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"It's the man who saw Bobby, and said – " Jennifer broke off abruptly, biting her lips in vexation at having thus betrayed herself, and Cleek, looking at her significantly, took up the thread.
"Yes, the man you tried to bribe, Miss Jennifer, who ran away so quickly and disappeared in an empty field. I will show you how he did it. Dollops, bring him along, and follow me, people. There is still more to this astounding riddle."
He switched on his heel, and passed through the door which he had opened behind them and across the vaulted kitchen, followed by his companions. Then, climbing up a few steps, they went through still another door which led them out into the open.
"The moat," said Lady Margaret, softly, as she looked up at the blue sky, high above their heads.
Cleek said nothing, but bending over twitched aside a little clump of green shrubs.
It disclosed a dark opening like a cutting let right into the earth.
"This slopes up," said he. "I have already tried it, and if you noticed those cages, you would have seen that every one was fitted with wheels. This enabled them to be wheeled down this passageway, and to-night probably they would have been transferred to the circus and thence to London. I do not think that either the police or the other members of the gang would have thought of searching in so queer a hiding place, do you?.. What's that, Sir Edgar? How did I come to think of it? Well, when I discovered the animals last week, I was struck with their excited condition, and the strong smell of musk told me that something had been done recently to them to rouse them up to such a pitch. A little link of broken chain in a cage and a hastily made experiment told me the rest of the tale."
While Cleek was speaking they were moving along the strange passage and soon noticed that they were walking up an incline. Just as their heads began to reach the level of the earth, an iron gate barred their way.
Cleek pushed it back, and they discovered that it was the entrance to the vaults of Cheyne Court cleverly hidden by the gorse bushes of the meadow belonging to the house.
In this meadow Professor James had pitched his circus, secure in the permission of "Miss Cheyne," and here he had waited for an opportunity to get hold of his precious freight.
Cleek and his followers were in the centre of affairs before the spectators even had time to wonder from whence they had sprung.
"Beg your pardin', Mr. Narkom, sir," began Petrie, a look of chagrin on his face. "We've got the caravans and all the rest of the stuff, but the man himself had got clear away."
Cleek smiled.
"All right, Petrie," said he, serenely. "Not so clear as he thought, for Dollops has got him safe and he is here, right enough. Get him down to the village and charge him with the robbery of the Cheyne jewels."
A light of satisfaction gleamed in Petrie's eyes as they lit on the figures of Dollops and his captive, and a look of relief crossed his face. It would have been the first time a suspected person had ever slipped through his grasp, and the fact that he had failed Cleek at a critical moment had filled him with dismay.
"Did you get the woman, Aggie?" asked Mr. Narkom, briskly.
"Yessir," said Hammond, smartly, "fought like a wild cat, she did, too, but we got her all right, and Constable Roberts has taken her down to the station."
"Good," said Cleek, "I think, then, that is all we need do here."
"But there are still points to be cleared, Mr. Cleek. Come up now to the Towers, where we can be at peace," said Lady Brenton. "I want to get this child," she smiled at Lady Margaret, "into safety, but we will have lunch first, for I am sure you are all absolutely worn out."
CHAPTER XXV
"A TALE UNFOLDED"
It was an hour later in Lady Brenton's drawing room, and the principals in this strange drama were assembled together. They were filled with curiosity to hear how this man, the greatest detective the Yard possessed, had contrived to elucidate the mystery; a mystery which they felt sure would have remained unsolved forever had he not chanced to take up the case. It would have certainly ended in the death of the young girl who now sat smiling and happy by the side of her lover.
Cleek looked round at his attentive audience and flung back his shoulders as though he would cast the burden of this riddle forever from them.
A smile came to his clean-cut lips, a triumphant light shone in his eyes, and for a moment, as he stood there, the little group about him could not fail to note the power of the man. He turned to Lady Margaret and reached out his hand to her.
"I am glad, more glad than I can say, that you are safe," he said, gravely, as her eyes met his, "for I felt myself in a measure responsible for having unconsciously driven you into the very centre of the danger."
"You, Mr. Headland?" The exclamation came involuntarily from her lips.
Cleek smiled.
"Yes," he said, serenely. "I am the man who did it, Lady Margaret. Lieutenant Deland and George Headland are one and the same person. See." For a second his features writhed, twisting themselves into the semblance of the dapper lieutenant, and then before the astonished circle could speak a word, Mr. Headland stood before them again. "You see," he went on, smiling at the amazed faces of those who did not know of his amazing birthright gift, "it is convenient sometimes, in the interests of the law, to change one's personality. I have changed mine often, and will no doubt continue to do so still oftener. It was I who drove you to Cheyne Court that night, and therefore it is right that I should save you from – other things – now. That is fair enough, isn't it?
"You have been the victim of a plot laid in Paris by James Blake, acting in conjunction with the envoys of the Hindoo priests. From them you will always have to be on guard.
"The story of the theft of the Eye of Shiva will be handed down from generation to generation, and if it were not making too great a sacrifice, I would advise you to send them a message through the Indian government, and let them make terms with you. They would probably gladly give you many other jewels in order to regain the sacred Eye."
Lady Margaret nodded enthusiastically.
"Oh, if you think they would!" she said with a little catch of the breath. "I will do it at once. When I was in that dreadful vault, I said I would give anything just to be free again. Now I am willing to pay. The priests shall have their Purple Emperor. It has already caused enough trouble in the world."
Cleek nodded his approval.
"You are a very wise young lady," said he, "and you will be the gainer in the end; of that I am sure. The Purple Emperor had always brought disaster in its wake, and, the story goes, will continue to do so until it is returned to its proper resting place in the empty eye-socket of Shiva. But time is short and I must go on with my story. If it bores you, simply tell me, but – "
"Bores us, Mr. Headland?" exclaimed Lady Brenton, excitedly. "When all our hearts are bound up in it? I can hardly wait to hear the end."
Cleek smiled.
"Then you shall not, dear lady," he responded, seating himself.
"Well, in the first place, I soon found that there was a connection between the murder of Miss Cheyne and that of her old servant Elsie McBride. This Elsie McBride was the ole clo' woman I mentioned before who was murdered for apparently no reason whatever in the neighbourhood of Drury Lane. And that connection was the Cheyne Court jewels. Sam Blake formerly an actor himself I believe, no doubt by chance saw the photograph of Miss Cheyne, which she had given her servant on her marriage. From that time onward Blake the younger plotted and planned to find some scheme by which he could enter the house and eventually secure the jewels. Some scheme, that is, which didn't include his brother James. The fact of this stranger who visited the shop only wanting old woman's clothes and the theft of wigs pointed to the need of a disguise. When I found that the finger-prints of the impostor at Cheyne Court coincided with those of the dagger with which the old woman was killed, I knew I was on the right track. Then the smell of jasmine, which clung to everything, puzzled me. It is, as you are all doubtless aware, a favourite scent in the native bazaars of India, and for that reason I suspected the priests of Shiva when I knew them to be in the neighbourhood. For a time I even believed that it was one of their number that I saw cross the lawn of Cheyne Court on the night of the first murder until I met you, Miss Wynne. Then the smell of the jasmine and your footprints told me that you were there on that night, as well as on the night of the second murder. Did you then suspect your brother of having committed both murders, that you tried to bribe the butler, John? What were you doing at Cheyne Court the night when the real Miss Cheyne was shot?"
He fixed his piercing eyes on Miss Jennifer, who had risen from her seat, her lips white and trembling.
"What do you mean?" she said in a low, tense voice. "I don't understand! Are you some wizard or – "
"Not quite such a fool of a policeman as you might once have thought," he responded, quietly. "I saw you cross the lawn that night, though I know you had no hand in the murder itself. Can you not tell us the reason of your presence there?"
"I followed Edgar," said Miss Wynne, speaking unwillingly enough, a wave of scarlet surging over her face at the significance of the words. "I saw him go up to the door, and I slipped in. It was open – unlatched, that is. But Miss Cheyne was furious at his appearance and I heard her drive him out again and lock the door afterward. Knowing her, I was afraid of her tongue if I should dare to reveal myself, so I crept away, and directly it was quiet, I got out into the grounds. I heard the shot, but did not attach any importance to it. Indeed, when later I heard the wheels of your motor driving away I put it down to a burst tire. It was not until a week or so later when Bobby told me he was in trouble with heavy racing debts that I thought of Miss Cheyne again. Then in sheer desperation I thought I would ask her to lend me a little money. And that was the opening of the mystery to me, for I knew directly I saw her that a trick was being played; that it was not Miss Cheyne herself. I soon found out that it was a man by the trick of throwing – "
"Throwing!" interrupted Lady Brenton suddenly. "How could you tell by throwing, Miss Wynne?"
"I tossed her the roll of papers I had brought," said Miss Wynne, quietly. "And she brought her knees together instead of spreading them apart to make a lap as any woman would. It was then I guessed the truth. I taxed him with it, and the man revealed himself then as Sammy Blake, the tipster. I was helpless then, because Bobby was in this very man's power – "
Her voice broke a little and Cleek slid his fingers into one of his pockets and drew forth something which he held up for her to see.
"By reason of these, eh?" he interposed, stretching out a soiled envelope toward her. A little cry broke from her lips, and Bobby Wynne, springing to his feet, gasped in relieved amazement.
"My I. O. U.'s," he cried, exultantly, as Cleek handed them to him. "He always promised to give them to me, but he never did."
"I found them in his pocketbook," said Cleek, then turned once more to Miss Jennifer and gave her an understanding nod.
"You need hardly say that you succeeded in getting money from Blake," he said, "for not even your whole garden full of hyacinths would have produced the £50 you gave your brother. That was the first thing that put me on the right track."
She stared at him in astonishment.
"How did you know?" she said, quickly. "But you are perfectly right. I had to account for the money somehow, and so I told him I had sold my flowers. And I blackmailed Blake! It was an awful thing to do but I was desperate. And I never thought of any harm coming to Lady Margaret, for he swore that she was in London, waiting for Sir Edgar at the Hotel Central. That is why I wired, afterward, so as to make up for it – "
"Wired?" cried Sir Edgar. "Do you mean to tell me it was you who sent me on that wild-goose chase to London?"
"I did not know it was that," she retorted a trifle angrily. "I thought it would get you into safety and give you back to her."
"But the telegram was an old one."
She blushed at the note in his voice, and looked at him defiantly.
"Yes," she said. "I sent it, and then – changed my mind. I got it back again before it reached you by intercepting the boy and bribing him with half a crown and the truth that I had sent it and then regretted it afterward. I had – my reasons!"
Sir Edgar looked away, as she lowered her head.
"But your good sense got the better of you later on, eh? And so you sent it along by a private messenger? I see – "
She lifted her head and looked at him very squarely in the eyes.
"Yes," she said. "I changed my mind again."
A moment's silence followed, then Bobby Wynne spoke.
"But I never knew a thing about Blake's impersonation, Jen," he said, apologetically, "and I never guessed you'd go so far as to blackmail for me! I – I'm a bit of a rotter I know, but I'd never have let you do that!"
"I know you wouldn't," she responded with a sudden smile as she looked at the boy's pale, shamed face. "You see," turning to the others, "I promised father always to look after him so that when I found a letter from Blake, telling Bobby to meet him at Cheyne Court, what else could I do but follow and go inside for the second time? I got into the house, but I was too late. I heard the sound of quarrelling though I couldn't tell if it were Bobby or not. So I hid myself on the landing until the voices stopped suddenly. I didn't dare to move, but I heard someone run upstairs right past where I had hidden myself in the landing linen cupboard. Then I got out and looked from the window. In the lane I saw Lady Brenton and recognized her gold scarf. What's more I saw Sir Edgar, too, and that frightened me! Then I went down myself and peeped in the dining room – "
She broke off with a little shudder of terror and Lady Margaret bent over and squeezed her hand impulsively.
"I could see the figure of Blake in his woman's clothes lying in the chair. I was just about to go over to him when a woman came through the window. She snatched up a revolver from the desk beside the window and shot straight at Blake.
"'You shan't do us, you devil, so don't you think it!' she cried, and threw the revolver down at Blake's side. I nearly died of fright for I recognized it as one that Miss Cheyne had treasured. It had belonged to Sir Edgar's father, she told me so herself once."
"It must have been Blake's own," interrupted Sir Edgar, in tones of deep conviction, "for I had the other one. Miss Cheyne threatened me with it a month ago, and I snatched it away and brought it home with me. But go on, Miss Wynne please."
"Just as I was examining it," continued Miss Wynne, ignoring the interruption in her eagerness to continue, "the man came in, and recognized me. I knew him to be one of the confederates of Blake and he said that he had seen Bobby kill the real Miss Cheyne but he would keep silent if I paid him. Outside in the lane I found Edgar – Dr. Verrall." She glanced shyly up at the pale young doctor, as if asking permission to finish her tale, and when he nodded emphatically, she continued speaking in a low, colourless voice: "He had heard the shots, and was about to investigate, but when he saw me, he was so afraid lest I should be seen and brought into the matter, that he turned back down the lane to see if the coast was clear. I should have escaped even then had it not been for that gold scarf which I suddenly remembered I had left on the landing. I ran back for it, and it was then that that young assistant of yours caught me." She broke off, her story evidently finished.
"But who was the other woman?" put in Sir Edgar, as Jennifer sank back in her chair, apparently exhausted by the recital.
"I think," said Cleek, softly, "that Lady Margaret would probably know her."
"Aggie, the woman who waited on me," the girl cried. "Why, of course, that accounts for it. She came down into the cellar frightfully excited and did nothing but drink and drink. That was how the Hindoo, the other man I mean, was able to get me out of the vault. She had dropped off into a drunken stupor and nothing seemed to arouse her."
"I never thought of your being in the house," said Miss Wynne, as she looked piteously at Lady Margaret; "please forgive me! You don't know how desperate I was for money."
"It's all right," replied Lady Margaret, impulsively. "I don't think they would have hurt me, only when I discovered the trick, they did not know what to do. Thank Heaven I am safe out of it." She stretched out an impulsive hand to the other girl and their fingers met silently.
But Lady Brenton was eager to get on with the story.
"How did you come to discover where Margaret had been taken?" she asked Cleek who had sat silent during all this recital, listening to it with occasional nods as though he had heard it all already. "To think that I let that devil sit in my drawing room while all the time he was keeping her a prisoner – "
"I owe that to Dollops," said Cleek, with a friendly little nod to that worthy. "While making my investigations in the house, John and the woman Aggie caught me foul and made me a prisoner. They threatened indeed to kill me if I did not reveal where I had hidden Lady Margaret, which, of course, showed that she had been removed from the vault by someone unknown to them. At that time I was as much in the dark as they themselves, but a strong gleam of sunlight revealed caught in the window frame two little shreds, one of gold, the fatal gold scarf again, and one of tweed, smelling strongly of jasmine. I guessed then that she was either in the hands of Gunga Dall or of the Hindoo priests, and I was right.
"Afterward, when I found the animals down in the vaults and came upon the circus with no animals in it – not the temptation of a £5 note would procure me a look at one – I knew their purpose. It remained then but to see that they were not removed that night, and also to keep guard over the caravan, which you may be sure I did…
"Suspicion pointed to so many people – even including yourself, Lady Brenton," he added with an odd little smile at the lady's start of surprise.
"Would it astonish you very much to know that you yourself were really in Cheyne Court on the nights of both murders?"
A little gasp of amazement came from the listeners and Lady Brenton looked up with blanched face and dilated eyes.
"Impossible!" she cried in quivering tones.
"No, you were the lady in the scarlet satin cloak," said Cleek.
"Dear," said Ailsa, interposing suddenly as Lady Brenton's pale face flamed with an angry colour, "it is all right. I understand now, you were walking in your sleep, and you took my scarlet opera-cloak – the one we had had such a talk over; don't you remember? When you commenced to worry over Sir Edgar and poor Miss Cheyne, you just wandered out in your sleep and visited the spot in the working out of your dreams."
"I saw you, Mother," said Sir Edgar with an emphatic nod of the head, as the good lady stared first at one face and then another in her amazement at this turn of events, "and it brought us both under suspicion."
"It certainly brought you under suspicion, Dr. Verrall," said Cleek, suddenly, "for what with your footsteps in the lane, and the fact that the prussic acid bottle had been tampered with in Dr. Wynne's surgery! But that's over and done with now, thank goodness, and I don't imagine that there is any more to tell. But if I am not mistaken, there's a shower of congratulations to be presented to both you and Sir Edgar, eh? Well, send me an invitation to the wedding, Doctor, and I'll come no matter what happens, just to see Miss Jennifer in bridal white with that look in her eyes."
Then Cleek's eyes turned to Lady Margaret and Sir Edgar, who were sitting with hands frankly clasped as though there were no one but themselves in the whole universe.
Cleek nodded at Lady Brenton.
"Love's young dream," he said, softly. "What's that, my young friend?" as Bobby Wynne crossed over to him suddenly and reached out a boyish hand. "Want to shake hands with me? Of course, of course. Anything I've been able to do has been a great pleasure, I assure you. But here's a piece of advice for you. Don't indulge too much in the racing habit, for it grows and, like pitch, is inclined to stick a trifle too closely. Hard work's the best antidote for it, and if you're willing and ready, I've a friend who is looking out for a young political secretary this moment – one who is honest and trustworthy and straight. It's a chance. Want to take it?"
There was a sort of sob in the boy's voice. "Want to? Well, just give me a chance, sir. I swear I'll stick to it, and show you I'm worthy of your friendship. The only bet I intend to make in the future is a straight tip, and that is that I won't fail you – ever!"
Cleek gripped the slim young fingers firmly and nodded his head three or four times.
"Good boy!" he said, softly. "That's the talk. And you'll be able to show that foolish young sister of yours that her love for you has been worth having, after all. I'll drop you a line as soon as things are fixed up.
"But I must be off now, for time flies, and there is other work to be done… Ailsa, am I to have the great pleasure of escorting you back to the Cottage?"
She jumped to her feet at this, laughing and happy.
"Of course," she said, softly, "who else?" And Lady Brenton, with a sudden little nod of comprehension, smiled.
"Then there are – other congratulations to be given," she said, softly. "Well, well, I'm glad to hear that. Come here, dear, and let me kiss you before you go."
Cleek glanced at Mr. Narkom and Mr. Narkom looked back at Cleek, for they two had been in the secret for a long time. Cleek's hand sought the Superintendent's arm and gave it a friendly squeeze.
"Some day, old friend," he said, softly, "and when that day does dawn, well, none other shall best man me but yourself – the – the best friend a fellow ever had."
Mr. Narkom gulped uncomfortably as though there were something sticking in his throat. For all his position as chief keeper of law and order, he was a sentimentalist at heart.
"Brothers, Cleek," he responded in a husky whisper. "Better be moving on, hadn't we? I've to get back to the Yard this afternoon if possible."
Cleek nodded.
"Yes, better be moving on. Coming, Ailsa? Ready, Dollops? All right, then, we'll be off. Good morning, good people, and good-bye. The riddle is solved, I think, and our task is over."
