Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces by Thomas W. Hanshew (early readers .TXT) 📗

a horrible thing and so upset everybody that none of us thought to look."

"An error of judgment that; however, it is one easily rectified, since the body is not yet interred," said Cleek. "Ever read Harvey's 'Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Sanguinis,' Captain?—the volume in which William Harvey first gave to the world at large his discovery regarding the circulation of the blood."

"Good heavens, no! What would I be doing reading matters of that kind?
I'm not a medico, Mr. Cleek—I'm a soldier."

"I know. But, still—well, I thought it just possible that you might have read the work, or, at least, heard something regarding the contents of the volume. Men who have a hobby are rather given to riding it and boring other people with discussions and dissertations upon it; and I seem to think that I have heard it said that Sir Gilbert Morford's greatest desire in the time of his youth was to become a medical man. In fact, that he put in two or three years as a student at St. Bartholomew's, and would have qualified, but that the sudden death of his father compelled him to abandon the hope and to assume the responsibilities of the head of the house of Morford & Morford, tea importers, of Mincing Lane."

"Yes; that's quite correct. He bitterly resented the compulsion—the 'pitchforking of a man out of a profession into the abomination of trade,' as he always expresses it—but of course, he was obliged to yield, and the 'dream of his life' dropped off into nothing but a dream. But the old love and the old recollection still linger, and, although he no longer personally follows either trade or profession, he keeps up his laboratory work, subscribes to every medical journal in Christendom, and if you want to tickle his vanity or to get on the right side of him all you have to do is to address him as 'doctor.' With all due respect to him, he's a bit of a prig, Mr. Cleek, and hates people of no position—'people of the lower order,' as he always terms them—as the gentleman down under is said to hate holy water."

"So that he, naturally, would move heaven and earth to prevent his grandson and heir from marrying a young woman of that class? I see!" supplemented Cleek. "The dear gentleman would like the name of Morford to go down to posterity linked to duchesses or earls' daughters, and surrounded by a blaze of glory. Ah, it's a queer world, Captain. There is no bitterer hater of the 'common herd' than the snob who has climbed up from it! The snob and the sneak are closely allied, Captain, and men of that stamp have been known to do some pretty ugly things to uphold their pinchbeck dignity, and to keep the tinsel of the present over the cheap gingerbread of the past."

"Good God, man! You don't surely mean to suggest—"

"Gently, gently, Captain. Your indignation does you credit; but it is never well to have a shot at a rabbit before he's fairly out of the hole, and you are sure that it isn't the ferret you sent in after him. Anything in the way of a conveyance handy, Mr. Narkom?"

"Yes—the limousine. I came down in it yesterday. It's over at the Rose and Crown."

"Good! Then perhaps Captain Morford will meet us there in a half hour's time. Meanwhile, I've got a few things to throw into my kit-bag, and as that's over at the Three Desires, perhaps you won't mind coming along and giving me a hand. Then we'll run over to that house at Dalehampton and have a look at the body of that poor little shaver as expeditiously as possible. Will you come?"

"Yes, certainly," said Narkom; and having given a few necessary directions to the Captain walked on and followed Cleek. He knew very well the suggestion that he should do so was merely an excuse to have a few words with him in private—for no man would be likely to need another man's assistance in simply putting a few things into a bag—and he was rather puzzled to account for Cleek's desire to say anything to him which the Captain was not to hear. However, he kept his curiosity in check and his tongue behind his teeth until they were on the other side of the lich-gate and in the road leading to the Three Desires.

"There's something you want to say to me, isn't there?" he inquired.
"Something you want attended to on the quiet?"

"Yes," admitted Cleek, tersely. "There's a public telephone station a mile or two on the other side of this place—I saw it this morning when I was out tramping. Slip off down there, ring up the head of the Dalehampton Constabulary, and tell him to have a man at the house ready to pop up when wanted. I'll be long enough over my supposed 'packing' to cover the time of your going and returning without the Captain's knowledge."

"Without—Good Heaven! My dear Cleek, you were serious, then? You meant it? You—you really believe that suspicion points to Sir Gilbert Morford?"

"Not any more than it points to Sir Gilbert Morford's grandson, Mr.
Narkom."

"Good Lord! To him? To that boy? Why, man alive, what possible motive could he have for bringing grief and anguish to Miss Comstock when he's willing to give up a fortune to marry her?"

"Ah, but don't forget that another fortune descends to all the heirs, male and female alike, of the late Mrs. Comstock, Mr. Narkom, and that if the Captain's fiancée becomes, in course of time, the only surviving child of that unfortunate lady, the Captain's sacrifice will not be such an overpowering hardship for him, after all."

"Great Scott! I never thought of that before, Cleek—never."

"Didn't you? Well, don't think too much of it now that you have. For circumstantial evidence is tricky and treacherous, and he mayn't be the man, after all!"

"Mayn't be? What a beggar you are for damping a man's ardour after you've fanned it up to the blazing point. Any light in the darkness, old chap? Any idea of what—and how?"

"Yes," said Cleek, quietly. "If there's a mark on that poor little shaver's neck, Mr. Narkom, I shall know the means. And if there's soap on the window sill I shall know the man!" And then, having reached the doorway of the inn, he dived into it and went up the staircase two steps at a time.

CHAPTER XXXIV

The little house of Dalehampton was something more than a mere house of grief, they found, when the long drive came to an end and Cleek and his two companions entered it, for the very spirit of desolation and despair seemed to have taken up its abode there; and, like an Incarnate Woe, Miss Comstock paced through the hush and darkness, hour in and hour out, as she had been doing since daybreak.

"My darling, you mustn't—you really mustn't, dear. You'll lose your mind if you brood over the thing like this," said the Captain, flying to her the very instant they arrived; and, disregarding the presence of his two companions, caught her in his arms and kissed her. "Miriam, dearest, don't! It breaks my heart. I know it's awful; but do try to have strength and hope. I am sure we shall get at the bottom of the thing now—sure that there will be no more—that this is truly the end. These gentlemen are from Scotland Yard, dearest, and they say it surely will be."

"Heaven knows I hope so," replied Miss Comstock, acknowledging the introduction to Cleek and Narkom by a gentle inclination of the head. "But indeed, I can't hope, Jim—indeed, I cannot, gentlemen. The tenth of next month will take its toll as the tenth of this one has done. I feel persuaded that it will. For who can fight a thing unseen and unknown?"

Her grief was so great, her despair so hopeless, that Cleek forbore attempting to assuage either by any words of sympathy or promise. He seemed to feel that hers was an anguish upon which even the kindliest words must fall only as an intrusion, and the heart of the man—that curiously created heart, which at times could be savage even to the point of brutality, and again tender and sympathetic as any woman's—went out to her in one great surge of human feeling. And two minutes later—when all the Law's grim business of inquiry and inquest had been carried out by Narkom, and she, in obedience to his expressed desire, led them to the room where the dead boy lay—that wave of sympathetic feeling broke over his soul again. For the gentle opening of the door had shown him a small, dimly lit room, a kneeling figure, bent of back and bowed of head, that leant over a little white bed in a very agony of tearless woe.

"He can hardly tear himself away for an instant—he loved him so!" she said in a quavering whisper to Cleek. "Must we disturb him? It seems almost cruel."

"I know it," he whispered back; "but the place must be searched in quest of possible clues, Miss Comstock. The—the little boy, too, must be examined, and it would be crueller still if he were to stay and see things like that. Lead him out if you can. It will be for a few minutes only. Tell him so—tell him he can come back then." And turned his face away from that woeful picture as she went over and spoke to the sorrowing old man.

"Uncle!" she said softly. "Uncle Phil! You must come away for a little time, dear. It is necessary."

"Oh, I can't, Mirry—I can't, lovie, dear!" he answered without lifting his head or loosening his folded hands. "My bonnie, my bonnie, that I loved so well! Ah, let me have him while I may, Mirry—they'll take him from me soon enough—soon enough, my bonnie boy!"

"But, dearest, you must. The—the Law has stepped in. Gentlemen from Scotland Yard are here. Jim has brought them. They must have the room for a little time. There—there's the window to be examined, you know; and if they can find out anything—"

"I'll give them the half of all I have in the world!" broke in the old man with a little burst of tears. "Tell them that. The half of everything—everything—if they can get at the creature. If they can find out. But"—collapsing suddenly, with his elbows on his knees and his face between his hands—"they can't, they can't; nobody can! It kills and kills and kills; and God help us! we all shall go the same way! It will be my turn, too, some time soon. I wish it were mine now. I wish it had been mine long ago—before I lost my bonnie own!"

"Takes it hard, poor old chap, doesn't he?" whispered Narkom, glancing round and getting something of a shock when he saw that Cleek, who a moment before had appeared to be almost on the verge of tears, was now fumbling in his coat pockets, and, with indrawn lips and knotted brows, was scowling—absolutely scowling—in the direction where Captain Morford stood, biting his lips and drumming with his finger nails upon the edge of the washstand. But Cleek made no reply. Instead, he walked quickly across to the Captain's side, stretched forth his hand, took up a tablet of soap, turned it over, laid it down again, stepped to the window, stepped back, and laid a firm hand on the young man's shoulder.

"Captain," he said suddenly, in sharp, crisp tones, that sounded painfully harsh after the old man's broken cries, "Captain, there's a little game of cards called 'Bluff,' and it's an excellent amusement if you don't get caught at it. We shan't have to go any further with the search for clues in this case; but I think I shall have to ask you, my friend, a few little questions in private, and in the interests of a gentleman called Jack Ketch!"

This unexpected outburst produced something like a panic. Miss Comstock, hearing the words, cried out, put both hands to her temples, as though her head were reeling; old Mr. Harmstead straightened suddenly and flung a look of blank amazement across the room; and the Captain, twitching away from the man who gripped him, went first deathly white and then red as any beet.

"Good God!" he gulped. "You—I—Look here, I say now, what does this mean? What the dickens are you talking about?"

"Bluff, Captain! Simply 'bluff'!" responded Cleek serenely. "And as I said before, it's a clever little game. Stand where you are—keep an eye on him, Mr. Narkom. What I've got to say