CHAPTER XXXVII
THE DARK POOL
As I went into that house with the rest of them, I had two suddenimpressions. One was that here at my side, in the person of Mr. GavinSmeaton, was, in all probability, its real owner, the real holder of theancient title, who was coming to his lawful rights in this strangefashion. The other was of the contrast between my own coming at thatmoment and the visit which I had paid there, only a few eveningspreviously, when Hollins had regarded me with some disfavour and theusurper had been so friendly. Now Hollins was lying dead in the old ruin,and the other man was a fugitive--and where was he?
Murray had brought us there to do something towards settling that point,and he began his work at once by assembling every Jack and Jill in thehouse and, with the help of the London detective, subjecting them to asearching examination as to the recent doings of their master andmistress and the butler. But Mr. Lindsey motioned Mr. Elphinstone, andMr. Gavin Smeaton, and myself into a side-room and shut the door on us.
"We can leave the police to do their own work," he remarked, motioningus to be seated at a convenient table. "My impression is that they'llfind little out from the servants. And while that's afoot, I'd like tohave that promised story of yours, Mr. Elphinstone--I only got an idea ofit, you know, when you and Murray came to my house. And these two wouldlike to hear it--one of them, at any rate, is more interested in thisaffair than you'd think or than he knew of himself until recently."
Now that we were in a properly lighted room, I took a more careful lookat the former steward of Hathercleugh. He was a well-preserved,shrewd-looking man of between sixty and seventy: quiet and observant, thesort of man that you could see would think a lot without saying much. Hesmiled a little as he put his hands together on the table and glanced atour expectant faces--it was just the smile of a man who knows what he istalking about.
"Aye, well, Mr. Lindsey," he responded, "maybe there's not so muchmystery in this affair as there seems to be once you've got at an idea.I'll tell you how I got at mine and what's come of it. Of course, you'llnot know, for I think you didn't come to Berwick yourself until after I'dleft the neighbourhood--but I was connected with the Hathercleugh estatefrom the time I was a lad until fifteen years ago, when I gave up thesteward's job and went to live on a bit of property of my own, nearAlnwick. Of course, I knew the two sons--Michael and Gilbert; and Iremember well enough when, owing to perpetual quarrelling with theirfather, he gave them both a good lot of money and they went theirseveral ways. And after that, neither ever came back that I heard of, nordid I ever come across either, except on one occasion--to which I'llrefer in due course. In time, as I've just said, I retired; in time, too,Sir Alexander died, and I heard that, Mr. Michael being dead in the WestIndies, Sir Gilbert had come into the title and estates. I did think,once or twice, of coming over to see him; but the older a man gets, thefonder he is of his own fireside--and I didn't come here, nor did I everhear much of him; he certainly made no attempt to see me. And so we cometo the beginning of what we'll call the present crisis. That beginningcame with the man who turned up in Berwick this spring."
"You mean Gilverthwaite?" asked Mr. Lindsey.
"Aye--but I didn't know him by that name!" assented Mr. Elphinstone, witha sly smile. "I didn't know him by any name. What I know is this. It musthave been about a week--certainly not more--before Gilverthwaite's deaththat he--I'm sure of his identity, because of his description--called onme at my house, and with a good deal of hinting and such-like told methat he was a private inquiry agent, and could I tell him something aboutthe late Michael Carstairs?--and that, it turned out, was: Did I know ifMichael was married before he left England, and if so, where, and towhom? Of course, I knew nothing about it, and as the man wouldn't give methe least information I packed him off pretty sharply. And the next thingI heard was of the murder of John Phillips. I didn't connect that withthe visit of the mysterious man at first; but of course I read theaccount of the inquest, and Mr. Ridley's evidence, and then I began tosee there was some strange business going on, though I couldn't evenguess at what it could be. And I did nothing, and said nothing--thereseemed nothing, then, that I could do or say, though I meant to comeforward later--until I saw the affair of Crone in the newspapers, and Iknew then that there was more in the matter than was on the surface. So,when I learnt that a man named Carter had been arrested on the charge ofmurdering Crone, I came to Berwick, and went to the court to hear whatwas said when Carter was put before the magistrates. I got a quiet seatin the court--and maybe you didn't see me."
"I did!" I exclaimed. "I remember you perfectly, Mr. Elphinstone."
"Aye!" he said with an amused smile. "You're the lad that's had hisfinger in the pie pretty deep--you're well out of it, my man! Well--thereI was, and a man sitting by me that knew everybody, and before ever thecase was called this man pointed out Sir Gilbert Carstairs coming in andbeing given a seat on the bench. And I knew that there was a fine to-do,and perhaps nobody but myself knowing of it, for the man pointed out tome was no Sir Gilbert Carstairs, nor any Carstairs at all--not he! But--Iknew him!"
"You knew him!" exclaimed Mr. Lindsey. "Man!--that's the first direct bitof real illumination we've had! And--who is he, then, Mr. Elphinstone?"
"Take your time!" answered Mr. Elphinstone. "We'll have to go back a bit:you'll put the police court out of your mind a while. It's about--Iforget rightly how long since, but it was just after I gave up thestewardship that I had occasion to go up to London on business of my own.And there, one morning, as I was sauntering down the lower end of RegentStreet, I met Gilbert Carstairs, whom I'd never seen since he left home.He'd his arm in mine in a minute, and he would have me go with him to hisrooms in Jermyn Street, close by--there was no denying him. I went, andfound his rooms full of trunks, and cases, and the like--he and a friendof his, he said, were just off on a sort of hunting-exploration trip tosome part of Central America; I don't know what they weren't going to do,but it was to be a big affair, and they were to come back loaded up withnatural-history specimens and to make a pile of money out of the venture,too. And he was telling me all about it in his eager, excitable way whenthe other man came in, and I was introduced to him. And, gentlemen,that's the man I saw--under the name of Sir Gilbert Carstairs--on thebench at Berwick only the other day! He's changed, of course--more than Ishould have thought he would have done in fifteen years, for that's aboutthe time since I saw him and Gilbert together there in JermynStreet,--but I knew him as soon as I clapped eyes on him, and whateverdoubt I had went as soon as I saw him lift his right hand to hismoustache, for there are two fingers missing on that hand--the middleones--and I remembered that fact about the man Gilbert Carstairs hadintroduced to me. I knew, I tell you, as I sat in that court, that thefellow there on the bench, listening, was an impostor!"
We were all bending forward across the table, listeningeagerly--and there was a question in all our thoughts, which Mr.Lindsey put into words.
"The man's name?"
"It was given to me, in Jermyn Street that morning, as Meekin--Dr.Meekin," answered Mr. Elphinstone. "Gilbert Carstairs, as you're aware,was a medical man himself--he'd qualified, anyway--and this was a friendof his. But that was all I gathered then--they were both up to the eyesin their preparations, for they were off for Southampton that night,and I left them to it--and, of course, never heard of them again. Butnow to come back to the police court the other day: I tell you, Iwas--purposely--in a quiet corner, and there I kept till the case wasover; but just when everybody was getting away, the man on the benchcaught sight of me--"
"Ah!" exclaimed Mr. Lindsey, looking across at me. "Ah! that's anotherreason--that supplements the ice-ax one! Aye!--he caught sight of you,Mr. Elphinstone--"
"And," continued Mr. Elphinstone, "I saw a queer, puzzled look come intohis face. He looked again--looked hard. I took no notice of his look,though I continued to watch him, and presently he turned away and wentout. But I knew he had recognized me as a man he had seen somewhere. Nowremember, when Gi
lbert Carstairs introduced me to this man, Gilbert didnot mention any connection of mine with Hathercleugh--he merely spokeof me as an old friend; so Meekin, when he came into these parts, wouldhave no idea of finding me here. But I saw he was afraid--badlyafraid--because of his recognition and doubt about me. And the nextquestion was--what was I to do? I'm not the man to do things in haste,and I could see this was a black, deep business, with maybe two murdersin it. I went off and got my lunch--and thought. At the end of it, ratherthan go to the police, I went to your office, Mr. Lindsey. And youroffice was locked up, and you were all away for the day. And then an ideastruck me: I have a relative--the man outside with Murray--who's ahigh-placed officer in the Criminal Investigation Department at NewScotland Yard--I would go to him. So--I went straight off to London bythe very next South express. Why? To see if he could trace anything aboutthis Meekin."
"Aye!" nodded Mr. Lindsey admiringly. "You were in the right of it,there--that was a good notion. And--you did?"
"Not since the Jermyn Street affair," answered Mr. Elphinstone. "Wetraced him in the medical register all right up to that point. His nameis Francis Meekin--he's various medical letters to it. He was in one ofthe London hospitals with Gilbert Carstairs--he shared those rooms inJermyn Street with Gilbert Carstairs. We found--easily--a man who'dbeen their valet, and who remembered their setting off on the huntingexpedition. They never came back--to Jermyn Street, anyway. Nothing wasever heard or seen of them in their old haunts about that quarter fromthat time. And when we'd found all that out, we came straight down,last evening, to the police--and that's all, Mr. Lindsey. And, ofcourse, the thing is plain to me--Gilbert probably died while in thisman's company; this man possessed himself of his letters and papers andso on; and in time, hearing how things were, and when the chance came,he presented himself to the family solicitors as Gilbert Carstairs.Could anything be plainer?"
"Nothing!" exclaimed Mr. Lindsey. "It's a sure case--and simple when yousee it in the light of your knowledge; a case of common personation. ButI'm wondering what the connection between the Gilverthwaite and Phillipsaffair and this Meekin has been--if we could get at it?"
"Shall I give you my theory?" suggested Mr. Elphinstone. "Of course, I'veread all there's been in the newspapers, and Murray told me a lot lastnight before we came to you, and you mentioned Mr. Ridley'sdiscovery,--well, then, I've no doubt whatever that this young gentlemanis Michael Carstairs' son, and therefore the real owner of the title andestates! And I'll tell you how I explain the whole thing. MichaelCarstairs, as I remember him--and I saw plenty of him as a lad and ayoung man--was what you'd call violently radical in his ideas. He was aqueer, eccentric, dour chap in some ways--kindly enough in others. He'd amost extraordinary objection to titles, for one thing; another, hethought that, given a chance, every man ought to make himself. Now, myopinion is that when he secretly married a girl who was much below him instation, he went off to America, intending to put his principles inpractice. He evidently wanted his son to owe nothing to his birth; andthough he certainly made ample and generous provision for him, and gavehim a fine start, he wanted him to make his own life and fortune. Thataccounts for Mr. Gavin Smeaton's bringing-up. But now as regards thesecret. Michael Carstairs was evidently a rolling stone who came upagainst some queer characters--Gilverthwaite was one, Phillips--whoeverhe may have been--another. It's very evident, from what I've heard fromyou, that the three men were associates at one time. And it may be--it'sprobably the case--that in some moment of confidence, Michael let out hissecret to these two, and that when he was dead they decided to make moreinquiries into it--possibly to blackmail the man who had stepped in, andwhom they most likely believed to be the genuine Sir Gilbert Carstairs.Put it this way: once they'd found the documentary evidence they wanted,the particulars of Michael's marriage, and so on, what had they to do butgo to Sir Gilbert--as they thought him to be--and put it to him that, ifhe didn't square them to keep silence, they'd reveal the truth to hisnephew, whom, it's evident, they'd already got to know of as Mr. GavinSmeaton. But as regards the actual murder of Phillips--ah, that's amystery that, in my opinion, is not like to be solved! The probability isthat a meeting had been arranged with Sir Gilbert--which means, ofcourse, Meekin--that night, and that Phillips was killed by him. As toCrone--it's my opinion that Crone's murder came out of Crone's own greedand foolishness; he probably caught Meekin unawares, told what he knew,and paid the penalty."
"There's another possible theory about the Phillips murder," remarked Mr.Gavin Smeaton. "According to what you know, Mr. Elphinstone, this Meekinis a man who has travelled much abroad--so had Phillips. How do we knowthat when Meekin and Phillips met that night, Meekin wasn't recognized byPhillips as Meekin--and that Meekin accordingly had a double incentive tokill him?"
"Good!" exclaimed Mr. Lindsey. "Capital theory!--and probably the rightone. But," he continued, rising and making for the door, "all thetheories in the world won't help us to lay hands on Meekin, and I'm goingto see if Murray has made out anything from his search and hisquestioning."
Murray had made out nothing. There was nothing whatever in the privaterooms of the supposed Sir Gilbert Carstairs and his wife to suggest anyclue to their whereabouts: the servants could tell nothing of theirmovements beyond what the police already knew. Sir Gilbert had never beenseen by any of them since the morning on which he went into Berwick tohear the case against Carter: Lady Carstairs had not been seen since herdeparture from the house secretly, two mornings later. Not one of all themany servants, men or women, could tell anything of their master ormistress, nor of any suspicious doings on the part of Hollins during thepast two days, except that he had been away from the house a good deal.Whatever share the butler had taken in these recent events, he had playedhis part skilfully.
So--as it seemed--there was nothing for it but to look further away, theimpression of the police being that Meekin had escaped in one directionand his wife in another, and that it had been their plan that Hollinsshould foregather with them somewhere on the Continent; and presently weall left Hathercleugh House to go back to Berwick. As we crossed thethreshold, Mr. Lindsey turned to Mr. Gavin Smeaton with a shrewd smile.
"The next time you step across here, sir, it'll be as Sir GavinCarstairs!" he said. "And we'll hope that'll not long be delayed!"
"I'm afraid there's a good deal to do before you'll be seeing that, Mr.Lindsey," answered the prospective owner. "We're not out of the wood yet,you know."
We certainly were not out of the wood--so far as I was concerned, thoselast words might have been prophetic, as, a little later, I was inclinedto think Maisie's had been before she went off in the car. The rest ofthem, Mr. Lindsey and his group, Murray and his, had driven up fromBerwick in the first conveyances they could get at that time of night,and they now went off to where they had been waiting in a neighbouringshed. They wanted me to go with them--but I was anxious about my bicycle,a nearly new machine. I had stowed it away as securely as I could undersome thick undergrowth on the edge of the woods, but the downpour of rainhad been so heavy that I knew it must have soaked through the foliage,and that I should have a nice lot of rust to face, let alone a saturatedsaddle. So I went away across the park to where I had left it, and theothers drove off to Berwick--and so both Mr. Lindsey and myself broke oursolemn words to Maisie. For now I was alone--and I certainly did notanticipate more danger.
But not only danger, but the very threatening of death was on me as Iwent my way. We had stayed some time in Hathercleugh House, and the dawnhad broken before we left. The morning came clear and bright after thestorm, and the newly-risen sun--it was just four o'clock, and he wasnicely above the horizon--was transforming the clustering raindrops onthe firs and pines into glistening diamonds as I plunged into the thickof the woods. I had no other thought at that moment but of getting homeand changing my clothes before going to Andrew Dunlop's to tell thenews--when, as I crossed a narrow cut in the undergrowth, I saw, somedistance away, a man's head slowly look out from the trees. I drew backon
the instant, watching. Fortunately--or unfortunately--he was notlooking in my direction, and did not catch even a momentary glance of me,and when he twisted his neck in my direction I saw that he was the manwe had been talking of, and whom I now knew to be Dr. Meekin. And itflashed on me at once that he was hanging about for Hollins--allunconscious that Hollins was lying dead there in the old tower.
So--it was not he who had driven that murderous knife intoHollins's throat!
I watched him--myself securely hidden. He came out of his shelter,crossed the cut, went through the belt of wood which I had just passed,and looked out across the park to the house--all this I saw by cautiouslyedging through the trees and bushes behind me. He was a good forty yardsaway from me at that time, but I could see the strained, anxiousexpression on his face. Things had gone wrong--Hollins and the car hadnot met him where he had expected them--and he was trying to find outwhat had happened. And once he made a movement as if he would skirt thecoppices and make for the tower, which lay right opposite, but with anopen space between it and us--and then he as suddenly drew back, andbegan to go away among the trees.
I followed him, cautiously. I had always been a bit proud of what Icalled my woodcraft, having played much at Red Indians as a youngster,and I took care to walk lightly as I stalked him from one brake toanother. He went on and on--a long way, right away from Hathercleugh, andin the direction of where Till meets Tweed. And at last he was out of theHathercleugh grounds, and close to the Till, and in the end he took to athin belt of trees that ran down the side of the Till, close by the placewhere Crone's body had been found, and almost opposite the very spot, onthe other bank, where I had come across Phillips lying dead; and suddenlyI saw what he was after. There, right ahead, was an old boat, tied up tothe bank--he was making for it, intending doubtless to put himself acrossthe two rivers, to get the north bank of the Tweed, and so to make forsafety in other quarters.
It was there that things went wrong. I was following cautiously, fromtree to tree, close to the river-bank, when my foot caught in a trail ofground bramble, and I went headlong into the brushwood. Before I was wellon my feet, he had turned and was running back at me, his face white withrage and alarm, and a revolver in his hand. And when he saw who it was,he had the revolver at the full length of his arm, covering me.
"Go back!" he said, stopping and steadying himself.
"No!" said I.
"If you come a yard further, Moneylaws, I'll shoot you dead!" hedeclared. "I mean it! Go back!"
"I'm not coming a foot nearer," I retorted, keeping where I was. "But I'mnot going back. And whenever you move forward, I'm following. I'm notlosing sight of you again, Mr. Meekin!"
He fairly started at that--and then he began looking on all sides of me,as if to find out if I was accompanied. And all of a sudden he plumpedme with a question.
"Where is Hollins?" he asked. "I'll be bound you know!"
"Dead!" I answered him. "Dead, Mr. Meekin! As dead as Phillips, or asAbel Crone. And the police are after you--all round--and you'd betterfling that thing into the Till there and come with me. You'll not getaway from me as easily now as you did yon time in your yacht."
It was then that he fired at me--from some twelve or fifteen yards'distance. And whether he meant to kill me, or only to cripple me, I don'tknow; but the bullet went through my left knee, at the lower edge of theknee-cap, and the next thing I knew I was sprawling on all-fours on theearth, and the next--and it was in the succeeding second, before even Ifelt a smart--I was staring up from that position to see the vengeancethat fell on my would-be murderer in the very instant of his attempt onme. For as he fired and I fell, a woman sprang out of the bushes at hisside, and a knife flashed, and then he too fell with a cry that wassomething between a groan and a scream--and I saw that his assailant wasthe Irishwoman Nance Maguire, and I knew at once who it was that hadkilled Hollins.
But she had not killed Meekin. He rose like a badly wounded thing--halfrose, that is, as I have seen crippled animals rise, and he cried like abeast in a trap, fighting with his hands. And the woman struck againwith the knife--and again he sank back, and again he rose, and ... Ishut my eyes, sick with horror, as she drove the knife into him for thethird time.
But that was nothing to the horror to come. When I looked again, he wasstill writhing and crying, and fighting blindly for his life, and I criedout on her to leave him alone, for I saw that in a few minutes he wouldbe dead. I even made an effort to crawl to them, that I might drag heraway from him, but my knee gave at the movement and I fell backhalf-fainting. And taking no more notice of me than if I had been one ofthe stocks and stones close by, she suddenly gripped him, writhing as hewas, by the throat, and drawing him over the bank as easily as if he hadbeen a child in her grasp, she plunged knee-deep into the Till and heldhim down under the water until he was drowned.
There was a most extraordinary horror came over me as I lay there,powerless to move, propped up on my elbow, watching. The purposefuldeliberation with which the woman finished her work; the dead silenceabout us, broken only by an occasional faint lapping of the river againstits bank; the knowledge that this was a deed of revenge--all these thingsproduced a mental state in me which was as near to the awful as ever Iapproached it. I could only lie and watch--fascinated. But it was over atlast, and she let the body go, and stood watching for a moment as itfloated into a dark pool beneath the alders; and then, shaking herselflike a dog, she came up the bank and looked at me, in silence.
"That was--in revenge for Crone," I managed to get out.
"It was them killed Crone," she answered in a queer dry voice. "Let thepollis find this one where they found Crone! You're not greatly hurtyourself--and there's somebody at hand."
Then she suddenly turned and vanished amongst the trees, and, twistingmyself round in the direction to which she had pointed, I saw agamekeeper coming along. His gun was thrown carelessly in the crook ofhis arm, and he was whistling, gaily and unconcernedly.
I have a perpetual memento of that morning in my somewhat crippled knee.And once, two years ago, when I was on business in a certain Englishtown, and in a quarter of it into which few but its own denizenspenetrate, I met for one moment, at a slum corner, a great raw-bonedIrishwoman who noticed my bit of a limp, and turned her eyes for aninstant to give me a sharp look that won as sharp an answer. And theremay have been mutual understanding and sympathy in the glance we thusexchanged--certainly, when it had passed between us, we continued on ourseparate ways, silent.
THE END
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