CHAPTER XIX

Superintendent Merrington sat in his office at Scotland Yard, irascible

with the exertions of a trying day which had made heavy inroads upon his

temper and patience. He had several big cases on his hands, his time had

been broken into by a series of visitors with grievances, and he had

been called upon to adjust a vexatious claim of a woman attacked in the

street by a police dog, while the animal was supposed to be on duty

tracking a sacrilegious thief who had felled a priest in an oratory and

bolted with the silver candlesticks from the altar.

The woman had gone mad from the shock and had been placed in a public

asylum, where she had imagined herself to be a horse, and in that guise

had neighed harmlessly, for some years, until cured by auto-suggestion

by a rising young brain doctor who had devoted much time and study to

her peculiar case. Her first act of returned reason was to bring a heavy

claim for damages against Scotland Yard, and Merrington had fought it

out that day with an avaricious lawyer who had taken up the case on the

promise of an equal division of the spoils.

Merrington had preferred to pay rather than contest the suit in law, and

he was exceedingly wroth in consequence. He was angry with the old woman

for presuming to get cured, and angry with the brain doctor for curing

her. He considered that the brain doctor had been guilty of a piece of

meddlesome interference in restoring the old lady to so-called sanity in

a world of fools, without achieving any object except robbery from the

public funds by a rascally lawyer. To use Merrington's own words,

expressed with intense exasperation to an astonished subordinate, the

old woman was quite all right as a horse, comfortable and well-fed, and

had probably got more out of life in that guise than she ever had as a

human being, compelled to all sorts of shifts and contrivances and mean

scrapings before her betters for a scanty living, with nothing but the

work-house ahead of her. He concluded in a sort of grumbling epilogue

that some people never knew when to leave well alone.

It was in no very amiable frame of mind, therefore, that he received

Colwyn's card with a pencilled request for an immediate interview.

Merrington disapproved of all private detectives as an unwarrantable

usurpation of the functions of Scotland Yard, but he particularly

disapproved of a private detective like Colwyn, whose popular renown was

far greater than his own. But there were politic reasons for the

extension of courtesy to him. The famous private detective was such a

powerful rival that it was best to conciliate him with a little

politeness, which cost nothing, and he had done Scotland Yard several

good turns which at least demanded an outward show of gratitude. He had

influence in the right quarter, too, and, altogether, was not a person

to be lightly affronted. The consideration of these factors impelled

Merrington to inform the waiting janitor that he would see Mr. Colwyn at

once, and even caused him to crease his fat red features into a smile of

welcome as he awaited his entrance.

When Colwyn appeared in the doorway the big man he had called to see got

up from his swing-chair to shake hands with him. When his visitor was

seated Merrington leaned back in his own chair and remarked, in his

great rolling voice:

"What can I do for you, Mr. Colwyn?"

"Nothing personally. I have called to have a talk with you about the

Heredith case."

The veneer of welcome disappeared from Merrington's face at this

opening, though a large framed photograph of himself on the wall behind

his chair continued to smile down at the private detective with unwonted

amiability.

"Ah, yes, the Heredith case," he responded. "A strange affair, that. I

investigated it personally. It was a pity you were not in it. There were

points about that murder--distinct points. You would have enjoyed it."

Merrington's professional commiseration of Colwyn's ill-luck in missing

an enjoyable murder was intended to convey a distinct rebuke to the

other's presumption in discussing a case in which he had not been

engaged. But Colwyn's next words startled Merrington out of his attitude

of censorious dignity.

"I was not in the case at first, but I was called into it subsequently

by the husband of the murdered woman. He is dissatisfied with the

outcome. He thinks a mistake has been made in arresting the girl Hazel

Rath."

The silence with which Merrington received this information was an

involuntary tribute to his visitor, implying, as it did, that he knew

Colwyn would not have come to see him without weighty reason for the

support of what sounded like the repetition of a mere expression of

opinion.

"I was reluctant to interfere until Mr. Heredith told me something which

suggested that one of your men was in danger of underestimating an

important clue," continued Colwyn. "That decided me. I went back with

Mr. Heredith in my car the night before last. After my arrival at the

moat-house I made an interesting discovery--quite by accident. I

discovered that a pearl necklace which had been given to Mrs. Heredith

by Sir Philip Heredith was missing from the jewel-case in which it had

been locked. That jewel-case was in Mrs. Heredith's bedroom on the night

she was murdered."

This piece of news was so unexpected that it caught Merrington off his

guard.

"A jewel robbery as well as murder!" he ejaculated, in something like

dismay.

"It looks like it. You will be able to form a better judgment when I

have told you all the circumstances of the discovery."

Merrington had long ago convinced himself that the case he had worked up

against Hazel Rath did not admit of the slightest possibility of doubt;

and, like all obstinate men, he adhered to his convictions with

additional strength in the face of anything tending to weaken them. As

he recovered from his surprise at the private detective's piece of news,

he listened to his account of the opening of the jewel-case with the

wary air of one seeking a loop-hole in an unexpected obstacle. Before

Colwyn had finished he had found it in the belief that Hazel Rath, and

nobody else, had stolen the missing jewels.

"This girl is a thief as well as a murderer," was the manner in which he

expressed his opinion when Colwyn had ceased speaking. "She has stolen

the necklace."

"She may have done so, but it is too great an assumption to make without

proof," returned Colwyn. "You must be perfectly well aware, Mr.

Merrington, that this belated discovery is of the utmost importance to

the Crown case, one way or the other. If you can prove that Hazel Rath

stole the necklace, it gives you an unassailable case against her. If

the necklace was stolen by somebody else, you are confronted with a new

and strange aspect of this murder."

"Not to the extent of lessening the strength of the case against this

girl," replied Merrington doggedly. "She was seen going to the staircase

leading to Mrs. Heredith's room just before the murder; her brooch was

found upstairs in the room; and the revolver and her handkerchief were

found concealed in her mother's rooms. Add to that, her silence under

accusation, and it is impossible to get away from the belief that she,

and nobody else, murdered Mrs. Heredith."

"I am not attempting to controvert your theory or contradict your

facts," rejoined Colwyn coldly. "My visit is to bring under your notice

a fresh fact in the case which needs investigation. Whether that fact

squares with your own theory or not, it is too important to be

disregarded or overlooked. That is why I left the moat-house immediately

I discovered it. I felt that you had been ignorantly misled, and that it

was only right you should be told without delay."

Merrington was conscious of that evanescent feeling which men call

gratitude. His impulse of thankfulness towards the man opposite him was

all the keener for the realization that he would not have acted so

generously if he had been in Colwyn's place. But his gratitude was

speedily swallowed up by the knowledge that he had been led astray, and

his anger was mingled with the determination to find a scapegoat.

"I am obliged to you for your information, although I do not attach

quite so much importance to it as you do," was his careful rejoinder.

"But I certainly blame Detective Caldew for not finding it out before

you did. He made the original inquiries at the moat-house, and he seems

to have made them very carelessly. He said nothing to the Chief

Constable of Sussex or myself, when we arrived, about a jewel-case,

locked or open."

"He didn't know himself."

"It was his duty to inquire. When he assured us, on the authority of

Miss Heredith, that nothing was missing, I naturally assumed that he had

made the proper inquiries. But I thank you for letting me know, and I

shall, of course, have investigations made. But I should like to know

why young Heredith interfered and brought you into the case?"

"For one thing, he has a strong belief in Hazel Rath's innocence."

"Mere sentiment," replied Merrington contemptuously. "Perhaps he's still

sweet on the girl."

"There is more than that in it. There's the question of the revolver. Of

course you are aware that he identified the revolver with which his wife

was shot as the property of Captain Nepcote, a guest at the moat-house

who left on the afternoon of the day on which Mrs. Heredith was

murdered. Heredith does not accept your theory of the way in which Hazel

Rath is supposed to have obtained the revolver. He does not think that

Nepcote left the revolver behind him at the moat-house. He told Caldew

this, but Caldew said the ownership of the revolver was a matter of no

consequence."

"Caldew's a fool if he said that, and I wish I'd never allowed him to

meddle in the case," replied Merrington forcibly. "I've had the police

court proceedings against the girl put back for a week till the question

of the ownership of the revolver could be settled. Now that it is

decided I shall have Nepcote interviewed and questioned without delay."

"Before you try to trace the missing necklace?" The faint inflection of

surprise in Colwyn's voice might have escaped a quicker ear than

Merrington's.

"Scotland Yard will trace the necklace fast enough," he confidently

declared. "I like to take things in their proper order. The next thing

to do is to ascertain whether Nepcote left his revolver behind him at

the moat-house, though I have not the least doubt that he did. The

necklace is really a minor consideration. It merely provides another

motive for the murder--cupidity as well as jealousy."

"Is that the way you regard it?" A less thick-skinned man than

Merrington would this time have caught something more than surprise in

the other's tone.

"Is there any other way of looking at it?"

"I would not like to venture an opinion in this case without more

knowledge than I have at present," returned Colwyn in sober accents.

"But so far as I have gone into it I should say that there are several

things which seem to require more explanation. Nepcote's own actions

seem to call for some investigation."

"You are surely not suggesting that Nepcote had anything to do with the

murder or the robbery of the pearls?" said Merrington in an astonished

voice. "That is quite impossible. He left the moat-house in the

afternoon before the murder was committed, and went over to France that

night."

"He didn't go to France that night. He stayed in London, and did not

return to France until the following day."

Merrington was obviously startled at this unexpected information.

"This is news to me," he said gravely. "Where did you learn it?"

"From the War Office this morning. There is no possibility of mistake.

Nepcote was in London on the night of the murder."

"He probably has an explanation, but what you have just told me is an

additional reason for seeing and questioning Nepcote without delay, even

if I have to send a man to France for the job."

"It will not be necessary for you to do that. Nepcote returned to London

two days ago--sent over on some special mission. I ascertained that fact

also from my friend at the War Office."

Merrington glanced at a small clock which stood on the desk in front of

him.

"I will go immediately and see him myself," he said.

"I should like to accompany you."

"I shall be delighted to have you," replied Merrington with complete

untruth. "I have Nepcote's address included in the list of guests who

were at the moat-house at the time of the murder," he added, opening his

pocket-book and hastily scanning it. "Ah, here it is--10 Sherryman

Street. I'll send for a taxi-cab. Is there anything I can do for you in

return for your kindness in bringing me this information?"

"I should be obliged if you would lend me a copy of the coroner's

depositions in the Heredith case."

"With pleasure." Merrington touched a bell, and instructed the policeman

who answered it to bring a typescript of the Heredith murder depositions

and the revolver which figured as an exhibit in the case. "And tell

somebody to call a taxi, Johnson," he added.

When Merrington and Colwyn emerged from the swing doors of the entrance

a few moments later, a taxi-cab was waiting at the bottom of the stone

steps, with a pockmarked driver leaning against the door of the vehicle,

gazing moodily over the Thames Embankment. He received Merrington's

instructions morosely, cranked his cab wearily, and was soon threading

his way through the mazes of Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly Circus with

a contemptuous disregard for traffic regulations, due to his prompt

recognition of the fact that he was carrying a high official of Scotland

Yard who was above rules of the road regulated by mere police

constables. He skimmed in a hazardous way along Regent Street, dipped

into the network of narrower streets which lay between that haunt of the

fox and the geese and Baker Street, and finally stopped abruptly outside

a tall house which was one of a row in a quiet street which led into the

highly fashionable locality of Sherryman Square.

Sherryman Street, in which the taxi-cab had stopped, was an offshoot and

snobbish mean relation of Sherryman Square, which housed a duke, an

ex-prime minister, and a fugitive king, to say nothing of several lesser

notabilities, such as a High Court Judge or two, several baronets, and a

war-time profiteer whose brand-new peerage had descended in the last

heavy downpour of kingly honours. Because of their proximity to these

great ones of the earth, the inhabitants of Sherryman Street assumed all

the airs of exclusiveness which distinguished the residents of the

superior neighbourhood, and parasitical house agents spoke of it with

great respect because one end opened into the rarefied atmosphere of the

Square. It was true that the other end was close to a slum, and there

was a mews across the way, but these were small drawbacks compared to

the social advantages.

Sherryman Street was full of gaunt, narrow houses, with prim fronts and

narrow railed windows, let in segments, flats, and bachelor apartments.

Number 10 was as like its fellows as one drab soul resembles another.

Superintendent Merrington's ring at the doorbell brought forth an

elderly woman with an expressionless face surmounted by a frilled white

cap. She informed them in an expressionless voice that Captain Nepcote's

apartments were on the second floor. Having said this much, she

disappeared into a small lobby room off the entrance hall, leaving them

free to enter.

A knock at the entrance door of the second-floor flat brought forth a

manservant whose smart bearing and precision of manner suggested

military training. He cautiously informed Superintendent Merrington, in

reply to his question, that he was not sure if Captain Nepcote was at

home, but he would go and see.

"Who shall I say, sir?" he asked, in unconscious contradiction of his

statement.

Merrington stopped further parleying by impatiently pushing past the

servant into the room.

"Go and tell your master I want to see him," he said, seating himself.

The servant looked angrily at the burly figure on the slender chair, and

then, as though realizing his inability to eject him, he left the room

without further speech.

The room they had entered was furnished in a style which suggested that

its occupier had sufficient means or credit to gratify his tastes, which

obviously soared no higher than racehorses and chorus girls. Pictures of

the former adorned the wall in oak; the latter smirked at the beholder

from silver frames on small tables. The room was handsomely furnished in

a masculine way, although there was the suggestion of a feminine touch

in the vases on the mantelpiece and some clusters of flowers in a bowl.

The door opened to admit a young man, who advanced towards his visitors

with a questioning glance. His appearance, though military, was far from

suggesting the sordid warfare of the trenches. He was well-groomed and

handsome, and wore his spotless uniform with that touch of distinction

which khaki lends to some men.

"Good afternoon," he said, and waited for them to announce the object of

their visit.

"Are you Captain Nepcote?" Merrington asked.

"My name is Nepcote," was the response. "May I ask who you are?" His

glance included both his visitors.

"My name is Merrington," responded that officer, answering for himself.

"Superintendent Merrington, of Scotland Yard. This is Mr. Colwyn, a

private detective," he added, as an afterthought. "I wish to ask you a

few questions. I understand you were staying at the residence of Sir

Philip Heredith when young Mrs. Heredith was murdered."

"That is not quite accurate," replied the young man. "I left the

moat-house on the afternoon of the day that the murder was committed,

and returned to London. What is it you wish to ask me? I am afraid I

cannot enlighten you about the crime in any way, for I know nothing

whatever about it. It came as a great shock to me when I heard of it."

"Is this your revolver?" said Merrington, producing the weapon and

laying it on the table.

"Why, yes, it is," said the young man, picking it up and looking at it

in unmistakable surprise. "Where did you get it?"

"Where did you have it last?" was Merrington's cautious rejoinder.

"Let me think," returned Nepcote thoughtfully. "Oh, I remember. The last

time I saw it was at the moat-house on the day before my departure. We

were using it for a little target practice in the gun-room downstairs."

"And what did you do with it afterwards?"

"That I cannot tell you," responded Nepcote. "I have no recollection of

seeing it since. I have never thought about it."

"Nor missed it?"

"No. It is no use to me--it is not an Army revolver. But it seems to me

that I must have left it in the moat-house gun-room after the target

shooting. After we finished shooting some of us had a game of bagatelle

on a table in the gun-room. I must have put the revolver down and

forgotten all about it afterward. I have no recollection of taking it

upstairs, and I have certainly never seen it since. Was it found in the

gun-room?"

"It was found at the moat-house, at any rate. It was the weapon with

which Mrs. Heredith was killed."

"What!" His exclamation rang out in horror and incredulity. "Why, it is

impossible. The thing is a mere toy."

"A pretty dangerous toy--as it turned out," was the grim comment of

Merrington.

"It seems incredible to me," persisted the young man. "It's very

old, and you have to be very strong with the finger and thumb to

make it revolve. And the cartridges are very small; only seven

millimetres--about a quarter of an inch. I've had the old thing for

years, but I never regarded it as a real fire-arm. I'd never have let

the girls use it in the gun-room if I'd thought it was a dangerous

weapon. Perhaps there is some mistake."

"There is no mistake," replied Merrington. "Mrs. Heredith was killed

with that revolver, and no other. We were unable to establish the

identity of the weapon until a day or two ago, and that is one of my

reasons for calling on you to-day--to make quite sure of the identity

and see if you could tell me where you left it."

"I have no doubt now that I must have left it behind me at the

moat-house," responded Nepcote. "I was recalled to France and went away

in a hurry. God forgive me for my carelessness. To think that it

resulted in this terrible murder!" His face had gone suddenly white.

"Did you return to France that night?" asked Merrington carelessly.

"As a matter of fact, I did not. When I returned to London from Sussex I

found another telegram here from the War Office extending my leave until

the following day. I returned to France the next afternoon."

"Thank you, Captain Nepcote." Merrington, as he rose to go, held out his

hand. It was evident that the statement about the telegram had cleared

his mind of any suspicions he may have felt about the young man. As

Nepcote shook hands he added: "You had better hold yourself in readiness

to attend the police court inquiry, which will be held a week from

to-day. I will send you a proper notification of time and place. All we

need from you is the formal identification of the revolver."

"Is it essential that I should attend?" asked the young man anxiously.

"I'd rather not be mixed up in the case at all, you know. Besides, I may

have to return to France."

"Perhaps we shall be able to dispense with your evidence now that we

have the facts," replied Merrington, after a moment's consideration. "I

will see what can be done, and let you know. You had better give me your

address in France, in case you have left England. It is necessary for me

to know that, because the case has to some extent taken a new turn by

the discovery that robbery as well as murder has been committed. A

valuable necklace belonging to the murdered woman is missing."

Captain Nepcote had taken out his pocket-book while Merrington was

speaking, in order to extract a card. As the other uttered the last

sentence, the pocket-book half slipped from his fingers, and several

other cards fluttered onto the table. Nepcote picked them up hastily,

but not before Colwyn's quick glance had taken in their contents. It

seemed to him something more than a coincidence that the name and

address displayed in neat black lettering on one of the cards should be

identical with one of the Hatton Garden addresses given him by Musard at

the moat-house the previous day.