Cleek of Scotland Yard Part 39

interposed Narkom. "So if you will state the case at once he will be able to advise."

"A detective? You?" She flashed round on Cleek and looked at him in amazement, her lower lip indrawn, a look almost of horror in her eyes. One may not tell a lion that another lion is a jacka.s.s, though he masquerade in the skin of one. Birth spoke to Birth. She saw, she knew, she understood. "By what process could such as you--"

she began; then stopped and made a slight inclination of the head.

"Pardon," she continued; "that was rude. Your private affairs are of course your own, Mr.--er----"

"Headland, your ladys.h.i.+p," supplied Cleek. "My name is George Headland!" And Narkom knew from that that for all her grace and charm he neither liked nor trusted her soft-eyed ladys.h.i.+p.

"Thank you," said Lady Essington, accepting this self-introduction with a graceful inclination of the head. "No doubt Mr. Narkom has given you some idea of my reason for consulting you, Mr. Headland; but as time is very short let me give you the further details as briefly as possible. I am convinced beyond any shadow of a doubt that some one who has an interest in his death is secretly attacking the life of my little grandson; and I have every reason to believe that the 'some one' is either the Honourable Felix Carruthers or his wife."

"But to what purpose, your ladys.h.i.+p? People do not commit so desperate an act as murder without some powerful motive, either of gain or revenge, behind it, and from what I have heard, neither the uncle nor the aunt can have anything to win by injuring his little lords.h.i.+p."

"Can they not?" she answered, with a despairing gesture. "How little you know! Mrs. Carruthers is an ambitious woman, Mr. Headland, and, like all women of the cla.s.s from which she was recruited, she aspires to a t.i.tle. She was formerly an actress. The Honourable Felix married and took her from the theatre. It is abominable that a person of that type should be foisted upon society and brought into contact with her betters."

"Oho! that's where the shoe pinches, is it?" thought Cleek; but aloud he merely said: "The day has long pa.s.sed, your ladys.h.i.+p, when the followers of Thespis have to apologize for their existence. There are many ladies of the stage in these times whose lives are exemplary and whose names call forth nothing but respect and admiration; and so long as this particular lady bore an unblemished reputation----Did she?"

"Oh, yes. There was never a word against her in that respect.

Felix would never have married her if there had been. But I believe in persons of that cla.s.s remaining in their own circle, and not intruding themselves into others to which they were not _born_. She is an ambitious woman, as I have told you. She aspires to a t.i.tle as _well_ as to riches, and if little Lord Strathmere should die, her husband would inherit both. Surely that is 'motive' enough for a woman of that type. As for her husband----"

"There, I am afraid, your suspicion confounds itself, your ladys.h.i.+p,"

interrupted Cleek. "I am told that the Honourable Mr. Carruthers is extremely fond of the boy; besides which, being rich in his own right, he has no reason to covet the riches of his brother's baby son."

"Pardon me: '_was_ rich' is the proper expression, not 'is,' Mr.

Headland. The failure, a fortnight or so ago, of the West Coast Diamond Mining Company, in which the greater part of his fortune was invested and of which he was the chairman, has sadly crippled his resources, and he has now nothing but the income from his nephew's estate to live upon."

"Hum-m-m! Ah! Just so!" said Cleek, pinching his chin. "Now I recollect what made the name seem familiar, Mr. Narkom. I remember reading of the failure, and of the small hope that was held out of anything being saved from the wreckage. Still, the income from the Strathmere estate is enormous; and by dint of care, in the seventeen or eighteen years which must elapse before his little lords.h.i.+p comes of age----"

"He will never come of age! He will be killed first--he is being killed now!" interposed Lady Essington, agitatedly. "Oh, Mr.

Headland, help me! I love the boy--he is my own child's child. I love him as I never loved anything else in all the world; and if he were to die----Dear G.o.d! what should I do? And he is dying: I tell you he is. And they won't let me go near him: they won't let me have him all to myself, these two! If his cries in the night wring my heart and I run to his nursery, one or the other of them is always there, and never for one moment will they let me hold him in my arms nor be with him alone."

"Hum-m-m! Cries out in the night, does he, your ladys.h.i.+p? What kind of cries? Those of fright or of pain?"

"Of pain--of excruciating pain: it would wring the heart of a stone to hear him, and, though there is never a spot of blood nor a sign of violence, he declares that some one comes in the night and sticks something into his neck--something which, in his baby way, he likens to 'a long, long needle that goes yite froo my neck and sets uvver needles p.r.i.c.kin' and p.r.i.c.kin' all down my arm.'"

"h.e.l.lo! what's that? Let's have that again, please!" rapped out Cleek, before he thought; then recollected himself and added apologetically, "I beg your ladys.h.i.+p's pardon, but I am apt to get a little excited at times. Something like a needle being run into his neck, eh? And other needles continuing the sensation down the arm? Hum-m-m! Had a doctor called in?"

"No. I wished to, but neither the uncle nor aunt would let me do so. They say it is nothing--a mere 'growing pain' which he will overcome in time. But it is not--I _know_ it is not! If it were natural, why did it never manifest itself before the failure of that wretched diamond company? Why did it wait to begin until after the Honourable Felix Carruthers had lost his money? And why is it going on, night after night, ever since? Why has he begun to fail in health?--to change from a happy, laughing, healthy child into a peevish, fretful, constantly complaining one? I tell you they are killing him, those two; I tell you they are using some secret diabolical thing which is sapping his very life; and if----"

She stopped and sucked her breath in with a little gasp of fright, and, whisking down her veil, turned and made hurriedly for the door.

"I told you he guessed; I told you I should be followed!" she said in a shaking voice. "He is coming--that man: along the road there!

look through the window and you will see. Oh, come to my a.s.sistance, Mr. Headland! Find some way to do it, for G.o.d's sake! Good-bye!"

Then the door opened and shut and she was gone, darting out from the rear of the inn into the shelter of the scattered clumps of furze bushes and the thick growth of bracken which covered the downs, and running like a hare pursued.

"Well, what do you make of it, old chap?" asked Narkom anxiously, turning to Cleek after ascertaining past all doubt that the Honourable Felix Carruthers was riding up the road toward the French Horn.

"Oh, a crime beyond doubt," he replied. "But whose I am in no position to determine at present. A hundred things might produce that stabbing sensation in the neck, from the p.r.i.c.k of a pin-point dipped in curare to a smear of the 'Pope's balm,' that h.e.l.lish ointment of the Borgias. Hum-m-m! And so that's the Honourable Felix Carruthers, is it? Keep back from the window, my friend.

When you are out gunning for birds, it never does to raise an alarm.

And we should be hard put to it to explain our presence here at this particular time if he were to see you."

"My dear chap, you don't surely mean that you think _he_ is really at the bottom of it?" began Narkom, in surprise; but before he could say a word further, _that_ surprise was completely overwhelmed by another and a greater one. For the Honourable Felix had reined in and dismounted at the French Horn's door, and, with a clear-voiced, "No, don't put him up; I shan't be long, Betty. Just want a word or two with some friends I'm expecting," walked straightway into the bar parlour and advanced toward the superintendent with hand outstretched.

"Thank G.o.d, you got my letter in time, Mr. Narkom," he said, with a breath of intense relief. "Although I sent it by express messenger, it was after three o'clock and I was afraid you wouldn't. What a friend you are to come to my relief like this! I shall owe you a debt no money can repay. This then is the great and amazing Cleek, is it? I thank you, Mr. Cleek, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for accepting the case. Now we _shall_ get to the bottom of the mystery, I am sure."

It was upon the tip of Narkom's tongue to inquire what he meant by all this; but Cleek, rightly suspecting that the letter to which he alluded had been delivered at the Yard after the superintendent's departure, jumped into the breach and saved the situation.

"Very good of you indeed to place such great reliance in me, Mr.

Carruthers," he said. "We had to scramble for it, Mr. Narkom and I--the letter was so late in arriving--but, thank fortune, we managed to get here, as you see. And now, please, may I have the details of the case?"

He spoke guardedly, lest it should be upon some matter other than the interest of the "Golden Boy" and to prevent the Honourable Felix from guessing that he had already been approached upon that subject by Lady Essington. It was not some other matter, however.

It was again the mystery of the secret attacks upon his little lords.h.i.+p he was asked to dispel; and the Honourable Felix, plunging forthwith into the details connected with it, gave him exactly the same report as Lady Essington had done.

"Come to the rescue, Mr. Cleek," he finished, rather excitedly. "Both my wife and I feel that you and you alone are the man to get at the bottom of this diabolical thing; and the boy is as dear to us as if he were our own. Help me to get proof--unimpeachable proof--of the hand which is engineering these diabolical attacks, that we may not only put an end to them before they go too far, but may avert the disgrace which publicity must inevitably bring."

"Publicity, Mr. Carruthers? What publicity are you in dread of, please?"

"That which could only bring shame to a dear, lovable young fellow if any hint of what I believe to be the truth should get out, Mr. Cleek," he replied. "To you I may confess it: I appeal to no medical man because I fear, for young Claude's sake, that investigation may lead to a discovery of the truth; for both my wife and I feel--indeed, we almost _know_--that it is his own grandmother, Lady Essington, who is injuring the boy and that it will not be long before she attempts to direct suspicion against _us_."

"Indeed? For what purpose?"

"To have us removed by the courts as not being fit to have the care of the child, and to get him transferred to her care, that she may enjoy the revenue from his estate."

"Phew!" whistled Cleek softly. "Well done, my lady!"

"We do our best to keep her from getting at him," went on the Honourable Felix, "but she succeeds in spite of us. His nursery was on the same floor as her rooms, but for greater safety I last night had him carried to my own bedchamber and double-locked all the windows and doors. I said to myself that nothing could get to him then; but--it did, just the same! In the middle of the night he woke up screaming and crying out that some one had come and stuck a long needle in his neck, and then for the first time--G.o.d!

I nearly went off my head when I saw it--for the first time, Mr.

Cleek, there was a mark upon him--three red raw little spots just over the collarbone on the left side of the neck, as if a bird had pecked him."

"Hum-m-m! And all the windows closed, you say?"

"All but one--the window of my dressing-room--but as that is barred so that n.o.body could possibly get in, I thought it did not matter, and so left it partly open for the sake of air."

"I see," said Cleek. "I see! Hum-m-m! A fortnight without any outward sign and then of a sudden three small raw spots! Indented in the centre are they, and much inflamed about the edges? Thanks! Quite so, quite so! And the doors locked and all the windows but one closed and secured on the inside, so that no human body----What's that? Take the case? Certainly I will, Mr. Carruthers. You are entertaining a house party at present, I hear. Now if you can make it convenient to put me up in the Priory for a night or two, and will inform your guests that an old 'Varsity friend named--er--let's see! Oh, ah! Deland, that will do as well as any--Lieutenant Arthur Deland, home on leave from India--if you will inform your guests that that friend will join the house party to-morrow afternoon, I'll be with you in time for lunch, and will bring my man servant with me."

"Thank you! thank you!" said the Honourable Felix, wringing his hand. "I'll do exactly as you suggest, Mr. Cleek, and rooms shall be ready for you when you arrive."

And the matter being thus arranged, the Honourable Felix took his departure; and Cleek, calling the landlady to furnish him with pen, ink, and paper, sat down then and there to write a private note to Lady Essington, telling her to look out for Mr. George Headland to put in an appearance at the Priory in three days' time.

It was exactly half-past one o'clock when Lieutenant Arthur Deland, a big, handsome, fair-haired, fair-moustached fellow, with the stamp of the Army all over him, turned up at Boskydell Priory with an undersized Indian servant and an oversized kit and was presented to his hostess and to the several members of the house party, by all of whom he was voted a decided acquisition before he had been an hour under the Priory's roof.

It is odd how one's fancies sometimes go. He found the Honourable Mrs. Carruthers a sweet, gentle, dovelike little woman for whom he did not care in the least degree, and he found Lady Essington's son a rollicking, bubbling, overgrown boy of two-and-twenty, whom, in spite of frivolous upbringing and a rather p.r.o.nounced brusqueness toward his mother, he fancied very much indeed. In fact, he "played right up" to Mr. Claude Essington, as our American cousins say; and Mr. Claude Essington, fancying him hugely, took him to his heart forthwith and blurted out his sentiments with almost small-boy candour.

"I say, Deland, you're a spiffing sort--I like you!" he said bluntly, after they'd played one or two sets of tennis with the ladies and done their "social duties" generally. "If things look up a bit and I'm able to go back to Oxford for the next term (and the Lord knows how I shall, if the mater doesn't succeed in 'touching'

Carruthers for some money for we're jolly near broke and up to our eyes in debt), but if I do go back and you're in England still, I'll have you up for the May week and give you the time of your life. Oh, Lord! here's the mater coming now. Let's hook it. Come round to the stables, will you, and have a look at my collection.

Pippin' lot--they'll interest you."

They did; for on investigation the "collection" proved to be made up of pigeons, magpies, parrakeets, white mice, monkeys, and even a tame squirrel, all of which came forth at their master's call and swarmed or flocked all over him.