The Hampstead Mystery - John R. Watson (best management books of all time txt) 📗

to place his services at the disposal of anyone who needs them and is prepared to pay for them. A great deal of nonsense has been said and written on that subject. A barrister can return a brief because for private reasons he does not wish to have anything to do with the case. It was Holymead's duty to do his best to get Birchill off whether he believed his client was guilty or innocent. Could Holymead have done his best for Birchill if he had believed that Birchill was the murderer of his lifelong friend? Would he have trusted himself to do his best? No, Holymead knew that Birchill was innocent; he knew who the guilty man was, and, knowing that, knowing that his action in defending the man charged with the murder of an old friend would weigh with the jury, he took up the case because he felt there was a moral obligation on him to get Birchill off. His conduct of the defence, during which he attacked the moral character of your father, was remarkable, coming from him—the friend of the dead man. As the action of defending counsel it was perfectly legitimate. It gave rise to some discussion in purely legal circles—whether Holymead did right or wrong in violating a long friendship in order to get his man off. The academic point is whether he ought to have violated his personal feelings for an old friend, or violated his duty to his client by doing something less than his best for him.

"Apart from the circumstantial and inferential evidence against Holymead, there is the fact that his wife knows that he committed the crime. Her acts point to that; her conduct throughout springs from the desire to shield him. Even the removal of the letters from the secret drawer was prompted more by the desire to save him than to save herself. Their discovery would not have been very serious for her, but it would have put the police on her husband's track. If I remember rightly, she asked you to keep her in touch with all the developments of the investigations of the police and myself. You told me that she was greatly interested in the fact that I did not believe Birchill was guilty, and particularly anxious to know if I suspected anyone. At Birchill's trial she did me the honour of watching me very closely. I was watching both her and her husband. When she discovered through her womanly intuition that I suspected her husband; that I was accumulating evidence against him; she sent round her friend, Mademoiselle Chiron, with some interesting information for me. An extremely clever young woman that—like all her countrywomen she is wonderfully sharp and quick, with a natural aptitude for intrigue. Of course, the information she gave me was intended to mislead me—intended to show me that Mr. Holymead had nothing to do with the crime. But some of it was extremely interesting when it dealt with actual facts, and some of the facts were quite new to me. For instance, I had not previously known that a piece of a lady's handkerchief was found clenched in your father's right hand after he was dead. The police very kindly kept that information from me. Had they told me about it I might have been inclined to suspect Mrs. Holymead and to believe that her husband was trying to shield her. His conduct would bear that interpretation if she had happened to be guilty. The police unconsciously saved me from taking up that false scent.

"I have detained you a long time in dealing with these points, Miss Fewbanks, but I wanted to make everything clear. I have all but reached the end. Let us take in chronological order what happened on the night of the tragedy. We have your father's sudden return from Scotland. Hill was at Riversbrook when he arrived, and having the secret letters in his possession, was greatly perturbed by the unexpected return of Sir Horace. He went to Doris Fanning's flat in Westminster to see Birchill. In his absence Holymead arrived. It is probable that he took the Tube from Hyde Park Corner to Hampstead and walked to Riversbrook. He rang the bell; was admitted by your father, and, leaving his hat and stick in the hall-stand as he had often done before, the two went upstairs to the library. There was an angry interview, Holymead accusing your father of having wronged him and demanding satisfaction. My own opinion is that there was an irregular sort of duel. Each of them fired one shot. It is quite conceivable that Holymead, in spite of his mission, being that of revenge, gave your father a fair chance for his life. A man in Holymead's position would probably feel indifferent whether he killed the man who had ruined his home or was killed by him. But whereas your father's shot missed by a few inches, Holymead's inflicted a fatal wound. When he saw your father fall and realised what he had done, the instinct of self-preservation asserted itself. He grabbed at the gloves he had taken off, but in his hurry dropped one on the floor. He ran downstairs, took his hat from the hall-stand, but left his stick. Then he rushed out of the house, leaving the front door open. He made his way back to Hampstead Tube station, got out at Hyde Park and took a cab to his hotel.

"Within a few minutes of Holymead's departure from Riversbrook the Frenchwoman arrived. She may have passed Holymead in Tanton Gardens, or Holymead, when he saw her approaching, may have hidden inside the gateway of a neighbouring house. She had come up from the country on learning that Holymead had come to London. She caught the next train, but unfortunately it was late on arriving at Victoria owing to a slight accident to the engine. I take it that she was sent by Mrs. Holymead to follow her husband if possible and see if he had any designs on Sir Horace. She took a cab as far as the Spaniards Inn and then got out, and walked to Riversbrook. When she arrived at the house she found the front door open and the lights burning. There was no answer to her ring and she entered the house and crept upstairs. Opening the library door, she saw your father lying on the floor. She endeavoured to raise him to a sitting posture, but it was too late to do anything for him. With a convulsive movement he grasped at the handkerchief she was holding in one hand, and a corner of it was torn off and remained in his hand. When she saw he had breathed his last she laid him down on the floor. Since she had been too late to prevent the crime, the next best thing in the interests of Mrs. Holymead was to remove traces of Holymead's guilt. She picked up the revolver, which she thought belonged to Holymead, turned off the light in the room, went downstairs, turned off the light in the hall, and closed the hall door as she went out.

"She behaved with remarkable courage and coolness, but she overlooked the glove in the room of the tragedy, and Holymead's stick in the hall-stand. Later in the night we have Birchill's entry into the house, his alarm at finding your father had been killed, and his return to the flat where Hill was waiting for him."

When Crewe had finished he looked at the girl. She had followed his statement with breathless interest.

"You have been wonderfully clever," she said. "It is perfectly marvellous."

Crewe's eyes had wandered to the inlaid chess-table and the Japanese chessmen set in prim rows on either side. Mechanically he began to arrange a problem on the board. His interest in the famous murder mystery seemed to have evaporated.

"I was very fortunate," he said absently, in reply to Miss Fewbanks.
"Everything seemed to come right for me."

"You made everything come right," she replied. "I do not know how to thank you for giving so much of your time to unravelling the mystery."

"It was fascinating while it lasted," he replied, his fingers still busy with the chessmen. "Of course, I am pleased with my success, but in a way I am sorry the work has come to an end. I thought that the knowledge that Holymead was the guilty man would come as a great shock to you. But I am glad you are able to take it so well."

"A few minutes before you arrived I learned that it was Mr. Holymead. But what has been more of a shock to me, Mr. Crewe, is the discovery that my father had ruined his home. Oh, Mr. Crewe, it is terrible for me to have to hold my dead father up to judgment, but it is more terrible still to know that he was not faithful even to his lifelong friendship with Mr. Holymead."

"Your nerves are unstrung," he said. "You want rest and quiet—you want a long sea voyage."

"Yes, I want to forget," she said. "But there are others who want to forget, too. Cannot we bury the whole thing in forgetfulness?"

Crewe's growing interest in the chessboard and his problem suddenly vanished. His eyes became instantly riveted on her face in a keen, questioning look.

"What is it to me or you that Mr. Holymead should be publicly proved guilty of this terrible thing?" she went on, passionately. "Why drag into the light my father's conduct in order to make a day's sensation for the newspapers? For his sake, what better thing could I do than let his memory rest?"

"Do you mean that Holymead should be allowed to go free?" he asked, in astonishment.

"Yes."

"I'm extremely sorry," he said slowly.

"Won't you let it all drop?" she pleaded.

"I could not take upon myself the responsibility of condoning such a crime—the responsibility of judging between your father and his murderer," he said solemnly. "But even if I could it is too late to think of doing so. There is already a warrant out for Holymead's arrest"

CHAPTER XXIX

The newspapers made a sensation out of the announcement of Holymead's arrest on a charge of having murdered Sir Horace Fewbanks. They declared that the arrest of the eminent K.C. on a capital charge would come as a surprising development of the Riversbrook case. It would cause a shock to his many friends, and especially to those who knew what a close friendship had existed between the arrested man and the dead judge. The papers expatiated on the fact that Holymead had appeared for the defence when Frederick Birchill had been tried for the murder. As the public would remember, Birchill had been acquitted owing to the great ability with which his defence was conducted.

It was somewhat remarkable, said the Daily Record, that in his speech for the defence Holymead had attempted to throw suspicion on one of the witnesses for the prosecution. The journal hinted that it was the result of something which Counsel for the defence had let drop at this trial that Inspector Chippenfield had picked up the clue which had led to Holymead's arrest. The papers had very little information to give the public about this new development of the Fewbanks mystery, but they boldly declared that some startling revelations were expected when the case came before the court.

In the absence of interesting facts apropos of the arrest of the distinguished K.C., some of the papers published summaries of his legal career, and the more famous cases with which he had been connected. These summaries would have been equally suitable to an announcement that Mr. Holymead had been promoted to the peerage or that he had been run over by a London bus.

There were people who declared without knowing anything about the evidence the police had in their possession that in arresting the famous barrister the police had made a far worse blunder than in arresting Birchill. It was even hinted that the arrest of the man who had got Birchill off was an expression of the police desire for revenge. To these people the acquittal of Holymead was a foregone conclusion. The man who had saved Birchill's life by his brilliant forensic abilities was not likely to fail when his own life was at stake.

But when the case came before the police court and the police produced their evidence, it was seen that there was a strong case against the prisoner. The whispers as to the circumstances under which the prisoner had taken the life of a friend of many years appealed to a sentimental public. These whispers concerned the discovery by the prisoner that his friend had seduced his beautiful wife. In