good plateful!--of cold beef, with a
pickle--onion or walnut, 'tain't no matter. And bread--a loaf of real
home-baked? And a morsel of cheese?"
The landlord smiled as he reached for the rum bottle.
"I daresay we can fit you up, my lad," he answered. "Got a nice round
of boiled beef on go--as it happens. Drop of rum first, eh? And--yours
sir?"
"A glass of ale if you please," said I. "And as I'm not quite as
hungry as our friend here, a crust of bread and a piece of cheese."
The landlord satisfied our demands, and then vanished through a door
at the back of his bar. And when he had expressed his wishes for my
good health, Salter Quick tasted the rum, smacked his lips over it,
and looked about him with evident approval.
"Sort of port that a vessel might put into with security and comfort
for a day or two, this, master," he observed. "I reckon I'll put
myself up here, while I'm looking round--this will do me very well.
And doubtless there'll be them coming in here, night-time, as'll know
the neighbourhood, and be able to give a man points as to his
bearings."
"I daresay you'll be very comfortable here," I assented. "It's not
exactly a desert island."
"Aye, well, and Salter Quick's been in quarters of that sort in his
time," he observed, with a glance that suggested infinite meaning. "He
has, so! But this ain't no desert island, master. I can see they ain't
short of good grub and sound liquor here!"
He made his usual jerk of the thumb--this time in the direction of the
landlord, who just then came back with a well-filled tray. And
presently, first removing his cap and saying his grace in a devout
fashion, he sat down and began to eat with an evidently sharp-set
appetite. Trifling with my bread and cheese, I turned to the landlord.
"This is a very lonely spot," I said. "I was surprised to see a
licensed house here. Where do you get your customers?"
"Ah, you wouldn't see it as you came along," replied the landlord. "I
saw you coming--you came from Alnmouth way. There's a village just
behind here--it 'ud be hidden from you by this headland at back of the
house--goodish-sized place. Plenty o' custom from that, o' nights. And
of course there's folks going along, north and south."
Quick, his weather-stained cheeks bulging with his food, looked up
sharply.
"A village, says you!" he exclaimed. "Then if a village, a church. And
if a church, a churchyard. There is a churchyard, ain't there?"
"Why, there is a church, and there's a churchyard to it," replied the
landlord. "What o' that?"
Quick nodded at me.
"As I been explaining to this gentleman," he said, "churchyards is
what I'm looking for. Graves in 'em, you understand. And on them
graves, a name. Name of Netherfield. Now I asks you, friendly--ha' you
ever seen that name in your churchyard? 'Cause if so I'm at anchor.
For the time being."
"Well, I haven't," answered the landlord. "But our churchyard--Lord
bless you, there's scores o' them flat stones in it that's covered
with long grass--there might be that name on some of 'em, for aught I
know; I've never looked 'em over, I'm sure. But----"
Just then there came into the parlour a man, who from his rough dress,
appeared to be a cattle-drover or a shepherd. Claigue turned to him
with a glance that seemed to indicate him as authority.
"Here's one as lives by that churchyard," he observed. "Jim! ha' you
ever noticed the name of Netherfield on any o' them old gravestones up
yonder? This gentleman's asking after it, and I know you mow that
churchyard grass time and again."
"Never seen it!" answered the new-comer. "But--strange things!--there
was a man come up to me the other night, this side o' Lesbury, and
asked that very question--not o' these parts, he wasn't. But--"
He stopped at that. Salter Quick dropped his knife and fork with a
clatter, and held up his right hand.