The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Shrieking Pit, by Arthur J. Rees

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net


Title: The Shrieking Pit

Author: Arthur J. Rees

Release Date: February 2, 2007 [EBook #20494]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SHRIEKING PIT ***




Produced by Marcia, Suzanne Shell and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net









THE
SHRIEKING PIT

BY

ARTHUR J. REES

CO-AUTHOR OF
THE MYSTERY OF THE DOWNS,
THE HAMPSTEAD MYSTERY.

NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS

Made in the United States of America


COPYRIGHT, 1918,
BY STREET & SMITH CORPORATION

COPYRIGHT, 1919,
BY JOHN LANE COMPANY


+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
|Transcriber's Notes: Obvious printer errors have been corrected, all|
|other inconsistencies are as in the original.                       |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+




TO

MY SISTERS IN AUSTRALIA

ANNIE AND FRANCES


  _The sea beats in at Blakeney--
  Beats wild and waste at Blakeney;
    O'er ruined quay and cobbled street,
    O'er broken masts of fisher fleet,
  Which go no more to sea._

  _The bitter pools at ebb-tide lie,
  In barren sands at Blakeney;
    Green, grey and green the marshes creep,
    To where the grey north waters leap
  By dead and silent Blakeney._

  _And Time is dead at Blakeney--
  In old, forgotten Blakeney;
    What care they for Time's Scythe or Glass;
    Who do not feel the hours pass,
  Who sleep in sea-worn Blakeney?_

  _By the old grey church in Blakeney,
  By quenched turret light in Blakeney,
    They slumber deep, they do not know,
    If Life's told tale is Death and Woe;
  Through all eternity._

  _But Love still lives at Blakeney,
  'Tis graven deep at Blakeney;
    Of Love which seeks beyond the grave,
    Of Love's sad faith which fain would save--
  The headstones tell the story._

  _Grave-grasses grow at Blakeney
  Sea pansies, sedge, and rosemary;
    Frail fronds thrust forth in dim dank air,
    A message from those lying there:
  Wan leaves of memory._

  _I send you this from Blakeney--
  From distant, dreaming Blakeney;
    Love and Remembrance: These are sure;
    Though Death is strong they shall endure,
  Till all things cease to be._

_A. J. R._

_Blakeney,
Norfolk._




PREFACE


As the scenes of this story are laid in a part of Norfolk which will be
readily identified by many Norfolk people, it is perhaps well to state
that all the personages are fictitious, and that the Norfolk police
officials who appear in the book have no existence outside these pages.
They and the other characters are drawn entirely from imagination.

To East Anglian readers I offer my apologies for any faults there may be
in reproducing the Norfolk dialect. My excuse is the fascination the
language produced on myself, and that it is as essential to the scene of
the story as the marshes and the sea. Though I have found it impossible
to transliterate the pronunciation into the ordinary English alphabet, I
hope I have been able to convey enough of the characteristic speech of
the native to enable those familiar with it to put it for themselves
into the accents of their own people. To those who are not familiar with
the dialect, I can only say, "Go and study this relic of old English in
that remote part of the country where the story is laid, where the
ghosts of a ruined past mingle with the primitive survivors of to-day,
who walk very near the unseen."


A. J. R.
LONDON




THE SHRIEKING PIT




CHAPTER I


Colwyn had never seen anything quite so eccentric in a public room as
the behaviour of the young man breakfasting alone at the alcove table in
the bay embrasure, and he became so absorbed in watching him that he
permitted his own meal to grow cold, impatiently waving away the waiter
who sought with obtrusive obsequiousness to recall his wandering
attention by thrusting the menu card before him.

To outward seeming the occupant of the alcove table was a good-looking
young man, whose clear blue eyes, tanned skin and well-knit frame
indicated the truly national product of common sense, cold water, and
out-of-door pursuits; of a wholesomely English if not markedly
intellectual type, pleasant to look at, and unmistakably of good birth
and breeding. When a young man of this description, your fellow guest at
a fashionable seaside hotel, who had been in the habit of giving you a
courteous nod on his morning journey across the archipelago of
snowy-topped tables under the convoy of the head waiter to his own
table, comes in to breakfast with shaking hands, flushed face, and
passes your table with unseeing eyes, you would probably conclude that
he was under the influence of liquor, and in your English way you would
severely blame him, not so much for the moral turpitude involved in his
excess as for the bad taste, which prompted him to show himself in public
in such a condition. If, on reaching his place, the young man's conduct
took the additional extravagant form of picking up a table-knife and
sticking it into the table in front of him, you would probably enlarge
your previous conclusion by admitting the hypotheses of drugs or
dementia to account for such remarkable behaviour.

All these things were done by the young man at the alcove table in the
breakfast room of the Grand Hotel, Durrington, on an October morning in
the year 1916; but Colwyn, who was only half an Englishman, and,
moreover, had an original mind, did not attribute them to drink,
morphia, or madness. Colwyn flattered himself that he knew the outward
signs of these diseases too well to be deceived into thinking that the
splendid specimen of young physical manhood at the far table was the
victim of any of them. His own impression was that it was a case of
shell-shock. It was true that, apart from the doubtful evidence of a
bronzed skin and upright frame, there was nothing about him to suggest
that he had been a soldier: no service lapel or regimental badge in his
grey Norfolk jacket. But an Englishman of his class would be hardly
likely to wear either once he had left the Army. It was almost certain
that he must have seen service in the war, and by no means improbable
that he had been bowled over by shell-shock, like many thousands more of
equally splendid specimens of young manhood. Any other conclusion to
account for the strange condition of a young man like him seemed
unworthy and repellent.

"It _must_ be shell-shock, and a very bad case--probably supposed to be
cured, and sent up here to recuperate," thought Colwyn. "I'll keep an
eye on him."

As Colwyn resumed his breakfast it occurred to him that some of the
other guests might have been alarmed by the young man's behaviour, and
he cast his eyes round the room to see if anybody else had noticed him.

There were about thirty guests in the big breakfast apartment, which had
been built to accommodate five times the number--a charming, luxuriously
furnished place, with massive white pillars supporting a frescoed
ceiling, and lighted by numerous bay windows opening on to the North
Sea, which was sparkling brightly in a brilliant October sunshine. The
thirty people comprised the whole of the hotel visitors, for in the year
1916 holiday seekers preferred some safer resort than a part of the
Norfolk coast which lay in the track of enemy airships seeking a way to
London.

Two nights before a Zeppelin had dropped a couple of bombs on the
Durrington front, and the majority of hotel visitors had departed by the
next morning's train, disregarding the proprietor's assurance that the
affair was a pure accident, a German oversight which was not likely to
happen again. Off the nervous ones went, and left the big hotel, the
long curved seafront, the miles of yellow sand, the high green
headlands, the best golf-links in the East of England, and all the other
attractions mentioned in the hotel advertisements, to a handful of
people, who were too nerve-proof, lazy, fatalistic, or indifferent to
bother about Zeppelins.

These thirty guests, scattered far and wide over the spacious isolation
of the breakfast-room, in twos and threes, and little groups, seemed,
with one exception, too engrossed in the solemn British rite of
beginning the day well with a good breakfast to bother their heads about
the conduct of the young man at the alcove table. They were, for the
most part, characteristic war-time holiday-makers: the men, obviously
above military age, in Norfolk tweeds or golf suits; two young officers
at a table by the window, and--as indifference to Zeppelins is not
confined to the sterner sex--a sprinkling of ladies, plump and matronly,
or of the masculine walking type, with two charmingly pretty girls and a
gay young war widow to leaven the mass.

The exception was a tall and portly gentleman with a slightly bald head,
glossy brown beard, gold-rimmed eye-glasses perilously balanced on a
prominent nose, and an important manner. He was breakfasting alone at a
table not far from Colwyn's, and Colwyn noticed that he kept glancing at
the alcove table where the young man sat. As Colwyn looked in his
direction their eyes met, and the portly gentleman nodded portentously
in the direction of the alcove table, as an indication that he also had
been watching the curious behaviour of the occupant. A moment afterwards
he got up and walked across to the pillar against which Colwyn's table
was placed.

"Will you permit me to take a seat at your table?" he remarked urbanely.
"I am afraid we are going to have trouble over there directly," he
added, sinking his voice as he nodded in the direction of the distant
alcove table. "We may have to act promptly. Nobody else seems to have
noticed anything. We can watch him from behind this pillar without his
seeing us."

Colwyn nodded in return with a quick comprehension of all the other's
speech implied, and pushed a chair towards his visitor, who sat down and
resumed his watch of the young man at the alcove table. Colwyn bestowed
a swift glance on his companion which took in everything. The tall man
in glasses looked too human for a lawyer, too intelligent for a
schoolmaster, and too well-dressed for an ordinary medical man. Colwyn,
versed in judging men swiftly from externals, noting the urbane,
somewhat pompous face, the authoritative, professional pose, the
well-shaped, plump white hands, and the general air of well-being and
prosperity which exuded from the whole man, placed him as a successful
practitioner in the more lucrative path of medicine--probably a
fashionable Harley Street specialist.

Colwyn returned to his scrutiny of the young man at the alcove table,
and he and his companion studied him intently for some time in silence.
But the young man, for the moment, was comparatively quiet, gazing
moodily through the open window over the waters of the North Sea, an
untasted sole in front of him, and an impassive waiter pouring out his
coffee as though the spectacle of a young man sticking a knife into the
table-cloth was a commonplace occurrence at the Grand Hotel, and all in
the day's doings. When the waiter had finished pouring out the coffee
and noiselessly departed, the young man tasted it with an indifferent
air, pushed it from him, and resumed his former occupation of staring
out of the window.

"He seems quiet enough now," observed Colwyn, turning to his companion.
"What do you think is the matter with him--shell-shock?"

"I would not care to hazard a definite opinion on so cursory an
observation," returned the other, in a dry, reticent, ultra-professional
manner. "But I will go so far as to say that I do not think it is a case
of shell-shock. If it is what I suspect, that first attack was the
precursor of another, possibly a worse attack. Ha! it is commencing.
Look at his thumb--that is the danger signal!"

Colwyn looked across the room again. The young man was still sitting in
the same posture, with his gaze bent on the open sea. His left hand was
extended rigidly on the table in front of him, with the thumb, extended
at right angles, oscillating rapidly in a peculiar manner.

"This attack may pass away like the other, but if he looks round at
anybody, and makes the slightest move, we must secure him immediately,"
said Colwyn's companion, speaking in a whisper.

He had barely finished speaking when the young man turned his head from
the open window and fixed his blue eyes vacantly on the table nearest
him, where an elderly clergyman, a golfing friend, and their wives, were
breakfasting together. With a swift movement the young man got up, and
started to walk towards this table.

Colwyn, who was watching every movement of the young man closely, could
not determine, then or afterwards, whether he meditated an attack on the
occupants of the next table, or merely intended to leave the breakfast
room. The clergyman's table was directly in front of the alcove and in a
line with the pair of swinging glass doors which were the only exit from
the breakfast-room. But Colwyn's companion did not wait for the matter
to be put to the test. At the first movement of the young man he sprang
to his feet and, without waiting to see whether Colwyn was following
him, raced across the room and caught the young man by the arm while he
was yet some feet away from the clergyman's table. The young man
struggled desperately in his grasp for some moments, then suddenly
collapsed and fell inert in the other's arms. Colwyn walked over to the
spot in time to see his portly companion lay the young man down on the
carpet and bend over to loosen his collar.

The young man lay apparently unconscious on the floor, breathing
stertorously, with convulsed features and closed eyes. After the lapse
of some minutes he opened his eyes, glanced listlessly at the circle of
frightened people who had gathered around him, and feebly endeavoured
to sit up. Colwyn's companion, who was bending over him feeling his
heart, helped him to a sitting posture, and then, glancing at the faces
crowded around, exclaimed in a sharp voice:

"He wants air. Please move back there a little."

"Certainly, Sir Henry." It was a stout man in a check golfing suit who
spoke. "But the ladies are very anxious to know if it is anything
serious."

"No, no. He will be quite all right directly. Just fall back, and give
him more air. Here, you!"--this to one of the gaping waiters--"just slip
across to the office and find out the number of this gentleman's room."

The waiter hurried away and speedily returned with the proprietor of the
hotel, a little man in check trousers and a frock coat, with a bald head
and an anxious, yet resigned eye which was obviously prepared for the
worst. His demeanour was that of a man who, already overloaded by
misfortune, was bracing his sinews to bear the last straw. As he
approached the group near the alcove table he smoothed his harassed
features into an expression of solicitude, and, addressing himself to
the man who was supporting the young man on the floor, said, in a voice
intended to be sympathetic,

"I thought I had better come myself, Sir Henry. I could not understand
from Antoine what you wanted or what had happened. Antoine said
something about somebody dying in the breakfast-room----"

"Nothing of the sort!" snapped the gentleman addressed as Sir Henry,
shifting his posture a little so as to enable the young man to lean
against his shoulder. "Haven't you eyes in your head, Willsden? Cannot
you see for yourself that this gentleman has merely had a fainting
fit?"

"I'm delighted to hear it, Sir Henry," replied the hotel proprietor. But
his face expressed no visible gratification. To a man who had had his
hotel emptied by a Zeppelin raid the difference between a single guest
fainting instead of dying was merely infinitesimal.

"Who is this gentleman, and what's the number of his room?" continued
Sir Henry. "He will be better lying quietly on his bed."

"His name is Ronald, and his room is No. 32--on the first floor, Sir
Henry."

"Very good. I'll take him up there at once."

"Shall I help you, Sir Henry? Perhaps he could be carried up. One of the
waiters could take his feet, or perhaps it would be better to have two."

"There's not the slightest necessity. He'll be able to walk in a
minute--with a little assistance. Ah, that's better!" The abrupt manner
in which Sir Henry addressed the hotel proprietor insensibly softened
itself into the best bedside manner when he spoke to the patient on the
carpet, who, from a sitting posture, was now endeavouring to struggle to
his feet. "You think you can get up, eh? Well, it won't do you any harm.
That's the way!" Sir Henry assisted the young man to rise, and supported
him with his arm. "Now, the next thing is to get him to his room. No,
no, not you, Willsden--you're too small. Where's that gentleman I was
sitting with a few minutes ago? Ah, thank you"--as Colwyn stepped
forward and took the other arm--"now, let us take him gently upstairs."

The young man allowed himself to be led away without resistance. He
walked, or rather stumbled, along between his guides like a man in a
dream. Colwyn noticed that his eyes were half-closed, and that his head
sagged slightly from side to side as he was led along. A waiter held
open the glass doors which led into the lounge, and a palpitating
chambermaid, hastily summoned from the upper regions, tripped ahead up
the broad carpeted stairs and along the passage to show the way to the
young man's bedroom.



CHAPTER II


Sir Henry dismissed the chambermaid at the door, and Colwyn and he
lifted the young man on to the bed. He lay like a man in a stupor,
breathing heavily, his face flushed, his eyes nearly closed. Sir Henry
drew up the blind, and by the additional light examined him thoroughly,
listening closely to the action of his heart, and examining the pupils
of his eyes by rolling back the upper lid with some small instrument he
took from his pocket.

"He'll do now," he said, after loosening the patient's clothes for his
greater comfort. "He'll come to in about five minutes, and may be all
right again shortly afterwards. But there are certain peculiar features
about this case which are new in my experience, and rather alarm me.
Certainly the young man ought not to be left to himself. His friends
should be sent for. Do you know anything about him? Is he staying at the
hotel alone? I only arrived here last night."

"I believe he is staying at the hotel alone. He has been here for a
fortnight or more, and I have never seen him speak to anybody, though I
have exchanged nods with him every morning. His principal recreation
seems to lie in taking long solitary walks along the coast. He has been
in the habit of going out every day, and not returning until dinner is
half over. Perhaps the hotel proprietor knows who his friends are."

"Would you be so kind as to step downstairs and inquire? I do not wish
to leave him, but his friends should be telegraphed to at once and asked
to come and take charge of him."

"Certainly. And I'll send the telegram while I am down there."

But Colwyn returned in a few moments to say that the hotel proprietor
knew nothing of his guest. He had never stayed in the house before, and
he had booked his room by a trunk call from London. On arrival he had
filled in the registration paper in the name of James Ronald, but had
left blank the spaces for his private and business addresses. He looked
such a gentleman that the proprietor had not ventured to draw his
attention to the omissions.

"Another instance of how hotels neglect to comply with the requirements
of the Defence of the Realm Act!" exclaimed Sir Henry. "Really, it is
very awkward. I hardly know, in the circumstances, how to act. Speaking
as a medical man, I say that he should not be left alone, but if he
orders us out of his room when he recovers his senses what are we to do?
Can you suggest anything?" He shot a keen glance at his companion.

"I should be in a better position to answer you if I knew what you
consider him to be really suffering from. I was under the impression it
was a bad case of shell-shock, but your remarks suggest that it is
something worse. May I ask, as you are a medical man, what you consider
the nature of his illness?"

Sir Henry bestowed another searching glance on the speaker. He noted,
for the first time, the keen alertness and intellectuality of the
other's face. It was a fine strong face, with a pair of luminous grey
eyes, a likeable long nose, and clean-shaven, humorous mouth--a man to
trust and depend upon.

"I hardly know what to do," said Sir Henry, after a lengthy pause, which
he had evidently devoted to considering the wisdom of acceding to his
companion's request. "This gentleman has not consulted me
professionally, and I hardly feel justified in confiding my hurried and
imperfect diagnosis of his case, without his knowledge, to a perfect
stranger. On the other hand, there are reasons why somebody should know,
if we are to help him in his weak state. Perhaps, sir, if you told me
your name----"

"Certainly: my name is Colwyn--Grant Colwyn."

"You are the famous American detective of that name?"

"You are good enough to say so."

"Why not? Who has not heard of you, and your skill in the unraveling of
crime? There are many people on both sides of the Atlantic who regard
you as a public benefactor. But I am surprised. You do not at all
resemble my idea of Colwyn."

"Why not?"

"You do not talk like an American, for one thing."

"You forget I have been over here long enough to learn the language.
Besides, I am half English."

Sir Henry laughed good-humouredly.

"That's a fair answer, Mr. Colwyn. Of course, your being Colwyn alters
the question. I have no hesitation in confiding in you. I am Sir Henry
Durwood--no doubt you have heard of me. Naturally, I have to be
careful."

Colwyn looked at his companion with renewed interest. Who had not heard
of Sir Henry Durwood, the nerve specialist whose skill had made his name
a household word amongst the most exclusive women in England, and,
incidentally, won him a knighthood? There were professional detractors
who hinted that Sir Henry had climbed into the heaven of Harley Street
and fat fees by the ladder of social influence which a wealthy,
well-born wife had provided, with no qualifications of his own except
"the best bedside manner in England" and a thorough knowledge of the
weaknesses of the feminine temperament. But his admirers--and they were
legion--declared that Sir Henry Durwood was the only man in London who
really understood how to treat the complex nervous system of the present
generation. These thoughts ran through Colwyn's mind as he murmured that
the opinion of such an eminent specialist as Sir Henry Durwood on the
case before them must naturally outweigh his own.

"You are very good to say so." Sir Henry spoke as though the tribute
were no more than his due. "In my opinion, the symptoms of this young
man point to epilepsy, and his behaviour downstairs was due to a seizure
from which he is slowly recovering."

"Epilepsy! Haut or petit mal?"

"The lesser form--petit mal, in my opinion."

"But are his symptoms consistent with the form of epilepsy known as
petit mal, Sir Henry? I thought in that lesser form of the disease the
victim merely suffered from slight seizures of transient
unconsciousness, without convulsions, regaining control of himself after
losing himself, to speak broadly, for a few seconds or so."

"Ah, I see you know something of the disease. That simplifies matters.
The layman's mind is usually at sea when it comes to discussing a
complicated affection of the nervous system like epilepsy. You are more
or less right in your definition of petit mal. But that is the simple
form, without complications. In this case there are complications, in my
opinion. I should say that this young man's attack was combined with the
form of epilepsy known as _furor epilepticus_."

"I am afraid you are getting beyond my depth, Sir Henry. What is _furor
epilepticus_?"

"It is a term applied to the violence sometimes displayed by the
patient during an attack of petit mal. The manifestation is extreme
violence--usually much greater than in violent anger, as a rule."

"I believe there are cases on record of epileptics having committed the
most violent outrages against those nearest and dearest to them. Is that
what you mean by _furor epilepticus_?"

"Yes; but that attacks are generally directed towards strangers--rarely
towards loved ones, though there have been such cases."

"I begin to understand. When we were at the breakfast table your
professional eye diagnosed this young man's symptoms--his nervous
tremors, his excitability, and the extravagant action with the knife--as
premonitory symptoms of an attack of _furor epilepticus_, in which the
sufferer would be liable to a dangerous outburst of violence?"

"Exactly. The minor symptoms suggested petit mal, but the act of
sticking the knife into the table pointed strongly to the complication
of _furor epilepticus_. That was why I went over to your table to have
your assistance in case of trouble."

"You feared he would attack one of the guests?"

"Yes, epileptics are extremely dangerous in that condition, and will
commit murder if they are in possession of a weapon. There have been
cases in which they have succeeded in killing the victims of their
fury."

"Without being conscious of it?"

"Without being conscious of it then or afterwards. After the patient
recovers from one of these attacks his mind is generally a complete
blank, but occasionally he will have a troubled or confused sense of
something having happened to him--like a man awakened from a bad dream,
which he cannot recall. This young man may come to his senses without
remembering anything which occurred downstairs, or he may be vaguely
alarmed, and ask a number of questions. In either case, it will be some
time--from half an hour to several hours--before his mind begins to work
normally again."

"Do you think it was his intention, when he got up from his table, to
attack the group at the table nearest him--that elderly clergyman and
his party?"

"I think it highly probable that he would have attacked the first person
within his reach--that is why I wanted to prevent him."

"But he didn't carry the knife with him from his table."

"My dear sir"--Sir Henry's voice conveyed the proper amount of
professional superiority--"you speak as though you thought a victim of
_furor epilepticus_ was a rational being. He is nothing of the kind.
While the attack lasts he is an uncontrollable maniac, not responsible
for his actions in the slightest degree."

"But, if he is capable of conceiving the idea of attacking his fellow
creatures, surely he is capable of picking up a knife for the purpose,
particularly when he has just previously had one in his hand?" urged
Colwyn. "I have no intention of setting up my opinion against yours, Sir
Henry, but there are certain aspects of this young man's illness which
are not altogether consistent with my own experience of epileptics. As a
criminologist, I have given some study to the effect of epilepsy and
other nervous diseases on the criminal temperament. For instance, this
young man did not give the usual cry of an epileptic when he sprang up
from the table. And if it is merely an attack of petit mal, why is he so
long in recovering consciousness?"

"The so-called epileptic cry is not invariably present, and petit mal
is sometimes the half-way house to haut mal," responded Sir Henry. "I
have said that this case presents several unusual features, but, in my
opinion, there is nothing absolutely inconsistent with epilepsy,
combined with _furor epilepticus_. And here is one symptom rarely found
in any fit except an epileptic seizure." The specialist pointed to a
faint fleck of foam which showed beneath the young man's brown
moustache.

Colwyn bent over him and wiped his lips with his handkerchief. As he did
so the young man's eyes unclosed. He regarded Colwyn languidly for a
moment or two, and then sat upright on the bed.

"Who are you?" he exclaimed.

"It's quite all right, Mr. Ronald," said the specialist, in his most
soothing bedside manner. "Just take things easily. You have been ill,
but you are almost yourself again. Let me feel your pulse--ha, very good
indeed! We will have you on your legs in no time."

The young man verified the truth of the latter prediction by springing
off his bed and regarding his visitors keenly. There was now, at all
events, no lack of sanity and intelligence in his gaze.

"What has happened? How did I get here?"

"You fainted, and we brought you up to your room," interposed Colwyn
tactfully, before Sir Henry could speak.

"Awfully kind of you. I remember now. I felt a bit seedy as I went
downstairs, but I thought it would pass off. I don't remember much more
about it. I hope I didn't make too much of an ass of myself before the
others, going off like a girl in that way. You must have had no end of a
bother in dragging me upstairs--very good of you to take the trouble."
He smiled faintly, and produced a cigarette case.

"How do you feel now?" asked Sir Henry Durwood solemnly, disregarding
the proffered case.

"A bit as though I'd been kicked on the top of the head by a horse, but
it'll soon pass off. Fact is, I got a touch of sun when I was out
there"--he waved his hand vaguely towards the East--"and it gives me a
bit of trouble at times. But I'll be all right directly. I'm sorry to
have given you so much trouble."

He proffered this explanation with an easy courtesy, accompanied by a
slight deprecating smile which admirably conveyed the regret of a
well-bred man for having given trouble to strangers. It was difficult to
reconcile his self-control with his previous extravagance downstairs.
But to Colwyn it was apparent that his composure was simulated, the
effort of a sensitive man who had betrayed a weakness to strangers, for
the fingers which held a cigarette trembled slightly, and there were
troubled shadows in the depths of the dark blue eyes. Colwyn admired the
young man's pluck--he would wish to behave the same way himself in
similar circumstances, he felt--and he realised that the best service he
and Sir Henry Durwood could render their fellow guest was to leave him
alone.

But Sir Henry was far from regarding the matter in the same light. As a
doctor he was more at home in other people's bedrooms than his own, for
rumour whispered that Lady Durwood was so jealous of her husband's
professional privileges as a fashionable ladies' physician that she was
in the habit of administering strong doses of matrimonial truths to him
every night at home. Sir Henry settled himself in his chair, adjusted
his eye-glasses more firmly on his nose and regarded the young man
standing by the mantelpiece with a bland professional smile, slightly
dashed by the recollection that he was not receiving a fee for his
visit.

"You have made a good recovery, but you'll need care," he said.
"Speaking as a professional man--I am Sir Henry Durwood--I think it
would be better for you if you had somebody with you who understood your
case. With your--er--complaint, it is very desirable that you should not
be left to the mercy of strangers. I would advise, strongly advise you,
to communicate with your friends. I shall be only too happy to do so on
your behalf if you will give me their address. In the meantime--until
they arrive--my advice to you is to rest."

A look of annoyance flashed through the young man's eyes. He evidently
resented the specialist's advice; indeed, his glance plainly revealed
that he regarded it as a piece of gratuitous impertinence. He answered
coldly:

"Many thanks, Sir Henry, but I think I shall be able to look after
myself."

"That is not an uncommon feature of your complaint," said the
specialist. An oracular shake of the head conveyed more than the words.

"What do you imagine my complaint, as you term it, to be?" asked the
young man curtly.

Colwyn wondered whether even a fashionable physician, used to the
freedom with which fashionable ladies discussed their ailments, would
have the courage to tell a stranger that he regarded him as an
epileptic. The matter was not put to the test--perhaps fortunately--for
at that moment there was a sharp tap at the door, which opened to admit
a chambermaid who seemed the last word in frills and smartness.

"If you please, Sir Henry," said the girl, with a sidelong glance at the
tall handsome young man by the mantelpiece, "Lady Durwood would be
obliged if you would go to her room at once."

It speaks well for Sir Henry Durwood that the physician was instantly
merged in the husband. "Tell Lady Durwood I will come at once," he said.
"You'll excuse me," he added, with a courtly bow to his patient.
"Perhaps--if you wish--you might care to see me later."

"Many thanks, Sir Henry, but there will be no need." He bowed gravely to
the specialist, but smiled cordially and held out his hand to Colwyn, as
the latter prepared to follow Sir Henry out of the room. "I hope to see
you later," he said.

But when Colwyn, after a day spent on the golf-links, went into the
dining-room for dinner that evening, the young man's place was vacant.
After the meal Colwyn went to the office to inquire if Mr. Ronald was
still unwell, and learnt, to his surprise, that he had departed from the
hotel an hour or so after his illness.



CHAPTER III


Lunch was over the following day, and the majority of the hotel guests
were assembled in the lounge, some sitting round a log fire which roared
and crackled in the old-fashioned fireplace, others wandering backwards
and forwards to the hotel entrance to cast a weather eye on the black
and threatening sky.

During the night there had been one of those violent changes in the
weather with which the denizens of the British Isles are not altogether
unfamiliar; a heavy storm had come shrieking down the North Sea, and
though the rain had ceased about eleven o'clock the wind had blown hard
all through the night, bringing with it from the Arctic a driving sleet
and the first touch of bitter, icy, winter cold.

The ladies of the hotel, who the previous day had paraded the front in
light summer frocks, sat shivering round the fire in furs; and the men
walked up and down in little groups discussing the weather and the war.
The golfers stood apart debating, after their wont, the possibility of
trying a round in spite of the weather. The elderly clergyman was
prepared to risk it if he could find a partner, and, with the aid of an
umbrella held upside down, was demonstrating to an attentive circle the
possibility of going round the most open course in England in the teeth
of the fiercest gale that ever blew, provided that a brassy was used
instead of a driver.

"I don't see how you could drive a ball with either to-day," said one
of the doubtful ones. "You'd be driving right against the wind for the
first four holes, and when you have the wind behind you at the bend in
the cliff by the fifth, the force of the gale would probably carry your
ball half a mile out to sea. These links here are supposed to be the
most exposed in England."

"My dear sir, you surely do not call this a gale," retorted the
clergyman. "I have played some of my best games in a stronger wind than
this. And as for this being the most exposed course in England--well,
let me ask you one question: have you ever played over the Worthing
course with a strong northeast gale--a gale, mind you, not a
wind--sweeping over the Downs?"

"Can't say I have," grunted the previous speaker, a tall cadaverous man,
wrapped from head to foot in a great grey ulster, and wearing woollen
gloves. "In fact, I've never been on the Worthing course."

"I thought not." The clergyman's face showed a golfer's satisfaction at
having tripped a fellow player. "The Worthing course is the most
difficult course in England, all up hill and down dale, and full of
pitfalls for those who don't know its peculiarities. I had a very
remarkable experience there, last year, with the crack local player--his
handicap was plus two. We played a round in a gale with the wind
whistling over the high downs at the rate of seventy or eighty miles an
hour. My partner didn't want to play at first because of the weather,
but I persuaded him to go round, and I beat him by two up and four to
play solely by relying on the brassy and midiron. He stuck to the
driver, and lost in consequence. I'll just show you how the game went.
Suppose the first hole to be just beyond the hall door there, and you
drive off from here. Now, imagine that umbrella stand--would you mind
moving away a little from it, sir? Thank you--to be a group of fir trees
fully a hundred yards to the right of the fairway. Well, I got a shot
160 yards up the fairway with a low straight ball which never lifted
more than a yard from the green, but my opponent, instead of sticking to
the brassy, as I did, preferred to use his big driver, and what do you
think happened to him? The wind took his ball clean over the fir trees."

The story was interrupted by the sudden entrance from outside of a young
officer who had been taking a turn on the front. He strode hurriedly
into the lounge, with a look of excitement on his good-humoured boyish
face, and accosted the golfers, who happened to be nearest the door.

"I say, you fellows, what do you think has happened? You remember that
chap who fainted yesterday morning? Well, he's wanted for committing a
murder!"

The piece of news created the sensation that its imparter had counted
upon. "A murder!" was echoed from different parts of the lounge in
varying degrees of horror, amazement and dread, and the majority of the
guests came eagerly crowding round to hear the details.

"Yes, a murder!" repeated the young officer, with relish. "And, what's
more, he committed it after he left here yesterday. He walked across to
some inn a few miles from here along the coast, put up there for the
night, and in the middle of the night stabbed some old chap who was
staying there."

There was a lengthy pause while the hotel guests digested this startling
information, and endeavoured to register anew their previous faint
impressions of the young man of the alcove table in the new light of his
personality as an alleged murderer. The pause was followed by an excited
hum of conversation and eager questions, the ladies all talking at once.

"What a providential escape we have all had!" exclaimed the clergyman's
wife, her fresh comely face turning pale.

"That's just what I said myself, madam, when I heard the news," replied
the young officer.

"I presume this murderous young ruffian has been secured?" asked the
clergyman, who had turned even paler than his wife. "The police, I hope,
have him under arrest."

The young officer shook his head.

"He's shown them a clean pair of heels. He may be heading back this way,
for all I know. There will be a hue and cry over the whole of Norfolk
for him by to-night, but murderers are usually very crafty, and
difficult to catch. I bet they won't catch him before he murders
somebody else."

The men looked at one another gravely, and some of the ladies gave vent
to cries of alarm, and clung to their husband's arms. The clergyman
turned angrily on the man who had brought the news.

"What do you mean, sir, by blurting out a piece of news like this before
a number of ladies?" he said sternly. "It was imprudent and foolish in
the last degree. You have alarmed them exceedingly."

"Oh, that's all tosh!" replied the other rudely. "They were bound to
hear of it sooner or later; why, everybody on the front is talking about
it. I thought you'd be awfully bucked to hear the news, seeing that you
were sitting at the next table to him yesterday morning."

"Who gave you this information?" asked Colwyn, who had just come down
stairs wearing a motor coat and cap, and paused on his way to the door
on hearing the loud voices of the excited group round the young officer.

"One of the fishermen on the front. The police constable at the place
where the murder was committed--a little village with some outlandish
name--came over here to report the news. This is the nearest police
station to the spot, it seems."

"But is he quite certain that the man who is supposed to have committed
the murder is the young man who fainted yesterday morning?" asked Sir
Henry Durwood, who had joined the group. "Has he been positively
identified?"

"The fisherman tells me that there's no doubt it's him--the
description's identical. He cleared out before the murder was
discovered. There's a rare hue and cry all along the coast. They are
organizing search parties. There's one going out from here this
afternoon. I'm going with it."

Colwyn left the group of hotel guests, and went to the front door. Sir
Henry Durwood, after a moment's hesitation, followed him. The detective
was standing in the hotel porch, thoughtfully smoking a cigar, and
looking out over the raging sea. He nodded cordially to the specialist.

"What do you think of this story?" asked Sir Henry.

"I was just about to walk down to the police station to make some
inquiries," responded Colwyn. "It is impossible to tell from that man's
story how much is truth and how much mere gossip."

"I'm afraid it's true enough," replied Sir Henry Durwood. "You'll
remember I warned him yesterday to send for his friends. A man in his
condition of health should not have been permitted to wander about the
country unattended. He has probably had another attack of _furor
epilepticus_, and killed somebody while under its influence. Dear, dear,
what a dreadful thing! It may be said that I should have taken a firmer
hand with him yesterday, but what more could I have done? It's a very
awkward situation--very. I hope you'll remember, Mr. Colwyn, that I did
all that was humanly possibly for a professional man to do--in fact, I
went beyond the bounds of professional decorum, in tendering advice to a
perfect stranger. And you will also remember that what I told you about
his condition was in the strictest confidence. I should like very much
to accompany you to the police station, if you have no objection--I feel
strongly interested in the case."

"I shall be glad if you will come," replied the detective.

Colwyn turned down the short street to the front, where a footpath
protected by a hand rail had been made along the edge of the cliff for
the benefit of jaded London visitors who wanted to get the best value
for their money in the bracing Norfolk air. At the present moment that
air, shrieking across the North Sea with almost hurricane force, was too
bracing for weak nerves on the exposed path, and it was real hard work
to force a way, even with the help of the handrail, against the wind, to
say nothing of the spray which was flung up in clouds from the
thundering masses of yellow waves dashing at the foot of the cliffs
below. Sir Henry Durwood, at any rate, was very glad when his companion
turned away from the cliffs into one of the narrow tortuous streets
running off the front into High Street.

Colwyn paused in front of a stone building, half way up the street,
which displayed the words, "County Police," on a board outside. Knots of
people were standing about in the road--fishermen in jerseys and
sea boots, some women, and a sprinkling of children--brought together by
the news of murder, but kept from encroaching on the sacred domain of
law and order by a massive red-faced country policeman, who stood at
the gate in an awkward pose of official dignity, staring straight in
front of him, ignoring the eager questions which were showered on him by
the crowd. The group of people nearest the gate fell back a little as
they approached, and the policeman on duty looked at them inquiringly.

Colwyn asked him the name of the officer in charge of the district, and
received the reply that it was Superintendent Galloway. The policeman
looked somewhat doubtful when Colwyn asked him to take in his card with
the request for an interview. He compromised between his determination
to do the right thing and his desire not to offend two well-dressed
gentlemen by taking Colwyn into his confidence.

"Well, you see, sir, it's like this," he said, sinking his voice so that
his remarks should not be heard by the surrounding rabble. "I don't like
to interrupt Superintendent Galloway unless it's very important. The
chief constable is with him."

"Do you mean Mr. Cromering, from Norwich?" asked Colwyn.

The policeman nodded.

"He came over here by the morning train," he explained.

"Very good. I know Mr. Cromering well. Will you please take this card to
the chief constable and say that I should be glad of the favour of a
short interview? This is a piece of luck," he added to Sir Henry, as the
constable took the card and disappeared into the building. "We shall now
be able to find out all we want to know."

The police constable came hastening back, and with a very respectful air
informed them that Mr. Cromering would be only too happy to see Mr.
Colwyn. He led them forthwith into the building, down a passage, knocked
at a door, and without waiting for a response, ushered them into a
large room and quietly withdrew.

There were two officials in the room. One, in uniform, a heavily built
stout man with sandy hair and a red freckled face, sat at a large
roll-top desk writing at the dictation of the other, who wore civilian
clothes. The second official was small and elderly, of dry and meagre
appearance, with a thin pale face, and sunken blue eyes beneath
gold-rimmed spectacles. This gentleman left off dictating as Colwyn and
Sir Henry Durwood entered, and advanced to greet the detective with a
look which might have been mistaken for gratitude in a less important
personage.

Mr. Cromering's gratitude to Colwyn was not due to any assistance he had
received from the detective in the elucidation of baffling crime
mysteries. It arose from an entirely different cause. Wolfe is supposed
to have said that he would sooner have been remembered as the author of
Gray's "Elegy in a Country Churchyard" than as the conqueror of Quebec.
Mr. Cromering would sooner have been the editor of the _English Review_
than the chief constable of Norfolk. His tastes were bookish; Nature had
intended him for the librarian of a circulating library: the safe pilot
of middle class ladies through the ocean of new fiction which overwhelms
the British Isles twice a year. His particular hobby was paleontology.
He was the author of _The Jurassic Deposits of Norfolk, with Some
Remarks on the Kimeridge Clay_--an exhaustive study of the geological
formation of the county and the remains of prehistoric reptiles, fishes,
mollusca and crustacea which had been discovered therein. This work,
which had taken six years to prepare, had almost been lost to the world
through the carelessness of the Postal Department, which had allowed
the manuscript to go astray while in transit from Norfolk to the London
publishers.

The distracted author had stirred up the postal authorities at London
and Norwich, and had ultimately received a courteous communication from
the Postmaster General to the effect that all efforts to trace the
missing packet had failed. A friend of Mr. Cromering's suggested that he
should invoke the aid of the famous detective Colwyn, who had a name for
solving mysteries which baffled the police. Mr. Cromering took the
advice and wrote to Colwyn, offering to mention his name in a preface to
_The Jurassic Deposits_ if he succeeded in recovering the missing
manuscript. Colwyn, by dint of bringing to bear a little more
intelligence and energy than the postal officials had displayed, ran the
manuscript to earth in three days, and forwarded it to the owner with a
courteous note declining the honour of the offered preface as too great
a reward for such a small service.

"Very happy to meet you, Mr. Colwyn," said the chief constable, as he
came forward with extended hand. "I've long wanted to thank you
personally for your kindness--your great kindness to me last year.
Although I feel I can never repay it, I'm glad to have the opportunity
of expressing it."

"I'm afraid you are over-estimating a very small service," said Colwyn,
with a smile.

"Very small?" The chief constable's emphasis of the words suggested that
his pride as an author had been hurt. "If you had not recovered the
manuscript, a work of considerable interest to students of British
paleontology would have been lost. I must show you a letter I have just
received from Sir Thomas Potter, of the British Museum, agreeing with my
conclusions about the fossil remains of Ichthyosaurus, Plesiosaurus, and
Mosasaurs, discovered last year at Roslyn Hole. It is very gratifying
to me; very gratifying. But what can I do for you, Mr. Colwyn?"

"First let me introduce to you Sir Henry Durwood," said Colwyn.

"Durwood? Did you say Durwood?" said the little man, eagerly advancing
upon the specialist with outstretched hand. "I'm delighted to meet one
of our topmost men of science. Your illuminating work on Elephas
Meridionalis is a classic."

"I'm afraid you're confusing Sir Henry with a different Durwood," said
the detective, coming to the rescue. "Sir Henry Durwood is the
distinguished specialist of Harley Street, and not the paleontologist of
that name. We have called to make some inquiries about the murder which
was committed somewhere near here last night."

"The ruling passion, Mr. Colwyn, the ruling passion! Personally I should
be only too glad of your assistance in the case in question, but I'm
afraid there's no deep mystery to unravel--it's not worth your while. It
would be like cracking a nut with a steam hammer for you to devote your
brains to this case. All the indications point strongly to one man."

"A young man who was staying at the _Grand_ till yesterday?" inquired
the detective.

The chief constable nodded.

"We're looking for a young man who's been staying at the _Grand_ for
some weeks past under the name of Ronald. He's a stranger to the
district, and nobody seems to know anything about him. Perhaps you
gentlemen can tell me something about him."

"Very little, I'm afraid," replied Colwyn. "I've seen him at meal
times, and nodded to him, but never spoken to him till yesterday, when
he had a fainting fit at breakfast. Sir Henry Durwood and I helped him
to his bedroom, and exchanged a few remarks with him on his recovery."

"Yes, I've been told of that illness," said Mr. Cromering, meditating.
"Did he do or say anything while you were with him that would throw any
light on the subsequent tragic events of the night, for which he is now
under suspicion?"

Colwyn related what had happened at breakfast and afterwards. Mr.
Cromering listened attentively, and turning to Sir Henry Durwood asked
him if he had seen Ronald before the previous day.

"I saw him yesterday for the first time at the breakfast table," replied
Sir Henry Durwood. "I arrived only the previous night. He was taken ill
at breakfast. Mr. Colwyn and I assisted him to his room and left him
there. I know nothing whatever about him."

"What was the nature of his illness?" inquired the chief constable.

"It had some of the symptoms of a seizure," replied Sir Henry guardedly.
"I begged him, when he recovered, not to leave his room. I even offered
to communicate with his friends, by telephone, if he would give me their
address, but he refused."

"It is a pity he did not take your advice," responded the chief
constable. "He appears to have left the hotel shortly after his illness,
and walked along the coast to a little hamlet called Flegne, about ten
miles from here. He reached there in the evening, and put up at the
village inn, the _Golden Anchor_, for the night. He left early in the
morning, before anybody was up. Shortly afterwards the body of Mr. Roger
Glenthorpe, an elderly archaeologist, who had been staying at the inn
for some time past making researches into the fossil remains common to
that part of Norfolk, was found in a pit near the house. The tracks of
boot-prints from near the inn to the mouth of the pit, and back again,
indicate that Mr. Glenthorpe was murdered in his bedroom at the inn, and
his body afterwards carried by the murderer to the pit in which it was
found."

"In order to conceal the crime?" said Colwyn.

"Precisely. Two men employed by Mr. Glenthorpe saw the footprints
earlier in the morning, and when it was discovered that Mr. Glenthorpe
was missing, one of them was lowered into the pit by a rope and found
the body at the bottom. The pit forms a portion of a number of so-called
hut circles, or prehistoric shelters of the early Briton, which are not
uncommon in this part of Norfolk."

"And you have strong grounds for believing that this young man Ronald,
who was staying at the _Grand_ till yesterday, is the murderer?"

"The very strongest. He slept in the room next to the murdered man's,
and disappeared hurriedly in the early morning from the inn some time
before the body was discovered. It is his boot-tracks which led to and
from the pit where the body was found. A considerable sum of money has
been stolen from the deceased, and we have ascertained that Ronald was
in desperate straits for money. Another point against Ronald is that Mr.
Glenthorpe was stabbed, and a knife which was used by Ronald at the
dinner table that night is missing. It is believed that the murder was
committed with this knife. But if you feel interested in the case, Mr.
Colwyn, you had better hear the report of Police Constable Queensmead."

The chief constable touched a bell, and directed the policeman who
answered it to bring in Constable Queensmead.

The policeman who appeared in answer to this summons was a thickset
sturdy Norfolk man, with an intelligent face and shrewd dark eyes. On
the chief constable informing him that he was to give the gentlemen the
details of the _Golden Anchor_ murder, he produced a notebook from his
tunic, and commenced the story with official precision.

Ronald had arrived at the inn before dark on the previous evening, and
had asked for a bed for the night. A little later Mr. Glenthorpe, the
murdered man, who had been staying at the inn for some time past, had
come in for his dinner, and was so pleased to meet a gentleman in that
rough and lonely place that he had asked Ronald to dine with him. The
dinner was served in an upstairs sitting-room, and during the course of
the meal Mr. Glenthorpe talked freely of his scientific researches in
the district, and informed his guest that he had that day been to
Heathfield to draw L300 to purchase a piece of land containing some
valuable fossil remains which he intended to excavate. The two gentlemen
sat talking after dinner till between ten and eleven, and then retired
to rest in adjoining rooms, in a wing of the inn occupied by nobody
else. In the morning Ronald departed before anybody, except the servant,
was up, refusing to wait for his boots to be cleaned. The servant, who
had had the boots in her hands, had noticed that one of the boots had a
circular rubber heel on it, but not the other. Ronald gave her a pound
to pay for his bed, and the note was one of the first Treasury issue,
as were the notes which Mr. Glenthorpe had drawn from the bank at
Heathfield the day before. The men who had seen the footprints to the
pit earlier in the morning, informed Queensmead of their discovery on
learning that Mr. Glenthorpe had disappeared. Queensmead examined the
footprints, and, with the assistance of the men, recovered the body.
Queensmead telephoned a description of Ronald to the police stations
along the coast, then mounted his bicycle and caught the train at
Leyland in order to report the matter to the district headquarters at
Durrington.

"I suppose there is no doubt that the young man who stayed at the inn is
identical with Ronald," said the detective, when the constable had
finished his story. "Do the descriptions tally in every respect?"

"Read the particulars you have prepared for the hand-bills,
Queensmead," said the chief constable.

The constable produced a paper from his pocket and read: "Description of
wanted man: About 28 years of age, five feet nine or ten inches high,
fair complexion rather sunburnt, blue eyes, straight nose, fair hair,
tooth-brush moustache, clean-cut features, well-shaped hands and feet,
white, even teeth. Was attired in grey Norfolk or sporting lounge
jacket, knickerbockers and stockings to match, with soft grey hat of
same material. Wore a gold signet-ring on little finger of left hand.
Distinguishing marks, a small star-shaped scar on left cheek, slightly
drags left foot in walking. Manner superior, evidently a gentleman."

"That is conclusive enough," said Colwyn. "It tallies in every respect.
The scar is an unmistakable mark. I noticed it the first time I saw
Ronald."

"I noticed it also," said Sir Henry Durwood.

"It seems a clear case to me," said the chief constable. "I have signed
a warrant for Ronald's arrest, and Superintendent Galloway has notified
all the local stations along the coast to have the district searched. We
think it very possible that Ronald is in hiding somewhere in the
marshes. We have also notified the district railway stations to be on
the lookout for anybody answering his description, in case he tries to
escape by rail."

"It seems a strange case," remarked the detective thoughtfully. "Why
should a young man of Ronald's type leave his hotel and go across to
this remote inn, and commit this brutal murder?"

"He was very short of money. We have ascertained that he had been
requested to leave the hotel here because he could not pay his bill. He
has paid nothing since he has been here, and owed more than L30. The
proprietor told him yesterday morning, as he was going in to breakfast,
that he must leave the hotel at once if he could not pay his bill. He
went away shortly after the scene in the breakfast room which was
witnessed by you gentlemen, and left his luggage behind him. I suspect
the proprietor would not allow him to take his luggage until he had
discharged his bill."

"It strikes me as a remarkable case, nevertheless," said Colwyn. "I
should like to look into it a little further, with your permission."

"Certainly," replied the chief constable courteously. "Superintendent
Galloway will be in charge of the case. I suggested that he should ask
for a man to be sent down from Scotland Yard, but he does not think it
necessary. I feel sure that he will be delighted to have the assistance
of such a celebrated detective as yourself. When are you starting for
Flegne, Galloway?"

"In half an hour," replied the superintendent. "I shall have to walk
from Leyland--five miles or more. The train does not go beyond there."

"Then I will drive you over in my car," said the detective.

"In that case perhaps you'll permit me to accompany you," said the chief
constable. "I should very much like to observe your methods."

"And I too," said Sir Henry Durwood.



CHAPTER IV


The road to Flegne skirted the settled and prosperous cliff uplands,
thence ran through the sea marshes which stretched along that part of
the Norfolk coast as far as the eye could reach until they were merged
and lost to view in the cold northern mists.

The road, after leaving the uplands, descended in a sinuous curve
towards the sea, but the party in the motor car were stopped on their
way down by a young mounted officer, who, on learning of their
destination, told them they would have to make an inland detour for some
miles, as the military authorities had closed that part of the coast to
ordinary traffic.

As they turned away from the coast, the chief constable informed Colwyn
that the prohibited area was full of troops guarding a little bay called
Leyland Hoop, where the water was so deep that hostile transports might
anchor close inshore, and where, according to ancient local tradition,


  "He who would Old England win,
  Must at the Leyland Hoop begin."


After traversing a mile or so of open country, and passing through one
or two scattered villages, they turned back to the coast again on the
other side of a high green headland which marked the end of the
prohibited area, and, crossing the bridge of a shallow muddy river,
found themselves in the area of the marshes.

It was a region of swamps and stagnant dykes, of tussock land and wet
flats, with scarcely a stir of life in any part of it, and nothing to
take the eye except a stone cottage here and there.

The marshes stretched from the road to the sea, nearly a mile away. Man
had almost given up the task of attempting to wrest a living from this
inhospitable region. The boat channels which threaded the ooze were
choked with weed and covered with green slime from long disuse, the
little stone quays were thick with moss, the rotting planks of a broken
fishing boat were foul with the encrustations of long years, the stone
cottages by the roadside seemed deserted. Here and there the marshes had
encroached upon the far side of the road, creeping half a mile or more
farther inland, destroying the wholesome earth like rust corroding
steel, and stretching slimy tentacles towards the farmlands on the rise.

Humanity had retreated from the inroads of the sea only after a stubborn
fight. The ruins of an Augustinian priory, a crumbling fragment of a
Norman tower, the mouldering remnant of a castellated hall, showed how
prolonged had been the struggle with the elements of Nature before Man
had acknowledged his defeat and retreated, leaving hostages behind him.
And--significant indication of the bitterness of the fight--it was to be
noted that, while the builders of a bygone generation had built to face
the sea, the handful of their successors who still kept up the losing
fight had built their beach-stone cottages with sturdy stone backs to the
road, for the greater protection of the inmates from the fierce winter
gales which swept across the marshes from the North Sea.

The car had travelled some miles through this desolate region when the
chief constable directed Colwyn's attention to a spire rising from the
flats a mile or so away, and said it was the church of Flegne-next-sea.
Colwyn increased his speed a little, and in a few minutes the car had
reached the outskirts of the little hamlet, which consisted of a
straggling row of beach-stone cottages, a few gaunt farm-houses on the
rise, and a cruciform church standing back from the village on a little
hill, with high turret or beacon lights which had warned the North Sea
mariners of a former generation of the dangers of that treacherous
coast.

In times past Flegne-next-sea--pronounced "Fly" by the natives, "Fleen"
by etymologists, and "Flegney" by the rare intrusive Cockney--had
doubtless been a prosperous little port, but the encroaching sea had
long since killed its trade, scattered its inhabitants, and reduced it
to a spectre of human habitation compelled to keep the scene of its
former activities after life had departed. Half the stone cottages were
untenanted, with broken windows, flapping doors, and gardens overgrown
with rank marsh weeds. The road through the village had fallen into
disrepair, and oozed beneath the weight of the car, a few boards thrown
higgledy-piggledy across in places representing the local effort to
preserve the roadway from the invading marshes. The little canal quay--a
wooden one--was a tangle of rotting boards and loose piles, and the
stagnant green water of the shallow canal was abandoned to a few grey
geese, which honked angrily at the passing car. There was no sign of
life in the village street, and no sound except the autumn wind moaning
across the marshes and the boom of the distant sea against the
breakwater.

"There's the inn--straight in front," said Police-Constable Queensmead,
pointing to it.

The _Golden Anchor_ inn must have been built in the days of Sir
Cloudesley Shovel, for nothing remained of the maritime prosperity
which had originally bestowed the name upon the building. It was of
rough stone, coloured a dirty white, with two queer circular windows
high up in the wall on one side, the other side resting on a little,
round-shouldered hill. It was built facing away from the sea like the
beach-stone cottages, from which it was separated by a patch of common.
From the rear of the inn the marshes stretched in unbroken monotony to
the line of leaping white sea dashing sullenly against the breakwater
wall, and ran for miles north and south in a desolate uniformity, still
and grey as the sky above, devoid of life except for a few migrant birds
feeding in the salt creeks or winging their way seaward in strong,
silent flight. The rays of the afternoon sun, momentarily piercing the
thick clouds, fell on the white wall and round glazed windows of the
inn, giving it a sinister resemblance to a dead face.

Colwyn brought his car to a standstill on the edge of the saturated
strip of common.

"We shall have to walk across," he said.

"Nobody will run off with the car," said Galloway, scrambling down from
his seat.

"The murderer brought the body from the back of the house across this
green, and carried it up that rise in front of the inn," said
Queensmead. "You cannot see the pit from here, but it is close to that
little wood on the summit. The footprints do not show in the grass, but
they are very plain in the clay a little farther on, and lead straight
to the pit."

"How deep is the pit?" asked Colwyn.

"About thirty feet. It was not an easy matter to bring up the body."

"We will examine the pit and the footprints later," said Mr. Cromering.
"Let us go inside first."

Picking their way across the common to the front of the inn, they
encountered a little group of men conversing underneath the rusty old
anchor signboard which dangled from a stout stanchion above the front
door of the inn. Some men, wearing sea-boots and jerseys, others in
labouring garb, splashed with clay and mud, were standing about. They
ceased their conversation as the party from the motor-car appeared
around the corner, and, moving a respectful distance away, watched them
covertly.

The front door of the inn was closed. Superintendent Galloway tapped at
it sharply, and after the lapse of a moment or two the door was opened,
and a man appeared on the threshold. Seeing the police uniforms he
stepped outside as if to make more room for the party to enter the
narrow passage from which he had emerged. Colwyn noticed that he was so
tall that he had to stoop in the old-fashioned doorway as he came out.

Seen at close quarters, this man was a strange specimen of humanity. He
was well over six feet in height, and so cadaverous, thin and gaunt that
he might well have been mistaken for the presiding genius of the marshes
who had stricken that part of the Norfolk coast with aridity and
barrenness. But there was no lack of strength in his frame as he
advanced briskly towards his visitors. His face was not the least
remarkable part of him. It was ridiculously small and narrow for so big
a frame, with a great curved beak of a nose, and small bright eyes set
close together. Those eyes were at the present moment glancing with
bird-like swiftness from one to the other of his visitors.

"You are the innkeeper--the landlord of this place?" asked Mr.
Cromering.

"At your service, sir. Won't you go inside?" His voice was the best
part of him; soft and gentle, with a cultivated accent which suggested
that the speaker had known a different environment at some time or
other.

"Show us into a private room," said Mr. Cromering.

The innkeeper escorted the party along the passage, and took them into a
room with a low ceiling and sanded floor, smelling of tobacco,
explaining, as he placed chairs, that it was the bar parlour, but they
would be quiet and free from interruption in it, because he had closed
the inn that day in anticipation of the police visit.

"Quite right--very proper," said the chief constable.

"Will you and the other gentlemen take any refreshment, after your
journey?" suggested the innkeeper. "I'm afraid the resources of the inn
are small, but there is some excellent old brandy."

He stretched out an arm towards the bell rope behind him. Colwyn noticed
that his hand was long and thin and yellow--a skeleton claw covered with
parchment.

"Never mind the brandy just now," said Mr. Cromering, taking on himself
to refuse on behalf of his companions the proffered refreshment. "We
have much to do and it will be time enough for refreshments afterwards.
We will view the body first, and make inquiries after. Where is the
body, Benson?"

"Upstairs, sir."

"Take us to the room."

The innkeeper led the way upstairs along a dark and narrow passage. When
he reached a door near the end, he opened it and stood aside for them to
enter.

"This is the room," he said, in a low voice. It was Colwyn's keen eye
that noted the key in the door. "What is that key doing in the door, on
the outside?" he asked. "How long has it been there?"

"The maid found it there this morning, sir, when she went up with Mr.
Glenthorpe's hot water. That made her suspect something must be wrong,
because Mr. Glenthorpe was in the habit of locking his door of a night
and placing the key under his pillow. So, after knocking and getting no
answer, she opened the door, and found the room empty."

"The door was not locked, though the key was in the door?"

"No, sir, and everything in the room was just as usual. Nothing had been
disturbed."

"And was that bedroom window open when you found the room empty?" asked
Superintendent Galloway, pointing to it through the open doorway.

"Yes, sir--just as you see it now. I gave orders that nothing was to be
touched."

"Ronald slept in this room," said Queensmead, indicating the door of the
adjoining bedroom.

"We will look at that later," said Galloway.

The interior of the room they entered was surprisingly light and
cheerful and spacious, having nothing in common with those low gloomy
vaults, crammed with clumsy furniture and moth-eaten stuffed animals,
which generally pass muster as bedrooms in English country inns. Instead
of the small circular windows of the south side, there was a large
modern two-paned window in a line with the door, opening on to the other
side of the house. The bottom pane was up, and the window opened as wide
as possible. A very modern touch, unusual in a remote country inn, was a
rose coloured gas globe suspended from the ceiling, in the middle of the
room. The furniture belonged to a past period, but it was handsome and
well-kept--a Spanish mahogany wardrobe, chest of drawers and washstand
with chairs to match. Modern articles, such as a small writing-desk near
the window, some library books, a fountain pen, a reading-lamp by the
bedside, and an attache case, suggested the personal possessions and
modern tastes of the last occupant. A comfortable carpet covered the
floor, and some faded oil-paintings adorned the walls.

The bed--a large wooden one, but not a fourposter--stood on the
left-hand side of the room from the entrance, with the head against the
wall nearest the outside passage, and the foot partly in line with the
open window, which was about eight feet away from it. The door when
pushed back swung just clear of a small bedroom table beside the bed, on
which the reading lamp stood, with a book beside it. The other side of
the bed was close to the wall which divided the room from the next
bedroom, so that there was a large clear space on the outside, between
the bed and the door. The gas fitting, which was suspended from the
ceiling in this open space, hung rather low, the bottom of the globe
being not more than six feet from the floor. The globe was cracked, and
the incandescent burner was broken.

The murdered man had been laid in the middle of the bed, and covered
with a sheet. Superintendent Galloway quietly drew the sheet away,
revealing the massive white head and clear-cut death mask of a man of
sixty or sixty-five; a fine powerful face, benign in expression, with a
chin and mouth of marked character and individuality. But the distorted
contour of the half-open mouth, and the almost piteous expression of the
unclosed sightless eyes, seemed to beseech the assistance of those who
now bent over him, revealing only too clearly that death had come
suddenly and unexpectedly.

"He was a great archaeologist--one of the greatest in England," said Mr.
Cromering gently, with something of a tremor in his voice, as he gazed
down at the dead man's face. "To think that such a man should have been
struck down by an assassin's blow. What a loss!"

"Let us see how he was murdered," said the more practical Galloway, who
was standing beside his superior officer. He drew off the covering sheet
as he spoke, and dropped it lightly on the floor.

The body thus revealed was that of a slightly built man of medium
height. It was clad in a flannel sleeping suit, spattered with mud and
clay, and oozing with water. The arms were inclining outwards from the
body, and the legs were doubled up. There were a few spots of blood on
the left breast, and immediately beneath, almost on the left side, just
visible in the stripe of the pyjama jacket, was the blow which had
caused death--a small orifice like a knife cut, just over the heart.

"It is a very small wound to have killed so strong a man," said Mr.
Cromering. "There is hardly any blood."

Sir Henry examined the wound closely. "The blow was struck with great
force, and penetrated the heart. The weapon used--a small, thin, steel
instrument--and internal bleeding, account for the small external flow."

"What do you mean by a thin, steel instrument?" asked Superintendent
Galloway. "Would an ordinary table-knife answer that description?"

"Certainly. In fact, the nature of the wound strongly suggests that it
was made by a round-headed, flat-bladed weapon, such as an ordinary
table or dinner knife. The thrust was made horizontally,--that is,
across the ribs and between them, instead of perpendicularly, which is
the usual method of stabbing. Apparently the murderer realised that his
knife was too broad for the purpose, and turned it the other way, so as
to make sure of penetrating the ribs and reaching the heart."

"Does not that suggest a rather unusual knowledge of human anatomy on
the murderer's part?" asked Mr. Cromering.

"I do not think so. Anybody can tell how far apart the human ribs are by
feeling them."

"It is easy to see, Sir Henry, that the wound was made by a thin-bladed
knife, but why do you think it was also round-headed?" asked
Superintendent Galloway. "Might it not have been a sharp-pointed one?"

"Or even a dagger?" suggested Mr. Cromering.

"Certainly not a dagger. The ordinary dagger would have made a wider
perforation with a corresponding increase in the blood-flow. My theory of
a round-headed knife is based on the circumstance of a portion of the
deceased's pyjama jacket having been carried into the wound. A
sharp-pointed knife would have made a clean cut through the jacket."

"I see," said Superintendent Galloway, with a sharp nod.

"Therefore, we may assume, in the case before us,"--Sir Henry Durwood
waved a fat white hand in the direction of the corpse as though he were
delivering an anatomical lecture before a class of medical
students--"that the victim was killed with a flat, round knife with a
round edge, held sideways. Furthermore, the position of the wound
reveals that the blow was too much on the left side to pierce the centre
of the heart directly, but was a slanting blow, delivered with such
force that it has probably pierced the heart on the _right_ side,
causing instant death."

"The weapon, then, entered the body in a lateral direction, that is,
from left to right?" asked Colwyn, who had been closely following the
specialist's remarks.

"That is what I meant to convey," responded Sir Henry, in his most
professional manner. "The blade entered on the left side, and travelled
towards the centre of the body."

"From the nature of the wound would you say that the knife entered
almost parallel with the ribs, though slanting slightly downwards, in
order to pierce the heart on the right side?"

"That would be the general direction, though it is impossible to
ascertain, without a postmortem examination, the exact spot where the
heart was pierced."

"But the wound slants in such a way as to prove that the blow was struck
from left to right?" persisted Colwyn.

"Undoubtedly," responded Sir Henry.



CHAPTER V


During the latter part of the conversation Superintendent Galloway
walked to the open window, and looked out. He turned round swiftly, with
a look of unusual animation on his heavy features, and exclaimed:

"The murderer entered through the window."

The others went over to the window. The inn on that side had been built
into a small hill of beehive shape, which had been partly levelled to
make way for the foundations. Seen from outside, the inn, with its back
to the sea and a corner of its front entering the hillside, bore a
remote resemblance to some nakedly ugly animal with its nose burrowed
into the earth. Part of the bar was actually underground, and the
windows of the rooms immediately above looked out on the hillside. The
window of Mr. Glenthorpe's room, which was above the bar parlour, was
not more than four or five feet away from the round-shouldered side of
the hill. From that point the hill fell away rapidly, and the
first-story windows at the back, where the house rose from the flat edge
of the marsh, were about fifteen feet from the ground. The space between
the inn wall and the beehive curve of the hill, which was very narrow
under Mr. Glenthorpe's window, but widened as the hill fell away, was
covered with a russet-coloured clay, which contrasted vividly with the
sombre grey and drab tints of the marshes.

"It was an easy matter to get in this window," said Superintendent
Galloway. "And here's the proof that the murderer came in this way." He
stooped and picked up something from the floor, close to the window,
and held it out in the palm of his hand for the inspection of his
companions. It was a small piece of red clay, like the russet-coloured
clay outside the window.

"Here is another clue," said Colwyn, pointing to a fragment of black
material adhering to a nail near the bottom of the window.

"Ronald ripped something he was wearing while getting through the
window," said Galloway, detaching the fragment, which he and Colwyn
examined closely.

"Have you noticed that?" said Colwyn, pointing to a pool of water which
had collected near the open window, between the edge of the carpet and
the skirting board.

"Yes," replied Galloway. "It was raining heavily last night."

With eyes sharpened by his discoveries, Galloway made a careful search
of the carpet, and found several more crumbs of red clay between the
window and the bed. Near the bed he detected some splashes of
candle-grease, which he detached from the carpet with his pocket-knife.
He also picked up the stump of a burnt wooden match, and the broken
unlighted rink head of another. After showing these things to his
companions he placed them carefully in an empty match-box, which he put
in his pocket.

"Somebody has bumped against this gas globe pretty hard," said Colwyn.
"The glass is broken and the incandescent burner smashed."

He bent down to examine the white fragments of the burner which were
scattered about the carpet, and as he did so he noticed another broken
wooden match, and two more splashes of candle-grease directly beneath
the gas-jet. He removed the candle-grease carefully, and showed it to
Galloway.

"More candle-grease!" the latter said. "Well, that's not likely to prove
anything except that Ronald was careless with his light. I suppose the
wind caused the candle to gutter. I would willingly exchange the
candle-grease for some finger-prints. There's not a sign of
finger-prints anywhere. Ronald must have worn gloves. Now, let us have a
look at Ronald's room. I want to see if he could get out of his own
window on to the hillside. His window is higher from the ground than
this window. The hill falls away very sharply."

The bedroom Ronald had occupied was small and narrow, and its meagre
furniture was in striking contrast with the comfortable appointments of
the room they had just left. It contained a single bed, a chest of
drawers, a washstand, and a wardrobe. The latter, a cumbrous article of
furniture, stood between the bed and the wall, against the side nearest
to Mr. Glenthorpe's room.

Galloway strode across to the window, which was open, and looked out.
The hillside fell away so rapidly that the bottom of the window was
quite eight feet from the ground outside.

"Not much of a drop for an athletic young fellow like Ronald," said
Galloway to Colwyn, who had joined him.

"The window is very much smaller than the one in Mr. Glenthorpe's
bedroom," said Colwyn.

"But large enough for a man to get through. Look here! I can get my head
and shoulders through, and where the head and shoulders go the rest of
the body will follow. Ronald got through it last night and into the next
room by the other window. There can be no doubt that that was how the
murder was committed."

Galloway left the window, and examined the bedroom carefully. He turned
down the bed-clothes, and scrutinised the sheets and pillows.

"I thought he might have left some blood-stains on the linen, after
carrying the body downstairs," he explained. "But he hasn't."

"Sir Henry says the bleeding was largely internal," remarked Mr.
Cromering. "That would account for the absence of any tell-tale marks on
the bed-clothes."

"He was too clever to wash his hands when he came back," grumbled
Galloway, turning to the washstand and examining the towels. "He's a
cool customer."

"I notice that the candle in the candlestick is a wax one," said Colwyn.

"And burnt more than half-way down," commented Galloway, glancing at it.

"You attach no significance to the fact that the candle is a wax one?"
questioned the detective.

"No, do you?" replied Galloway, with a puzzled glance.

Colwyn did not reply to the question. He was looking attentively at the
large wardrobe by the side of the bed.

"That's a strange place to put a wardrobe," he said. "It would be
difficult to get out of bed without barking one's shins against it."

"It was probably put there to hide the falling wall-paper,--the place is
going to rack and ruin," said Galloway, pointing to the top of the
wardrobe, where the faded wall-paper, mildewed and wet with damp, was
hanging in festoons. "Now, Queensmead, lead the way outside. I've seen
all I want to see in this room."

"Would you like to see the room where Ronald and Mr. Glenthorpe dined?"
suggested the constable. "It's on this floor, on the other side of Mr.
Glenthorpe's bedroom."

"We can see that later. I want to examine outside before it gets dark."

They left the room. The innkeeper was waiting patiently in the passage,
standing motionless at the head of the staircase, with his head
inclining forward, like a marsh heron fishing in a dyke. He hastened
towards them.

"I noticed a reading-lamp by Mr. Glenthorpe's bedside, Mr. Benson," said
Colwyn. "Did he use that as well as the gas?"

"He rarely used the gas, sir, though it was put into the room at his
request. He found the reading-lamp suited his sight better."

"Did he use candles? I saw no candlestick in the room."

"He never used candles, sir--only the reading-lamp."

"When was the gas-globe smashed? Last night?"

"It must have been, sir. Ann says it was quite all right yesterday."

"I've got my own idea how that was done," said Galloway, who had been an
attentive listener to the innkeeper's replies to Colwyn's questions.
"Show the way downstairs to the back door, Mr. Benson."

The innkeeper preceded them down the stairs and along the passage to
another one, which terminated in a latched door, which he opened.

"How was this door fastened last night?" asked Galloway.

"By this bolt at the top," said the innkeeper, pointing to it. "There is
no key--only this catch."

"Is this the only back outlet from the inn?" asked Colwyn.

"Yes, sir."

At Galloway's suggestion they first went to the side of the inn, in
order to examine the ground beneath the windows. The fence enclosing the
yard had fallen into disrepair, and had many gaps in it. There were no
footprints visible in the red clay of the natural passage-way between
the inn wall and the hill, either beneath the window of Ronald's room or
Mr. Glenthorpe's window.

"The absence of footprints means nothing," said Galloway. "Ronald may
have climbed from one room to the other in his stocking feet, and then
put on his boots to remove the body. Even if he wore his boots he might
have left no marks, if he walked lightly."

"I am not so sure of that," said Colwyn. "But what do you make of this?"

He pointed to an impression in the red earth underneath Mr. Glenthorpe's
window--a line so faint as to be barely noticeable, running outward from
the wall for about eighteen inches, with another line about the same
length running at right angles from it. Superintendent Galloway examined
these two lines closely and then shook his head as though to intimate he
could make nothing of them.

"What do you think they are?" said Mr. Cromering, turning to Colwyn.

"I think they may have been made by a box," was the reply.

"You are not suggesting that the murderer threw a box out of the
window?" exclaimed Superintendent Galloway, staring at the detective.
"Look how straight the line from the wall is! A box would have fallen
crookedly."

"I do not suggest anything of the kind. If it was a box, it is more
likely it was placed outside the window."

"For what purpose?"

"To help the murderer climb into the room."

"He didn't need it," replied Galloway. "It's an easy matter to get
through this window from the ground. I can do it myself." He placed his
hands on the sill, sprang on to the window ledge, and dropped back
again. "I attach no importance to these lines. They are so faint that
they might have been made months ago. There is nothing to be seen here,
so we may as well go and look at the footprints. Show us where the marks
of the footsteps commence, Queensmead."

The constable led the way to the other side of the house and across the
green. The grass terminated a little distance from the inn in a clay
bank bordering a wide tract of bare and sterile land, which extended
almost to the summit of the rise. Clearly defined in the clay and the
black soft earth were two sets of footprints, one going towards the
rise, and the other returning. The outgoing footsteps were deeply and
distinctly outlined from heel to toe. The right foot plainly showed the
circular mark of a rubber heel, which was missing in the other, though a
sharp indentation showed the mark of the spike to which the rubber had
been fastened.

"The footprints lead straight to the mouth of the pit where the body was
thrown," said Queensmead.

"What a clue!" exclaimed Superintendent Galloway, his eyes sparkling
with excitement. "You are quite certain the inn servant can swear that
these marks were made by Ronald's boots, Queensmead?"

"There's no doubt on that point, sir," replied the constable. "She had
the boots in her hands this morning, just before Ronald put them on, and
she distinctly noticed that there was a rubber heel on the right boot,
but not on the other."

"It seems a strange thing for a young man of Ronald's position to have
rubber heels affixed to his boots," remarked Mr. Cromering. "I was under
the impression that they were an economical device of the working
classes. But perhaps he found them useful to save his feet from
jarring."

"We shall find them useful to hang him," responded Galloway curtly. "Let
us proceed to the pit, gentlemen. May I ask you to keep clear of the
footprints? I do not want them obliterated before I can take plaster
casts."

They followed the footsteps up the rise. Near the summit they
disappeared in a growth of nettles, but reappeared on the other side,
skirting a number of bowl-shaped depressions clustered in groups along
the brow of the rise. These were the hut circles--the pit dwellings of
the early Britons, shallow excavations from six to eight feet deep, all
running into one another, and choked with a rank growth of weeds.
Between them and a little wood which covered the rest of the summit was
an open space, with a hole gaping nakedly in the bare earth.

"That's the pit where the body was thrown," said Queensmead, walking to
the brink.

The pit descended straight as a mining shaft until the sides disappeared
in the interior gloom. It was impossible to guess at its depth because
of the tangled creepers which lined its sides and obscured the view, but
Mr. Cromering, speaking from his extensive knowledge of Norfolk geology,
said it was fully thirty feet deep. He added that there was considerable
difference of opinion among antiquaries to account for its greater
depth. Some believed the pit was simply a larger specimen of the
adjoining hut circles, running into a natural underground passage which
had previously existed. But the more generally accepted theory was that
the hut circles marked the site of a prehistoric village, and the deeper
pit had been the quarry from which the Neolithic men had obtained the
flints of which they made their implements. These flints were imbedded
in the chalk a long way from the surface, and to obtain them the cave
men burrowed deeply into the clay, and then excavated horizontal
galleries into the chalk. Several of the red-deer antler picks which
they used for the purpose had been discovered when the pit was first
explored twenty-five years ago.

"Mr. Glenthorpe was very much interested in the prehistoric and late
Stone Age remains which are to be found in abundance along the Norfolk
coast," he added. "He has enriched the national museums with a valuable
collection of prehistoric man's implements and utensils, which he
recovered in various parts of Norfolk. For some time past he had been
carrying out explorations in this district in order to add to the
collection. It is sad to think that he met his death while thus
employed, and that his murdered body was thrown in the very pit which
was, as it were, the centre of his explorations and the object of his
keenest scientific curiosity."

"Did you ever see clearer footprints?" exclaimed the more
practical-minded Galloway. "Look how deep they are near the edge of the
pit, where the murderer braced himself to throw the body off his back
into the hole. See! there is a spot of blood on the edge."

It was as he had said. The footprints were clear and distinct to the
brink of the pit, but fainter as they turned away, showing that the man
who had carried the body had stepped more lightly and easily after
relieving himself of his terrible burden.

"I must take plaster casts of those prints before it rains," said
Galloway. "They are far too valuable a piece of evidence to be lost.
They form the final link in the case against Ronald."

"You regard the case as conclusive, then?" said Colwyn.

"Of course I do. It is now a simple matter to reconstruct the crime from
beginning to end. Ronald got through Mr. Glenthorpe's window last night
in the dark. As the catch has not been forced, he either found it
unlocked or opened it with a knife. After getting into the room he
walked towards the foot of the bed. He listened to make sure that Mr.
Glenthorpe was asleep, and then struck the match I picked up near the
foot of the bed, lit the candle he was carrying, put it on the table
beside the bed, and stabbed the sleeping man. Having secured the money,
he unlocked the door, carried the corpse out on his shoulder, closed the
door behind him but did not lock it, then took the body downstairs, let
himself out of the back door, carried it up here and cast it into the
pit. That's how the murder was committed."

"I agree with you that the murderer entered through the window," said
Colwyn. "But why did he do so? It strikes me as important to clear that
up. If Ronald is the murderer, why did he take the trouble to enter the
room from the outside when he slept in the next room?"

"Surely you have not forgotten that the door was locked from inside?
Benson says Mr. Glenthorpe was in the habit of locking his door and
sleeping with the key under the pillow. Ronald no doubt first tried to
enter the room by the door, but, finding it locked, climbed out of his
window, and got into the room through the other window. He dared not
break open the door for fear of disturbing the inmate or alarming the
house."

"Then how do you account for the key being found in the outside of Mr.
Glenthorpe's door this morning?"

"Quite easily. During the struggle or in the victim's death convulsions
the bed-clothes were disarranged, and Ronald saw the key beneath the
pillow. Or he may have searched for it, as he knew he would need it
before he could open the door and remove the body. It was easy for him
to climb through the window to commit the murder, but he couldn't remove
the body that way. After finding the key he unlocked the door, and put
the key in the outside, intending to lock the door and remove the key as
he left the room, so as to defer the discovery that Mr. Glenthorpe was
missing until as long after his own departure in the morning as
possible. He may have found it a difficult matter to stoop and lock the
door and withdraw the key while he was encumbered with the corpse, so
left it in the door till he returned from the pit. When he returned he
was so exhausted with carrying the body several hundred yards, mostly
uphill, that he forgot all about the key. That is my theory to account
for the key being in the outside of the door."

"It's an ingenious one, at all events," commented Colwyn. "But would
such a careful deliberate murderer overlook the key when he returned?"

"Nothing more likely," said the confident superintendent. "It's in
trifles like this that murderers give themselves away. The notorious
Deeming, who murdered several wives, and disposed of their bodies by
burying them under hearthstones and covering them with cement, would
probably never have been caught if he had not taken away with him a
canary which belonged to the last woman he murdered. It was a clue that
couldn't be missed--like the silk skein in Fair Rosamond's Bower."

"Here's another point: why did not Ronald, having disposed of the body,
disappear at once, instead of waiting for the morning?"

"Because if his room had been found empty in the morning, as well as
that of Mr. Glenthorpe's, the double disappearance would have aroused
instant suspicion and search. Ronald gauged the moment of his departure
very cleverly, in my opinion. On the one hand, he wanted to get away
before the discovery of Mr. Glenthorpe's empty bedroom; and, on the
other hand, he wished to stay at the inn long enough to suggest that he
had no reason for flight, but was merely compelled to make an early
departure. The trouble and risk he took to conceal the body outside
prove conclusively that he thought the pit a sufficiently safe
hiding-place to retard discovery of the crime for a considerable time,
and he probably thought that even when it was discovered that Mr.
Glenthorpe was missing his absence would not, at first, arouse
suspicions that he had met with foul play.

"It was not as though Mr. Glenthorpe was living at home with relatives
who would have immediately raised a hue and cry. He was a lonely old man
living in an inn amongst strangers, who were not likely to be interested
in his goings and comings. That suggests another alternative theory to
account for the key in the door: Ronald may have left it in the door to
convey the impression that Mr. Glenthorpe had gone out for an early
walk. That belief would at least gain Ronald a few hours to make good
his escape from this part of the country and get away by train before
any suspicions were aroused. The fact that none of Mr. Glenthorpe's
clothes were missing was not likely to be discovered in an inn until
suspicion was aroused. Ronald laid his plans well, but how was he to
know that in his path to the pit he walked over soil as plastic and
impressionable as wax?"

"But in spite of that you assume he knew exactly where this pit was
situated?"

"Nothing more likely. It is well-known to archaeologists. Ronald may well
have heard of it while staying at Durrington, or he may have known of
it personally through some previous visit to this part of the world. And
there is also evidence that Mr. Glenthorpe told him of the hut circles
and the pit during dinner last night."

"Just one more doubt, Superintendent. How do you account for the cracked
gas globe and the broken incandescent mantle?"

"Ronald probably knocked his head against it as he approached the bed,"
said Galloway promptly.

"Hardly. Ronald's height, according to the description, is five feet ten
inches. That happens to be also my height, and I can pass under the gas
globe without touching it."

"Then it was broken when Ronald was carrying the corpse downstairs,"
replied Galloway, after a moment's reflection. "He carried the corpse on
his shoulders and part of the body would be above his head."

"Superintendent Galloway has an answer for everything," said Colwyn with
a smile, to Mr. Cromering. "He is persuasive if not always convincing."

"The case seems clear enough to me," said the chief constable
thoughtfully. "Come, gentlemen, let us return to the inn. We have a
number of things to do, and not much time to do them in."



CHAPTER VI


The inn, seen in the grey evening of a grey day, had a stark and
sinister aspect, an atmosphere of mystery and secretiveness, an air of
solitary aloofness in the dreary marshes, standing half shrouded in the
night mists which were sluggishly crawling across the oozing flats from
the sea. It was not a place where people could be happy--this battered
abode of a past age on the edge of the North Sea, with the bitter waters
of the marshes lapping its foundations, and the cold winds for ever
wailing round its gaunt white walls.

The portion buried in the hillside, with only the tops of the windows
peering above, suggested the hidden holes and burrowing byways of a dead
and gone generation of smugglers who had used the inn in the heyday of
Norfolk's sea prosperity. It may have been a thought of the
possibilities of the inn as a hiding place which prompted Mr. Cromering
to exclaim, after gazing at it attentively for some seconds:

"We had better go through this place from the bottom."

As they approached the inn a stout short man, who was looking out from
the low and narrow doorway, retreated into the interior, and immediately
afterwards the long figure of the innkeeper emerged as though he had
been awaiting the return of the party, and had posted somebody to watch
for them.

The innkeeper showed no surprise on receiving Mr. Cromering's
instruction to show them over the inn. Walking before them he led them
along a side passage opposite the bar, opening doors as he went, and
drawing aside for them to enter and look at the rooms thus revealed.

It was a strange rambling old place inside, full of nooks and crannies,
and unexpected odd corners and apertures, short galleries and stone
passages winding everywhere and leading nowhere; the downstairs rooms on
different levels, with stone steps into them, and queer slits of windows
pierced high up in the thick walls. On the ground floor a central
passage divided the inn into two portions. On the one side were several
rooms, some empty and destitute of furniture, others barely furnished
and empty, and a big gloomy kitchen in which a stout countrywoman, who
shook and bobbed at the sight of the visitors, was washing greens at a
dirty deal table. Off the kitchen were two small rooms, poorly furnished
as servants' bedrooms, and the windows of these looked out on the
marshes at the back of the house. On the other side of the centre
passage was the bar, which was subterranean at the far end, with the
cellar adjoining tunnelled into the hillside. In the recesses of the
cellar the short stout man they had seen at the doorway was, by the
light of a tallow candle, affixing a spigot to one of the barrels which
stood against the earthen wall. Behind the bar was a small bar parlour,
and behind that two more rooms, the house on that side finishing in a
low and narrow gallery running parallel with the outside wall.

The staircase upstairs opened into a stone passage, running from the
front of the inn to the back. On the left-hand side of the passage,
going from the head of the stairs to the back of the house, were four
rooms. The first was a small, comfortably furnished sitting room, where
Mr. Glenthorpe and his guest had dined the previous night. The bed
chamber of the murdered man adjoined this room. Next came the room in
which Ronald had slept, and then an empty lumber room. There were four
bedrooms on the other side, all unfurnished, except one at the far end
of the passage, the lumber-room. The innkeeper explained that the
murdered man had been the sole occupant of that wing of the house until
the previous night, when Mr. Ronald had occupied the room next to him.
At this end of the passage another and narrower passage ran at right
angles from it along the back of the house, with several rooms opening
off it on one side only. The first of these rooms was empty; the next
room contained a small iron bedstead, a chair, and a table, and the
innkeeper said that it was his bedroom. At the next door he paused, and
turning to Mr. Cromering hesitatingly remarked:

"This is my mother's room, sir. She is an invalid."

"We will not disturb your mother, we will merely glance into the room,"
said the kindly chief constable.

"It is not that, sir. She is----" He broke off abruptly, and knocked at
the door.

After a few moments' pause there was the sound of somebody within
turning a key in the lock, then the door was opened by a young girl,
who, at the sight of the visitors, walked hurriedly across to a bedstead
at the far end of the room, on which something grey was moving, and
stood in front of it as though she would guard the occupant of the bed
from the intruding eyes of strangers.

"It's all right, Peggy," said the innkeeper. "We shall not be here long.
My daughter is afraid you will disturb her grandmother," he said turning
to the gentlemen. "My mother is----" A motion of his finger towards his
forehead completed the sentence more significantly than words.

The figure on the bed in the corner was in the shadow, but they could
make it out to be that of an old and shrivelled woman in a grey flannel
nightdress, who was sitting up in bed, swinging backward and forward,
holding some object in her arms, clasped tightly to her breast, while
her small dark eyes, deepset under furrowed brows, gazed at the visitors
with the unmeaning stare of an animal.

But Colwyn's eyes were drawn to the girl at the bedside. She was
beautiful, of a type sufficiently rare to attract attention anywhere.
Her delicate profile and dainty grace shone in the shadow of the sordid
room like an exquisite picture. He was aware of a skin of transparent
whiteness, a wistful sensitive mouth, a pair of wonderful eyes with the
green-grey colour of the sea in their depths, and a crown of red-gold
hair. She was poorly, almost shabbily, dressed, but the crude cheap
garbing of a country dressmaker was unable to mar the graceful outlines
of her slim young figure. But it was the impassivity of the face and
detachment of attitude which chained Colwyn's attention and stimulated
his intellectual curiosity. The human face is usually an index to the
owner's character, but this girl's face was a mask which revealed
nothing. The features might have been marble for anything they
displayed, as she stood by the bedside regarding with grave inscrutable
eyes the group of men in the doorway. There was something pathetic in
the contrast between her grace and beauty and stillness and the uncouth
gestures and meaningless stare of the old woman in the bed behind her.

The old woman, moving from side to side with the unhappy restlessness
which characterises the insane, dropped over the side of the bed the
object she had been nursing in her arms, and looked at the girl with the
dumb entreaty of an animal. The girl stooped down by the side of the
bed, picked up the fallen article, and restored it to the mad woman. It
was a doll.

Mr. Cromering, who saw the action and the article, flushed like a man
who had seen something which should be kept secret, and turned to leave
the room. The others followed, and immediately afterwards they heard the
door closed after them, and the key turned in the lock.

Superintendent Galloway, who had more of the inquiring turn of mind of
the police official than the chief constable, asked the innkeeper
several questions about his mother and her condition. The innkeeper said
her insanity was the outcome of an accident which had happened two years
before. She was sitting dozing by the kitchen fire when a large boiler
of water overturned, scalding her terribly, and the shock and pain had
sent her mad. She had never left the bedroom since, and had gradually
become reduced to a condition of imbecility, alternated by occasional
outbursts of violence.

"Is she ever allowed out of the room?" asked Superintendent Galloway
quickly, as though a sudden thought had struck him.

"Never, sir; she never tries to get out of bed except when she's
violent. She will sit there for hours, playing with a doll, but when she
has her paroxysms she runs round and round the room, crying out as you
heard her just now, and throwing the things about. Did you notice, sir,
that there was no glassware in the room? She has tried to injure herself
with glass and crockery in her violent fits."

"How often does she have paroxysms of violent madness?" asked the chief
constable.

"Not often, sir; usually about the turn of the moon, or when there is a
gale at sea."

"There was a gale at sea last night," said Colwyn. "Did your mother have
an attack then?"

"Peggy said when she came downstairs last night she thought there were
signs of an attack coming on, but when I looked in on Mother as I was
going to bed, shortly before eleven, she seemed quiet enough, so I
locked her door and went to bed."

"Do you mean to say that you leave this poor mad woman in her bedroom
all night alone?" asked the chief constable.

"It's the best thing to be done, sir," replied the innkeeper, with an
apologetic air. "We tried having somebody to sleep with her, but it only
made her worse, and the doctor who saw her last year said it wasn't
necessary. Peggy is with her a lot in the daytime, and often until she
goes to bed. So she's really not left alone very much, because Ann goes
into her room as soon as she gets up in the morning--about six o'clock."

"And is your mother always secured in her room--is the door always
locked?" asked Superintendent Galloway.

"Yes, sir: the door is always locked inside or outside, and when I go to
bed at night I take the key into my room and hang it on a nail. Ann
comes in and gets it in the morning."

"You did that last night, as usual?"

"Yes, sir. Mother was quiet--just as you saw her now. She is quiet most
of the time."

"God help her, poor soul!" exclaimed the chief constable. "Where does
this passage lead to, Benson?" he asked, as if to change the
conversation, pointing to a gloomy gallery running off the passage in
which they were standing.

"It leads to two rooms looking out over the end of the inn, sir,"
replied the innkeeper. "They are the only two rooms you haven't seen."

"Who occupies this room?" asked Superintendent Galloway, opening the
door of the first, and disclosing a small, plainly furnished bedroom.

"My daughter, sir."

"The next one is empty and unfurnished, like many of the others,"
observed the chief constable. "This place seems too big for you, Benson.
Were all these rooms destitute of furniture when you took over the inn?"

"Not all, sir, but the inn being too big for me I sold the furniture for
what it would fetch. It was no use to me."

"Why don't you take a smaller place?" asked Superintendent Galloway,
abruptly. "You'll never do any good on this part of the coast--it's
played out, and there's no population."

"I'm well aware of that, sir, but it's difficult for a man like me to
make a shift once he gets into a place. There's Mother for one thing."

"She ought to be placed in a lunatic asylum," said the superintendent,
looking sternly at the innkeeper.

"It's a hard thing, sir, to put your own mother away. Besides, begging
your pardon, she's hardly bad enough for a lunatic asylum."

"Let us go downstairs, Galloway, if we have seen the whole of the inn,"
said the chief constable, breaking into this colloquy. "Time is really
getting on."

They went downstairs again to the small room they had been shown into
when they first entered the inn, Mr. Cromering after despatching the
innkeeper for refreshments for the party glanced once more at his watch,
and remarked to Colwyn that he was afraid he would have to ask him to
drive him in his car back to Durrington without delay.

"Galloway will stay here for the inquest to-morrow," he added. "But I
must get back to Norwich to-night."

"It is not necessary to go back to Durrington, to get to Norwich," said
Colwyn; "there's a train passes through Heathfield on the branch line,
at 5.40." He consulted his own watch as he spoke. "It's now just four
o'clock. Heathfield cannot be more than six miles away across country. I
can run you over there in twenty minutes. That would give you an hour or
so more here. I am speaking for myself as well as you," he added, with a
smile. "I should like to know a little more about this case."

"But I shall be taking you out of your way, and delaying the return of
you and Sir Henry to Durrington."

"I should like to return here and stay until after the inquest. Perhaps
Sir Henry would not mind returning to Durrington from Heathfield. He
will be able to catch the Durrington train at Cottenden, and get back to
his hotel in time for dinner. Would you mind, Sir Henry?"

"Not in the least," replied Sir Henry politely.

"Then I think I might stay a little longer," said the chief constable.
"What's the road like to Heathfield, Galloway? You know something about
this part of the country."

"Very bad," replied the superintendent uncompromisingly, who had his own
reasons for wanting to get rid of his superior officer and the
detective.

"It will be all right in daylight, and I'll risk it coming back," said
the detective cheerfully.

He spoke with the resolute air of one used to making prompt decisions,
and Mr. Cromering yielded with the feeble smile of a man who was rather
glad to be released of the task of making up his own mind. The entrance
of the innkeeper with refreshments put an end to the discussion. He
thrust upon the police officials present the responsibility of breaking
the licensed hours in which liquor might be drunk in war time by serving
them with sherry, old brandy, and biscuits.

The chief constable made himself a party to this breach of the law by
helping himself to a glass of sherry. The wine was excellent and dry,
and he poured himself out another. The result of this stimulant was
directly apparent in the firm tones with which he announced his
intention of examining those inmates of the inn who could throw any
light on the murder of the previous night. He directed Superintendent
Galloway to sit beside him and take notes of the information thus
elicited for the use of the coroner the following day.

"I think it would be as well to begin with the story of the innkeeper,"
he added. "Please pull that bell-rope, Galloway."



CHAPTER VII


The innkeeper answered the bell in person, and was ordered by the chief
constable to take a seat and tell everything he knew about the previous
night's events, without equivocation or reserve. He took a chair at the
table, his bright bird's glance wandering from one to the other of the
faces opposite him as he smoothed with one claw-like hand the thatch of
iron-grey hair which hung down over his forehead almost to his eyes.

"Where shall I begin?" he asked.

"You had better start by telling us how this young man Ronald came to
your house yesterday afternoon, and then give us an account of the
subsequent events, so far as you know them," said the chief constable.

"I was down near the breakwater yesterday evening, setting some
eel-lines in the canal, when he arrived," commenced the innkeeper. "When
I came in, Charles--that's the waiter--told me there was a young
gentleman in the bar parlour waiting to see me. I went into the parlour,
and saw the young man sitting near the door. He looked very tired and
weary, and said he wished to stay at the inn for the night."

"How was he dressed?" asked Superintendent Galloway, looking up from his
note-book.

"In a grey Norfolk suit, with knickerbockers, and a soft felt hat."

"Had you ever seen him before?"

"No, sir. He was a complete stranger to me. I could see he was a
gentleman. I told him I could not take him in, as the inn was only a
poor rough place, with no accommodation for gentlefolk at the best of
times, let alone war-time. The young gentleman said he was very tired
and would sleep anywhere, and was not particular about food. He told me
he had lost his way on the marshes, and a fisherman had directed him to
the inn."

"Did he say where he had come from?" asked the chief constable.

"No, sir, and I didn't think to ask him. I might have done so, but Mr.
Glenthorpe walked into the parlour just then, carrying some partridges
in his hand. He didn't see the young gentleman at first--he was sitting
in the corner behind the door--but told me to have one of the partridges
cooked for his dinner. They had just been given to him, he said, by the
farmer whose land he was going to excavate next week. As he turned to go
out he saw the young gentleman sitting in the corner, and he said, in
his hearty way: 'Good evening, sir; it is not often that we have any
society in these parts.' The young gentleman told him what he had told
me--how he had wandered away from Durrington and got lost, and had come
to the inn in the hopes of getting a bed for the night. 'Glad to see a
civilised human being in these parts,' said Mr. Glenthorpe. 'I hope
you'll give me the pleasure of your company at dinner. Benson, tell Ann
to cook another partridge.' 'I don't know whether the innkeeper will
allow me that pleasure,' replied the young gentleman. 'He says he cannot
put me up for the night.' 'Of course he'll put you up,' said Mr.
Glenthorpe. 'Not even a Norfolk innkeeper would turn you out on to the
North Sea marshes at this time of year.' That settled the question,
because I couldn't afford to offend Mr. Glenthorpe, and besides, his
providing the dinner helped me out of a difficulty. So I went out to
give orders about the dinner, leaving Mr. Glenthorpe and him sitting
together talking."

"Did you get him to fill in a registration form?" asked Superintendent
Galloway.

"I forgot to ask him, sir," replied the innkeeper.

"That is gross and inexcusable carelessness on your part, Benson," said
Galloway sternly. "I shall have to report it."

"I do not understand much about these things, sir," replied the
innkeeper apologetically. "It is so rarely that we have a visitor to the
place."

"The authorities will hold you responsible. You are supposed to know the
law, and help to carry it out. What's the use of devising regulations
for the security of the country if they are not carried out? You
innkeepers and hotel-keepers are really very careless. Go on with your
story, Benson."

"He and Mr. Glenthorpe had dinner together in the little upstairs
sitting room which Mr. Glenthorpe kept for his own private use. He did
his writing in it, and the flints and fossils he discovered in his
excavations were stored in the cupboards. His meals were always taken up
there, and last night he ordered the dinner to be taken up there as
usual, and the table to be laid for two. Charles waited at table, but I
was up there twice--first time with some sherry, and the second time was
about an hour afterwards, when the gentlemen had finished dinner. I took
up a bottle of some old brandy that the inn used to be famous for--it's
the same that you gentlemen have been drinking. When I knocked at the
door with the brandy it was Mr. Glenthorpe who called 'Come in!' He was
standing in front of the fire, with a fossil in his hand, and he was
telling the young man about how he came to discover it. I put the
brandy on the table and left the room.

"That was the last time I saw him alive. Charles came down with the
dinner things about half-past nine, and said he was not wanted upstairs
any more. Charles went to bed shortly afterwards--he sleeps in one of
the two rooms off the kitchen. I went to my own bedroom before ten,
after first telling Ann, the servant, who was doing some ironing in the
kitchen, to turn off the gas at the meter if the gentlemen retired
before she finished, but not to bother if they were still sitting up. It
had been decided that the young gentleman should occupy the bedroom next
to Mr. Glenthorpe, and Ann was a bit late with her ordinary work because
it had taken her some time to get his room ready. The room had not been
occupied for some time, and she'd had to air the bed-clothes and make
the bed afresh.

"The next morning I was a bit late getting down--there's nothing to open
the inn for in the mornings--and Ann told me as soon as I got down that
the young gentleman had left nearly an hour before. She had taken him up
an early cup of tea at seven o'clock, and he opened the door to her
knock, and took it from her. He was fully dressed, except for his boots,
which he had in his hand, and he asked her to clean them, as he wanted
to leave at once. She was walking away with the boots, when he called
her back and took them from her, saying that it didn't matter about
cleaning them, as he was in a hurry. When she gave him the boots he put
a note into her hand, and said that was to pay for his bill.

"It was the key in the outside of Mr. Glenthorpe's room which led to us
finding out that he was not in the room. As I told you upstairs, sir, he
used to always lock his door when he went to bed and put the key under
the pillow. Ann noticed the key in the outside of the door when she
went up with his breakfast tray--he never took early morning tea but he
always breakfasted in his room. That would be about eight o'clock. She
thought it strange to see the key in the door, and as she could get no
answer to her knock she tried the door, found it unlocked and the room
empty. She came downstairs and told me. I thought at first that Mr.
Glenthorpe might have got up early to go and look at his excavations,
but I went up to his room and saw the signs of a struggle and
blood-stains on the bed-clothes, and I knew that something must have
happened to him. I went into the village and told Constable Queensmead.
He came to the inn, and made a search inside and outside and found the
footprints leading to the pit on the rise. One of Mr. Glenthorpe's men
who had been down the pit for flints was lowered by a rope, and brought
up the body."

The innkeeper took a leather wallet from his pocket and produced from it
a Treasury L1 note. "This is the note the young gentleman left behind
with Ann to pay his bill," he explained, pushing it across the table to
the chief constable.

"I would draw your attention, sir, to the fact that this Treasury note
is one of the first issue--printed in black on white paper," remarked
Superintendent Galloway to his superior officer. "Constable Queensmead
has ascertained that the L300 which Mr. Glenthorpe drew out of the bank
yesterday was all in L1 notes of the first issue. That money is missing
from the dead man's effects."

The chief constable looked thoughtfully at the note through his glasses,
and then passed it to Colwyn, who examined it closely, and took a note
of the number, and held it up to the light to see the watermark.

"Did you or the servant find any weapon in Mr. Glenthorpe's room?" asked
the chief constable.

"No, sir."

"You have missed a knife though, have you not?" asked Superintendent
Galloway.

"Yes, sir."

"What sort of a knife?"

"A table-knife."

"Was it one of the knives sent up to the sitting-room last night?"

"Yes, sir. At least Charles says so. He has charge of the cutlery."

"Then Charles had better tell us about it," interposed the chief
constable. "You say you went to bed before ten o'clock, Benson. Did you
hear anything in the night?"

"No, sir, I fell asleep almost immediately. My room is a good distance
from Mr. Glenthorpe's room."

"I do not think we have any more questions to ask you, Benson."

"Pardon the curiosity of a medical man, Mr. Cromering," remarked Sir
Henry, "but would it be possible to ask the innkeeper whether he noticed
anything peculiar about Mr. Ronald's demeanour, when he arrived at the
inn, or when he saw him at dinner subsequently?"

"You hear that question, Benson?" said the chief constable. "Did you
notice anything strange about Mr. Ronald's conduct when first he came to
the inn or at any time?"

"I cannot say I did, sir. I thought he looked very tired when he first
came into the inn, and his eyes were heavy as though with want of
sleep."

"He seemed quite sane and rational?"

"Quite, sir."

"Did you notice any symptoms of mental disturbance or irritability about
him at any time?" struck in Sir Henry Durwood.

"No, sir. He was a little bit angry at first when I said I couldn't take
him in, but he struck me as quite cool and collected."

Sir Henry looked a little disappointed at this reply. He asked no more
questions, but entered a note in a small note-book which he took from
his waistcoat pocket. Mr. Cromering intimated to the innkeeper that he
had finished questioning him, and would like to examine the waiter,
Charles.

"If you wouldn't mind pulling the bell-rope behind you, sir," hinted the
innkeeper.

In response to a pull at the old-fashioned bell-rope, the stout country
servant, who had been washing greens in the kitchen, entered the room.

"Where is Charles, Ann?" asked the innkeeper.

"He's in the kitchen," replied the woman nervously.

"Then tell him he is wanted here immediately."

"You run your inn in a queer sort of way, Benson," remarked
Superintendent Galloway, in his loud voice, as the woman went away on
her errand. "Why couldn't Charles have answered the bell himself, if he
is in the kitchen? What does he wait on, if not the bar parlour?"

"Charles is stone deaf, sir," replied the innkeeper.



CHAPTER VIII


The man who entered the room was of sufficiently remarkable appearance
to have attracted attention anywhere. He was short, but so fat that he
looked less than his actual height, which was barely five feet. His
ponderous head, which was covered with short stiff black hair, like a
brush, seemed to merge into his body without any neck, and two black
eyes glittered like diamond points in the white expanse of his hairless
face. As he advanced towards the table these eyes roved quickly from one
to the other of the faces on the other side of the table. He was in
every way a remarkable contrast to his employer, and a painter in search
of a subject might have been tempted to take the pair as models for a
picture of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.

"Take that chair and answer my questions," said Mr. Cromering,
addressing the waiter in a very loud voice. "Oh, I forgot," he added, to
the innkeeper. "How do you manage to communicate with him if he is stone
deaf?"

"Quite easily, sir. Charles understands the lip language--he reads your
lips while you speak. It is not even necessary to raise your voice, so
long as you pronounce each word distinctly."

"Sit down, Charles--do you understand me?" said the chief constable
doubtfully. By way of helping the waiter to comprehend he pointed to the
chair the innkeeper had vacated.

The waiter crossed the room and took the chair. Like so many fat men,
his movements were quick, agile, and noiseless, but as he came forward
it was noticeable that his right arm was deformed, and much shorter than
the other.

The chief constable eyed the strange figure before him in some
perplexity, and the fat white-faced deaf man confronted him stolidly,
with his black twinkling eyes fixed on his face. His gaze, which was
directed to the mouth and did not reach the eyes, was so disconcerting
to Mr. Cromering that he cleared his throat with several nervous "hems"
before commencing his examination:

"Your name is----?"

"Charles Lynn, sir."

The reply was delivered in a whispered voice, the not infrequent result
of prolonged deafness, complete isolation from the rest of humanity
causing the gradual loss of sound values in the afflicted person; but
the whisper, coming from such a mountain of flesh, conveyed the
impression that the speaker's voice was half-strangled in layers of fat,
and with difficulty gasped a way to the air. Mr. Cromering looked hard
at the waiter as though suspecting him of some trick, but Charles' eyes
were fixed on the mouth of his interrogator, awaiting his next question.

"I understand that you waited on the two gentlemen in the upstairs
sitting-room last night"--Mr. Cromering still spoke in such an
unnecessarily loud voice that he grew red in the face with the
exertion--"the gentleman who was murdered, and the young man Ronald, who
came to the inn last night. Do you understand me?"

"Yes, sir. I waited on the gentlemen, sir."

"Very well. I want you to tell us all that took place between these
gentlemen while you were in the room. You were there all through the
dinner, I suppose?"

"Yes, sir, but I didn't follow all of the conversation because of my
infirmity." He touched his ears as he spoke. "I gathered some remarks of
Mr. Glenthorpe's, because he told me to stand opposite him and watch his
lips for orders, but I didn't get much of what the young gentleman said,
because I was standing behind his chair most of the time so as to see
Mr. Glenthorpe's lips better."

"Well, tell us all you did gather of the conversation, and everything
you saw."

"I beg your pardon, sir"--the interruption came from Superintendent
Galloway--"but would it not be advisable to get from the waiter first
something of what passed between him and Ronald when Ronald came to the
inn last night? The waiter was the first to see him, Benson says."

"Quite right. I had forgotten. Tell us, Charles, what passed when Ronald
first came to the inn in the afternoon."

"It was between five and six o'clock, sir, when the young gentleman came
to the front door and asked for the landlord. I told him he was out, but
would be back shortly. The young gentleman said he was very tired, as he
had walked a long distance and lost his way in the marshes, and would I
show him into a private room and send him some refreshments. I took him
into the bar parlour--this room, sir--and brought him refreshments. He
seemed very tired--hardly able to lift one leg after the other."

"Did he look ill--or strange?"

"I didn't notice anything strange about him, sir, but he dropped into a
chair as though he was exhausted, and told me to send the landlord to
him as soon as he came in. I left him sitting there, and when Mr. Benson
returned I told him, and he went in to him. I didn't see the young
gentleman again until I waited on him and Mr. Glenthorpe at dinner in
the upstairs sitting-room."

"Very good. Tell us what happened there."

"I laid the ta