The Big Bow Mystery

 By I. Zangwill

Chicago and New YorkRand, McNally & Company

Copyright, 1895, by Rand, McNally & Co. 

[Illustration: "My God!" he cried. ]

INTRODUCTION. 

OF MURDERS AND MYSTERIES. 

As this little book was written some four years ago, I feel able toreview it without prejudice. A new book just hot from the brain isnaturally apt to appear faulty to its begetter, but an old book has gotinto the proper perspective and may be praised by him without fear orfavor. "The Big Bow Mystery" seems to me an excellent murder story, asmurder stories go, for, while as sensational as the most of them, itcontains more humor and character creation than the best. Indeed, thehumor is too abundant. Mysteries should be sedate and sober. Thereshould be a pervasive atmosphere of horror and awe such as Poe managesto create. Humor is out of tone; it would be more artistic to preserve asomber note throughout. But I was a realist in those days, and in reallife mysteries occur to real persons with their individual humors, andmysterious circumstances are apt to be complicated by comic. Theindispensable condition of a good mystery is that it should be able andunable to be solved by the reader, and that the writer's solution shouldsatisfy. Many a mystery runs on breathlessly enough till the dénouementis reached, only to leave the reader with the sense of having beenrobbed of his breath under false pretenses. And not only must thesolution be adequate, but all its data must be given in the body of thestory. The author must not suddenly spring a new person or a newcircumstance upon his reader at the end. Thus, if a friend were to askme to guess who dined with him yesterday, it would be fatuous if he hadin mind somebody of whom he knew I had never heard. The only person whohas ever solved "The Big Bow Mystery" is myself. This is not paradox butplain fact. For long before the book was written, I said to myself onenight that no mystery-monger had ever murdered a man in a room to whichthere was no possible access. The puzzle was scarcely propounded ere thesolution flew up and the idea lay stored in my mind till, years later, during the silly season, the editor of a popular London evening paper, anxious to let the sea-serpent have a year off, asked me to provide himwith a more original piece of fiction. I might have refused, but therewas murder in my soul, and here was the opportunity. I went to workseriously, though the _Morning Post_ subsequently said the skit was toolabored, and I succeeded at least in exciting my readers, so many ofwhom sent in unsolicited testimonials in the shape of solutions duringthe run of the story that, when it ended, the editor asked me to saysomething by way of acknowledgement. Thereupon I wrote a letter to thepaper, thanking the would-be solvers for their kindly attempts to helpme out of the mess into which I had got the plot. I did not like towound their feelings by saying straight out that they had failed, oneand all, to hit on the real murderer, just like real police, so I triedto break the truth to them in a roundabout, mendacious fashion, as thus:

 _To the Editor of "The Star. "_

 SIR: Now that "The Big Bow Mystery" is solved to the satisfaction of at least one person, will you allow that person the use of your invaluable columns to enable him to thank the hundreds of your readers who have favored him with their kind suggestions and solutions while his tale was running and they were reading? I ask this more especially because great credit is due to them for enabling me to end the story in a manner so satisfactory to myself. When I started it, I had, of course, no idea who had done the murder, but I was determined no one should guess it. Accordingly, as each correspondent sent in the name of a suspect, I determined he or she should not be the guilty party. By degrees every one of the characters got ticked off as innocent--all except one, and I had no option but to make that character the murderer. I was very sorry to do this, as I rather liked that particular person, but when one has such ingenious readers, what can one do? You can't let anybody boast that he guessed aright, and, in spite of the trouble of altering the plot five or six times, I feel that I have chosen the course most consistent with the dignity of my profession. Had I not been impelled by this consideration I should certainly have brought in a verdict against Mrs. Drabdump, as recommended by the reader who said that, judging by the illustration in the "Star, " she must be at least seven feet high, and, therefore, could easily have got on the roof and put her (proportionately) long arm down the chimney to effect the cut. I am not responsible for the artist's conception of the character. When I last saw the good lady she was under six feet, but your artist may have had later information. The "Star" is always so frightfully up to date. I ought not to omit the humorous remark of a correspondent, who said: "Mortlake might have swung in some wild way from one window to another, _at any rate in a story_. " I hope my fellow-writers thus satirically prodded will not demand his name, as I object to murders, "at any rate in real life. " Finally, a word with the legions who have taken me to task for allowing Mr. Gladstone to write over 170 words on a postcard. It is all owing to you, sir, who announced my story as containing humorous elements. I tried to put in some, and this gentle dig at the grand old correspondent's habits was intended to be one of them. However, if I _am_ to be taken "at the foot of the letter" (or rather of the postcard), I must say that only to-day I received a postcard containing about 250 words. But this was not from Mr. Gladstone. At any rate, till Mr. Gladstone himself repudiates this postcard, I shall consider myself justified in allowing it to stand in the book. 

 Again thanking your readers for their valuable assistance, Yours, etc. 

One would have imagined that nobody could take this seriously, for it isobvious that the mystery-story is just the one species of story that cannot be told impromptu or altered at the last moment, seeing that itdemands the most careful piecing together and the most elaboratedove-tailing. Nevertheless, if you cast your joke upon the waters, youshall find it no joke after many days. This is what I read in the_Lyttelton Times_, New Zealand: "The chain of circumstantial evidenceseems fairly irrefragable. From all accounts, Mr. Zangwill himself waspuzzled, after carefully forging every link, how to break it. The methodultimately adopted I consider more ingenious than convincing. " Afterthat I made up my mind never to joke again, but this good intention nowhelps to pave the beaten path. 

 I. ZANGWILL. LONDON, September, 1895. 

NOTE. 

The Mystery which the author will always associate with this story ishow he got through the task of writing it. It was written in afortnight--day by day--to meet a sudden demand from the "Star, " whichmade "a new departure" with it. 

The said fortnight was further disturbed by an extraordinary combinedattack of other troubles and tasks. This is no excuse for theshortcomings of the book, as it was always open to the writer to reviseor suppress it. The latter function may safely be left to the public, while if the work stands--almost to a letter--as it appeared in the"Star, " it is because the author cannot tell a story more than once. 

The introduction of Mr. Gladstone into a fictitious scene is defended onthe ground that he is largely mythical. 

 I. Z. 

THE BIG BOW MYSTERY. 

CHAPTER I. 

On a memorable morning of early December London opened its eyes on afrigid gray mist. There are mornings when King Fog masses his moleculesof carbon in serried squadrons in the city, while he scatters themtenuously in the suburbs; so that your morning train may bear you fromtwilight to darkness. But to-day the enemy's maneuvering was moremonotonous. From Bow even unto Hammersmith there draggled a dull, wretched vapor, like the wraith of an impecunious suicide come into afortune immediately after the fatal deed. The barometers andthermometers had sympathetically shared its depression, and theirspirits (when they had any) were low. The cold cut like a many-bladedknife. 

Mrs. Drabdump, of 11 Glover Street, Bow, was one of the few persons inLondon whom fog did not depress. She went about her work quite ascheerlessly as usual. She had been among the earliest to be aware of theenemy's advent, picking out the strands of fog from the coils ofdarkness the moment she rolled up her bedroom blind and unveiled thesomber picture of the winter morning. She knew that the fog had come tostay for the day at least, and that the gas bill for the quarter wasgoing to beat the record in high-jumping. She also knew that this wasbecause she had allowed her new gentleman lodger, Mr. Arthur Constant, to pay a fixed sum of a shilling a week for gas, instead of charging hima proportion of the actual account for the whole house. Themeteorologists might have saved the credit of their science if they hadreckoned with Mrs. Drabdump's next gas bill when they predicted theweather and made "Snow" the favorite, and said that "Fog" would benowhere. Fog was everywhere, yet Mrs. Drabdump took no credit to herselffor her prescience. Mrs. Drabdump indeed took no credit for anything, paying her way along doggedly, and struggling through life like awearied swimmer trying to touch the horizon. That things always went asbadly as she had foreseen did not exhilarate her in the least. 

Mrs. Drabdump was a widow. Widows are not born, but made, else you mighthave fancied Mrs. Drabdump had always been a widow. Nature had given herthat tall, spare form, and that pale, thin-lipped, elongated, hard-eyedvisage, and that painfully precise hair, which are always associatedwith widowhood in low life. It is only in higher circles that women canlose their husbands and yet remain bewitching. The late Mr. Drabdump hadscratched the base of his thumb with a rusty nail, and Mrs. Drabdump'sforeboding that he would die of lockjaw had not prevented her wrestlingday and night with the shadow of Death, as she had wrestled with itvainly twice before, when Katie died of diphtheria and little Johnny ofscarlet fever. Perhaps it is from overwork among the poor that Death hasbeen reduced to a shadow. 

Mrs. Drabdump was lighting the kitchen fire. She did it veryscientifically, as knowing the contrariety of coal and the anxiety offlaming sticks to end in smoke unless rigidly kept up to the mark. Science was a success as usual; and Mrs. Drabdump rose from her kneescontent, like a Parsee priestess who had duly paid her morning devotionsto her deity. Then she started violently, and nearly lost her balance. Her eye had caught the hands of the clock on the mantel. They pointed tofifteen minutes to seven. Mrs. Drabdump's devotion to the kitchen fireinvariably terminated at fifteen minutes past six. What was the matterwith the clock?

Mrs. Drabdump had an immediate vision of Snoppet, the neighboringhorologist, keeping the clock in hand for weeks and then returning itonly superficially repaired and secretly injured more vitally "for thegood of the trade. " The evil vision vanished as quickly as it came, exorcised by the deep boom of St. Dunstan's bells chiming thethree-quarters. In its place a great horror surged. Instinct had failed;Mrs. Drabdump had risen at half-past six instead of six. Now sheunderstood why she had been feeling so dazed and strange and sleepy. Shehad overslept herself. 

Chagrined and puzzled, she hastily set the kettle over the cracklingcoal, discovering a second later that she had overslept herself becauseMr. Constant wished to be woke three-quarters of an hour earlier thanusual, and to have his breakfast at seven, having to speak at an earlymeeting of discontented tram-men. She ran at once, candle in hand, tohis bedroom. It was upstairs. All "upstairs" was Arthur Constant'sdomain, for it consisted of but two mutually independent rooms. Mrs. Drabdump knocked viciously at the door of the one he used for a bedroom, crying, "Seven o'clock, sir. You'll be late, sir. You must get up atonce. " The usual slumbrous "All right" was not forthcoming; but, as sheherself had varied her morning salute, her ear was less expectant of theecho. She went downstairs, with no foreboding save that the kettle wouldcome off second best in the race between its boiling and her lodger'sdressing. 

For she knew there was no fear of Arthur Constant's lying deaf to thecall of duty--temporarily represented by Mrs. Drabdump. He was a lightsleeper, and the tram conductors' bells were probably ringing in hisears, summoning him to the meeting. Why Arthur Constant, B. A. --white-handed and white-shirted, and gentleman to the very purse ofhim--should concern himself with tram-men, when fortune had confined hisnecessary relations with drivers to cabmen at the least, Mrs. Drabdumpcould not quite make out. He probably aspired to represent Bow inParliament; but then it would surely have been wiser to lodge with alandlady who possessed a vote by having a husband alive. Nor was theremuch practical wisdom in his wish to black his own boots (an occupationin which he shone but little), and to live in every way like a Bowworking man. Bow working men were not so lavish in their patronage ofwater, whether existing in drinking glasses, morning tubs, or laundress'establishments. Nor did they eat the delicacies with which Mrs. Drabdumpsupplied him, with the assurance that they were the artisan's appanage. She could not bear to see him eat things unbefitting his station. ArthurConstant opened his mouth and ate what his landlady gave him, not firstdeliberately shutting his eyes according to the formula, the ratherpluming himself on keeping them very wide open. But it is difficult forsaints to see through their own halos; and in practice an aureola aboutthe head is often indistinguishable from a mist. The tea to be scaldedin Mr. Constant's pot, when that cantankerous kettle should boil, wasnot the coarse mixture of black and green sacred to herself and Mr. Mortlake, of whom the thoughts of breakfast now reminded her. Poor Mr. Mortlake, gone off without any to Devonport, somewhere about four in thefog-thickened darkness of a winter night! Well, she hoped his journeywould be duly rewarded, that his perks would be heavy, and that he wouldmake as good a thing out of the "traveling expenses" as rival laborleaders roundly accused him of to other people's faces. She did notgrudge him his gains, nor was it her business if, as they alleged, inintroducing Mr. Constant to her vacant rooms, his idea was not merely tobenefit his landlady. He had done her an uncommon good turn, queer aswas the lodger thus introduced. His own apostleship to the sons of toilgave Mrs. Drabdump no twinges of perplexity. Tom Mortlake had been acompositor; and apostleship was obviously a profession better paid andof a higher social status. Tom Mortlake--the hero of a hundredstrikes--set up in print on a poster, was unmistakably superior to TomMortlake setting up other men's names at a case. Still, the work was notall beer and skittles, and Mrs. Drabdump felt that Tom's latest job wasnot enviable. She shook his door as she passed it on her way to thekitchen, but there was no response. The street door was only a few feetoff down the passage, and a glance at it dispelled the last hope thatTom had abandoned the journey. The door was unbolted and unchained, andthe only security was the latch-key lock. Mrs. Drabdump felt a whituneasy, though, to give her her due, she never suffered as much as mosthousewives do from criminals who never come. Not quite opposite, butstill only a few doors off, on the other side of the street, lived thecelebrated ex-detective, Grodman, and, illogically enough, his presencein the street gave Mrs. Drabdump a curious sense of security, as of abeliever living under the shadow of the fane. That any human being ofill-odor should consciously come within a mile of the scent of so famousa sleuth-hound seemed to her highly improbable. Grodman had retired(with a competence) and was only a sleeping dog now; still, evencriminals would have sense enough to let him lie. 

So Mrs. Drabdump did not really feel that there had been any danger, especially as a second glance at the street door showed that Mortlakehad been thoughtful enough to slip the loop that held back the bolt ofthe big lock. She allowed herself another throb of sympathy for thelabor leader whirling on his dreary way toward Devonport Dockyard. Notthat he had told her anything of his journey beyond the town; but sheknew Devonport had a Dockyard because Jessie Dymond--Tom'ssweetheart--once mentioned that her aunt lived near there, and it lay onthe surface that Tom had gone to help the dockers, who were imitatingtheir London brethren. Mrs. Drabdump did not need to be told things tobe aware of them. She went back to prepare Mr. Constant's superfine tea, vaguely wondering why people were so discontented nowadays. But when shebrought up the tea and the toast and the eggs to Mr. Constant'ssitting-room (which adjoined his bedroom, though without communicatingwith it), Mr. Constant was not sitting in it. She lit the gas, and laidthe cloth; then she returned to the landing and beat at the bedroom doorwith an imperative palm. Silence alone answered her. She called him byname and told him the hour, but hers was the only voice she heard, andit sounded strangely to her in the shadows of the staircase. Then, muttering, "Poor gentleman, he had the toothache last night; and p'r'apshe's only just got a wink o' sleep. Pity to disturb him for the sake ofthem grizzling conductors. I'll let him sleep his usual time, " she borethe tea-pot downstairs with a mournful, almost poetic, consciousness, that soft-boiled eggs (like love) must grow cold. 

Half-past seven came--and she knocked again. But Constant slept on. 

His letters, always a strange assortment, arrived at eight, and atelegram came soon after. Mrs. Drabdump rattled his door, shouted, andat last put the wire under it. Her heart was beating fast enough now, though there seemed to be a cold, clammy snake curling round it. Shewent downstairs again and turned the handle of Mortlake's room, and wentin without knowing why. The coverlet of the bed showed that the occupanthad only lain down in his clothes, as if fearing to miss the earlytrain. She had not for a moment expected to find him in the room; yetsomehow the consciousness that she was alone in the house with thesleeping Constant seemed to flash for the first time upon her, and theclammy snake tightened its folds round her heart. 

She opened the street door, and her eye wandered nervously up and down. It was half-past eight. The little street stretched cold and still inthe gray mist, blinking bleary eyes at either end, where the streetlamps smoldered on. No one was visible for the moment, though smoke wasrising from many of the chimneys to greet its sister mist. At the houseof the detective across the way the blinds were still down and theshutters up. Yet the familiar, prosaic aspect of the street calmed her. The bleak air set her coughing; she slammed the door to, and returned tothe kitchen to make fresh tea for Constant, who could only be in a deepsleep. But the canister trembled in her grasp. She did not know whethershe dropped it or threw it down, but there was nothing in the hand thatbattered again a moment later at the bedroom door. No sound withinanswered the clamor without. She rained blow upon blow in a sort ofspasm of frenzy, scarce remembering that her object was merely to wakeher lodger, and almost staving in the lower panels with her kicks. Thenshe turned the handle and tried to open the door, but it was locked. Theresistance recalled her to herself--she had a moment of shocked decencyat the thought that she had been about to enter Constant's bedroom. Thenthe terror came over her afresh. She felt that she was alone in thehouse with a corpse. She sank to the floor, cowering; with difficultystifling a desire to scream. Then she rose with a jerk and raced downthe stairs without looking behind her, and threw open the door and ranout into the street, only pulling up with her hand violently agitatingGrodman's door-knocker. In a moment the first floor window wasraised--the little house was of the same pattern as her own--andGrodman's full, fleshy face loomed through the fog in sleepy irritationfrom under a nightcap. Despite its scowl the ex-detective's face dawnedupon her like the sun upon an occupant of the haunted chamber. 

"What in the devil's the matter?" he growled. Grodman was not an earlybird, now that he had no worms to catch. He could afford to despiseproverbs now, for the house in which he lived was his, and he lived init because several other houses in the street were also his, and it iswell for the landlord to be about his own estate in Bow, where poachersoften shoot the moon. Perhaps the desire to enjoy his greatness amonghis early cronies counted for something, too, for he had been born andbred at Bow, receiving when a youth his first engagement from the localpolice quarters, whence he drew a few shillings a week as an amateurdetective in his leisure hours. 

Grodman was still a bachelor. In the celestial matrimonial bureau apartner might have been selected for him, but he had never been able todiscover her. It was his one failure as a detective. He was aself-sufficing person, who preferred a gas stove to a domestic; but indeference to Glover Street opinion he admitted a female factotum betweenten a. M. And ten p. M. , and, equally in deference to Glover Streetopinion, excluded her between ten p. M. And ten a. M. 

"I want you to come across at once, " Mrs. Drabdump gasped. "Somethinghas happened to Mr. Constant. "

"What! Not bludgeoned by the police at the meeting this morning, Ihope?"

"No, no! He didn't go. He is dead. "

"Dead?" Grodman's face grew very serious now. 

"Yes. Murdered!"

"What?" almost shouted the ex-detective. "How? When? Where? Who?"

"I don't know. I can't get to him. I have beaten at his door. He doesnot answer. "

Grodman's face lit up with relief. 

"You silly woman! Is that all? I shall have a cold in my head. Bitterweather. He's dog-tired after yesterday--processions, three speeches, kindergarten, lecture on 'the moon, ' article on co-operation. That's hisstyle. " It was also Grodman's style. He never wasted words. 

"No, " Mrs. Drabdump breathed up at him solemnly, "he's dead. "

"All right; go back. Don't alarm the neighborhood unnecessarily. Waitfor me. Down in five minutes. " Grodman did not take this Cassandra ofthe kitchen too seriously. Probably he knew his woman. His small, bead-like eyes glittered with an almost amused smile as he withdrew themfrom Mrs. Drabdump's ken, and shut down the sash with a bang. The poorwoman ran back across the road and through her door, which she would notclose behind her. It seemed to shut her in with the dead. She waited inthe passage. After an age--seven minutes by any honest clock--Grodmanmade his appearance, looking as dressed as usual, but with unkempt hairand with disconsolate side-whisker. He was not quite used to thatside-whisker yet, for it had only recently come within the margin ofcultivation. In active service Grodman had been clean-shaven, like allmembers of the profession--for surely your detective is the mostversatile of actors. Mrs. Drabdump closed the street door quietly, andpointed to the stairs, fear operating like a polite desire to give himprecedence. Grodman ascended, amusement still glimmering in his eyes. Arrived on the landing he knocked peremptorily at the door, crying, "Nine o'clock, Mr. Constant; nine o'clock!" When he ceased there was noother sound or movement. His face grew more serious. He waited, thenknocked, and cried louder. He turned the handle, but the door was fast. He tried to peer through the keyhole, but it was blocked. He shook theupper panels, but the door seemed bolted as well as locked. He stoodstill, his face set and rigid, for he liked and esteemed the man. 

"Ay, knock your loudest, " whispered the pale-faced woman. "You'll notwake him now. "

The gray mist had followed them through the street door, and hoveredabout the staircase, charging the air with a moist, sepulchral odor. 

"Locked and bolted, " muttered Grodman, shaking the door afresh. 

"Burst it open, " breathed the woman, trembling violently all over, andholding her hands before her as if to ward off the dreadful vision. Without another word, Grodman applied his shoulder to the door, and madea violent muscular effort. He had been an athlete in his time, and thesap was yet in him. The door creaked, little by little it began to give, the woodwork enclosing the bolt of the lock splintered, the panels bentupward, the large upper bolt tore off its iron staple; the door flewback with a crash. Grodman rushed in. 

"My God!" he cried. The woman shrieked. The sight was too terrible. 

 * * * * *

Within a few hours the jubilant news-boys were shrieking "HorribleSuicide in Bow, " and "The Star" poster added, for the satisfaction ofthose too poor to purchase: "A Philanthropist Cuts His Throat. "

CHAPTER II. 

But the newspapers were premature. Scotland Yard refused to prejudge thecase despite the penny-a-liners. Several arrests were made, so that thelater editions were compelled to soften "Suicide" into "Mystery. " Thepeople arrested were a nondescript collection of tramps. Most of themhad committed other offenses for which the police had not arrested them. One bewildered-looking gentleman gave himself up (as if he were ariddle), but the police would have none of him, and restored himforthwith to his friends and keepers. The number of candidates for eachnew opening in Newgate is astonishing. 

The full significance of this tragedy of a noble young life cut shorthad hardly time to filter into the public mind, when a fresh sensationabsorbed it. Tom Mortlake had been arrested the same day at Liverpool onsuspicion of being concerned in the death of his fellow-lodger. The newsfell like a bombshell upon a land in which Tom Mortlake's name was ahousehold word. That the gifted artisan orator, who had never shrunkupon occasion from launching red rhetoric at Society, should actuallyhave shed blood seemed too startling, especially as the blood shed wasnot blue, but the property of a lovable young middle-class idealist, whohad now literally given his life to the Cause. But this supplementarysensation did not grow to a head, and everybody (save a few laborleaders) was relieved to hear that Tom had been released almostimmediately, being merely subpoenaed to appear at the inquest. In aninterview which he accorded to the representative of a Liverpool paperthe same afternoon, he stated that he put his arrest down entirely tothe enmity and rancor entertained toward him by the police throughoutthe country. He had come to Liverpool to trace the movements of a friendabout whom he was very uneasy, and he was making anxious inquiries atthe docks to discover at what times steamers left for America, when thedetectives stationed there in accordance with instructions fromheadquarters had arrested him as a suspicious-looking character. "Though, " said Tom, "they must very well have known my phiz, as I havebeen sketched and caricatured all over the shop. When I told them who Iwas they had the decency to let me go. They thought they'd scored off meenough, I reckon. Yes, it certainly is a strange coincidence that Imight actually have had something to do with the poor fellow's death, which has cut me up as much as anybody; though if they had known I hadjust come from the 'scene of the crime, ' and actually lived in thehouse, they would probably have--let me alone. " He laughedsarcastically. "They are a queer lot of muddle-heads are the police. Their motto is, 'First catch your man, then cook the evidence. ' Ifyou're on the spot you're guilty because you're there, and if you'reelsewhere you're guilty because you have gone away. Oh, I know them! Ifthey could have seen their way to clap me in quod, they'd ha' done it. Lucky I know the number of the cabman who took me to Euston before fivethis morning. "

"If they clapped you in quod, " the interviewer reported himself asfacetiously observing, "the prisoners would be on strike in a week. "

"Yes, but there would be so many black-legs ready to take their places, "Mortlake flashed back, "that I'm afraid it 'ould be no go. But do excuseme. I am so upset about my friend. I'm afraid he has left England, and Ihave to make inquiries; and now there's poor Constant gone--horrible!horrible! and I'm due in London at the inquest. I must really run away. Good-by. Tell your readers it's all a police grudge. "

"One last word, Mr. Mortlake, if you please. Is it true that you werebilled to preside at a great meeting of clerks at St. James' Hallbetween one and two to-day to protest against the German invasion?"

"Whew! so I had. But the beggars arrested me just before one, when I wasgoing to wire, and then the news of poor Constant's end drove it out ofmy head. What a nuisance! Lord, how troubles do come together! Well, good-by, send me a copy of the paper. "

Tom Mortlake's evidence at the inquest added little beyond this to thepublic knowledge of his movements on the morning of the Mystery. Thecabman who drove him to Euston had written indignantly to the papers tosay that he had picked up his celebrated fare at Bow Railway Station atabout half-past four a. M. , and the arrest was a deliberate insult todemocracy, and he offered to make an affidavit to that effect, leavingit dubious to which effect. But Scotland Yard betrayed no itch for theaffidavit in question, and No. 2, 138 subsided again into the obscurityof his rank. Mortlake--whose face was very pale below the black manebrushed back from his fine forehead--gave his evidence in low, sympathetic tones. He had known the deceased for over a year, comingconstantly across him in their common political and social work, and hadfound the furnished rooms for him in Glover Street at his own request, they just being to let when Constant resolved to leave his rooms atOxford House in Bethnal Green and to share the actual life of thepeople. The locality suited the deceased, as being near the People'sPalace. He respected and admired the deceased, whose genuine goodnesshad won all hearts. The deceased was an untiring worker; never grumbled, was always in fair spirits, regarded his life and wealth as a sacredtrust to be used for the benefit of humanity. He had last seen him at aquarter past nine p. M. On the day preceding his death. He (witness) hadreceived a letter by the last post which made him uneasy about a friend. Deceased was evidently suffering from toothache, and was fixing a pieceof cotton-wool in a hollow tooth, but he did not complain. Deceasedseemed rather upset by the news he brought, and they both discussed itrather excitedly. 

By a Juryman: Did the news concern him?

Mortlake: Only impersonally. He knew my friend, and was keenlysympathetic when one was in trouble. 

Coroner: Could you show the jury the letter you received?

Mortlake: I have mislaid it, and cannot make out where it has got to. Ifyou, sir, think it relevant or essential, I will state what the troublewas. 

Coroner: Was the toothache very violent?

Mortlake: I cannot tell. I think not, though he told me it had disturbedhis rest the night before. 

Coroner: What time did you leave him?

Mortlake: About twenty to ten. 

Coroner: And what did you do then?

Mortlake: I went out for an hour or so to make some inquiries. Then Ireturned, and told my landlady I should be leaving by an early trainfor--for the country. 

Coroner: And that was the last you saw of the deceased?

Mortlake (with emotion): The last. 

Coroner: How was he when you left him?

Mortlake: Mainly concerned about my trouble. 

Coroner: Otherwise you saw nothing unusual about him?

Mortlake: Nothing. 

Coroner: What time did you leave the house on Tuesday morning?

Mortlake: At about five and twenty minutes past four. 

Coroner: Are you sure that you shut the street door?

Mortlake: Quite sure. Knowing my landlady was rather a timid person, Ieven slipped the bolt of the big lock, which was usually tied back. Itwas impossible for any one to get in even with a latch-key. 

Mrs. Drabdump's evidence (which, of course, preceded his) was moreimportant, and occupied a considerable time, unduly eked out byDrabdumpian padding. Thus she not only deposed that Mr. Constant had thetoothache, but that it was going to last about a week; in tragic-comicindifference to the radical cure that had been effected. Her account ofthe last hours of the deceased tallied with Mortlake's, only that shefeared Mortlake was quarreling with him over something in the letterthat came by the nine o'clock post. Deceased had left the house a littleafter Mortlake, but had returned before him, and had gone straight tohis bedroom. She had not actually seen him come in, having been in thekitchen, but she heard his latch-key, followed by his light step up thestairs. 

A Juryman: How do you know it was not somebody else? (Sensation, ofwhich the juryman tries to look unconscious. )

Witness: He called down to me over the banisters, and says in hissweetish voice: "Be hextra sure to wake me at a quarter to seven, Mrs. Drabdump, or else I shan't get to my tram meeting. "

(Juryman collapses. )

Coroner: And did you wake him?

Mrs. Drabdump (breaking down): Oh, my lud, how can you ask?

Coroner: There, there, compose yourself. I mean did you try to wake him?

Mrs. Drabdump: I have taken in and done for lodgers this seventeenyears, my lud, and have always gave satisfaction; and Mr. Mortlake, hewouldn't ha' recommended me otherwise, though I wish to Heaven the poorgentleman had never----

Coroner: Yes, yes, of course. You tried to rouse him?

But it was some time before Mrs. Drabdump was sufficiently calm toexplain that though she had overslept herself, and though it would havebeen all the same anyhow, she had come up to time. Bit by bit the tragicstory was forced from her lips--a tragedy that even her telling couldnot make tawdry. She told with superfluous detail how--when Mr. Grodmanbroke in the door--she saw her unhappy gentleman lodger lying on hisback in bed, stone dead, with a gaping red wound in his throat; how herstronger-minded companion calmed her a little by spreading ahandkerchief over the distorted face; how they then looked vainly aboutand under the bed for any instrument by which the deed could have beendone, the veteran detective carefully making a rapid inventory of thecontents of the room, and taking notes of the precise position andcondition of the body before anything was disturbed by the arrival ofgapers or bunglers; how she had pointed out to him that both the windowswere firmly bolted to keep out the cold night air; how, having notedthis down with a puzzled, pitying shake of the head, he had opened thewindow to summon the police, and espied in the fog one Denzil Cantercot, whom he called and told to run to the nearest police-station and askthem to send on an inspector and a surgeon. How they both remained inthe room till the police arrived, Grodman pondering deeply the while andmaking notes every now and again, as fresh points occurred to him, andasking her questions about the poor, weak-headed young man. Pressed asto what she meant by calling the deceased "weak-headed, " she repliedthat some of her neighbors wrote him begging letters, though, Heavenknew, they were better off than herself, who had to scrape her fingersto the bone for every penny she earned. Under further pressure from Mr. Talbot, who was watching the inquiry on behalf of Arthur Constant'sfamily, Mrs. Drabdump admitted that the deceased had behaved like ahuman being, nor was there anything externally eccentric or queer in hisconduct. He was always cheerful and pleasant spoken, though certainlysoft--God rest his soul. No; he never shaved, but wore all the hair thatHeaven had given him. 

By a Juryman: She thought deceased was in the habit of locking his doorwhen he went to bed. Of course, she couldn't say for certain. (Laughter. ) There was no need to bolt the door as well. The bolt slidupward, and was at the top of the door. When she first let lodgings, herreasons for which she seemed anxious to publish, there had only been abolt, but a suspicious lodger, she would not call him a gentleman, hadcomplained that he could not fasten his door behind him, and so she hadbeen put to the expense of having a lock made. The complaining lodgerwent off soon after without paying his rent. (Laughter. ) She had alwaysknown he would. 

The Coroner: Was deceased at all nervous?

Witness: No, he was a very nice gentleman. (A laugh. )

Coroner: I mean did he seem afraid of being robbed?

Witness: No, he was always goin' to demonstrations. (Laughter. ) I toldhim to be careful. I told him I lost a purse with 3s. 2d. Myself onJubilee Day. 

Mrs. Drabdump resumed her seat, weeping vaguely. 

The Coroner: Gentlemen, we shall have an opportunity of viewing the roomshortly. 

The story of the discovery of the body was retold, though morescientifically, by Mr. George Grodman, whose unexpected resurgence intothe realm of his early exploits excited as keen a curiosity as thereappearance "for this occasion only" of a retired prima donna. Hisbook, "Criminals I Have Caught, " passed from the twenty-third to thetwenty-fourth edition merely on the strength of it. Mr. Grodman statedthat the body was still warm when he found it. He thought that death wasquite recent. The door he had had to burst was bolted as well as locked. He confirmed Mrs. Drabdump's statement about the windows; the chimneywas very narrow. The cut looked as if done by a razor. There was noinstrument lying about the room. He had known the deceased about amonth. He seemed a very earnest, simple-minded young fellow who spoke agreat deal about the brotherhood of man. (The hardened old man-hunter'svoice was not free from a tremor as he spoke jerkily of the dead man'senthusiasms. ) He should have thought the deceased the last man in theworld to commit suicide. 

Mr. Denzil Cantercot was next called. He was a poet. (Laughter. ) He wason his way to Mr. Grodman's house to tell him he had been unable to dosome writing for him because he was suffering from writer's cramp, whenMr. Grodman called to him from the window of No. 11 and asked him to runfor the police. No, he did not run; he was a philosopher. (Laughter. ) Hereturned with them to the door, but did not go up. He had no stomach forcrude sensations. (Laughter. ) The gray fog was sufficiently unbeautifulfor him for one morning. (Laughter. )

Inspector Howlett said: About 9:45 on the morning of Tuesday, 4thDecember, from information received, he went with Sergeant Runnymede andDr. Robinson to 11 Glover Street, Bow, and there found the dead body ofa young man, lying on his back with his throat cut. The door of the roomhad been smashed in, and the lock and the bolt evidently forced. Theroom was tidy. There were no marks of blood on the floor. A purse fullof gold was on the dressing-table beside a big book. A hip-bath withcold water stood beside the bed, over which was a hanging bookcase. There was a large wardrobe against the wall next to the door. Thechimney was very narrow. There were two windows, one bolted. It wasabout 18 feet to the pavement. There was no way of climbing up. No onecould possibly have got out of the room, and then bolted the doors andwindows behind him; and he had searched all parts of the room in whichanyone might have been concealed. He had been unable to find anyinstrument in the room, in spite of exhaustive search, there being noteven a penknife in the pockets of the clothes of the deceased, which layon a chair. The house and the back yard, and the adjacent pavement, hadalso been fruitlessly searched. 

Sergeant Runnymede made an identical statement, saving only that he hadgone with Dr. Robinson and Inspector Howlett. 

Dr. Robinson, divisional surgeon, said: The deceased was lying on hisback, with his throat cut. The body was not yet cold, the abdominalregion being quite warm. Rigor mortis had set in in the lower jaw, neckand upper extremities. The muscles contracted when beaten. I inferredthat life had been extinct some two or three hours, probably not longer, it might have been less. The bedclothes would keep the lower part warmfor some time. The wound, which was a deep one, was 5-1/2 inches fromright to left across the throat to a point under the left ear. The upperportion of the windpipe was severed, and likewise the jugular vein. Themuscular coating of the carotid artery was divided. There was a slightcut, as if in continuation of the wound, on the thumb of the left hand. The hands were clasped underneath the head. There was no blood on theright hand. The wound could not have been self-inflicted. A sharpinstrument had been used, such as a razor. The cut might have, been madeby a left-handed person. No doubt death was practically instantaneous. Isaw no signs of a struggle about the body or the room. I noticed a purseon the dressing-table, lying next to Madame Blavatsky's big book onTheosophy. Sergeant Runnymede drew my attention to the fact that thedoor had evidently been locked and bolted from within. 

By a Juryman: I do not say the cuts could not have been made by aright-handed person. I can offer no suggestion as to how the inflicterof the wound got in or out. Extremely improbable that the cut wasself-inflicted. There was little trace of the outside fog in the room. 

Police Constable Williams said he was on duty in the early hours of themorning of the 4th inst. Glover Street lay within his beat. He saw orheard nothing suspicious. The fog was never very dense, though nasty tothe throat. He had passed through Glover Street about half-past four. Hehad not seen Mr. Mortlake or anybody else leave the house. 

The Court here adjourned, the Coroner and the jury repairing in a bodyto 11 Glover Street to view the house and the bedroom of the deceased. And the evening posters announced, "The Bow Mystery Thickens. "

CHAPTER III. 

Before the inquiry was resumed, all the poor wretches in custody hadbeen released on suspicion that they were innocent; there was not asingle case even for a magistrate. Clues, which at such seasons aregathered by the police like blackberries off the hedges, were scanty andunripe. Inferior specimens were offered them by bushels, but there wasnot a good one among the lot. The police could not even manufacture aclue. 

Arthur Constant's death was already the theme of every hearth, railwaycarriage and public house. The dead idealist had points of contact withso many spheres. The East End and West End alike were moved and excited, the Democratic Leagues and the Churches, the Doss-houses and theUniversities. The pity of it! And then the impenetrable mystery of it!

The evidence given in the concluding portion of the investigation wasnecessarily less sensational. There were no more witnesses to bring thescent of blood over the coroner's table; those who had yet to be heardwere merely relatives and friends of the deceased, who spoke of him ashe had been in life. His parents were dead, perhaps luckily for them;his relatives had seen little of him, and had scarce heard as much abouthim as the outside world. No man is a prophet in his own country, and, even if he migrates, it is advisable for him to leave his family athome. His friends were a motley crew; friends of the same friend are notnecessarily friends of one another. But their diversity only made thecongruity of the tale they had to tell more striking. It was the tale ofa man who had never made an enemy even by benefiting him, nor lost afriend even by refusing his favors; the tale of a man whose heartoverflowed with peace and good will to all men all the year round; of aman to whom Christmas came not once, but three hundred and sixty-fivetimes a year; it was the tale of a brilliant intellect, who gave up tomankind what was meant for himself, and worked as a laborer in thevineyard of humanity, never crying that the grapes were sour; of a manuniformly cheerful and of good courage, living in that forgetfulness ofself which is the truest antidote to despair. And yet there was notquite wanting the note of pain to jar the harmony and make it human. Richard Elton, his chum from boyhood, and vicar of Somerton, inMidlandshire, handed to the coroner a letter from the deceased about tendays before his death, containing some passages which the coroner readaloud: "Do you know anything of Schopenhauer? I mean anything beyond thecurrent misconceptions? I have been making his acquaintance lately. Heis an agreeable rattle of a pessimist; his essay on 'The Misery ofMankind' is quite lively reading. At first his assimilation ofChristianity and Pessimism (it occurs in his essay on 'Suicide') dazzledme as an audacious paradox. But there is truth in it. Verily, the wholecreation groaneth and travaileth, and man is a degraded monster, and sinis over all. Ah, my friend, I have shed many of my illusions since Icame to this seething hive of misery and wrongdoing. What shall oneman's life--a million men's lives--avail against the corruption, thevulgarity and the squalor of civilization? Sometimes I feel like afarthing rush-light in the Hall of Eblis. Selfishness is so long andlife so short. And the worst of it is that everybody is so beastlycontented. The poor no more desire comfort than the rich culture. Thewoman to whom a penny school fee for her child represents an appreciableslice of her income is satisfied that the rich we shall always have withus. 

"The real crusted old Tories are the paupers in the Workhouse. TheRadical working men are jealous of their own leaders, and the leaders ofone another. Schopenhauer must have organized a labor party in his saladdays. And yet one can't help feeling that he committed suicide as aphilosopher by not committing it as a man. He claims kinship withBuddha, too; though Esoteric Buddhism at least seems spheres removedfrom the philosophy of 'The Will and the Idea, ' What a wonderful womanMadame Blavatsky must be. I can't say I follow her, for she is up in theclouds nearly all the time, and I haven't as yet developed an astralbody. Shall I send you on her book? It is fascinating. . . . I am becomingquite a fluent orator. One soon gets into the way of it. The horriblething is that you catch yourself saying things to lead up to 'Cheers'instead of sticking to the plain realities of the business. Lucy isstill doing the galleries in Italy. It used to pain me sometimes tothink of my darling's happiness when I came across a flat-chestedfactory girl. Now I feel her happiness is as important as a factorygirl's. "

Lucy, the witness explained, was Lucy Brent, the betrothed of thedeceased. The poor girl had been telegraphed for, and had started forEngland. The witness stated that the outburst of despondency in thisletter was almost a solitary one, most of the letters in his possessionbeing bright, buoyant and hopeful. Even this letter ended with ahumorous statement of the writer's manifold plans and projects for thenew year. The deceased was a good Churchman. 

Coroner: Was there any private trouble in his own life to account forthe temporary despondency?

Witness: Not so far as I am aware. His financial position wasexceptionally favorable. 

Coroner: There had been no quarrel with Miss Brent?

Witness: I have the best authority for saying that no shadow ofdifference had ever come between them. 

Coroner: Was the deceased left-handed?

Witness: Certainly not. He was not even ambidextrous. 

A Juryman: Isn't Shoppinhour one of the infidel writers, published bythe Freethought Publication Society?

Witness: I do not know who publishes his books. 

The Juryman (a small grocer and big raw-boned Scotchman, rejoicing inthe name of Sandy Sanderson and the dignities of deaconry and membershipof the committee of the Bow Conservative Association): No equeevocation, sir. Is he not a secularist, who has lectured at the Hall of Science?

Witness: No, he is a foreign writer--(Mr. Sanderson was heard to thankHeaven for this small mercy)--who believes that life is not worthliving. 

The Juryman: Were you not shocked to find the friend of a meenisterreading such impure leeterature?

Witness: The deceased read everything. Schopenhauer is the author of asystem of philosophy, and not what you seem to imagine. Perhaps youwould like to inspect the book? (Laughter. )

The Juryman: I would na' touch it with a pitchfork. Such books should beburnt. And this Madame Blavatsky's book--what is that? Is that alsopheelosophy?

Witness: No. It is Theosophy. (Laughter. )

Mr. Allen Smith, secretary of the Trammel's Union, stated that he hadhad an interview with the deceased on the day before his death, when he(the deceased) spoke hopefully of the prospects of the movement, andwrote him out a check for 10 guineas for his union. Deceased promised tospeak at a meeting called for a quarter past seven a. M. The next day. 

Mr. Edward Wimp, of the Scotland Yard Detective Department, said thatthe letters and papers of the deceased threw no light upon the manner ofhis death, and they would be handed back to the family. His Departmenthad not formed any theory on the subject. 

The Coroner proceeded to sum up the evidence. "We have to deal, gentlemen, " he said, "with a most incomprehensible and mysterious case, the details of which are yet astonishingly simple. On the morning ofTuesday, the 4th inst. , Mrs. Drabdump, a worthy, hard-working widow, wholets lodgings at 11 Grover Street, Bow, was unable to arouse thedeceased, who occupied the entire upper floor of the house. Becomingalarmed, she went across to fetch Mr. George Grodman, a gentleman knownto us all by reputation, and to whose clear and scientific evidence weare much indebted, and got him to batter in the door. They found thedeceased lying back in bed with a deep wound in his throat. Life hadonly recently become extinct. There was no trace of any instrument bywhich the cut could have been effected; there was no trace of any personwho could have effected the cut. No person could apparently have got inor out. The medical evidence goes to show that the deceased could nothave inflicted the wound himself. And yet, gentlemen, there are, in thenature of things, two--and only two--alternative explanations of hisdeath. Either the wound was inflicted by his own hand, or it wasinflicted by another's. I shall take each of these possibilitiesseparately. First, did the deceased commit suicide? The medical evidencesays deceased was lying with his hands clasped behind his head. Now thewound was made from right to left, and terminated by a cut on the leftthumb. If the deceased had made it he would have had to do it with hisright hand, while his left hand remained under his head--a most peculiarand unnatural position to assume. Moreover, in making a cut with theright hand, one would naturally move the hand from left to right. It isunlikely that the deceased would move his right hand so awkwardly andunnaturally, unless, of course, his object was to baffle suspicion. Another point is that on this hypothesis, the deceased would have had toreplace his right hand beneath his head. But Dr. Robinson believes thatdeath was instantaneous. If so, deceased could have had no time to poseso neatly. It is just possible the cut was made with the left hand, butthen the deceased was right-handed. The absence of any signs of apossible weapon undoubtedly goes to corroborate the medical evidence. The police have made an exhaustive search in all places where the razoror other weapon or instrument might by any possibility have beenconcealed, including the bedclothes, the mattress, the pillow, and thestreet into which it might have been dropped. But all theories involvingthe willful concealment of the fatal instrument have to reckon with thefact or probability that death was instantaneous, also with the factthat there was no blood about the floor. Finally, the instrument usedwas in all likelihood a razor, and the deceased did not shave, and wasnever known to be in possession of any such instrument. If, then, wewere to confine ourselves to the medical and police evidence, therewould, I think, be little hesitation in dismissing the idea of suicide. Nevertheless, it is well to forget the physical aspect of the case for amoment and to apply our minds to an unprejudiced inquiry into the mentalaspect of it. Was there any reason why the deceased should wish to takehis own life? He was young, wealthy and popular, loving and loved; lifestretched fair before him. He had no vices. Plain living, high thinking, and noble doing were the three guiding stars of his life. If he had hadambition, an illustrious public career was within reach. He was anorator of no mean power, a brilliant and industrious man. His outlookwas always on the future--he was always sketching out ways in which hecould be useful to his fellow-men. His purse and his time were ever atthe command of whosoever could show fair claim upon them. If such a manwere likely to end his own life, the science of human nature would be atan end. Still, some of the shadows of the picture have been presented tous. The man had his moments of despondency--as which of us has not? Butthey seem to have been few and passing. Anyhow, he was cheerful enoughon the day before his death. He was suffering, too, from toothache. Butit does not seem to have been violent, nor did he complain. Possibly, ofcourse, the pain became very acute in the night. Nor must we forget thathe may have overworked himself, and got his nerves into a morbid state. He worked very hard, never rising later than half-past seven, and doingfar more than the professional 'labor leader. ' He taught and wrote aswell as spoke and organized. But on the other hand all witnesses agreethat he was looking forward eagerly to the meeting of tram-men on themorning of the 4th inst. His whole heart was in the movement. Is itlikely that this was the night he would choose for quitting the scene ofhis usefulness? Is it likely that if he had chosen it, he would not haveleft letters and a statement behind, or made a last will and testament?Mr. Wimp has found no possible clue to such conduct in his papers. Or isit likely he would have concealed the instrument? The only positive signof intention is the bolting of his door in addition to the usual lockingof it, but one cannot lay much stress on that. Regarding the mentalaspects alone, the balance is largely against suicide; looking at thephysical aspects, suicide is well nigh impossible. Putting the twotogether, the case against suicide is all but mathematically complete. The answer, then, to our first question, Did the deceased commitsuicide? is, that he did not. "

The coroner paused, and everybody drew a long breath. The lucidexposition had been followed with admiration. If the coroner had stoppednow, the jury would have unhesitatingly returned a verdict of "murder. "But the coroner swallowed a mouthful of water and went on. 

"We now come to the second alternative--was the deceased the victim ofhomicide? In order to answer that question in the affirmative it isessential that we should be able to form some conception of the _modusoperandi_. It is all very well for Dr. Robinson to say the cut was madeby another hand; but in the absence of any theory as to how the cutcould possibly have been made by that other hand, we should be drivenback to the theory of self-infliction, however improbable it may seem tomedical gentlemen. Now, what are the facts? When Mrs. Drabdump and Mr. Grodman found the body it was yet warm, and Mr. Grodman, a witnessfortunately qualified by special experience, states that death had beenquite recent. This tallies closely enough with the view of Dr. Robinson, who, examining the body about an hour later, put the time of death attwo or three hours before, say seven o'clock. Mrs. Drabdump hadattempted to wake the deceased at a quarter to seven, which would putback the act to a little earlier. As I understand from Dr. Robinson, that it is impossible to fix the time very precisely, death may havevery well taken place several hours before Mrs. Drabdump's first attemptto wake deceased. Of course, it may have taken place between the firstand second calls, as he may merely have been sound asleep at first; itmay also not impossibly have taken place considerably earlier than thefirst call, for all the physical data seem to prove. Nevertheless, onthe whole, I think we shall be least likely to err if we assume the timeof death to be half-past six. Gentlemen, let us picture to ourselves No. 11 Glover Street at half-past six. We have seen the house; we knowexactly how it is constructed. On the ground floor a front room tenantedby Mr. Mortlake, with two windows giving on the street, both securelybolted; a back room occupied by the landlady; and a kitchen. Mrs. Drabdump did not leave her bedroom till half-past six, so that we may besure all the various doors and windows have not yet been unfastened;while the season of the year is a guarantee that nothing had been leftopen. The front door through which Mr. Mortlake has gone out beforehalf-past four, is guarded by the latch-key lock and the big lock. Onthe upper floor are two rooms--a front room used by deceased for abedroom, and a back room which he used as a sitting-room. The back roomhas been left open, with the key inside, but the window is fastened. Thedoor of the front room is not only locked, but bolted. We have seen thesplintered mortise and the staple of the upper bolt violently forcedfrom the woodwork and resting on the pin. The windows are bolted, thefasteners being firmly fixed in the catches. The chimney is too narrowto admit of the passage of even a child. This room, in fact, is asfirmly barred in as if besieged. It has no communication with any otherpart of the house. It is as absolutely self-centered and isolated as ifit were a fort in the sea or a log-hut in the forest. Even if anystrange person is in the house, nay, in the very sitting-room of thedeceased, he cannot get into the bedroom, for the house is one built forthe poor, with no communication between the different rooms, so thatseparate families, if need be, may inhabit each. Now, however, let usgrant that some person has achieved the miracle of getting into thefront room, first floor, 18 feet from the ground. At half-past six, orthereabouts, he cuts the throat of the sleeping occupant. How is he thento get out without attracting the attention of the now roused landlady?But let us concede him that miracle, too. How is he to go away and yetleave the doors and windows locked and bolted from within? This is adegree of miracle at which my credulity must draw the line. No, the roomhad been closed all night--there is scarce a trace of fog in it. No onecould get in or out. Finally, murders do not take place without motive. Robbery and revenge are the only conceivable motives. The deceased hadnot an enemy in the world; his money and valuables were left untouched. Everything was in order. There were no signs of a struggle. The answerthen to our second inquiry--was the deceased killed by anotherperson?--is, that he was not. 

"Gentlemen, I am aware that this sounds impossible and contradictory. But it is the facts that contradict themselves. It seems clear that thedeceased did not commit suicide. It seems equally clear that thedeceased was not murdered. There is nothing for it, therefore, gentlemen, but to return a verdict tantamount to an acknowledgment ofour incompetence to come to any adequately grounded conviction whateveras to the means or the manner by which the deceased met his death. It isthe most inexplicable mystery in all my experience. " (Sensation. )

The Foreman (after a colloquy with Mr. Sandy Sanderson): "We are notagreed, sir. One of the jurors insists on a verdict of "Death fromvisitation by the act of God. ""

CHAPTER IV. 

But Sandy Sanderson's burning solicitude to fix the crime flickered outin the face of opposition, and in the end he bowed his head to theinevitable "open verdict. " Then the floodgates of inkland were opened, and the deluge pattered for nine days on the deaf coffin where the pooridealist moldered. The tongues of the Press were loosened, and theleader writers reveled in recapitulating the circumstances of "The BigBow Mystery, " though they could contribute nothing but adjectives to thesolution. The papers teemed with letters--it was a kind of Indian summerof the silly season. But the editors could not keep them out, nor caredto. The mystery was the one topic of conversation everywhere--it was onthe carpet and the bare boards alike, in the kitchen and thedrawing-room. It was discussed with science or stupidity, with aspiratesor without. It came up for breakfast with the rolls, and was swept offthe supper table with the last crumbs. 

No. 11 Glover Street, Bow, remained for days a shrine of pilgrimage. Theonce sleepy little street buzzed from morning till night. From all partsof the town people came to stare up at the bedroom window and wonderwith a foolish look of horror. The pavement was often blocked for hourstogether, and itinerant vendors of refreshment made it a new marketcenter, while vocalists hastened thither to sing the delectable ditty ofthe deed without having any voice in the matter. It was a pity theGovernment did not erect a toll-gate at either end of the street. ButChancellors of the Exchequer rarely avail themselves of the more obviousexpedients for paying off the National debt. 

Finally, familiarity bred contempt, and the wits grew facetious at theexpense of the Mystery. Jokes on the subject appeared even in the comicpapers. 

To the proverb, "You must not say Boo to a goose, " one added, "or elseshe will explain you the Mystery. " The name of the gentleman who askedwhether the Bow Mystery was not 'arrowing shall not be divulged. Therewas more point in "Dagonet's" remark that, if he had been one of theunhappy jurymen, he should have been driven to "suicide. " A professionalparadox-monger pointed triumphantly to the somewhat similar situation in"the murder in the Rue Morgue, " and said that Nature had beenplagiarizing again--like the monkey she was--and he recommended Poe'spublishers to apply for an injunction. More seriously, Poe's solutionwas re-suggested by "Constant Reader" as an original idea. He thoughtthat a small organ-grinder's monkey might have got down the chimney withits master's razor, and, after attempting to shave the occupant of thebed, have returned the way it came. This idea created considerablesensation, but a correspondent with a long train of letters dragglingafter his name pointed out that a monkey small enough to get down sonarrow a flue would not be strong enough to inflict so deep a wound. This was disputed by a third writer, and the contest raged so keenlyabout the power of monkeys' muscles that it was almost taken for grantedthat a monkey was the guilty party. The bubble was pricked by the pen of"Common Sense, " who laconically remarked that no traces of soot or bloodhad been discovered on the floor, or on the nightshirt, or thecounterpane. The "Lancet's" leader on the Mystery was awaited withinterest. It said: "We cannot join in the praises that have beenshowered upon the coroner's summing up. It shows again the evilsresulting from having coroners who are not medical men. He seems to haveappreciated but inadequately the significance of the medical evidence. He should certainly have directed the jury to return a verdict of murderon that. What was it to do with him that he could see no way by whichthe wound could have been inflicted by an outside agency? It was for thepolice to find how that was done. Enough that it was impossible for theunhappy young man to have inflicted such a wound and then have strengthand will power enough to hide the instrument and to remove perfectlyevery trace of his having left the bed for the purpose. " It isimpossible to enumerate all the theories propounded by the amateurdetectives, while Scotland Yard religiously held its tongue. Ultimatelythe interest on the subject became confined to a few papers which hadreceived the best letters. Those papers that couldn't get interestingletters stopped the correspondence and sneered at the "sensationalism"of those that could. Among the mass of fantasy there were not a fewnotable solutions, which failed brilliantly, like rockets posing asfixed stars. One was that in the obscurity of the fog the murderer hadascended to the window of the bedroom by means of a ladder from thepavement. He had then with a diamond cut one of the panes away, andeffected an entry through the aperture. On leaving he fixed in the paneof glass again (or another which he had brought with him), and thus theroom remained with its bolts and locks untouched. On its being pointedout that the panes were too small, a third correspondent showed thatthat didn't matter, as it was only necessary to insert the hand and undothe fastening, when the entire window could be opened, the process beingreversed by the murderer on leaving. This pretty edifice of glass wassmashed by a glazier, who wrote to say that a pane could hardly be fixedin from only one side of a window frame, that it would fall out whentouched, and that in any case the wet putty could not have escapeddetection. A door panel sliced out and replaced was also put forward, and as many trap-doors and secret passages were ascribed to No. 11Glover Street as if it were a medieval castle. Another of these clevertheories was that the murderer was in the room the whole time the policewere there--hidden in the wardrobe. Or he had got behind the door whenGrodman broke it open, so that he was not noticed in the excitement ofthe discovery, and escaped with his weapon at the moment when Grodmanand Mrs. Drabdump were examining the window fastenings. 

Scientific explanations also were to hand to explain how the assassinlocked and bolted the door behind him. Powerful magnets outside the doorhad been used to turn the key and push the bolt within. Murderers armedwith magnets loomed on the popular imagination like a new microbe. Therewas only one defect in this ingenious theory--the thing could not bedone. A physiologist recalled the conjurers who swallowed swords--by ananatomical peculiarity of the throat--and said that the deceased mighthave swallowed the weapon after cutting his own throat. This was toomuch for the public to swallow. As for the idea that the suicide hadbeen effected with a penknife or its blade, or a bit of steel, which hadgot buried in the wound, not even the quotation of Shelley's line:

 "Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it, "

could secure it a moment's acceptance. The same reception was accordedto the idea that the cut had been made with a candlestick (or otherharmless article) constructed like a sword-stick. Theories of this sortcaused a humorist to explain that the deceased had hidden the razor inhis hollow tooth! Some kind friend of Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooksuggested that they were the only persons who could have done the deed, as no one else could get out of a locked cabinet. But perhaps the mostbrilliant of these flashes of false fire was the facetious, yet probablyhalf-seriously meant, letter that appeared in the "Pell Mell Press"under the heading of

 THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED. 

 "Sir--You will remember that when the Whitechapel murders were agitating the universe, I suggested that the district coroner was the assassin. My suggestion has been disregarded. The coroner is still at large. So is the Whitechapel murderer. Perhaps this suggestive coincidence will incline the authorities to pay more attention to me this time. The problem seems to be this. The deceased could not have cut his own throat. The deceased could not have had his throat cut for him. As one of the two must have happened, this is obvious nonsense. As this is obvious nonsense I am justified in disbelieving it. As this obvious nonsense was primarily put in circulation by Mrs. Drabdump and Mr. Grodman, I am justified in disbelieving them. In short, sir, what guarantee have we that the whole tale is not a cock-and-bull story, invented by the two persons who first found the body? What proof is there that the deed was not done by these persons themselves, who then went to work to smash the door and break the locks and the bolts, and fasten up all the windows before they called the police in? I enclose my card, and am, sir, yours truly, One Who Looks Through His Own Spectacles. "

 ("Our correspondent's theory is not so audaciously original as he seems to imagine. Has he not looked through the spectacles of the people who persistently suggested that the Whitechapel murderer was invariably the policeman who found the body? Somebody must find the body, if it is to be found at all. --Ed. P. M. P. ")

The editor had reason to be pleased that he inserted this letter, for itdrew the following interesting communication from the great detectivehimself:

 "THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED. 

 "Sir--I do not agree with you that your correspondent's theory lacks originality. On the contrary, I think it is delightfully original. In fact it has given me an idea. What that idea is I do not yet propose to say, but if 'One Who Looks Through His Own Spectacles' will favor me with his name and address I shall be happy to inform him a little before the rest of the world whether his germ has borne any fruit. I feel he is a kindred spirit, and take this opportunity of saying publicly that I was extremely disappointed at the unsatisfactory verdict. The thing was a palpable assassination; an open verdict has a tendency to relax the exertions of Scotland Yard. I hope I shall not be accused of immodesty, or of making personal reflections, when I say that the Department has had several notorious failures of late. It is not what it used to be. Crime is becoming impertinent. It no longer knows its place, so to speak. It throws down the gauntlet where once it used to cower in its fastnesses. I repeat, I make these remarks solely in the interest of law and order. I do not for one moment believe that Arthur Constant killed himself, and if Scotland Yard satisfies itself with that explanation, and turns on its other side and goes to sleep again, then, sir, one of the foulest and most horrible crimes of the century will forever go unpunished. My acquaintance with the unhappy victim was but recent; still, I saw and knew enough of the man to be certain (and I hope I have seen and known enough of other men to judge) that he was a man constitutionally incapable of committing an act of violence, whether against himself or anybody else. He would not hurt a fly, as the saying goes. And a man of that gentle stamp always lacks the active energy to lay hands on himself. He was a man to be esteemed in no common degree, and I feel proud to be able to say that he considered me a friend. I am hardly at the time of life at which a man cares to put on his harness again; but, sir, it is impossible that I should ever know a day's rest till the perpetrator of this foul deed is discovered. I have already put myself in communication with the family of the victim, who, I am pleased to say, have every confidence in me, and look to me to clear the name of their unhappy relative from the semi-imputation of suicide. I shall be pleased if anyone who shares my distrust of the authorities, and who has any clue whatever to this terrible mystery, or any plausible suggestion to offer, if, in brief, any 'One who looks through his own spectacles' will communicate with me. If I were asked to indicate the direction in which new clues might be most usefully sought, I should say, in the first instance, anything is valuable that helps us to piece together a complete picture of the manifold activities of the man in the East End. He entered one way or another into the lives of a good many people; is it true that he nowhere made enemies? With the best intentions a man may wound or offend; his interference may be resented; he may even excite jealousy. A young man like the late Mr. Constant could not have had as much practical sagacity as he had goodness. Whose corns did he tread on? The more we know of the last few months of his life the more we shall know of the manner of his death. Thanking you by anticipation for the insertion of this letter in your valuable columns, I am, sir, yours truly, "George Grodman. "46 Glover Street, Bow. "

 "P. S. --Since writing the above lines I have, by the kindness of Miss Brent, been placed in possession of a most valuable letter, probably the last letter written by the unhappy gentleman. It is dated Monday, 3 December, the very eve of the murder, and was addressed to her at Florence, and has now, after some delay, followed her back to London where the sad news unexpectedly brought her. It is a letter couched, on the whole, in the most hopeful spirit, and speaks in detail of his schemes. Of course, there are things in it not meant for the ears of the public, but there can be no harm in transcribing an important passage:

 "'You seem to have imbibed the idea that the East End is a kind of Golgotha, and this despite that the books out of which you probably got it are carefully labeled "Fiction. " Lamb says somewhere that we think of the "Dark Ages" as literally without sunlight, and so I fancy people like you, dear, think of the "East End" as a mixture of mire, misery and murder. How's that for alliteration? Why, within five minutes' walk of me there are the loveliest houses, with gardens back and front, inhabited by very fine people and furniture. Many of my university friends' mouths would water if they knew the income of some of the shop-keepers in the High Road. 

 "'The rich people about here may not be so fashionable as those in Kensington and Bayswater, but they are every bit as stupid and materialistic. I don't deny, Lucy, I do have my black moments, and I do sometimes pine to get away from all this to the lands of sun and lotus-eating. But, on the whole, I am too busy even to dream of dreaming. My real black moments are when I doubt if I am really doing any good. But yet on the whole my conscience or my self-conceit tells me that I am. If one cannot do much with the mass, there is at least the consolation of doing good to the individual. And, after all, is it not enough to have been an influence for good over one or two human souls? There are quite fine characters hereabout--especially in the women--natures capable not only of self-sacrifice, but of delicacy of sentiment. To have learnt to know of such, to have been of service to one or two of such--is not this ample return? I could not get to St. James' Hall to hear your friend's symphony at the Henschel concert. I have been reading Mme. Blavatsky's latest book, and getting quite interested in occult philosophy. Unfortunately I have to do all my reading in bed, and I don't find the book as soothing a soporific as most new books. For keeping one awake I find Theosophy as bad as toothache. . . . '"

 * * * * *

 "THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED. 

 "Sir--I wonder if anyone besides myself has been struck by the incredible bad taste of Mr. Grodman's letter in your last issue. That he, a former servant of the Department, should publicly insult and run it down can only be charitably explained by the supposition that his judgment is failing him in his old age. In view of this letter, are the relatives of the deceased justified in entrusting him with any private documents? It is, no doubt, very good of him to undertake to avenge one whom he seems snobbishly anxious to claim as a friend; but, all things considered, should not his letter have been headed 'The Big Bow Mystery Shelved?' I enclose my card, and am, sir, "Your obedient servant, "Scotland Yard. "

George Grodman read this letter with annoyance, and, crumpling up thepaper, murmured scornfully, "Edward Wimp. "

CHAPTER V. 

"Yes, but what will become of the Beautiful?" said Denzil Cantercot. 

"Hang the Beautiful!" said Peter Crowl, as if he were on the committeeof the Academy. "Give me the True. "

Denzil did nothing of the sort. He didn't happen to have it about him. 

[Illustration: Denzil Cantercot stood smoking a cigarette. ]

Denzil Cantercot stood smoking a cigarette in his landlord's shop, andimparting an air of distinction and an agreeable aroma to the closeleathery atmosphere. Crowl cobbled away, talking to his tenant withoutraising his eyes. He was a small, big-headed, sallow, sad-eyed man, witha greasy apron. Denzil was wearing a heavy overcoat with a fur collar. He was never seen without it in public during the winter. In private heremoved it and sat in his shirt sleeves. Crowl was a thinker, or thoughthe was--which seems to involve original thinking anyway. His hair wasthinning rapidly at the top, as if his brain was struggling to get asnear as possible to the realities of things. He prided himself on havingno fads. Few men are without some foible or hobby; Crowl felt almostlonely at times in his superiority. He was a Vegetarian, a Secularist, aBlue Ribbonite, a Republican, and an Anti-Tobacconist. Meat was a fad. Drink was a fad. Religion was a fad. Monarchy was a fad. Tobacco was afad. "A plain man like me, " Crowl used to say, "can live without fads. ""A plain man" was Crowl's catchword. When of a Sunday morning he stoodon Mile-end Waste, which was opposite his shop--and held forth to thecrowd on the evils of kings, priests and mutton chops, the "plain man"turned up at intervals like the "theme" of a symphonic movement. "I amonly a plain man and I want to know. " It was a phrase that sabered thespider-webs of logical refinement, and held them up scornfully on thepoint. When Crowl went for a little recreation in Victoria Park onSunday afternoons, it was with this phrase that he invariably routed thesupernaturalists. Crowl knew his Bible better than most ministers, andalways carried a minutely-printed copy in his pocket, dogs-eared to markcontradictions in the text. The second chapter of Jeremiah says onething; the first chapter of Corinthians says another. Two contradictorystatements may both be true, but "I am only a plain man, and I want toknow. " Crowl spent a large part of his time in setting "the word againstthe word. " Cock-fighting affords its votaries no acuter pleasure thanCrowl derived from setting two texts by the ears. Crowl had ametaphysical genius which sent his Sunday morning disciples frantic withadmiration, and struck the enemy dumb with dismay. He had discovered, for instance, that the Deity could not move, owing to already fillingall space. He was also the first to invent, for the confusion of theclerical, the crucial case of a saint dying at the Antipodescontemporaneously with another in London. Both went skyward to heaven, yet the two traveled in directly opposite directions. In all eternitythey would never meet. Which, then, got to heaven? Or was there no suchplace? "I am only a plain man, and I want to know. " Preserve us our openspaces; they exist to testify to the incurable interest of humanity inthe Unknown and the Misunderstood. Even 'Arry is capable of fiveminutes' attention to speculative theology, if 'Arriet isn't in a 'urry. 

Peter Crowl was not sorry to have a lodger like Denzil Cantercot, who, though a man of parts and thus worth powder and shot, was so hopelesslywrong on all subjects under the sun. In only one point did Peter Crowlagree with Denzil Cantercot--he admired Denzil Cantercot secretly. Whenhe asked him for the True--which was about twice a day on theaverage--he didn't really expect to get it from him. He knew that Denzilwas a poet. 

"The Beautiful, " he went on, "is a thing that only appeals to men likeyou. The True is for all men. The majority have the first claim. Tillthen you poets must stand aside. The True and the Useful--that's what wewant. The Good of Society is the only test of things. Everything standsor falls by the Good of Society. "

"The Good of Society!" echoed Denzil, scornfully. "What's the Good ofSociety? The Individual is before all. The mass must be sacrificed tothe Great Man. Otherwise the Great Man will be sacrificed to the mass. Without great men there would be no art. Without art life would be ablank. "

"Ah, but we should fill it up with bread and butter, " said Peter Crowl. 

"Yes, it is bread and butter that kills the Beautiful, " said DenzilCantercot bitterly. "Many of us start by following the butterfly throughthe verdant meadows, but we turn aside----"

"To get the grub, " chuckled Peter, cobbling away. 

"Peter, if you make a jest of everything, I'll not waste my time onyou. "

Denzil's wild eyes flashed angrily. He shook his long hair. Life wasvery serious to him. He never wrote comic verse intentionally. 

There are three reasons why men of genius have long hair. One is, thatthey forget it is growing. The second is, that they like it. The thirdis, that it comes cheaper; they wear it long for the same reason thatthey wear their hats long. 

Owing to this peculiarity of genius, you may get quite a reputation forlack of twopence. The economic reason did not apply to Denzil, who couldalways get credit with the profession on the strength of his appearance. Therefore, when street Arabs vocally commanded him to get his hair cut, they were doing no service to barbers. Why does all the world watch overbarbers and conspire to promote their interests? Denzil would have toldyou it was not to serve the barbers, but to gratify the crowd'sinstinctive resentment of originality. In his palmy days Denzil had beenan editor, but he no more thought of turning his scissors againsthimself than of swallowing his paste. The efficacy of hair has changedsince the days of Samson, otherwise Denzil would have been a Herculesinstead of a long, thin, nervous man, looking too brittle and delicateto be used even for a pipe-cleaner. The narrow oval of his face slopedto a pointed, untrimmed beard. His linen was reproachable, his dingyboots were down at heel, and his cocked hat was drab with dust. Such arethe effects of a love for the Beautiful. 

Peter Crowl was impressed with Denzil's condemnation of flippancy, andhe hastened to turn off the joke. 

"I'm quite serious, " he said. "Butterflies are no good to nothing ornobody; caterpillars at least save the birds from starving. "

"Just like your view of things, Peter, " said Denzil. "Good morning, madam. " This to Mrs. Crowl, to whom he removed his hat with elaboratecourtesy. Mrs. Crowl grunted and looked at her husband with a note ofinterrogation in each eye. For some seconds Crowl stuck to his last, endeavoring not to see the question. He shifted uneasily on his stool. His wife coughed grimly. He looked up, saw her towering over him, andhelplessly shook his head in a horizontal direction. It was wonderfulhow Mrs. Crowl towered over Mr. Crowl, even when he stood up in hisshoes. She measured half an inch less. It was quite an optical illusion. 

"Mr. Crowl, " said Mrs. Crowl, "then I'll tell him. "

"No, no, my dear, not yet, " faltered Peter helplessly; "leave it to me. "

"I've left it to you long enough. You'll never do nothing. If it was aquestion of provin' to a lot of chuckleheads that Jollygee and Genesis, or some other dead and gone Scripture folk that don't consarn no mortalsoul, used to contradict each other, your tongue 'ud run thirteen to thedozen. But when it's a matter of takin' the bread out o' the mouths o'your own children, you ain't got no more to say for yourself than alamppost. Here's a man stayin' with you for weeks and weeks--eatin' anddrinkin' the flesh off your bones--without payin' a far----"

"Hush, hush, mother; it's all right, " said poor Crowl, red as fire. 

Denzil looked at her dreamily. "Is it possible you are alluding to me, Mrs. Crowl?" he said. 

"Who then should I be alludin' to, Mr. Cantercot? Here's seven weekscome and gone, and not a blessed 'aypenny have I----"

"My dear Mrs. Crowl, " said Denzil, removing his cigarette from his mouthwith a pained air, "why reproach me for your neglect?"

"My neglect! I like that!"

"I don't, " said Denzil, more sharply. "If you had sent me in the billyou would have had the money long ago. How do you expect me to think ofthese details?"

"We ain't so grand down here. People pays their way--they don't get nobills, " said Mrs. Crowl, accentuating the word with infinite scorn. 

Peter hammered away at a nail, as though to drown his spouse's voice. 

"It's three pounds fourteen and eight-pence, if you're so anxious toknow, " Mrs. Crowl resumed. "And there ain't a woman in the Mile End Roadas 'ud a-done it cheaper, with bread at fourpence threefarden a quarternand landlords clamorin' for rent every Monday morning almost afore thesun's up and folks draggin' and slidderin' on till their shoes is onlyfit to throw after brides, and Christmas comin' and seven-pence a weekfor schoolin'!"

Peter winced under the last item. He had felt it coming--like Christmas. His wife and he parted company on the question of Free Education. Peterfelt that, having brought nine children into the world, it was only fairhe should pay a penny a week for each of those old enough to beareducating. His better half argued that, having so many children, theyought in reason to be exempted. Only people who had few children couldspare the penny. But the one point on which the cobbler-skeptic of theMile End Road got his way was this of the fees. It was a question ofconscience, and Mrs. Crowl had never made application for theirremission, though she often slapped her children in vexation instead. They were used to slapping, and when nobody else slapped them theyslapped one another. They were bright, ill-mannered brats, who pesteredtheir parents and worried their teachers, and were happy as the Road waslong. 

"Bother the school fees!" Peter retorted, vexed. "Mr. Cantercot's notresponsible for your children. "

"I should hope not, indeed, Mr. Crowl, " Mrs. Crowl said sternly. "I'mashamed of you. " And with that she flounced out of the shop into theback parlor. 

"It's all right, " Peter called after her soothingly. "The money'll beall right, mother. "

In lower circles it is customary to call your wife your mother; insomewhat superior circles it is the fashion to speak of her as "thewife" as you speak of "the Stock Exchange, " or "the Thames, " withoutclaiming any peculiar property. Instinctively men are ashamed of beingmoral and domesticated. 

Denzil puffed his cigarette, unembarrassed. Peter bent attentively overhis work, making nervous stabs with his awl. There was a long silence. An organ-grinder played a waltz outside, unregarded; and, failing toannoy anybody, moved on. Denzil lit another cigarette. The dirty-facedclock on the shop wall chimed twelve. 

"What do you think, " said Crowl, "of Republics?"

"They are low, " Denzil replied. "Without a Monarch there is no visibleincarnation of Authority. "

"What! do you call Queen Victoria visible?"

"Peter, do you want to drive me from the house? Leave frivolousness towomen, whose minds are only large enough for domestic difficulties. Republics are low. Plato mercifully kept the poets out of his. Republicsare not congenial soil for poetry. "

"What nonsense! If England dropped its fad of Monarchy and became aRepublic to-morrow, do you mean to say that----?"

"I mean to say that there would be no Poet Laureate to begin with. "

"Who's fribbling now, you or me, Cantercot? But I don't care abutton-hook about poets, present company always excepted. I'm only aplain man, and I want to know where's the sense of givin' any one personauthority over everybody else?"

"Ah, that's what Tom Mortlake used to say. Wait till you're in power, Peter, with trade-union money to control, and working men bursting togive you flying angels and to carry you aloft, like a banner, huzzahing. "

"Ah, that's because he's head and shoulders above 'em already, " saidCrowl, with a flash in his sad gray eyes. "Still, it don't prove thatI'd talk any different. And I think you're quite wrong about his beingspoiled. Tom's a fine fellow--a man every inch of him, and that's a goodmany. I don't deny he has his weaknesses, and there was a time when hestood in this very shop and denounced that poor dead Constant. 'Crowl, 'said he, 'that man'll do mischief. I don't like these kid-glovephilanthropists mixing themselves up in practical labor disputes theydon't understand. '"

Denzil whistled involuntarily. It was a piece of news. 

"I daresay, " continued Crowl, "he's a bit jealous of anybody'sinterference with his influence. But in this case the jealousy did wearoff, you see, for the poor fellow and he got quite pals, as everybodyknows. Tom's not the man to hug a prejudice. However, all that don'tprove nothing against Republics. Look at the Czar and the Jews. I'm onlya plain man, but I wouldn't live in Russia not for--not for all theleather in it! An Englishman, taxed as he is to keep up his Fad ofMonarchy, is at least king in his own castle, whoever bosses it atWindsor. Excuse me a minute, the missus is callin'. "

"Excuse _me_ a minute. I'm going, and I want to say before I go--I feelit is only right you should know at once--that after what has passedto-day I can never be on the same footing here as in the--shall I saypleasant?--days of yore. "

"Oh, no, Cantercot. Don't say that; don't say that!" pleaded the littlecobbler. 

"Well, shall I say unpleasant, then?"

"No, no, Cantercot. Don't misunderstand me. Mother has been very muchput to it lately to rub along. You see she has such a growing family. Itgrows--daily. But never mind her. You pay whenever you've got themoney. "

Denzil shook his head. "It cannot be. You know when I came here first Irented your top room and boarded myself. Then I learnt to know you. Wetalked together. Of the Beautiful. And the Useful. I found you had nosoul. But you were honest, and I liked you. I went so far as to take mymeals with your family. I made myself at home in your back parlor. Butthe vase has been shattered (I do not refer to that on the mantelpiece), and though the scent of the roses may cling to it still, it can bepieced together--nevermore. " He shook his hair sadly and shambled out ofthe shop. Crowl would have gone after him, but Mrs. Crowl was stillcalling, and ladies must have the precedence in all polite societies. 

Cantercot went straight--or as straight as his loose gait permitted--to46 Glover Street, and knocked at the door. Grodman's factotum opened it. She was a pock-marked person, with a brickdust complexion and acoquettish manner. 

"Oh, here we are again!" she said vivaciously. 

"Don't talk like a clown, " Cantercot snapped. "Is Mr. Grodman in?"

"No, you've put him out, " growled the gentleman himself, suddenlyappearing in his slippers. "Come in. What the devil have you been doingwith yourself since the inquest? Drinking again?"

"I've sworn off. Haven't touched a drop since----"

"The murder?"

"Eh?" said Denzil Cantercot, startled. "What do you mean?"

"What I say. Since December 4, I reckon everything from that murder, now, as they reckon longitude from Greenwich. "

"Oh, " said Denzil Cantercot. 

"Let me see. Nearly a fortnight. What a long time to keep away fromDrink--and Me. "

"I don't know which is worse, " said Denzil, irritated. "You both stealaway my brains. "

"Indeed?" said Grodman, with an amused smile. "Well, it's only pettypilfering, after all. What's put salt on your wounds?"

"The twenty-fourth edition of my book. "

"Whose book?"

"Well, your book. You must be making piles of money out of 'Criminals IHave Caught. '"

"'Criminals _I_ Have Caught, '" corrected Grodman. "My dear Denzil, howoften am I to point out that I went through the experiences that makethe backbone of my book, not you? In each case I cooked the criminal'sgoose. Any journalist could have supplied the dressing. "

"The contrary. The journeymen of journalism would have left the truthnaked. You yourself could have done that--for there is no man to beatyou at cold, lucid, scientific statement. But I idealized the bare factsand lifted them into the realm of poetry and literature. Thetwenty-fourth edition of the book attests my success. "

"Rot! The twenty-fourth edition was all owing to the murder! Did you dothat?"

"You take one up so sharply, Mr. Grodman, " said Denzil, changing histone. 

"No--I've retired, " laughed Grodman. 

Denzil did not reprove the ex-detective's flippancy. He even laughed alittle. 

"Well, give me another fiver, and I'll cry 'quits. ' I'm in debt. "

"Not a penny. Why haven't you been to see me since the murder? I had towrite that letter to the 'Pell Mell Press' myself. You might have earneda crown. "

"I've had writer's cramp, and couldn't do your last job. I was coming totell you so on the morning of the----"

"Murder. So you said at the inquest. "

"It's true. "

"Of course. Weren't you on your oath? It was very zealous of you to getup so early to tell me. In which hand did you have this cramp?"

"Why, in the right, of course. "

"And you couldn't write with your left?"

"I don't think I could even hold a pen. "

"Or any other instrument, mayhap. What had you been doing to bring iton?"

"Writing too much. That is the only possible cause. "

"Oh, I don't know. Writing what?"

Denzil hesitated. "An epic poem. "

"No wonder you're in debt. Will a sovereign get you out of it?"

"No; it wouldn't be the least use to me. "

"Here it is, then. "

Denzil took the coin and his hat. 

"Aren't you going to earn it, you beggar? Sit down and write somethingfor me. "

Denzil got pen and paper, and took his place. 

"What do you want me to write?"

"The Epic Poem. "

Denzil started and flushed. But he set to work. Grodman leaned back inhis armchair and laughed, studying the poet's grave face. 

Denzil wrote three lines and paused. 

"Can't remember any more? Well, read me the start. "

Denzil read:

 "Of man's first disobedience and the fruit Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste Brought death into the world--"

"Hold on!" cried Grodman; "what morbid subjects you choose, to be sure. "

"Morbid! Why, Milton chose the same subject!"

"Blow Milton. Take yourself off--you and your Epics. "

Denzil went. The pock-marked person opened the street door for him. 

"When am I to have that new dress, dear?" she whispered coquettishly. 

"I have no money, Jane, " he said shortly. 

"You have a sovereign. "

Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the door viciously. Grodmanoverheard their whispers, and laughed silently. His hearing was acute. Jane had first introduced Denzil to his acquaintance about two yearsago, when he spoke of getting an amanuensis, and the poet had been doingodd jobs for him ever since. Grodman argued that Jane had her reasons. Without knowing them he got a hold over both. There was no one, he felt, he could not get a hold over. All men--and women--have something toconceal, and you have only to pretend to know what it is. Thus Grodman, who was nothing if not scientific. 

Denzil Cantercot shambled home thoughtfully, and abstractedly took hisplace at the Crowl dinner-table. 

CHAPTER VI. 

Mrs. Crowl surveyed Denzil Cantercot so stonily and cut him his beef sosavagely that he said grace when the dinner was over. Peter fed hismetaphysical genius on tomatoes. He was tolerant enough to allow hisfamily to follow their Fads; but no savory smells ever tempted him to befalse to his vegetable loves. Besides, meat might have reminded him toomuch of his work. There is nothing like leather, but Bow beefsteaksoccasionally come very near it. 

After dinner Denzil usually indulged in poetic reverie. But to-day hedid not take his nap. He went out at once to "raise the wind. " But therewas a dead calm everywhere. In vain he asked for an advance at theoffice of the "Mile End Mirror, " to which he contributed scathingleaderettes about vestrymen. In vain he trudged to the city and offeredto write the "Ham and Eggs Gazette" an essay on the modern methods ofbacon-curing. Denzil knew a great deal about the breeding andslaughtering of pigs, smoke-lofts and drying processes, having for yearsdictated the policy of the "New Pork Herald" in these momentous matters. Denzil also knew a great deal about many other esoteric matters, including weaving machines, the manufacture of cabbage leaves and snuff, and the inner economy of drain-pipes. He had written for the tradepapers since boyhood. But there is great competition on these papers. Somany men of literary gifts know all about the intricate technicalitiesof manufactures and markets, and are eager to set the trade right. Grodman perhaps hardly allowed sufficiently for the step backward thatDenzil made when he devoted his whole time for months to "Criminals IHave Caught. " It was as damaging as a debauch. For when your rivals arepushing forward, to stand still is to go back. 

In despair Denzil shambled toilsomely to Bethnal Green. He paused beforethe window of a little tobacconist's shop, wherein was displayed aplacard announcing

 "PLOTS FOR SALE. "

The announcement went on to state that a large stock of plots was to beobtained on the premises--embracing sensational plots, humorous plots, love plots, religious plots, and poetic plots; also completemanuscripts, original novels, poems and tales. Apply within. 

It was a very dirty-looking shop, with begrimed bricks and blackenedwoodwork. The window contained some musty old books, an assortment ofpipes and tobacco, and a large number of the vilest daubs unhung, painted in oil on Academy boards, and unframed. These were intended forlandscapes, as you could tell from the titles. The most expensive was"Chingford Church, " and it was marked 1s. 9d. The others ran from 6d. To1s. 3d. , and were mostly representations of Scotch scenery--a loch withmountains in the background, with solid reflections in the water and atree in the foreground. Sometimes the tree would be in the background. Then the loch would be in the foreground. Sky and water were intenselyblue in all. The name of the collection was "Original oil paintings doneby hand. " Dust lay thick upon everything, as if carefully shoveled on;and the proprietor looked as if he slept in his shop window at nightwithout taking his clothes off. He was a gaunt man with a red nose, longbut scanty black locks covered by a smoking cap, and a luxuriant blackmustache. He smoked a long clay pipe, and had the air of a broken-downoperatic villain. 

"Ah, good afternoon, Mr. Cantercot, " he said, rubbing his hands, halffrom cold, half from usage; "what have you brought me?"

"Nothing, " said Denzil, "but if you will lend me a sovereign I'll do youa stunner. "

The operatic villain shook his locks, his eyes full of pawky cunning. "If you did it after that it would be a stunner. "

What the operatic villain did with these plots, and who bought them, Cantercot never knew nor cared to know. Brains are cheap to-day, andDenzil was glad enough to find a customer. 

"Surely you've known me long enough to trust me, " he cried. 

"Trust is dead, " said the operatic villain, puffing away. 

"So is Queen Anne, " cried the irritated poet. His eyes took a dangeroushunted look. Money he must have. But the operatic villain wasinflexible. No plot, no supper. 

Poor Denzil went out flaming. He knew not where to turn. Temporarily heturned on his heel again and stared despairingly at the shop window. Again he read the legend:

 "PLOTS FOR SALE. "

He stared so long at this that it lost its meaning. When the sense ofthe words suddenly flashed upon him again, they bore a new significance. He went in meekly, and borrowed fourpence of the operatic villain. Thenhe took the 'bus for Scotland Yard. There was a not ill-looking servantgirl in the 'bus. The rhythm of the vehicle shaped itself into rhymes inhis brain. He forgot all about his situation and his object. He hadnever really written an epic--except "Paradise Lost"--but he composedlyrics about wine and women and often wept to think how miserable hewas. But nobody ever bought anything of him, except articles onbacon-curing or attacks on vestrymen. He was a strange, wild creature, and the wench felt quite pretty under his ardent gaze. It almosthypnotized her, though, and she looked down at her new French kid bootsto escape it. 

At Scotland Yard Denzil asked for Edward Wimp. Edward Wimp was not onview. Like kings and editors, Detectives are difficult ofapproach--unless you are a criminal, when you cannot see anything ofthem at all. Denzil knew of Edward Wimp, principally because ofGrodman's contempt for his successor. Wimp was a man of taste andculture. Grodman's interests were entirely concentrated on the problemsof logic and evidence. Books about these formed his sole reading; for_belles lettres_ he cared not a straw. Wimp, with his flexibleintellect, had a great contempt for Grodman and his slow, laborious, ponderous, almost Teutonic methods. Worse, he almost threatened toeclipse the radiant tradition of Grodman by some wonderfully ingeniousbits of workmanship. Wimp was at his greatest in collectingcircumstantial evidence; in putting two and two together to make five. He would collect together a number of dark and disconnected data andflash across them the electric light of some unifying hypothesis in away which would have done credit to a Darwin or a Faraday. An intellectwhich might have served to unveil the secret workings of nature wassubverted to the protection of a capitalistic civilization. 

By the assistance of a friendly policeman, whom the poet magnetized intothe belief that his business was a matter of life and death, Denzilobtained the great detective's private address. It was near King'sCross. By a miracle Wimp was at home in the afternoon. He was writingwhen Denzil was ushered up three pairs of stairs into his presence, buthe got up and flashed the bull's-eye of his glance upon the visitor. 

"Mr. Denzil Cantercot, I believe!" said Wimp. 

Denzil started. He had not sent up his name, merely describing himselfas a gentleman. 

"That is my name, " he murmured. 

"You were one of the witnesses at the inquest on the body of the lateArthur Constant. I have your evidence there. " He pointed to a file. "Whyhave you come to give fresh evidence?"

Again Denzil started, flushing in addition this time. "I want money, " hesaid, almost involuntarily. 

"Sit down. " Denzil sat. Wimp stood. 

Wimp was young and fresh-colored. He had a Roman nose, and was smartlydressed. He had beaten Grodman by discovering the wife Heaven meant forhim. He had a bouncing boy, who stole jam out of the pantry withoutanyone being the wiser. Wimp did what work he could do at home in asecluded study at the top of the house. Outside his chamber of horrorshe was the ordinary husband of commerce. He adored his wife, who thoughtpoorly of his intellect, but highly of his heart. In domesticdifficulties Wimp was helpless. He could not even tell whether theservant's "character" was forged or genuine. Probably he could not levelhimself to such petty problems. He was like the senior wrangler who hasforgotten how to do quadratics, and has to solve equations of the seconddegree by the calculus. 

"How much money do you want?" he asked. 

"I do not make bargains, " Denzil replied, his calm come back by thistime. "I came to tender you a suggestion. It struck me that you mightoffer me a fiver for my trouble. Should you do so, I shall not refuseit. "

"You shall not refuse it--if you deserve it. "

"Good. I will come to the point at once, My suggestion concerns--TomMortlake. "

Denzil threw out the name as if it were a torpedo. Wimp did not move. 

"Tom Mortlake, " went on Denzil, looking disappointed, "had asweetheart. " He paused impressively. 

Wimp said "Yes?"

"Where is that sweetheart now?"

"Where, indeed?"

"You know about her disappearance?"

"You have just informed me of it. "

"Yes, she is gone--without a trace. She went about a fortnight beforeMr. Constant's murder. "

"Murder? How do you know it was a murder?"

"Mr. Grodman says so, " said Denzil, startled again. 

"H'm! Isn't that rather a proof that it was suicide? Well, go on. "

"About a fortnight before the suicide, Jessie Dymond disappeared. Sothey tell me in Stepney Green, where she lodged and worked. "

"What was she?"

"She was a dressmaker. She had a wonderful talent. Quite fashionableladies got to know of it. One of her dresses was presented at Court. Ithink the lady forgot to pay for it; so Jessie's landlady said. "

"Did she live alone?"

"She had no parents, but the house was respectable. "

"Good-looking, I suppose?"

"As a poet's dream. "

"As yours, for instance?"

"I am a poet; I dream. "

"You dream you are a poet. Well, well! She was engaged to Mortlake?"

"Oh, yes! They made no secret of it. The engagement was an old one. Whenhe was earning 36s. A week as a compositor they were saving up to buy ahome. He worked at Railton and Hockes', who print the 'New Pork Herald. 'I used to take my 'copy' into the comps' room, and one day the Father ofthe Chapel told me all about 'Mortlake and his young woman. ' Ye gods!How times are changed! Two years ago Mortlake had to struggle with mycaligraphy--now he is in with all the nobs, and goes to the 'at homes'of the aristocracy. "

"Radical M. P. 's, " murmured Wimp, smiling. 

"While I am still barred from the dazzling drawing-rooms, where beautyand intellect foregather. A mere artisan! A manual laborer!" Denzil'seyes flashed angrily. He rose with excitement. "They say he always was ajabberer in the composing-room, and he has jabbered himself right out ofit and into a pretty good thing. He didn't have much to say about thecrimes of capital when he was set up to second the toast of 'Railton andHockes' at the beanfeast. "

"Toast and butter, toast and butter, " said Wimp genially. "I shouldn'tblame a man for serving the two together, Mr. Cantercot. "

Denzil forced a laugh. "Yes; but consistency's my motto. I like to seethe royal soul immaculate, unchanging, immovable by fortune. Anyhow, when better times came for Mortlake the engagement still dragged on. Hedid not visit her so much. This last autumn he saw very little of her. "

"How do you know?"

"I--I was often in Stepney Green. My business took me past the house ofan evening. Sometimes there was no light in her room. That meant she wasdownstairs gossiping with the landlady. "

"She might have been out with Tom?"

"No, sir; I knew Tom was on the platform somewhere or other. He wasworking up to all hours organizing the eight hours working movement. "

"A very good reason for relaxing his sweethearting. "

"It was. He never went to Stepney Green on a week night. "

"But you always did. "

"No--not every night. "

"You didn't go in?"

"Never. She wouldn't permit my visits. She was a girl of strongcharacter. She always reminded me of Flora Macdonald. "

"Another lady of your acquaintance?"

"A lady I know better than the shadows who surround me; who is more realto me than the women who pester me for the price for apartments. JessieDymond, too, was of the race of heroines. Her eyes were clear blue, twowells with Truth at the bottom of each. When I looked into those eyes myown were dazzled. They were the only eyes I could never make dreamy. " Hewaved his hand as if making a pass with it. "It was she who had theinfluence over me. "

"You knew her then?"

"Oh, yes. I knew Tom from the old 'New Pork Herald' days, and when Ifirst met him with Jessie hanging on his arm he was quite proud tointroduce her to a poet. When he got on he tried to shake me off. "

"You should have repaid him what you borrowed. "

"It--it--was only a trifle, " stammered Denzil. 

"Yes, but the world turns on trifles, " said the wise Wimp. 

"The world is itself a trifle, " said the pensive poet. "The Beautifulalone is deserving of our regard. "

"And when the Beautiful was not gossiping with her landlady, did shegossip with you as you passed the door?"

"Alas, no! She sat in her room reading, and cast a shadow--"

"On your life?"

"No; on the blind. "

"Always one shadow?"

"No, sir. Once or twice, two. "

"Ah, you had been drinking. "

"On my life, not. I have sworn off the treacherous wine-cup. "

"That's right. Beer is bad for poets. It makes their feet shaky. Whosewas the second shadow?"

"A man's. "

"Naturally. Mortlake's, perhaps?"

"Impossible. He was still striking eight hours. "

"You found out whose? You didn't leave it a shadow of doubt?"

"No; I waited till the substance came out. "

"It was Arthur Constant. "

"You are a magician! You--you terrify me. Yes, it was he. "

"Only once or twice, you say?"

"I didn't keep watch over them. "

"No, no, of course not. You only passed casually. I understand youthoroughly. "

Denzil did not feel comfortable at the assertion. 

"What did he go there for?" Wimp went on. 

"I don't know. I'd stake my soul on Jessie's honor. "

"You might double your stake without risk. "

"Yes, I might! I would! You see her with my eyes. "

"For the moment they are the only ones available. When was the last timeyou saw the two together?"

"About the middle of November. "

"Mortlake knew nothing of their meetings?"

"I don't know. Perhaps he did. Mr. Constant had probably enlisted her inhis social mission work. I knew she was one of the attendants at the bigchildren's tea in the Great Assembly Hall early in November. He treatedher quite like a lady. She was the only attendant who worked with herhands. "

"The others carried the cups on their feet, I suppose?"

"No; how could that be? My meaning is that all the other attendants werereal ladies, and Jessie was only an amateur, so to speak. There was nonovelty for her in handing kids cups of tea. I daresay she had helpedher landlady often enough at that--there's quite a bushel of brats belowstairs. It's almost as bad as at friend Crowl's. Jessie was a realbrick. But perhaps Tom didn't know her value. Perhaps he didn't likeConstant to call on her, and it led to a quarrel. Anyhow, she'sdisappeared, like the snowfall on the river. There's not a trace. Thelandlady, who was such a friend of hers that Jessie used to make up herstuff into dresses for nothing, tells me that she's dreadfully annoyedat not having been left the slightest clue to her late tenant'swhereabouts. "

"You have been making inquiries on your own account apparently. "

"Only of the landlady. Jessie never even gave her the week's notice, butpaid her in lieu of it, and left immediately. The landlady told me Icould have knocked her down with a feather. Unfortunately, I wasn'tthere to do it, for I should certainly have knocked her down for notkeeping her eyes open better. She says if she had only had the leastsuspicion beforehand that the minx (she dared to call Jessie a minx) wasgoing, she'd have known where, or her name would have been somebodyelse's. And yet she admits that Jessie was looking ill and worried. Stupid old hag!"

"A woman of character, " murmured the detective. 

"Didn't I tell you so?" cried Denzil eagerly. "Another girl would havelet out that she was going. But, no! not a word. She plumped down themoney and walked out. The landlady ran upstairs. None of Jessie's thingswere there. She must have quietly sold them off, or transferred them tothe new place. I never in my life met a girl who so thoroughly knew herown mind or had a mind so worth knowing. She always reminded me of theMaid of Saragossa. "

"Indeed! And when did she leave?"

"On the 19th of November. "

"Mortlake of course knows where she is?"

"I can't say. Last time I was at the house to inquire--it was at the endof November--he hadn't been seen there for six weeks. He wrote to her, of course, sometimes--the landlady knew his writing. "

Wimp looked Denzil straight in the eyes, and said, "You mean, of course, to accuse Mortlake of the murder of Mr. Constant?"

"N-n-no, not at all, " stammered Denzil, "only you know what Mr. Grodmanwrote to the 'Pell Mell. ' The more we know about Mr. Constant's life themore we shall know about the manner of his death. I thought myinformation would be valuable to you, and I brought it. "

"And why didn't you take it to Mr. Grodman?"

"Because I thought it wouldn't be valuable to me. "

"You wrote 'Criminals I Have Caught. '"

"How--how do you know that?" Wimp was startling him to-day with avengeance. 

"Your style, my dear Mr. Cantercot. The unique noble style. "

"Yes, I was afraid it would betray me, " said Denzil. "And since youknow, I may tell you that Grodman's a mean curmudgeon. What does he wantwith all that money and those houses--a man with no sense of theBeautiful? He'd have taken my information, and given me more kicks thanha'pence for it, so to speak. "

"Yes, he is a shrewd man after all. I don't see anything valuable inyour evidence against Mortlake. "

"No!" said Denzil in a disappointed tone, and fearing he was going to berobbed. "Not when Mortlake was already jealous of Mr. Constant, who wasa sort of rival organizer, unpaid! A kind of blackleg doing the workcheaper--nay, for nothing. "

"Did Mortlake tell you he was jealous?" said Wimp, a shade of sarcasticcontempt piercing through his tones. 

"Oh, yes! He said to me, 'That man will work mischief. I don't like yourkid-glove philanthropists meddling in matters they don't understand. '"

"Those were his very words?"

"His _ipsissima verba_. "

"Very well. I have your address in my files. Here is a sovereign foryou. "

"Only one sovereign! It's not the least use to me. "

"Very well. It's of great use to me. I have a wife to keep. "

"I haven't, " said Denzil with a sickly smile, "so perhaps I can manageon it after all. " He took his hat and the sovereign. 

Outside the door he met a rather pretty servant just bringing in sometea to her master. He nearly upset her tray at sight of her. She seemedmore amused at the _rencontre_ than he. 

"Good afternoon, dear, " she said coquettishly. "You might let me havethat sovereign. I do so want a new Sunday bonnet. "

Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the hall door viciously whenhe got to the bottom of the stairs. He seemed to be walking arm-in-armwith the long arm of coincidence. Wimp did not hear the duologue. He wasalready busy on his evening's report to headquarters. The next dayDenzil had a body-guard wherever he went. It might have gratified hisvanity had he known it. But to-night he was yet unattended, so no onenoted that he went to 46 Glover Street, after the early Crowl supper. Hecould not help going. He wanted to get another sovereign. He also itchedto taunt Grodman. Not succeeding in the former object, he felt the roadopen for the second. 

"Do you still hope to discover the Bow murderer?" he asked the oldbloodhound. 

"I can lay my hand on him now, " Grodman announced curtly. 

Denzil hitched his chair back involuntarily. He found conversation withdetectives as lively as playing at skittles with bombshells. They got onhis nerves terribly, these undemonstrative gentlemen with no sense ofthe Beautiful. 

"But why don't you give him up to justice?" he murmured. 

"Ah--it has to be proved yet. But it is only a matter of time. "

"Oh!" said Denzil, "and shall I write the story for you?"

"No. You will not live long enough. "

Denzil turned white. "Nonsense! I am years younger than you, " he gasped. 

"Yes, " said Grodman, "but you drink so much. "

CHAPTER VII. 

When Wimp invited Grodman to eat his Christmas plum-pudding at King'sCross Grodman was only a little surprised. The two men were alwaysoverwhelmingly cordial when they met, in order to disguise their mutualdetestation. When people really like each other, they make noconcealment of their mutual contempt. In his letter to Grodman, Wimpsaid that he thought it would be nicer for him to keep Christmas incompany than in solitary state. There seems to be a general prejudice infavor of Christmas numbers, and Grodman yielded to it. Besides, hethought that a peep at the Wimp domestic interior would be as good as apantomime. He quite enjoyed the fun that was coming, for he knew thatWimp had not invited him out of mere "peace and goodwill. "

There was only one other guest at the festive board. This was Wimp'swife's mother's mother, a lady of sweet seventy. Only a minority ofmankind can obtain a grandmother-in-law by marrying, but Wimp was notunduly conceited. The old lady suffered from delusions. One of them wasthat she was a centenarian. She dressed for the part. It isextraordinary what pains ladies will take to conceal their age. Anotherof Wimp's grandmother-in-law's delusions was that Wimp had married toget her into the family. Not to frustrate his design, she always gavehim her company on high-days and holidays. Wilfred Wimp--the little boywho stole the jam--was in great form at the Christmas dinner. The onlydrawback to his enjoyment was that its sweets needed no stealing. Hismother presided over the platters, and thought how much cleverer Grodmanwas than her husband. When the pretty servant who waited on them wasmomentarily out of the room, Grodman had remarked that she seemed veryinquisitive. This coincided with Mrs. Wimp's own convictions, though Mr. Wimp could never be brought to see anything unsatisfactory or suspiciousabout the girl, not even though there were faults in spelling in the"character" with which her last mistress had supplied her. 

It was true that the puss had pricked up her ears when DenzilCantercot's name was mentioned. Grodman saw it and watched her, andfooled Wimp to the top of his bent. It was, of course, Wimp whointroduced the poet's name, and he did it so casually that Grodmanperceived at once that he wished to pump him. The idea that the rivalbloodhound should come to him for confirmation of suspicions against hisown pet jackal was too funny. It was almost as funny to Grodman thatevidence of some sort should be obviously lying to hand in the bosom ofWimp's hand-maiden; so obviously that Wimp could not see it. Grodmanenjoyed his Christmas dinner, secure that he had not found a successorafter all. Wimp, for his part, contemptuously wondered at the wayGrodman's thought hovered about Denzil without grazing the truth. A manconstantly about him, too!

"Denzil is a man of genius, " said Grodman. "And as such comes under theheading of Suspicious Characters. He has written an Epic Poem and readit to me. It is morbid from start to finish. There is 'death' in thethird line. I daresay you know he polished up my book. " Grodman'sartlessness was perfect. 

"No. You surprise me, " Wimp replied. "I'm sure he couldn't have donemuch to it. Look at your letter in the 'Pell Mell. ' Who wants morepolish and refinement than that showed?"

"Ah, I didn't know you did me the honor of reading that. "

"Oh, yes; we both read it, " put in Mrs. Wimp. "I told Mr. Wimp it wasclever and cogent. After that quotation from the letter to the poorfellow's _fiancée_ there could be no more doubt but that it was murder. Mr. Wimp was convinced by it, too, weren't you, Edward?"

Edward coughed uneasily. It was a true statement, and therefore anindiscreet. Grodman would plume himself terribly. At this moment Wimpfelt that Grodman had been right in remaining a bachelor. Grodmanperceived the humor of the situation, and wore a curious, sub-mockingsmile. 

"On the day I was born, " said Wimp's grandmother-in-law, "over a hundredyears ago, there was a babe murdered. " Wimp found himself wishing it hadbeen she. He was anxious to get back to Cantercot. "Don't let us talkshop on Christmas Day, " he said, smiling at Grodman. "Besides, murderisn't a very appropriate subject. "

"No, it ain't, " said Grodman. "How did we get on to it? Oh, yes--DenzilCantercot. Ha! ha! ha! That's curious, for since Denzil wrote 'CriminalsI have Caught, ' his mind's running on nothing but murders. A poet'sbrain is easily turned. "

Wimp's eye glittered with excitement and contempt for Grodman'sblindness. In Grodman's eye there danced an amused scorn of Wimp; to theoutsider his amusement appeared at the expense of the poet. 

Having wrought his rival up to the highest pitch Grodman slyly andsuddenly unstrung him. 

"How lucky for Denzil!" he said, still in the same naive, facetiousChristmasy tone, "that he can prove an alibi in this Constant affair. "

"An alibi!" gasped Wimp. "Really?"

"Oh, yes. He was with his wife, you know. She's my woman of all work, Jane. She happened to mention his being with her. "

Jane had done nothing of the kind. After the colloquy he had overheardGrodman had set himself to find out the relation between his twoemployes. By casually referring to Denzil as "your husband" he sostartled the poor woman that she did not attempt to deny the bond. Onlyonce did he use the two words, but he was satisfied. As to the alibi hehad not yet troubled her; but to take its existence for granted wouldupset and discomfort Wimp. For the moment that was triumph enough forWimp's guest. 

"Par, " said Wilfred Wimp, "what's a alleybi? A marble?"

"No, my lad, " said Grodman, "it means being somewhere else when you'resupposed to be somewhere. "

"Ah, playing truant, " said Wilfred self-consciously; his schoolmasterhad often proved an alibi against him. "Then Denzil will be hanged. "

Was it a prophecy? Wimp accepted it as such; as an oracle from the godsbidding him mistrust Grodman. Out of the mouths of little childrenissueth wisdom; sometimes even when they are not saying their lessons. 

"When I was in my cradle, a century ago, " said Wimp'sgrandmother-in-law, "men were hanged for stealing horses. "

They silenced her with snapdragon performances. 

Wimp was busy thinking how to get at Grodman's factotum. 

Grodman was busy thinking how to get at Wimp's domestic. 

Neither received any of the usual messages from the Christmas Bells. 

 * * * * *

The next day was sloppy and uncertain. A thin rain drizzled languidly. One can stand that sort of thing on a summer Bank Holiday; one expectsit. But to have a bad December Bank Holiday is too much of a bad thing. Some steps should surely be taken to confuse the weather clerk'schronology. Once let him know that Bank Holiday is coming, and he writesto the company for more water. To-day his stock seemed low and he wasdribbling it out; at times the wintry sun would shine in a feeble, diluted way, and though the holiday-makers would have preferred to taketheir sunshine neat, they swarmed forth in their myriads whenever therewas a ray of hope. But it was only dodging the raindrops; up went theumbrellas again, and the streets became meadows of ambulating mushrooms. 

Denzil Cantercot sat in his fur overcoat at the open window, looking atthe landscape in water colors. He smoked an after-dinner cigarette, andspoke of the Beautiful. Crowl was with him. They were in the first floorfront, Crowl's bedroom, which, from its view of the Mile End Road, waslivelier than the parlor with its outlook on the backyard. Mrs. Crowlwas an anti-tobacconist as regards the best bedroom; but Peter did notlike to put the poet or his cigarette out. He felt there was somethingin common between smoke and poetry, over and above their being bothFads. Besides, Mrs. Crowl was sulking in the kitchen. She had beenarranging for an excursion with Peter and the children to Victoria Park. She had dreamed of the Crystal Palace, but Santa Claus had put no giftsin the cobbler's shoes. Now she could not risk spoiling the feather inher bonnet. The nine brats expressed their disappointment by slappingone another on the staircases. Peter felt that Mrs. Crowl connected himin some way with the rainfall, and was unhappy. Was it not enough thathe had been deprived of the pleasure of pointing out to a superstitiousmajority the mutual contradictions of Leviticus and the Song of Solomon?It was not often that Crowl could count on such an audience. 

"And you still call Nature beautiful?" he said to Denzil, pointing tothe ragged sky and the dripping eaves. "Ugly old scarecrow!"

"Ugly she seems to-day, " admitted Denzil. "But what is Ugliness but ahigher form of Beauty? You have to look deeper into it to see it; suchvision is the priceless gift of the few. To me this wan desolation ofsighing rain is lovely as the sea-washed ruins of cities. "

"Ah, but you wouldn't like to go out in it, " said Peter Crowl. As hespoke the drizzle suddenly thickened into a torrent. 

"We do not always kiss the woman we love. "

"Speak for yourself, Denzil. I'm only a plain man, and I want to know ifNature isn't a Fad. Hallo, there goes Mortlake! Lord, a minute of thiswill soak him to the skin. "

The labor leader was walking along with bowed head. He did not seem tomind the shower. It was some seconds before he even heard Crowl'sinvitation to him to take shelter. When he did hear it he shook hishead. 

"I know I can't offer you a drawing-room with duchesses stuck about it, "said Peter, vexed. 

Tom turned the handle of the shop door and went in. There was nothing inthe world which now galled him more than the suspicion that he wasstuck-up and wished to cut old friends. He picked his way through thenine brats who clung affectionately to his wet knees, dispersing themfinally by a jet of coppers to scramble for. Peter met him on the stairand shook his hand lovingly and admiringly, and took him into Mrs. Crowl's bedroom. 

"Don't mind what I say, Tom. I'm only a plain man, and my tongue willsay what comes uppermost! But it ain't from the soul, Tom, it ain't fromthe soul, " said Peter, punning feebly, and letting a mirthless smileplay over his sallow features. "You know Mr. Cantercot, I suppose? Thepoet. "

"Oh, yes; how do you do, Tom? Seen the 'New Pork Herald' lately? Notbad, those old times, eh?"

"No, " said Tom, "I wish I was back in them. "

"Nonsense, nonsense, " said Peter, in much concern. "Look at the good youare doing to the working man. Look how you are sweeping away the Fads. Ah, it's a grand thing to be gifted, Tom. The idea of your chuckin'yourself away on a composin' room! Manual labor is all very well forplain men like me, with no gift but just enough brains to see into therealities of things--to understand that we've got no soul and noimmortality, and all that--and too selfish to look after anybody'scomfort but my own and mother's and the kid's. But men like you andCantercot--it ain't right that you should be peggin' away at lowmaterial things. Not that I think Cantercot's gospel's any value to themasses. The Beautiful is all very well for folks who've got nothing elseto think of, but give me the True. You're the man for my money, Mortlake. No reference to the funds, Tom, to which I contribute littleenough, Heaven knows; though how a place can know anything, Heaven aloneknows. You give us the Useful, Tom; that's what the world wants morethan the Beautiful. "

"Socrates said that the Useful is the Beautiful, " said Denzil. 

"That may be, " said Peter, "but the Beautiful ain't the Useful. "

"Nonsense!" said Denzil. "What about Jessie--I mean Miss Dymond? There'sa combination for you. She always reminds me of Grace Darling. How isshe, Tom?"

"She's dead!" snapped Tom. 

"What?" Denzil turned as white as a Christmas ghost. 

"It was in the papers, " said Tom; "all about her and the lifeboat. "

"Oh, you mean Grace Darling, " said Denzil, visibly relieved. "I meantMiss Dymond. "

"You needn't be so interested in her, " said Tom, surlily. "She don'tappreciate it. Ah, the shower is over. I must be going. "

"No, stay a little longer, Tom, " pleaded Peter. "I see a lot about youin the papers, but very little of your dear old phiz now. I can't sparethe time to go and hear you. But I really must give myself a treat. When's your next show?"

"Oh, I am always giving shows, " said Tom, smiling a little. "But my nextbig performance is on the twenty-first of January, when that picture ofpoor Mr. Constant is to be unveiled at the Bow Break o' Day Club. Theyhave written to Gladstone and other big pots to come down. I do hope theold man accepts. A non-political gathering like this is the onlyoccasion we could both speak at, and I have never been on the sameplatform with Gladstone. "

He forgot his depression and ill-temper in the prospect, and spoke withmore animation. 

"No, I should hope not, Tom, " said Peter. "What with his Fads about theBible being a Rock, and Monarchy being the right thing, he is a mostdangerous man to lead the Radicals. He never lays his ax to the root ofanything--except oak trees. "

"Mr. Cantycot!" It was Mrs. Crowl's voice that broke in upon the tirade. "There's a gentleman to see you. " The astonishment Mrs. Crowl put intothe "gentleman" was delightful. It was almost as good as a week's rentto her to give vent to her feelings. The controversial couple had movedaway from the window when Tom entered, and had not noticed the immediateadvent of another visitor who had spent his time profitably in listeningto Mrs. Crowl before asking to see the presumable object of his visit. 

"Ask him up if it's a friend of yours, Cantercot, " said Peter. It wasWimp. Denzil was rather dubious as to the friendship, but he preferredto take Wimp diluted. "Mortlake's upstairs, " he said. "Will you come upand see him?"

Wimp had intended a duologue, but he made no objection, so he, too, stumbled through the nine brats to Mrs. Crowl's bedroom. It was a queerquartette. Wimp had hardly expected to find anybody at the house onBoxing Day, but he did not care to waste a day. Was not Grodman, too, onthe track? How lucky it was that Denzil had made the first overtures, sothat he could approach him without exciting suspicion. 

Mortlake scowled when he saw the detective. He objected to thepolice--on principle. But Crowl had no idea who the visitor was, evenwhen told his name. He was rather pleased to meet one of Denzil'shigh-class friends, and welcomed him warmly. Probably he was some famouseditor, which would account for his name stirring vague recollections. He summoned the eldest brat and sent him for beer (people would havetheir Fads), and not without trepidation called down to "Mother" forglasses. "Mother" observed at night (in the same apartment) that thebeer money might have paid the week's school fees for half the family. 

"We were just talking of poor Mr. Constant's portrait, Mr. Wimp, " saidthe unconscious Crowl; "they're going to unveil it, Mortlake tells me, on the twenty-first of next month at the Bow Break o' Day Club. "

"Ah, " said Wimp, elated at being spared the trouble of maneuvering theconversation; "mysterious affair that, Mr. Crowl. "

"No; it's the right thing, " said Peter. "There ought to be some memorialof the man in the district where he worked and where he died, poorchap. " The cobbler brushed away a tear. 

"Yes, it's only right, " echoed Mortlake a whit eagerly. "He was a noblefellow, a true philanthropist. The only thoroughly unselfish worker I'veever met. "

"He was that, " said Peter; "and it's a rare pattern is unselfishness. Poor fellow, poor fellow. He preached the Useful, too. I've never methis like. Ah, I wish there was a Heaven for him to go to!" He blew hisnose violently with a red pocket-handkerchief. 

"Well, he's there, if there _is_, " said Tom. 

"I hope he is, " added Wimp fervently; "but I shouldn't like to go therethe way he did. "

"You were the last person to see him, Tom, weren't you?" said Denzil. 

"Oh, no, " answered Tom quickly. "You remember he went out after me; atleast, so Mrs. Drabdump said at the inquest. "

"That last conversation he had with you, Tom, " said Denzil. "He didn'tsay anything to you that would lead you to suppose--"

"No, of course not!" interrupted Mortlake impatiently. 

"Do you really think he was murdered, Tom?" said Denzil. 

"Mr. Wimp's opinion on that point is more valuable than mine, " repliedTom, testily. "It may have been suicide. Men often get sick oflife--especially if they are bored, " he added meaningly. 

"Ah, but you were the last person known to be with him, " said Denzil. 

Crowl laughed. "Had you there, Tom. "

But they did not have Tom there much longer, for he departed, lookingeven worse-tempered than when he came. Wimp went soon after, and Crowland Denzil were left to their interminable argumentation concerning theUseful and the Beautiful. 

Wimp went west. He had several strings (or cords) to his bow, and heultimately found himself at Kensal Green Cemetery. Being there, he wentdown the avenues of the dead to a grave to note down the exact date of adeath. It was a day on which the dead seemed enviable. The dull, soddensky, the dripping, leafless trees, the wet spongy soil, the reekinggrass--everything combined to make one long to be in a warm, comfortablegrave, away from the leaden ennui of life. Suddenly the detective's keeneye caught sight of a figure that made his heart throb with suddenexcitement. It was that of a woman in a gray shawl and a brown bonnetstanding before a railed-in grave. She had no umbrella. The rain plashedmournfully upon her, but left no trace on her soaking garments. Wimpcrept up behind her, but she paid no heed to him. Her eyes were loweredto the grave, which seemed to be drawing them toward it by some strangemorbid fascination. His eyes followed hers. The simple headstone borethe name: "Arthur Constant. "

Wimp tapped her suddenly on the shoulder. 

Mrs. Drabdump went deadly white. She turned round, staring at Wimpwithout any recognition. 

"You remember me, surely, " he said. "I've been down once or twice toyour place about that poor gentleman's papers. " His eye indicated thegrave. 

"Lor! I remember you now, " said Mrs. Drabdump. 

"Won't you come under my umbrella? You must be drenched to the skin. "

"It don't matter, sir. I can't take no hurt. I've had the rheumaticsthis twenty year. "

Mrs. Drabdump shrank from accepting Wimp's attentions, not so muchperhaps because he was a man as because he was a gentleman. Mrs. Drabdump liked to see the fine folks keep their place, and notcontaminate their skirts by contact with the lower castes. "It's setwet, it'll rain right into the new year, " she announced. "And they say abad beginnin' makes a worse endin'. " Mrs. Drabdump was one of thosepersons who give you the idea that they just missed being bornbarometers. 

"But what are you doing in this miserable spot, so far from home?"queried the detective. 

"It's Bank Holiday, " Mrs. Drabdump reminded him in tones of acutesurprise. "I always make a hexcursion on Bank Holiday. "

CHAPTER VIII. 

The New Year brought Mrs. Drabdump a new lodger. He was an old gentlemanwith a long gray beard. He rented the rooms of the late Mr. Constant, and lived a very retired life. Haunted rooms--or rooms that ought to behaunted if the ghosts of those murdered in them had anyself-respect--are supposed to fetch a lower rent in the market. Thewhole Irish problem might be solved if the spirits of "Mr. Balfour'svictims" would only depreciate the value of property to a pointconsistent with the support of an agricultural population. But Mrs. Drabdump's new lodger paid so much for his rooms that he laid himselfopen to a suspicion of special interest in ghosts. Perhaps he was amember of the Psychical Society. The neighborhood imagined him anothermad philanthropist, but as he did not appear to be doing any good toanybody it relented and conceded his sanity. Mortlake, who occasionallystumbled across him in the passage, did not trouble himself to thinkabout him at all. He was too full of other troubles and cares. Though heworked harder than ever, the spirit seemed to have gone out of him. Sometimes he forgot himself in a fine rapture of eloquence--lashinghimself up into a divine resentment of injustice or a passion ofsympathy with the sufferings of his brethren--but mostly he plodded onin dull, mechanical fashion. He still made brief provincial tours, starring a day here and a day there, and everywhere his admirersremarked how jaded and overworked he looked. There was talk of startinga subscription to give him a holiday on the Continent--a luxuryobviously unobtainable on the few pounds allowed him per week. The newlodger would doubtless have been pleased to subscribe, for he seemedquite to like occupying Mortlake's chamber the nights he was absent, though he was thoughtful enough not to disturb the hardworked landladyin the adjoining room by unseemly noise. Wimp was always a quiet man. 

Meantime the 21st of the month approached, and the East End was inexcitement. Mr. Gladstone had consented to be present at the ceremony ofunveiling the portrait of Arthur Constant, presented by an unknown donorto the Bow Break o' Day Club, and it was to be a great function. Thewhole affair was outside the lines of party politics, so that evenConservatives and Socialists considered themselves justified inpestering the committee for tickets. To say nothing of ladies. As thecommittee desired to be present themselves, nine-tenths of theapplications for admission had to be refused, as is usual on theseoccasions. The committee agreed among themselves to exclude the fair sexaltogether as the only way of disposing of their womankind who weremaking speeches as long as Mr. Gladstone's. Each committeeman told hissisters, female cousins and aunts that the other committeemen hadinsisted on divesting the function of all grace; and what could a man dowhen he was in a minority of one?

Crowl, who was not a member of the Break o' Day Club, was particularlyanxious to hear the great orator whom he despised; fortunately Mortlakeremembered the cobbler's anxiety to hear himself, and on the eve of theceremony sent him a ticket. Crowl was in the first flush of possessionwhen Denzil Cantercot returned, after a sudden and unannounced absenceof three days. His clothes were muddy and tattered, his cocked hat wasdeformed, his cavalier beard was matted, and his eyes were bloodshot. The cobbler nearly dropped the ticket at the sight of him. "Hullo, Cantercot!" he gasped. "Why, where have you been all these days?"

"Terribly busy!" said Denzil. "Here, give me a glass of water. I'm dryas the Sahara. "

Crowl ran inside and got the water, trying hard not to inform Mrs. Crowlof their lodger's return. "Mother" had expressed herself freely on thesubject of the poet during his absence, and not in terms which wouldhave commended themselves to the poet's fastidious literary sense. Indeed, she did not hesitate to call him a sponger and a low swindler, who had run away to avoid paying the piper. Her fool of a husband mightbe quite sure he would never set eyes on the scoundrel again. However, Mrs. Crowl was wrong. Here was Denzil back again. And yet Mr. Crowl feltno sense of victory. He had no desire to crow over his partner and toutter that "See! didn't I tell you so?" which is a greater consolationthan religion in most of the misfortunes of life. Unfortunately, to getthe water, Crowl had to go to the kitchen; and as he was usually such atemperate man, this desire for drink in the middle of the day attractedthe attention of the lady in possession. Crowl had to explain thesituation. Mrs. Crowl ran into the shop to improve it. Mr. Crowlfollowed in dismay, leaving a trail of spilled water in his wake. 

"You good-for-nothing, disreputable scarecrow, where have----"

"Hush, mother. Let him drink. Mr. Cantercot is thirsty. "

"Does he care if my children are hungry?"

Denzil tossed the water greedily down his throat almost at a gulp, as ifit were brandy. 

"Madam, " he said, smacking his lips, "I do care. I care intensely. Fewthings in life would grieve me more deeply than to hear that a child, adear little child--the Beautiful in a nutshell--had suffered hunger. Youwrong me. " His voice was tremulous with the sense of injury. Tears stoodin his eyes. 

"Wrong you? I've no wish to wrong you, " said Mrs. Crowl. "I should liketo hang you. "

"Don't talk of such ugly things, " said Denzil, touching his throatnervously. 

"Well, what have you been doin' all this time?"

"Why, what should I be doing?"

"How should I know what became of you? I thought it was another murder. "

"What!" Denzil's glass dashed to fragments on the floor. "What do youmean?"

But Mrs. Crowl was glaring too viciously at Mr. Crowl to reply. Heunderstood the message as if it were printed. It ran: "You have brokenone of my best glasses. You have annihilated threepence, or a week'sschool fees for half the family. " Peter wished she would turn thelightning upon Denzil, a conductor down whom it would run innocuously. He stooped down and picked up the pieces as carefully as if they werecuttings from the Koh-i-noor. Thus the lightning passed harmlessly overhis head and flew toward Cantercot. 

"What do I mean?" Mrs. Crowl echoed, as if there had been no interval. "I mean that it would be a good thing if you had been murdered. "

"What unbeautiful ideas you have, to be sure!" murmured Denzil. 

"Yes; but they'd be useful, " said Mrs. Crowl, who had not lived withPeter all these years for nothing. "And if you haven't been murderedwhat have you been doing?"

"My dear, my dear, " put in Crowl, deprecatingly, looking up from hisquadrupedal position like a sad dog, "you are not Cantercot's keeper. "

"Oh, ain't I?" flashed his spouse. "Who else keeps him I should like toknow?"

Peter went on picking up the pieces of the Koh-i-noor. 

"I have no secrets from Mrs. Crowl" Denzil explained courteously. "Ihave been working day and night bringing out a new paper. Haven't had awink of sleep for three nights. "

Peter looked up at his bloodshot eyes with respectful interest. 

"The capitalist met me in the street--an old friend of mine--I wasoverjoyed at the _rencontre_ and told him the idea I'd been broodingover for months and he promised to stand all the racket. "

"What sort of a paper?" said Peter. 

"Can you ask? To what do you think I've been devoting my days and nightsbut to the cultivation of the Beautiful?"

"Is that what the paper will be devoted to?"

"Yes. To the Beautiful. "

"I know, " snorted Mrs. Crowl, "with portraits of actresses. "

"Portraits? Oh, no!" said Denzil. "That would be the True--not theBeautiful. "

"And what's the name of the paper?" asked Crowl. 

"Ah, that's a secret, Peter. Like Scott, I prefer to remain anonymous. "

"Just like your Fads. I'm only a plain man, and I want to know where thefun of anonymity comes in? If I had any gifts, I should like to get thecredit. It's a right and natural feeling, to my thinking. "

"Unnatural, Peter; unnatural. We're all born anonymous, and I'm forsticking close to Nature. Enough for me that I disseminate theBeautiful. Any letters come during my absence, Mrs. Crowl?"

"No, " she snapped. "But a gent named Grodman called. He said you hadn'tbeen to see him for some time, and looked annoyed to hear you'ddisappeared. How much have you let him in for?"

"The man's in my debt, " said Denzil, annoyed. "I wrote a book for himand he's taken all the credit for it, the rogue! My name doesn't appeareven in the Preface. What's that ticket you're looking so lovingly at, Peter?"

"That's for to-night--the unveiling of Constant's portrait. Gladstonespeaks. Awful demand for places. "

"Gladstone!" sneered Denzil. "Who wants to hear Gladstone? A man who'sdevoted his life to pulling down the pillars of Church and State. "

"A man's who's devoted his whole life to propping up the crumbling Fadsof Religion and Monarchy. But, for all that, the man has his gifts, andI'm burnin' to hear him. "

"I wouldn't go out of my way an inch to hear him, " said Denzil; and wentup to his room, and when Mrs. Crowl sent him up a cup of nice strong teaat tea time, the brat who bore it found him lying dressed on the bed, snoring unbeautifully. 

The evening wore on. It was fine frosty weather. The Whitechapel Roadswarmed, with noisy life, as though it were a Saturday night. The starsflared in the sky like the lights of celestial costermongers. Everybodywas on the alert for the advent of Mr. Gladstone. He must surely comethrough the Road on his journey from the West Bow-wards. But nobody sawhim or his carriage, except those about the Hall. Probably he went bytram most of the way. He would have caught cold in an open carriage, orbobbing his head out of the window of a closed. 

"If he had only been a German prince, or a cannibal king, " said Crowlbitterly, as he plodded toward the Club, "we should have disguised MileEnd in bunting and blue fire. But perhaps it's a compliment. He knowshis London, and it's no use trying to hide the facts from him. They musthave queer notions of cities, those monarchs. They must fancy everybodylives in a flutter of flags and walks about under triumphal arches, likeas if I were to stitch shoes in my Sunday clothes. " By a defiance ofchronology Crowl had them on to-day, and they seemed to accentuate thesimile. 

"And why shouldn't life be fuller of the Beautiful, " said Denzil. Thepoet had brushed the reluctant mud off his garments to the extent it waswilling to go, and had washed his face, but his eyes were stillbloodshot from the cultivation of the Beautiful. Denzil was accompanyingCrowl to the door of the Club out of good-fellowship. Denzil was himselfaccompanied by Grodman, though less obtrusively. Least obtrusively washe accompanied by his usual Scotland Yard shadows, Wimp's agents. Therewas a surging nondescript crowd about the Club, and the police, and thedoor-keeper, and the stewards could with difficulty keep out the tide ofthe ticketless, through which the current of the privileged had equaldifficulty in permeating. The streets all around were thronged withpeople longing for a glimpse of Gladstone. Mortlake drove up in a hansom(his head a self-conscious pendulum of popularity, swaying and bowing toright and left) and received all the pent-up enthusiasm. 

"Well, good-by, Cantercot, " said Crowl. 

"No, I'll see you to the door, Peter. "

They fought their way shoulder to shoulder. 

Now that Grodman had found Denzil he was not going to lose him again. Hehad only found him by accident, for he was himself bound to theunveiling ceremony, to which he had been invited in view of his knowndevotion to the task of unveiling the Mystery. He spoke to one of thepolicemen about, who said, "Ay, ay, sir, " and he was prepared to followDenzil, if necessary, and to give up the pleasure of hearing Gladstonefor an acuter thrill. The arrest must be delayed no longer. 

But Denzil seemed as if he were going in on the heels of Crowl. Thiswould suit Grodman better. He could then have the two pleasures. ButDenzil was stopped half-way through the door. 

"Ticket, sir!"

Denzil drew himself up to his full height. 

"Press, " he said, majestically. All the glories and grandeurs of theFourth Estate were concentrated in that haughty monosyllable. Heavenitself is full of journalists who have overawed St. Peter. But thedoor-keeper was a veritable dragon. 

"What paper, sir?"

"'New Pork Herald, '" said Denzil sharply. He did not relish his wordbeing distrusted. 

"'New York Herald, '" said one of the bystanding stewards, scarcecatching the sounds. "Pass him in. "

And in the twinkling of an eye, Denzil had eagerly slipped inside. 

But during the brief altercation Wimp had come up. Even he could notmake his face quite impassive, and there was a suppressed intensity inthe eyes and a quiver about the mouth. He went in on Denzil's heels, blocking up the doorway with Grodman. The two men were so full of theircoming _coups_ that they struggled for some seconds, side by side, before they recognized each other. Then they shook hands heartily. 

"That was Cantercot just went in, wasn't it, Grodman?" said Wimp. 

"I didn't notice, " said Grodman, in tones of utter indifference. 

At bottom Wimp was terribly excited. He felt that his _coup_ was goingto be executed under very sensational circumstances. Everything wouldcombine to turn the eyes of the country upon him--nay, of the world, forhad not the Big Bow Mystery been discussed in every language under thesun? In these electric times the criminal achieves a cosmopolitanreputation. It is a privilege he shares with few other artists. Thistime Wimp would be one of them; and, he felt, deservedly so. If thecriminal had been cunning to the point of genius in planning the murder, he had been acute to the point of divination in detecting it. Neverbefore had he pieced together so broken a chain. He could not resist theunique opportunity of setting a sensational scheme in a sensationalframe-work. The dramatic instinct was strong in him; he felt like aplaywright who has constructed a strong melodramatic plot, and has theDrury Lane stage suddenly offered him to present it on. It would befolly to deny himself the luxury, though the presence of Mr. Gladstoneand the nature of the ceremony should perhaps have given him pause. Yet, on the other hand, these were the very factors of the temptation. Wimpwent in and took a seat behind Denzil. All the seats were numbered, sothat everybody might have the satisfaction of occupying somebody else's. Denzil was in the special reserved places in the front row just by thecentral gangway; Crowl was squeezed into a corner behind a pillar nearthe back of the hall. Grodman had been honored with a seat on theplatform, which was accessible by steps on the right and left, but hekept his eye on Denzil. The picture of the poor idealist hung on thewall behind Grodman's head, covered by its curtain of brown holland. There was a subdued buzz of excitement about the hall, which swelledinto cheers every now and again as some gentleman known to fame or Bowtook his place upon the platform. It was occupied by several local M. P. 's of varying politics, a number of other Parliamentary satellites ofthe great man, three or four labor leaders, a peer or two ofphilanthropic pretensions, a sprinkling of Toynbee and Oxford Hall men, the president and other honorary officials, some of the family andfriends of the deceased, together with the inevitable percentage ofpersons who had no claim to be there save cheek. Gladstone waslate--later than Mortlake, who was cheered to the echo when he arrived, someone starting "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow, " as if it were apolitical meeting. Gladstone came in just in time to acknowledge thecompliment. The noise of the song, trolled out from iron lungs, haddrowned the huzzahs heralding the old man's advent. The convivial choruswent to Mortlake's head, as if champagne had really preceded it. Hiseyes grew moist and dim. He saw himself swimming to the Millenium onwaves of enthusiasm. Ah, how his brother-toilers should be rewarded fortheir trust in him!

With his usual courtesy and consideration, Mr. Gladstone had refused toperform the actual unveiling of Arthur Constant's portrait. "That, " hesaid in his postcard, "will fall most appropriately to Mr. Mortlake, agentleman who has, I am given to understand, enjoyed the personalfriendship of the late Mr. Constant, and has co-operated with him invarious schemes for the organization of skilled and unskilled classes oflabor, as well as for the diffusion of better ideals--ideals ofself-culture and self-restraint--among the workingmen of Bow, who havebeen fortunate, so far as I can perceive, in the possession (if in onecase unhappily only temporary possession) of two such men of undoubtedability and honesty to direct their divided counsels and to lead themalong a road, which, though I cannot pledge myself to approve of it inall its turnings and windings, is yet not unfitted to bring themsomewhat nearer to goals to which there are few of us but would extendsome measure of hope that the working classes of this great Empire mayin due course, yet with no unnecessary delay, be enabled to arrive. "

Mr. Gladstone's speech was an expansion of his postcard, punctuated bycheers. The only new thing in it was the graceful and touching way inwhich he revealed what had been a secret up till then--that the portraithad been painted and presented to the Bow Break o' Day Club, by LucyBrent, who in the fulness of time would have been Arthur Constant'swife. It was a painting for which he had sat to her while alive, and shehad stifled yet pampered her grief by working hard at it since hisdeath. The fact added the last touch of pathos to the occasion. Crowl'sface was hidden behind his red handkerchief; even the fire of excitementin Wimp's eye was quenched for a moment by a tear-drop, as he thought ofMrs. Wimp and Wilfred. As for Grodman, there was almost a lump in histhroat. Denzil Cantercot was the only unmoved man in the room. Hethought the episode quite too Beautiful, and was already weaving it intorhyme. 

At the conclusion of his speech Mr. Gladstone called upon Tom Mortlaketo unveil the portrait. Tom rose, pale and excited. His hand faltered ashe touched the cord. He seemed overcome with emotion. Was it the mentionof Lucy Brent that had moved him to his depths?

The brown holland fell away--the dead stood revealed as he had been inlife. Every feature, painted by the hand of Love, was instinct withvitality: the fine, earnest face, the sad kindly eyes, the noble browseeming still a-throb with the thought of Humanity. A thrill ran throughthe room--there was a low, undefinable murmur. O, the pathos and thetragedy of it! Every eye was fixed, misty with emotion, upon the deadman in the picture and the living man who stood, pale and agitated, andvisibly unable to commence his speech, at the side of the canvas. Suddenly a hand was laid upon the labor leader's shoulder, and thererang through the hall in Wimp's clear, decisive tones the words: "TomMortlake, I arrest you for the murder of Arthur Constant!"

CHAPTER IX. 

For a moment there was an acute, terrible silence. Mortlake's face wasthat of a corpse; the face of the dead man at his side was flushed withthe hues of life. To the overstrung nerves of the onlookers, thebrooding eyes of the picture seemed sad and stern with menace, andcharged with the lightnings of doom. 

It was a horrible contrast. For Wimp, alone, the painted face hadfuller, more tragical, meanings. The audience seemed turned to stone. They sat or stood--in every variety of attitude--frozen, rigid. ArthurConstant's picture dominated the scene, the only living thing in a hallof the dead. 

But only for a moment. Mortlake shook off the detective's hand. 

"Boys!" he cried, in accents of infinite indignation, "this is a policeconspiracy. "

His words relaxed the tension. The stony figures were agitated. A dull, excited hubbub answered him. The little cobbler darted from behind hispillar, and leaped upon a bench. The cords of his brow were swollen withexcitement. He seemed a giant overshadowing the hall. 

"Boys!" he roared, in his best Victoria Park voice, "listen to me. Thischarge is a foul and damnable lie. "

"Bravo!" "Hear, hear!" "Hooray!" "It is!" was roared back at him fromall parts of the room. Everybody rose and stood in tentative attitudes, excited to the last degree. 

"Boys!" Peter roared on, "you all know me. I'm a plain man, and I wantto know if it's likely a man would murder his best friend. "

"No, " in a mighty volume of sound. 

Wimp had scarcely calculated upon Mortlake's popularity. He stood on theplatform, pale and anxious as his prisoner. 

"And if he did, why didn't they prove it the first time?"

"Hear, hear!"

"And if they want to arrest him, why couldn't they leave it till theceremony was over? Tom Mortlake's not the man to run away. "

"Tom Mortlake! Tom Mortlake! Three cheers for Tom Mortlake! Hip, hip, hip, hooray!"

"Three groans for the police. " "Hoo! Oo! Oo!"

Wimp's melodrama was not going well. He felt like the author to whoseears is borne the ominous sibilance of the pit. He almost wished he hadnot followed the curtain-raiser with his own stronger drama. Unconsciously the police, scattered about the hall, drew together. Thepeople on the platform knew not what to do. They had all risen and stoodin a densely-packed mass. Even Mr. Gladstone's speech failed him incircumstances so novel. The groans died away; the cheers for Mortlakerose and swelled and fell and rose again. Sticks and umbrellas werebanged and rattled, handkerchiefs were waved, the thunder deepened. Themotley crowd still surging about the hall took up the cheers, and forhundreds of yards around people were going black in the face out of mereirresponsible enthusiasm. At last Tom waved his hand--the thunderdwindled, died. The prisoner was master of the situation. 

Grodman stood on the platform, grasping the back of his chair, a curiousmocking Mephistophelian glitter about his eyes, his lips wreathed into ahalf smile. There was no hurry for him to get Denzil Cantercot arrestednow. Wimp had made an egregious, a colossal blunder. In Grodman's heartthere was a great glad calm as of a man who has strained his sinews towin in a famous match, and has heard the judge's word. He felt almostkindly to Denzil now. 

Tom Mortlake spoke. His face was set and stony. His tall figure wasdrawn up haughtily to its full height. He pushed the black mane backfrom his forehead with a characteristic gesture. The fevered audiencehung upon his lips--the men at the back leaned eagerly forward--thereporters were breathless with fear lest they should miss a word. Whatwould the great labor leader have to say at this supreme moment?

"Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: It is to me a melancholy pleasure to havebeen honored with the task of unveiling to-night this portrait of agreat benefactor to Bow and a true friend to the laboring classes. Except that he honored me with his friendship while living, and that theaspirations of my life have, in my small and restricted way, beenidentical with his, there is little reason why this honorable dutyshould have fallen upon me. Gentlemen, I trust that we shall all find aninspiring influence in the daily vision of the dead, who yet liveth inour hearts and in this noble work of art--wrought, as Mr. Gladstone hastold us, by the hand of one who loved him. " The speaker paused a moment, his low vibrant tones faltering into silence. "If we humble workingmenof Bow can never hope to exert individually a tithe of the beneficialinfluence wielded by Arthur Constant, it is yet possible for each of usto walk in the light he has kindled in our midst--a perpetual lamp ofself-sacrifice and brotherhood. "

That was all. The room rang with cheers. Tom Mortlake resumed his seat. To Wimp the man's audacity verged on the Sublime; to Denzil on theBeautiful. Again there was a breathless hush. Mr. Gladstone's mobileface was working with excitement. No such extraordinary scene hadoccurred in the whole of his extraordinary experience. He seemed aboutto rise. The cheering subsided to a painful stillness. Wimp cut thesituation by laying his hand again upon Tom's shoulder. 

"Come quietly with me, " he said. The words were almost a whisper, but inthe supreme silence they traveled to the ends of the hall. 

"Don't you go, Tom!" The trumpet tones were Peter's. The call thrilledan answering chord of defiance in every breast, and a low, ominousmurmur swept through the hall. 

Tom rose, and there was silence again. "Boys, " he said, "let me go. Don't make any noise about it. I shall be with you again to-morrow. "

But the blood of the Break o' Day boys was at fever heat. A hurtlingmass of men struggled confusedly from their seats. In a moment all waschaos. Tom did not move. Half-a-dozen men, headed by Peter, scaled theplatform. Wimp was thrown to one side, and the invaders formed a ringround Tom's chair. The platform people scampered like mice from thecenter. Some huddled together in the corners, others slipped out at therear. The committee congratulated themselves on having had theself-denial to exclude ladies. Mr. Gladstone's satellites hurried theold man off and into his carriage; though the fight promised to becomeHomeric. Grodman stood at the side of the platform secretly more amusedthan ever, concerning himself no more with Denzil Cantercot, who wasalready strengthening his nerves at the bar upstairs. The police aboutthe hall blew their whistles, and policemen came rushing in from outsideand the neighborhood. An Irish M. P. On the platform was waving hisgingham like a shillalah in sheer excitement, forgetting his new-foundrespectability and dreaming himself back at Donnybrook Fair. Him aconscientious constable floored with a truncheon. But a shower of fistsfell on the zealot's face, and he tottered back bleeding. Then the stormbroke in all its fury. The upper air was black with staves, sticks, andumbrellas, mingled with the pallid hailstones of knobby fists. Yells andgroans and hoots and battle-cries blent in grotesque chorus, like one ofDvorák's weird diabolical movements. Mortlake stood impassive, with armsfolded, making no further effort, and the battle raged round him as thewater swirls around some steadfast rock. A posse of police from the backfought their way steadily toward him, and charged up the heights of theplatform steps, only to be sent tumbling backward, as their leader washurled at them like a battering ram. Upon the top of the heap fell he, surmounting the strata of policemen. But others clambered upon them, escalading the platform. A moment more and Mortlake would have beentaken, after being well shaken. Then the miracle happened. 

As when of old a reputable goddess _ex machina_ saw her favorite hero indire peril, straightway she drew down a cloud from the celestial storesof Jupiter and enveloped her fondling in kindly night, so that hisadversary strove with the darkness, so did Crowl, the cunning cobbler, the much-daring, essay to insure his friend's safety. He turned off thegas at the meter. 

An Arctic night--unpreceded by twilight--fell, and there dawned thesabbath of the witches. The darkness could be felt--and it left bloodand bruises behind it. When the lights were turned on again, Mortlakewas gone. But several of the rioters were arrested, triumphantly. 

And through all, and over all, the face of the dead man who had soughtto bring peace on earth, brooded. 

 * * * * *

Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese, with his headbandaged, while Denzil Cantercot told him the story of how he hadrescued Tom Mortlake. He had been among the first to scale the height, and had never budged from Tom's side or from the forefront of the battletill he had seen him safely outside and into a by-street. 

[Illustration: Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese. ]

"I am so glad you saw that he got away safely, " said Crowl, "I wasn'tquite sure he would. "

"Yes; but I wish some cowardly fool hadn't turned off the gas. I likemen to see that they are beaten. "

"But it seemed--easier, " faltered Crowl. 

"Easier!" echoed Denzil, taking a deep draught of bitter. "Really, Peter, I'm sorry to find you always will take such low views. It may beeasier, but it's shabby. It shocks one's sense of the Beautiful. "

Crowl ate his bread and cheese shame-facedly. 

"But what was the use of breaking your head to save him?" said Mrs. Crowl with an unconscious pun. "He must be caught. "

"Ah, I don't see how the Useful does come in, now, " said Peterthoughtfully. "But I didn't think of that at the time. "

He swallowed his water quickly and it went the wrong way and added tohis confusion. It also began to dawn upon him that he might be called toaccount. Let it be said at once that he wasn't. He had taken tooprominent a part. 

Meantime, Mrs. Wimp was bathing Mr. Wimp's eye, and rubbing himgenerally with arnica. Wimp's melodrama had been, indeed, a sight forthe gods. Only, virtue was vanquished and vice triumphant. The villainhad escaped, and without striking a blow. 

CHAPTER X. 

There was matter and to spare for the papers the next day. The strikingceremony--Mr. Gladstone's speech--the sensational arrest--these would ofthemselves have made excellent themes for reports and leaders. But thepersonality of the man arrested, and the Big Bow Mystery Battle--as itcame to be called--gave additional piquancy to the paragraphs and theposters. The behavior of Mortlake put the last touch to thepicturesqueness of the position. He left the hall when the lights wentout, and walked unnoticed and unmolested through pleiads of policemen tothe nearest police station, where the superintendent was almost tooexcited to take any notice of his demand to be arrested. But to do himjustice, the official yielded as soon as he understood the situation. Itseems inconceivable that he did not violate some red-tape regulation inso doing. To some this self-surrender was limpid proof of innocence; toothers it was the damning token of despairing guilt. 

The morning papers were pleasant reading for Grodman, who chuckled ascontinuously over his morning egg, as if he had laid it. Jane wasalarmed for the sanity of her saturnine master. As her husband wouldhave said, Grodman's grins were not Beautiful. But he made no effort tosuppress them. Not only had Wimp perpetrated a grotesque blunder, butthe journalists to a man were down on his great sensation tableau, though their denunciations did not appear in the dramatic columns. TheLiberal papers said that he had endangered Mr. Gladstone's life; theConservative that he had unloosed the raging elements of Bowblackguardism, and set in motion forces which might have easily swelledto a riot, involving severe destruction of property. But "Tom Mortlake, "was, after all, the thought swamping every other. It was, in a sense, atriumph for the man. 

But Wimp's turn came when Mortlake, who reserved his defense, wasbrought up before a magistrate, and, by force of the new evidence, fullycommitted for trial on the charge of murdering Arthur Constant. Thenmen's thoughts centered again on the Mystery, and the solution of theinexplicable problem agitated mankind from China to Peru. 

In the middle of February, the great trial befell. It was another of theopportunities which the Chancellor of the Exchequer neglects. Sostirring a drama might have easily cleared its expenses--despite thelength of the cast, the salaries of the stars, and the rent of thehouse--in mere advance booking. For it was a drama which (by the rightsof Magna Charta) could never be repeated; a drama which ladies offashion would have given their earrings to witness, even with thecentral figure not a woman. And there was a woman in it anyhow, to judgeby the little that had transpired at the magisterial examination, andthe fact that the country was placarded with bills offering a reward forinformation concerning a Miss Jessie Dymond. Mortlake was defended bySir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C. , retained at the expense of theMortlake Defense Fund (subscriptions to which came also from Australiaand the Continent), and set on his mettle by the fact that he was theaccepted labor candidate for an East-end constituency. Their Majesties, Victoria and the Law, were represented by Mr. Robert Spigot, Q. C. 

Mr. Spigot, Q. C. , in presenting his case, said: "I propose to show thatthe prisoner murdered his friend and fellow-lodger, Mr. Arthur Constant, in cold blood, and with the most careful premeditation; premeditation sostudied, as to leave the circumstances of the death an impenetrablemystery for weeks to all the world, though fortunately withoutaltogether baffling the almost superhuman ingenuity of Mr. Edward Wimp, of the Scotland Yard Detective Department. I propose to show that themotives of the prisoner were jealousy and revenge; jealousy not only ofhis friend's superior influence over the workingmen he himself aspiredto lead, but the more commonplace animosity engendered by the disturbingelement of a woman having relations to both. If, before my case iscomplete, it will be my painful duty to show that the murdered man wasnot the saint the world has agreed to paint him, I shall not shrink fromunveiling the truer picture, in the interests of justice, which cannotsay _nil nisi bonum_ even of the dead. I propose to show that the murderwas committed by the prisoner shortly before half-past six on themorning of December 4th, and that the prisoner having, with theremarkable ingenuity which he has shown throughout, attempted to preparean alibi by feigning to leave London by the first train to Liverpool, returned home, got in with his latch-key through the street-door, whichhe had left on the latch, unlocked his victim's bedroom with a key whichhe possessed, cut the sleeping man's throat, pocketed his razor, lockedthe door again, and gave it the appearance of being bolted, wentdownstairs, unslipped the bolt of the big lock, closed the door behindhim, and got to Euston in time for the second train to Liverpool. Thefog helped his proceedings throughout. " Such was in sum the theory ofthe prosecution. The pale defiant figure in the dock winced perceptiblyunder parts of it. 

Mrs. Drabdump was the first witness called for the prosecution. She wasquite used to legal inquisitiveness by this time, but did not appear ingood spirits. 

"On the night of December 3d, you gave the prisoner a letter?"

"Yes, your ludship. "

"How did he behave when he read it?"

"He turned very pale and excited. He went up to the poor gentleman'sroom, and I'm afraid he quarreled with him. He might have left his lasthours peaceful. " (Amusement. )

"What happened then?"

"Mr. Mortlake went out in a passion, and came in again in about anhour. "

"He told you he was going away to Liverpool very early the nextmorning. "

"No, your ludship, he said he was going to Devonport. " (Sensation. )

"What time did you get up the next morning?"

"Half-past six. "

"That is not your usual time?"

"No, I always get up at six. "

"How do you account for the extra sleepiness?"

"Misfortunes will happen. "

"It wasn't the dull, foggy weather?"

"No, my lud, else I should never get up early. " (Laughter. )

"You drink something before going to bed?"

"I like my cup o' tea. I take it strong, without sugar. It alwayssteadies my nerves. "

"Quite so. Where were you when the prisoner told you he was going toDevonport?"

"Drinkin' my tea in the kitchen. "

"What should you say if prisoner dropped something in it to make yousleep late?"

Witness (startled): "He ought to be shot. "

"He might have done it without your noticing it, I suppose?"

"If he was clever enough to murder the poor gentleman, he was cleverenough to try and poison me. "

The Judge: "The witness in her replies must confine herself to theevidence. "

Mr. Spigot, Q. C. : "I must submit to your lordship that it is a verylogical answer, and exactly illustrates the interdependence of theprobabilities. Now, Mrs. Drabdump, let us know what happened when youawoke at half-past six the next morning. "

Thereupon Mrs. Drabdump recapitulated the evidence (with newredundancies, but slight variations) given by her at the inquest. Howshe became alarmed--how she found the street-door locked by the biglock--how she roused Grodman, and got him to burst open the door--howthey found the body--all this with which the public was already familiar_ad nauseam_ was extorted from her afresh. 

"Look at this key" (key passed to the witness). "Do you recognize it?"

"Yes; how did you get it? It's the key of my first-floor front. I amsure I left it sticking in the door. "

"Did you know a Miss Dymond?"

"Yes, Mr. Mortlake's sweetheart. But I knew he would never marry her, poor thing. " (Sensation. )

"Why not?"

"He was getting too grand for her. " (Amusement). 

"You don't mean anything more than that?"

"I don't know; she only came to my place once or twice. The last time Iset eyes on her must have been in October. "

"How did she appear?"

"She was very miserable, but she wouldn't let you see it. " (Laughter. )

"How has the prisoner behaved since the murder?"

"He always seemed very glum and sorry for it. "

Cross-examined: "Did not the prisoner once occupy the bedroom of Mr. Constant, and give it up to him, so that Mr. Constant might have the tworooms on the same floor?"

"Yes, but he didn't pay as much. "

"And, while occupying this front bedroom, did not the prisoner once losehis key and have another made?"

"He did; he was very careless. "

"Do you know what the prisoner and Mr. Constant spoke about on the nightof December 3d?"

"No; I couldn't hear. "

"Then how did you know they were quarreling?"

"They were talkin' so loud. "

Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C. (sharply): "But I'm talking loudly toyou now. Should you say I was quarreling?"

"It takes two to make a quarrel. " (Laughter. )

"Was the prisoner the sort of man who, in your opinion, would commit amurder?"

"No, I never should ha' guessed it was him. "

"He always struck you as a thorough gentleman?"

"No, my lud. I knew he was only a comp. "

"You say the prisoner has seemed depressed since the murder. Might notthat have been due to the disappearance of his sweetheart?"

"No, he'd more likely be glad to get rid of her. "

"Then he wouldn't be jealous if Mr. Constant took her off his hands?"(Sensation. )

"Men are dog-in-the-mangers. "

"Never mind about men, Mrs. Drabdump. Had the prisoner ceased to carefor Miss Dymond?"

"He didn't seem to think of her, my lud. When he got a letter in herhandwriting among his heap he used to throw it aside till he'd torn openthe others. "

Brown-Harland, Q. C. (with a triumphant ring in his voice): "Thank you, Mrs. Drabdump. You may sit down. "

Spigot, Q. C. : "One moment, Mrs. Drabdump. You say the prisoner hadceased to care for Miss Dymond. Might not this have been in consequenceof his suspecting for some time that she had relations with Mr. Constant?"

The Judge: "That is not a fair question. "

Spigot, Q. C. : "That will do, thank you, Mrs. Drabdump. "

Brown-Harland, Q. C. : "No; one question more, Mrs. Drabdump. Did youever see anything--say when Miss Dymond came to your house--to make yoususpect anything between Mr. Constant and the prisoner's sweetheart?"

"She did meet him once when Mr. Mortlake was out. " (Sensation. )

"Where did she meet him?"

"In the passage. He was going out when she knocked and he opened thedoor. " (Amusement. )

"You didn't hear what they said?"

"I ain't a eavesdropper. They spoke friendly and went away together. "

Mr. George Grodman was called and repeated his evidence at the inquest. Cross-examined, he testified to the warm friendship between Mr. Constantand the prisoner. He knew very little about Miss Dymond, having scarcelyseen her. Prisoner had never spoken to him much about her. He should notthink she was much in prisoner's thoughts. Naturally the prisoner hadbeen depressed by the death of his friend. Besides, he was overworked. Witness thought highly of Mortlake's character. It was incredible thatConstant had had improper relations of any kind with his friend'spromised wife. Grodman's evidence made a very favorable impression onthe jury; the prisoner looked his gratitude; and the prosecution feltsorry it had been necessary to call this witness. 

Inspector Howlett and Sergeant Runnymede had also to repeat theirevidence. Dr. Robinson, police-surgeon, likewise retendered his evidenceas to the nature of the wound, and the approximate hour of death. Butthis time he was much more severely examined. He would not bind himselfdown to state the time within an hour or two. He thought life had beenextinct two or three hours when he arrived, so that the deed had beencommitted between seven and eight. Under gentle pressure from theprosecuting counsel, he admitted that it might possibly have beenbetween six and seven. Cross-examined, he reiterated his impression infavor of the later hour. 

Supplementary evidence from medical experts proved as dubious anduncertain as if the court had confined itself to the original witness. It seemed to be generally agreed that the data for determining the timeof death of anybody were too complex and variable to admit of veryprecise inference; _rigor mortis_ and other symptoms setting in withinvery wide limits and differing largely in different persons. All agreedthat death from such a cut must have been practically instantaneous, andthe theory of suicide was rejected by all. As a whole the medicalevidence tended to fix the time of death, with a high degree ofprobability, between the hours of six and half-past eight. The effortsof the Prosecution were bent upon throwing back the time of death to asearly as possible after about half-past five. The Defense spent all itsstrength upon pinning the experts to the conclusion that death could nothave been earlier than seven. Evidently the Prosecution was going tofight hard for the hypothesis that Mortlake had committed the crime inthe interval between the first and second trains for Liverpool; whilethe Defense was concentrating itself on an alibi, showing that theprisoner had traveled by the second train which left Euston Station at aquarter-past seven, so that there could have been no possible time forthe passage between Bow and Euston. It was an exciting struggle. As yetthe contending forces seemed equally matched. The evidence had gone asmuch for as against the prisoner. But everybody knew that worse laybehind. 

"Call Edward Wimp. "

The story Edward Wimp had to tell began tamely enough withthrice-threshed-out facts. But at last the new facts came. 

"In consequence of suspicions that had formed in your mind you took upyour quarters, disguised, in the late Mr. Constant's rooms?"

"I did; at the commencement of the year. My suspicions had graduallygathered against the occupants of No. 11, Glover Street, and I resolvedto quash or confirm these suspicions once for all. "

"Will you tell the jury what followed?"

"Whenever the prisoner was away for the night I searched his room. Ifound the key of Mr. Constant's bedroom buried deeply in the side ofprisoner's leather sofa. I found what I imagine to be the letter hereceived on December 3d, in the pages of a 'Bradshaw' lying under thesame sofa. There were two razors about. "

Mr. Spigot, Q. C. , said: "The key has already been identified by Mrs. Drabdump. The letter I now propose to read. "

It was undated, and ran as follows:

 "Dear Tom--This is to bid you farewell. It is the best for us all. I am going a long way, dearest. Do not seek to find me, for it will be useless. Think of me as one swallowed up by the waters, and be assured that it is only to spare you shame and humiliation in the future that I tear myself from you and all the sweetness of life. Darling, there is no other way. I feel you could never marry me now. I have felt it for months. Dear Tom, you will understand what I mean. We must look facts in the face. I hope you will always be friends with Mr. Constant. Good by, dear. God bless you! May you always be happy, and find a worthier wife than I. Perhaps when you are great, and rich, and famous, as you deserve, you will sometimes think not unkindly of one who, however faulty and unworthy of you, will at least love you till the end. Yours, till death, "Jessie. "

By the time this letter was finished numerous old gentlemen, with wigsor without, were observed to be polishing their glasses. Mr. Wimp'sexamination was resumed. 

"After making these discoveries what did you do?"

"I made inquiries about Miss Dymond, and found Mr. Constant had visitedher once or twice in the evening. I imagined there would be some tracesof a pecuniary connection. I was allowed by the family to inspect Mr. Constant's check-book, and found a paid check made out for £25 in thename of Miss Dymond. By inquiry at the Bank, I found it had been cashedon November 12th of last year. I then applied for a warrant against theprisoner. "

Cross-examined: "Do you suggest that the prisoner opened Mr. Constant'sbedroom with the key you found?"

"Certainly. "

Brown-Harland, Q. C. (sarcastically): "And locked the door from withinwith it on leaving?"

"Certainly. "

"Will you have the goodness to explain how the trick was done?"

"It wasn't done. (Laughter. ) The prisoner probably locked the door fromthe outside. Those who broke it open naturally imagined it had beenlocked from the inside when they found the key inside. The key would, onthis theory, be on the floor as the outside locking could not have beeneffected if it had been in the lock. The first persons to enter the roomwould naturally believe it had been thrown down in the bursting of thedoor. Or it might have been left sticking very loosely inside the lockso as not to interfere with the turning of the outside key in which caseit would also probably have been thrown to the ground. "

"Indeed. Very ingenious. And can you also explain how the prisoner couldhave bolted the door within from the outside?"

"I can. (Renewed sensation. ) There is only one way in which it waspossible--and that was, of course, a mere conjurer's illusion. To causea locked door to appear bolted in addition, it would only be necessaryfor the person on the inside of the door to wrest the staple containingthe bolt from the woodwork. The bolt in Mr. Constant's bedroom workedperpendicularly. When the staple was torn off, it would simply remain atrest on the pin of the bolt instead of supporting it or keeping itfixed. A person bursting open the door and finding the staple resting onthe pin and torn away from the lintel of the door, would, of course, imagine he had torn it away, never dreaming the wresting off had beendone beforehand. " (Applause in court, which was instantly checked by theushers. ) The counsel for the defense felt he had been entrapped inattempting to be sarcastic with the redoubtable detective. Grodmanseemed green with envy. It was the one thing he had not thought of. 

Mrs. Drabdump, Grodman, Inspector Howlett, and Sergeant Runnymede wererecalled and re-examined by the embarrassed Sir Charles Brown-Harland asto the exact condition of the lock and the bolt and the position of thekey. It turned out as Wimp had suggested; so prepossessed were thewitnesses with the conviction that the door was locked and bolted fromthe inside when it was burst open that they were a little hazy about theexact details. The damage had been repaired, so that it was all aquestion of precise past observation. The inspector and the sergeanttestified that the key was in the lock when they saw it, though both themortise and the bolt were broken. They were not prepared to say thatWimp's theory was impossible; they would even admit it was quitepossible that the staple of the bolt had been torn off beforehand. Mrs. Drabdump could give no clear account of such petty facts in view of herimmediate engrossing interest in the horrible sight of the corpse. Grodman alone was positive that the key was in the door when he burst itopen. No, he did not remember picking it up from the floor and puttingit in. And he was certain that the staple of the bolt was not broken, from the resistance he experienced in trying to shake the upper panelsof the door. 

By the Prosecution: "Don't you think, from the comparative ease withwhich the door yielded to your onslaught, that it is highly probablethat the pin of the bolt was not in a firmly fixed staple, but in onealready detached from the woodwork of the lintel?"

"The door did not yield so easily. "

"But you must be a Hercules. "

"Not quite; the bolt was old, and the woodwork crumbling; the lock wasnew and shoddy. But I have always been a strong man. "

"Very well, Mr. Grodman. I hope you will never appear at themusic-halls. " (Laughter. )

Jessie Dymond's landlady was the next witness for the prosecution. Shecorroborated Wimp's statements as to Constant's occasional visits, andnarrated how the girl had been enlisted by the dead philanthropist as acollaborator in some of his enterprises. But the most telling portion ofher evidence was the story of how, late at night, on December 3d, theprisoner called upon her and inquired wildly about the whereabouts ofhis sweetheart. He said he had just received a mysterious letter fromMiss Dymond saying she was gone. She (the landlady) replied that shecould have told him that weeks ago, as her ungrateful lodger was gonenow some three weeks without leaving a hint behind her. In answer to hismost ungentlemanly raging and raving, she told him it served him right, as he should have looked after her better, and not kept away for solong. She reminded him that there were as good fish in the sea as evercame out, and a girl of Jessie's attractions need not pine away (as shehad seemed to be pining away) for lack of appreciation. He then calledher a liar and left her, and she hoped never to see his face again, though she was not surprised to see it in the dock. 

Mr. Fitzjames Montgomery, a bank clerk, remembered cashing the checkproduced. He particularly remembered it, because he paid the money to avery pretty girl. She took the entire amount in gold. At this point thecase was adjourned. 

Denzil Cantercot was the first witness called for the prosecution on theresumption of the trial. Pressed as to whether he had not told Mr. Wimpthat he had overheard the prisoner denouncing Mr. Constant, he could notsay. He had not actually heard the prisoner's denunciations; he mighthave given Mr. Wimp a false impression, but then Mr. Wimp was soprosaically literal. (Laughter. ) Mr. Crowl had told him something of thekind. Cross-examined, he said Jessie Dymond was a rare spirit and shealways reminded him of Joan of Arc. 

Mr. Crowl, being called, was extremely agitated. He refused to take theoath, and informed the court that the Bible was a Fad. He could notswear by anything so self-contradictory. He would affirm. He could notdeny--though he looked like wishing to--that the prisoner had at firstbeen rather mistrustful of Mr. Constant, but he was certain that thefeeling had quickly worn off. Yes, he was a great friend of theprisoner, but he didn't see why that should invalidate his testimony, especially as he had not taken an oath. Certainly the prisoner seemedrather depressed when he saw him on Bank Holiday, but it was overwork onbehalf of the people and for the demolition of the Fads. 

Several other familiars of the prisoner gave more or less reluctanttestimony as to his sometime prejudice against the amateur rival laborleader. His expressions of dislike had been strong and bitter. TheProsecution also produced a poster announcing that the prisoner wouldpreside at a great meeting of clerks on December 4th. He had not turnedup at this meeting nor sent any explanation. Finally, there was theevidence of the detectives who originally arrested him at LiverpoolDocks in view of his suspicious demeanor. This completed the case forthe prosecution. 

Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C. , rose with a swagger and a rustle ofhis silk gown, and proceeded to set forth the theory of the defense. Hesaid he did not purpose to call any witnesses. The hypothesis of theprosecution was so inherently childish and inconsequential, and sodependent upon a bundle of interdependent probabilities that it crumbledaway at the merest touch. The prisoner's character was of unblemishedintegrity, his last public appearance had been made on the same platformwith Mr. Gladstone, and his honesty and highmindedness had been vouchedfor by statesmen of the highest standing. His movements could beaccounted for from hour to hour--and those with which the prosecutioncredited him rested on no tangible evidence whatever. He was alsocredited with superhuman ingenuity and diabolical cunning of which hehad shown no previous symptom. Hypothesis was piled on hypothesis, as inthe old Oriental legend, where the world rested on the elephant and theelephant on the tortoise. It might be worth while, however, to point outthat it was at least quite likely that the death of Mr. Constant had nottaken place before seven, and as the prisoner left Euston Station at7:15 a. M. For Liverpool, he could certainly not have got there from Bowin the time; also that it was hardly possible for the prisoner, whocould prove being at Euston Station at 5:25 a. M. , to travel backwardand forward to Glover Street and commit the crime all within less thantwo hours. "The real facts, " said Sir Charles impressively, "are mostsimple. The prisoner, partly from pressure of work, partly (he had nowish to conceal) from worldly ambition, had begun to neglect MissDymond, to whom he was engaged to be married. The man was but human, andhis head was a little turned by his growing importance. Nevertheless, atheart he was still deeply attached to Miss Dymond. She, however, appearsto have jumped to the conclusion that he had ceased to love her, thatshe was unworthy of him, unfitted by education to take her place side byside with him in the new spheres to which he was mounting--that, inshort, she was a drag on his career. Being, by all accounts, a girl ofremarkable force of character, she resolved to cut the Gordian knot byleaving London, and, fearing lest her affianced husband'sconscientiousness should induce him to sacrifice himself to her;dreading also, perhaps, her own weakness, she made the parting absolute, and the place of her refuge a mystery. A theory has been suggested whichdrags an honored name in the mire--a theory so superfluous that I shallonly allude to it. That Arthur Constant could have seduced, or had anyimproper relations with his friend's betrothed is a hypothesis to whichthe lives of both give the lie. Before leaving London--or England--MissDymond wrote to her aunt in Devonport--her only living relative in thiscountry--asking her as a great favor to forward an addressed letter tothe prisoner, a fortnight after receipt. The aunt obeyed implicitly. This was the letter which fell like a thunderbolt on the prisoner on thenight of December 3d. All his old love returned--he was full ofself-reproach and pity for the poor girl. The letter read ominously. Perhaps she was going to put an end to herself. His first thought was torush up to his friend, Constant, to seek his advice. Perhaps Constantknew something of the affair. The prisoner knew the two were in notinfrequent communication. It is possible--my lord and gentlemen of thejury, I do not wish to follow the methods of the prosecution and confusetheory with fact, so I say it is possible--that Mr. Constant hadsupplied her with the £25 to leave the country. He was like a brother toher, perhaps even acted imprudently in calling upon her, though neitherdreamed of evil. It is possible that he may have encouraged her in herabnegation and in her altruistic aspirations, perhaps even withoutknowing their exact drift, for does he not speak in his very last letterof the fine female characters he was meeting, and the influence for goodhe had over individual human souls? Still, this we can now never know, unless the dead speak or the absent return. It is also not impossiblethat Miss Dymond was entrusted with the £25 for charitable purposes. Butto come back to certainties. The prisoner consulted Mr. Constant aboutthe letter. He then ran to Miss Dymond's lodgings in Stepney Green, knowing beforehand his trouble would be futile. The letter bore thepostmark of Devonport. He knew the girl had an aunt there; possibly shemight have gone to her. He could not telegraph, for he was ignorant ofthe address. He consulted his 'Bradshaw, ' and resolved to leave by the5:30 a. M. From Paddington, and told his landlady so. He left the letterin the 'Bradshaw, ' which ultimately got thrust among a pile of papersunder the sofa, so that he had to get another. He was careless anddisorderly, and the key found by Mr. Wimp in his sofa must have lainthere for some years, having been lost there in the days when heoccupied the bedroom afterward rented by Mr. Constant. Afraid to misshis train, he did not undress on that distressful night. Meantime thethought occurred to him that Jessie was too clever a girl to leave soeasy a trail, and he jumped to the conclusion that she would be going toher married brother in America, and had gone to Devonport merely to bidher aunt farewell. He determined therefore to get to Liverpool, withoutwasting time at Devonport, to institute inquiries. Not suspecting thedelay in the transit of the letter, he thought he might yet stop her, even at the landing-stage or on the tender. Unfortunately his cab wentslowly in the fog, he missed the first train, and wandered aboutbrooding disconsolately in the mist till the second. At Liverpool hissuspicious, excited demeanor procured his momentary arrest. Since thenthe thought of the lost girl has haunted and broken him. That is thewhole, the plain, and the sufficing story. " The effective witnesses forthe defense were, indeed, few. It is so hard to prove a negative. Therewas Jessie's aunt, who bore out the statement of the counsel for thedefense. There were the porters who saw him leave Euston by the 7:15train for Liverpool, and arrive just too late for the 5:15; there wasthe cabman (2, 138), who drove him to Euston just in time, he (witness)thought, to catch the 5:15 a. M. Under cross-examination, the cabman gota little confused; he was asked whether, if he really picked up theprisoner at Bow Railway Station at about 4:30, he ought not to havecaught the first train at Euston. He said the fog made him drive ratherslowly, but admitted the mist was transparent enough to warrant fullspeed. He also admitted being a strong trade unionist, Spigot, Q. C. , artfully extorting the admission as if it were of the utmostsignificance. Finally, there were numerous witnesses--of all sorts andconditions--to the prisoner's high character, as well as to ArthurConstant's blameless and moral life. 

In his closing speech on the third day of the trial, Sir Charles pointedout with great exhaustiveness and cogency the flimsiness of the case forthe prosecution, the number of hypotheses it involved, and their mutualinterdependence. Mrs. Drabdump was a witness whose evidence must beaccepted with extreme caution. The jury must remember that she wasunable to dissociate her observations from her inferences, and thoughtthat the prisoner and Mr. Constant were quarreling merely because theywere agitated. He dissected her evidence, and showed that it entirelybore out the story of the defense. He asked the jury to bear in mindthat no positive evidence (whether of cabmen or others) had been givenof the various and complicated movements attributed to the prisoner onthe morning of December 4th, between the hours of 5:25 and 7:15 a. M. , and that the most important witness on the theory of the prosecution--hemeant, of course, Miss Dymond--had not been produced. Even if she weredead, and her body were found, no countenance would be given to thetheory of the prosecution, for the mere conviction that her lover haddeserted her would be a sufficient explanation of her suicide. Beyondthe ambiguous letter, no tittle of evidence of her dishonor--on whichthe bulk of the case against the prisoner rested--had been adduced. Asfor the motive of political jealousy that had been a mere passing cloud. The two men had become fast friends. As to the circumstances of thealleged crime, the medical evidence was on the whole in favor of thetime of death being late; and the prisoner had left London at a quarterpast seven. The drugging theory was absurd, and as for the too cleverbolt and lock theories, Mr. Grodman, a trained scientific observer, hadpooh-poohed them. He would solemnly exhort the jury to remember that ifthey condemned the prisoner they would not only send an innocent man toan ignominious death on the flimsiest circumstantial evidence, but theywould deprive the workingmen of this country of one of their truestfriends and their ablest leader. 

The conclusion of Sir Charles' vigorous speech was greeted withirrepressible applause. 

Mr. Spigot, Q. C. , in closing the case for the prosecution, asked thejury to return a verdict against the prisoner for as malicious andpremeditated a crime as ever disgraced the annals of any civilizedcountry. His cleverness and education had only been utilized for thedevil's ends, while his reputation had been used as a cloak. Everythingpointed strongly to the prisoner's guilt. On receiving Miss Dymond'sletter announcing her shame, and (probably) her intention to commitsuicide, he had hastened upstairs to denounce Constant. He had thenrushed to the girl's lodgings, and, finding his worst fears confirmed, planned at once his diabolically ingenious scheme of revenge. He toldhis landlady he was going to Devonport, so that if he bungled, thepolice would be put temporarily off his track. His real destination wasLiverpool, for he intended to leave the country. Lest, however, his planshould break down here, too, he arranged an ingenious alibi by beingdriven to Euston for the 5:15 train to Liverpool. The cabman would notknow he did not intend to go by it, but meant to return to 11, GloverStreet, there to perpetrate this foul crime, interruption to which hehad possibly barred by drugging his landlady. His presence at Liverpool(whither he really went by the second train) would corroborate thecabman's story. That night he had not undressed nor gone to bed; he hadplotted out his devilish scheme till it was perfect; the fog came as anunexpected ally to cover his movements. Jealousy, outraged affection, the desire for revenge, the lust for political power--these were human. They might pity the criminal, they could not find him innocent of thecrime. 

Mr. Justice Crogie, summing up, began dead against the prisoner. Reviewing the evidence, he pointed out that plausible hypotheses neatlydove-tailed did not necessarily weaken one another, the fitting so welltogether of the whole rather making for the truth of the parts. Besides, the case for the prosecution was as far from being all hypothesis as thecase for the defense was from excluding hypothesis. The key, the letter, the reluctance to produce the letter, the heated interview withConstant, the misstatement about the prisoner's destination, the flightto Liverpool, the false tale about searching for a "him, " thedenunciations of Constant, all these were facts. On the other hand, there were various lacunae and hypotheses in the case for the defense. Even conceding the somewhat dubious alibi afforded by the prisoner'spresence at Euston at 5:25 a. M. , there was no attempt to account forhis movements between that and 7:15 a. M. It was as possible that hereturned to Bow as that he lingered about Euston. There was nothing inthe medical evidence to make his guilt impossible. Nor was thereanything inherently impossible in Constant's yielding to the suddentemptation of a beautiful girl, nor in a working-girl deeming herselfdeserted, temporarily succumbing to the fascinations of a gentleman andregretting it bitterly afterward. What had become of the girl was amystery. Hers might have been one of those nameless corpses which thetide swirls up on slimy river banks. The jury must remember, too, thatthe relation might not have actually passed into dishonor, it might havebeen just grave enough to smite the girl's conscience, and to induce herto behave as she had done. It was enough that her letter should haveexcited the jealousy of the prisoner. There was one other point which hewould like to impress on the jury, and which the counsel for theprosecution had not sufficiently insisted upon. This was that theprisoner's guiltiness was the only plausible solution that had ever beenadvanced of the Bow Mystery. The medical evidence agreed that Mr. Constant did not die by his own hand. Someone must therefore havemurdered him. The number of people who could have had any possiblereason or opportunity to murder him was extremely small. The prisonerhad both reason and opportunity. By what logicians called the method ofexclusion, suspicion would attach to him on even slight evidence. Theactual evidence was strong and plausible, and now that Mr. Wimp'singenious theory had enabled them to understand how the door could havebeen apparently locked and bolted from within, the last difficulty andthe last argument for suicide had been removed. The prisoner's guilt wasas clear as circumstantial evidence could make it. If they let him gofree, the Bow Mystery might henceforward be placed among the archives ofunavenged assassinations. Having thus well-nigh hung the prisoner, thejudge wound up by insisting on the high probability of the story for thedefense, though that, too, was dependent in important details upon theprisoner's mere private statements to his counsel. The jury, being bythis time sufficiently muddled by his impartiality, were dismissed, withthe exhortation to allow due weight to every fact and probability indetermining their righteous verdict. 

The minutes ran into hours, but the jury did not return. The shadows ofnight fell across the reeking, fevered court before they announced theirverdict--

"Guilty. "

The judge put on his black cap. 

The great reception arranged outside was a fiasco; the evening banquetwas indefinitely postponed. Wimp had won; Grodman felt like a whippedcur. 

CHAPTER XI. 

"So you were right, " Denzil could not help saying as he greeted Grodmana week afterward. "I shall not live to tell the story of how youdiscovered the Bow murderer. "

"Sit down, " growled Grodman; "perhaps you will after all. " There was adangerous gleam in his eyes. Denzil was sorry he had spoken. 

"I sent for you, " Grodman said, "to tell you that on the night Wimparrested Mortlake I had made preparations for your arrest. "

Denzil gasped, "What for?"

"My dear Denzil, there is a little law in this country invented for theconfusion of the poetic. The greatest exponent of the Beautiful is onlyallowed the same number of wives as the greengrocer. I do not blame youfor not being satisfied with Jane--she is a good servant but a badmistress--but it was cruel to Kitty not to inform her that Jane had aprior right in you, and unjust to Jane not to let her know of thecontract with Kitty. "

"They both know it now well enough, curse 'em, " said the poet. 

"Yes; your secrets are like your situations--you can't keep them long. My poor poet, I pity you--betwixt the devil and the deep sea. "

"They're a pair of harpies, each holding over me the Damocles sword ofan arrest for bigamy. Neither loves me. "

"I should think they would come in very useful to you. You plant one inmy house to tell my secrets to Wimp, and you plant one in Wimp's houseto tell Wimp's secrets to me, I suppose. Out with some, then. "

"Upon my honor you wrong me. Jane brought me here, not I Jane. As forKitty, I never had such a shock in my life as at finding her installedin Wimp's house. "

"She thought it safer to have the law handy for your arrest. Besides, she probably desired to occupy a parallel position to Jane's. She mustdo something for a living; you wouldn't do anything for hers. And so youcouldn't go anywhere without meeting a wife! Ha! ha! ha! Serve youright, my polygamous poet. "

"But why should you arrest me?"

"Revenge, Denzil. I have been the best friend you ever had in this cold, prosaic world. You have eaten my bread, drunk my claret, written mybook, smoked my cigars, and pocketed my money. And yet, when you have animportant piece of information bearing on a mystery about which I amthinking day and night, you calmly go and sell it to Wimp. "

"I did-didn't, " stammered Denzil. 

"Liar! Do you think Kitty has any secrets from me? As soon as Idiscovered your two marriages I determined to have you arrestedfor--your treachery. But when I found you had, as I thought, put Wimp onthe wrong scent, when I felt sure that by arresting Mortlake he wasgoing to make a greater ass of himself than even nature had been able todo, then I forgave you. I let you walk about the earth--anddrink--freely. Now it is Wimp who crows--everybody pats him on theback--they call him the mystery man of the Scotland-Yard tribe. Poor TomMortlake will be hanged, and all through your telling Wimp about JessieDymond!"

"It was you yourself, " said Denzil sullenly. "Everybody was giving itup. But you said 'Let us find out all that Arthur Constant did in thelast few months of his life. ' Wimp couldn't miss stumbling on Jessiesooner or later. I'd have throttled Constant, if I had known he'dtouched her, " he wound up with irrelevant indignation. 

Grodman winced at the idea that he himself had worked _ad majoremgloriam_ of Wimp. And yet, had not Mrs. Wimp let out as much at theChristmas dinner?

"What's past is past, " he said gruffly. "But if Tom Mortlake hangs, yougo to Portland. "

"How can I help Tom hanging?"

"Help the agitation as much as you can. Write letters under all sorts ofnames to all the papers. Get everybody you know to sign the greatpetition. Find out where Jessie Dymond is--the girl who holds the proofof Tom Mortlake's innocence. "

"You really believe him innocent?"

"Don't be satirical, Denzil. Haven't I taken the chair at all themeetings? Am I not the most copious correspondent of the Press?"

"I thought it was only to spite Wimp. "

"Rubbish. It's to save poor Tom. He no more murdered Arthur Constantthan--you did!" He laughed an unpleasant laugh. 

Denzil bade him farewell, frigid with fear. 

Grodman was up to his ears in letters and telegrams. Somehow he hadbecome the leader of the rescue party--suggestions, subscriptions camefrom all sides. The suggestions were burnt, the subscriptionsacknowledged in the papers and used for hunting up the missing girl. Lucy Brent headed the list with a hundred pounds. It was a finetestimony to her faith in her dead lover's honor. 

The release of the Jury had unloosed "The Greater Jury, " which alwaysnow sits upon the smaller. Every means was taken to nullify the value ofthe "palladium of British liberty. " The foreman and the jurors wereinterviewed, the judge was judged, and by those who were no judges. TheHome Secretary (who had done nothing beyond accepting office under theCrown) was vituperated, and sundry provincial persons wroteconfidentially to the Queen. Arthur Constant's backsliding cheered manyby convincing them that others were as bad as themselves; and well-to-dotradesmen saw in Mortlake's wickedness the pernicious effects ofsocialism. A dozen new theories were afloat. Constant had committedsuicide by Esoteric Buddhism, as witness his devotion to Mme. Blavatsky, or he had been murdered by his Mahatma, or victimized by Hypnotism, Mesmerism, Somnambulism, and other weird abstractions. Grodman's greatpoint was--Jessie Dymond must be produced, dead or alive. The electriccurrent scoured the civilized world in search of her. What wonder if theshrewder sort divined that the indomitable detective had fixed his lasthope on the girl's guilt? If Jessie had wrongs why should she not haveavenged them herself? Did she not always remind the poet of Joan of Arc?

Another week passed; the shadow of the gallows crept over the days; on, on, remorselessly drawing nearer, as the last ray of hope sank below thehorizon. The Home Secretary remained inflexible; the great petitionsdischarged their signatures at him in vain. He was a Conservative, sternly conscientious; and the mere insinuation that his obstinacy wasdue to the politics of the condemned only hardened him against thetemptation of a cheap reputation for magnanimity. He would not evengrant a respite, to increase the chances of the discovery of JessieDymond. In the last of the three weeks there was a final monster meetingof protest. Grodman again took the chair, and several distinguishedfaddists were present, as well as numerous respectable members ofsociety. The Home Secretary acknowledged the receipt of theirresolutions. The Trade Unions were divided in their allegiance; somewhispered of faith and hope, others of financial defalcations. Theformer essayed to organize a procession and an indignation meeting onthe Sunday preceding the Tuesday fixed for the execution, but it fellthrough on a rumor of confession. The Monday papers contained a lastmasterly letter from Grodman exposing the weakness of the evidence, butthey knew nothing of a confession. The prisoner was mute and disdainful, professing little regard for a life empty of love and burdened withself-reproach. He refused to see clergymen. He was accorded an interviewwith Miss Brent in the presence of a jailer, and solemnly asseveratedhis respect for her dead lover's memory. Monday buzzed with rumors; theevening papers chronicled them hour by hour. A poignant anxiety wasabroad. The girl would be found. Some miracle would happen. A reprievewould arrive. The sentence would be commuted. But the short day darkenedinto night even as Mortlake's short day was darkening. And the shadow ofthe gallows crept on and on and seemed to mingle with the twilight. 

Crowl stood at the door of his shop, unable to work. His big gray eyeswere heavy with unshed tears. The dingy wintry road seemed one vastcemetery; the street lamps twinkled like corpse-lights. The confusedsounds of the street-life reached his ear as from another world. He didnot see the people who flitted to and fro amid the gathering shadows ofthe cold, dreary night. One ghastly vision flashed and faded and flashedupon the background of the duskiness. 

Denzil stood beside him, smoking in silence. A cold fear was at hisheart. That terrible Grodman! As the hangman's cord was tightening roundMortlake, he felt the convict's chains tightening round himself. And yetthere was one gleam of hope, feeble as the yellow flicker of thegas-lamp across the way. Grodman had obtained an interview with thecondemned late that afternoon, and the parting had been painful, but theevening paper, that in its turn had obtained an interview with theex-detective, announced on its placard:

 "GRODMAN STILL CONFIDENT, "

and the thousands who yet pinned their faith on this extraordinary manrefused to extinguish the last sparks of hope. Denzil had bought thepaper and scanned it eagerly, but there was nothing save the vagueassurance that the indefatigable Grodman was still almost patheticallyexpectant of the miracle. Denzil did not share the expectation; hemeditated flight. 

"Peter, " he said at last, "I'm afraid it's all over. "

Crowl nodded, heart-broken. "All over!" he repeated, "and to think thathe dies--and it is--all over!"

He looked despairingly at the blank winter sky, where leaden clouds shutout the stars. "Poor, poor young fellow! To-night alive and thinking. To-morrow night a clod, with no more sense or motion than a bit ofleather! No compensation nowhere for being cut off innocent in the prideof youth and strength! A man who has always preached the Useful day andnight, and toiled and suffered for his fellows. Where's the justice ofit, where's the justice of it?" he demanded fiercely. Again his wet eyeswandered upward toward heaven, that heaven away from which the soul of adead saint at the Antipodes was speeding into infinite space. 

"Well, where was the justice for Arthur Constant if he, too, wasinnocent?" said Denzil. "Really, Peter, I don't see why you should takeit for granted that Tom is so dreadfully injured. Your horny-handedlabor leaders are, after all, men of no aesthetic refinement, with nosense of the Beautiful; you cannot expect them to be exempt from thecoarser forms of crime. Humanity must look to for other leaders--to theseers and the poets!"

"Cantercot, if you say Tom's guilty I'll knock you down. " The littlecobbler turned upon his tall friend like a roused lion. Then he added, "I beg your pardon, Cantercot, I don't mean that. After all, I've nogrounds. The judge is an honest man, and with gifts I can't lay claimto. But I believe in Tom with all my heart. And if Tom is guilty Ibelieve in the Cause of the People with all my heart all the same. TheFads are doomed to death, they may be reprieved, but they must die atlast. "

He drew a deep sigh, and looked along the dreary Road. It was quite darknow, but by the light of the lamps and the gas in the shop windows thedull, monotonous Road lay revealed in all its sordid, familiar outlines;with its long stretches of chill pavement, its unlovely architecture, and its endless stream of prosaic pedestrians. 

A sudden consciousness of the futility of his existence pierced thelittle cobbler like an icy wind. He saw his own life, and a hundredmillion lives like his, swelling and breaking like bubbles on a darkocean, unheeded, uncared for. 

A newsboy passed along, clamoring "The Bow murderer, preparations forthe hexecution!"

A terrible shudder shook the cobbler's frame. His eyes rangedsightlessly after the boy; the merciful tears filled them at last. 

"The Cause of the People, " he murmured, brokenly, "I believe in theCause of the People. There is nothing else. "

"Peter, come in to tea, you'll catch cold, " said Mrs. Crowl. 

Denzil went in to tea and Peter followed. 

 * * * * *

Meantime, round the house of the Home Secretary, who was in town, anever-augmenting crowd was gathered, eager to catch the first whisper ofa reprieve. 

The house was guarded by a cordon of police, for there was noinconsiderable danger of a popular riot. At times a section of the crowdgroaned and hooted. Once a volley of stones was discharged at thewindows. The news-boys were busy vending their special editions, and thereporters struggled through the crowd, clutching descriptive pencils, and ready to rush off to telegraph offices should anything "extraspecial" occur. Telegraph boys were coming up every now and again withthreats, messages, petitions and exhortations from all parts of thecountry to the unfortunate Home Secretary, who was striving to keep hisaching head cool as he went through the voluminous evidence for the lasttime and pondered over the more important letters which "The GreaterJury" had contributed to the obscuration of the problem. Grodman'sletter in that morning's paper shook him most; under his scientificanalysis the circumstantial chain seemed forged of painted cardboard. Then the poor man read the judge's summing up, and the chain becametempered steel. The noise of the crowd outside broke upon his ear in hisstudy like the roar of a distant ocean. The more the rabble hooted him, the more he essayed to hold scrupulously the scales of life and death. And the crowd grew and grew, as men came away from their work. Therewere many that loved the man who lay in the jaws of death, and a spiritof mad revolt surged in their breasts. And the sky was gray, and thebleak night deepened and the shadow of the gallows crept on. 

Suddenly a strange inarticulate murmur spread through the crowd, a vaguewhisper of no one knew what. Something had happened. Somebody wascoming. A second later and one of the outskirts of the throng wasagitated, and a convulsive cheer went up from it, and was taken upinfectiously all along the street. The crowd parted--a hansom dashedthrough the center. "Grodman! Grodman!" shouted those who recognized theoccupant. "Grodman! Hurrah!" Grodman was outwardly calm and pale, buthis eyes glittered; he waved his hand encouragingly as the hansom dashedup to the door, cleaving the turbulent crowd as a canoe cleaves thewaters. Grodman sprang out, the constables at the portal made way forhim respectfully. He knocked imperatively, the door was openedcautiously; a boy rushed up and delivered a telegram; Grodman forced hisway in, gave his name, and insisted on seeing the Home Secretary on amatter of life and death. Those near the door heard his words andcheered, and the crowd divined the good omen, and the air throbbed withcannonades of joyous sound. The cheers rang in Grodman's ears as thedoor slammed behind him. The reporters struggled to the front. Anexcited knot of working men pressed round the arrested hansom, they tookthe horse out. A dozen enthusiasts struggled for the honor of placingthemselves between the shafts. And the crowd awaited Grodman. 

CHAPTER XII. 

Grodman was ushered into the conscientious Minister's study. The doughtychief of the agitation was, perhaps, the one man who could not bedenied. As he entered, the Home Secretary's face seemed lit up withrelief. At a sign from his master, the amanuensis who had brought in thelast telegram took it back with him into the outer room where he worked. Needless to say not a tithe of the Minister's correspondence ever cameunder his own eyes. 

"You have a valid reason for troubling me, I suppose, Mr. Grodman?" saidthe Home Secretary, almost cheerfully. "Of course it is about Mortlake?"

"It is; and I have the best of all reasons. "

"Take a seat. Proceed. "

"Pray do not consider me impertinent, but have you ever given anyattention to the science of evidence?"

"How do you mean?" asked the Home Secretary, rather puzzled, adding, with a melancholy smile, "I have had to lately. Of course, I've neverbeen a criminal lawyer, like some of my predecessors. But I shouldhardly speak of it as a science; I look upon it as a question ofcommon-sense. "

"Pardon me, sir. It is the most subtle and difficult of all thesciences. It is, indeed, rather the science of the sciences. What is thewhole of Inductive Logic, as laid down, say, by Bacon and Mill, but anattempt to appraise the value of evidence, the said evidence being thetrails left by the Creator, so to speak? The Creator has--I say it inall reverence--drawn a myriad red herrings across the track, but thetrue scientist refuses to be baffled by superficial appearances indetecting the secrets of Nature. The vulgar herd catches at the grossapparent fact, but the man of insight knows that what lies on thesurface does lie. "

"Very interesting, Mr. Grodman, but really----"

"Bear with me, sir. The science of evidence being thus so extremelysubtle, and demanding the most acute and trained observation of facts, the most comprehensive understanding of human psychology, is naturallygiven over to professors who have not the remotest idea that 'things arenot what they seem, ' and that everything is other than it appears; toprofessors, most of whom, by their year-long devotion to theshop-counter or the desk, have acquired an intimate acquaintance withall the infinite shades and complexities of things and human nature. When twelve of these professors are put in a box, it is called a jury. When one of these professors is put in a box by himself, he is called awitness. The retailing of evidence--the observation of the facts--isgiven over to people who go through their lives without eyes; theappreciation of evidence--the judging of these facts--is surrendered topeople who may possibly be adepts in weighing out pounds of sugar. Apartfrom their sheer inability to fulfill either function--to observe, or tojudge--their observation and their judgment alike are vitiated by allsorts of irrelevant prejudices. "

"You are attacking trial by jury. "

"Not necessarily. I am prepared to accept that scientifically, on theground that, as there are, as a rule, only two alternatives, the balanceof probability is slightly in favor of the true decision being come to. Then, in cases where experts like myself have got up the evidence, thejury can be made to see through trained eyes. "

The Home Secretary tapped impatiently with his foot. 

"I can't listen to abstract theorizing, " he said. "Have you any freshconcrete evidence?"

"Sir, everything depends on our getting down to the root of the matter. What percentage of average evidence should you think is thorough, plain, simple, unvarnished fact, 'the truth, the whole truth, and nothing butthe truth'?"

"Fifty?" said the Minister, humoring him a little. 

"Not five. I say nothing of lapses of memory, of inborn defects ofobservational power--though the suspiciously precise recollection ofdates and events possessed by ordinary witnesses in important trialstaking place years after the occurrences involved, is one of the mostamazing things in the curiosities of modern jurisprudence. I defy you, sir, to tell me what you had for dinner last Monday, or what exactly youwere saying and doing at five o'clock last Tuesday afternoon. Nobodywhose life does not run in mechanical grooves can do anything of thesort; unless, of course, the facts have been very impressive. But thisby the way. The great obstacle to veracious observation is the elementof prepossession in all vision. Has it ever struck you, sir, that wenever see anyone more than once, if that? The first time we meet a manwe may possibly see him as he is; the second time our vision is coloredand modified by the memory of the first. Do our friends appear to us asthey appear to strangers? Do our rooms, our furniture, our pipes strikeour eye as they would strike the eye of an outsider, looking on them forthe first time? Can a mother see her babe's ugliness, or a lover hismistress' shortcomings, though they stare everybody else in the face?Can we see ourselves as others see us? No; habit, prepossession changesall. The mind is a large factor of every so-called external fact. Theeye sees, sometimes, what it wishes to see, more often what it expectsto see. You follow me, sir?"

The Home Secretary nodded his head less impatiently. He was beginning tobe interested. The hubbub from without broke faintly upon their ears. 

"To give you a definite example. Mr. Wimp says that when I burst openthe door of Mr. Constant's room on the morning of December 4th, and sawthat the staple of the bolt had been wrested by the pin from the lintel, I jumped at once to the conclusion that I had broken the bolt. Now Iadmit that this was so, only in things like this you do not seem toconclude, you jump so fast that you see, or seem to. On the other hand, when you see a standing ring of fire produced by whirling a burningstick, you do not believe in its continuous existence. It is the samewhen witnessing a legerdemain performance. Seeing is not alwaysbelieving, despite the proverb; but believing is often seeing. It is notto the point that in that little matter of the door Wimp was ashopelessly and incurably wrong as he has been in everything all along. Though the door was securely bolted, I confess that I should have seenthat I had broken the bolt in forcing the door, even if it had beenbroken beforehand. Never once since December 4th did this possibilityoccur to me, till Wimp with perverted ingenuity suggested it. If this isthe case with a trained observer, one moreover fully conscious of thisineradicable tendency of the human mind, how must it be with anuntrained observer?"

"Come to the point, come to the point, " said the Home Secretary, puttingout his hand as if it itched to touch the bell on the writing-table. 

"Such as, " went on Grodman imperturbably, "such as--Mrs. Drabdump. Thatworthy person is unable, by repeated violent knocking, to arouse herlodger who yet desires to be aroused; she becomes alarmed, she rushesacross to get my assistance; I burst open the door--what do you thinkthe good lady expected to see?"

"Mr. Constant murdered, I suppose, " murmured the Home Secretary, wonderingly. 

"Exactly. And so she saw it. And what should you think was the conditionof Arthur Constant when the door yielded to my violent exertions andflew open?"

"Why, was he not dead?" gasped the Home Secretary, his heart flutteringviolently. 

"Dead? A young, healthy fellow like that! When the door flew open ArthurConstant was sleeping the sleep of the just. It was a deep, a very deepsleep, of course, else the blows at his door would long since haveawakened him. But all the while Mrs. Drabdump's fancy was picturing herlodger cold and stark the poor young fellow was lying in bed in a nicewarm sleep. "

"You mean to say you found Arthur Constant alive?"

"As you were last night. "

The minister was silent, striving confusedly to take in the situation. Outside the crowd was cheering again. It was probably to pass the time. 

"Then, when was he murdered?"

"Immediately afterward. "

"By whom?"

"Well, that is, if you will pardon me, not a very intelligent question. Science and common-sense are in accord for once. Try the method ofexhaustion. It must have been either by Mrs. Drabdump or by myself. "

"You mean to say that Mrs. Drabdump----!"

"Poor dear Mrs. Drabdump, you don't deserve this of your Home Secretary!The idea of that good lady!"

"It was you!"

"Calm yourself, my dear Home Secretary. There is nothing to be alarmedat. It was a solitary experiment, and I intend it to remain so. " Thenoise without grew louder. "Three cheers for Grodman! Hip, hip, hip, hooray, " fell faintly on their ears. 

But the Minister, pallid and deeply moved, touched the bell. The HomeSecretary's home secretary appeared. He looked at the great man'sagitated face with suppressed surprise. 

"Thank you for calling in your amanuensis, " said Grodman. "I intended toask you to lend me his services. I suppose he can write shorthand. "

The minister nodded, speechless. 

"That is well. I intend this statement to form the basis of an appendixto the twenty-fifth edition--sort of silver wedding--of my book, 'Criminals I Have Caught, ' Mr. Denzil Cantercot, who, by the will I havemade to-day, is appointed my literary executor, will have the task ofworking it up with literary and dramatic touches after the model of theother chapters of my book. I have every confidence he will be able to dome as much justice, from a literary point of view, as you, sir, no doubtwill from a legal. I feel certain he will succeed in catching the styleof the other chapters to perfection. "

"Templeton, " whispered the Home Secretary, "this man may be a lunatic. The effort to solve the Big Bow Mystery may have addled his brain. Still, " he added aloud, "it will be as well for you to take down hisstatement in shorthand. "

"Thank you, sir, " said Grodman, heartily. "Ready, Mr. Templeton? Heregoes. My career till I left the Scotland-Yard Detective Department isknown to all the world. Is that too fast for you, Mr. Templeton? Alittle? Well, I'll go slower; but pull me up if I forget to keep thebrake on. When I retired, I discovered that I was a bachelor. But it wastoo late to marry. Time hung on my hands. The preparation of my book, 'Criminals I Have Caught, ' kept me occupied for some months. When it waspublished I had nothing more to do but think. I had plenty of money, andit was safely invested; there was no call for speculation. The futurewas meaningless to me; I regretted I had not elected to die in harness. As idle old men must, I lived in the past. I went over and over again myancient exploits; I re-read my book. And as I thought and thought, awayfrom the excitement of the actual hunt, and seeing the facts in a truerperspective, so it grew daily clearer to me that criminals were morefools than rogues. Every crime I had traced, however cleverlyperpetrated, was from the point of view of penetrability a weak failure. Traces and trails were left on all sides--ragged edges, rough-hewncorners; in short, the job was botched, artistic completenessunattained. To the vulgar, my feats might seem marvelous--the averageman is mystified to grasp how you detect the letter 'e' in a simplecryptogram--to myself they were as commonplace as the crimes theyunveiled. To me now, with my lifelong study of the science of evidence, it seemed possible to commit not merely one, but a thousand crimes thatshould be absolutely undiscoverable. And yet criminals would go onsinning, and giving themselves away, in the same old grooves--nooriginality, no dash, no individual insight, no fresh conception! Onewould imagine there were an Academy of crime with forty thousandarmchairs. And gradually, as I pondered and brooded over the thought, there came upon me the desire to commit a crime that should baffledetection. I could invent hundreds of such crimes, and please myself byimagining them done; but would they really work out in practice?Evidently the sole performer of my experiment must be myself; thesubject--whom or what? Accident should determine. I itched to commencewith murder--to tackle the stiffest problems first, and I burned tostartle and baffle the world--especially the world of which I had ceasedto be. Outwardly I was calm, and spoke to the people about me as usual. Inwardly I was on fire with a consuming scientific passion. I sportedwith my pet theories, and fitted them mentally on everyone I met. Everyfriend or acquaintance I sat and gossiped with, I was plotting how tomurder without leaving a clue. There is not one of my friends oracquaintances I have not done away with in thought. There is no publicman--have no fear, my dear Home Secretary--I have not planned toassassinate secretly, mysteriously, unintelligibly, undiscoverably. Ah, how I could give the stock criminals points--with their second-handmotives, their conventional conceptions, their commonplace details, their lack of artistic feeling and restraint. 

"The late Arthur Constant came to live nearly opposite me. I cultivatedhis acquaintance--he was a lovable young fellow, an excellent subjectfor experiment. I do not know when I have ever taken to a man more. Fromthe moment I first set eyes on him, there was a peculiar sympathybetween us. We were drawn to each other. I felt instinctively he wouldbe the man. I loved to hear him speak enthusiastically of theBrotherhood of Man--I, who knew the brotherhood of man was to the ape, the serpent, and the tiger--and he seemed to find a pleasure in stealinga moment's chat with me from his engrossing self-appointed duties. It isa pity humanity should have been robbed of so valuable a life. But ithad to be. At a quarter to ten on the night of December 3d he came tome. Naturally I said nothing about this visit at the inquest or thetrial. His object was to consult me mysteriously about some girl. Hesaid he had privately lent her money--which she was to repay at herconvenience. What the money was for he did not know, except that it wassomehow connected with an act of abnegation in which he had vaguelyencouraged her. The girl had since disappeared, and he was in distressabout her. He would not tell me who it was--of course now, sir, you knowas well as I it was Jessie Dymond--but asked for advice as to how to setabout finding her. He mentioned that Mortlake was leaving for Devonportby the first train on the next day. Of old I should have connected thesetwo facts and sought the thread; now, as he spoke, all my thoughts weredyed red. He was suffering perceptibly from toothache, and in answer tomy sympathetic inquiries told me it had been allowing him very littlesleep. Everything combined to invite the trial of one of my favoritetheories. I spoke to him in a fatherly way, and when I had tendered somevague advice about the girl, and made him promise to secure a night'srest (before he faced the arduous tram-men's meeting in the morning) bytaking a sleeping-draught, I gave him some sulfonal in a phial. It is anew drug, which produces protracted sleep without disturbing thedigestion, and which I use myself. He promised faithfully to take thedraught; and I also exhorted him earnestly to bolt and bar and lockhimself in so as to stop up every chink or aperture by which the coldair of the winter's night might creep into the room. I remonstrated withhim on the careless manner he treated his body, and he laughed in hisgood-humored, gentle way, and promised to obey me in all things. And hedid. That Mrs. Drabdump, failing to rouse him, would cry 'Murder!' Itook for certain. She is built that way. As even Sir CharlesBrown-Harland remarked, she habitually takes her prepossessions forfacts, her inferences for observations. She forecasts the future ingray. Most women of Mrs. Drabdump's class would have behaved as she did. She happened to be a peculiarly favorable specimen for working on by'suggestion, ' but I would have undertaken to produce the same effect onalmost any woman under similar conditions. The only uncertain link inthe chain was: Would Mrs. Drabdump rush across to get me to break openthe door? Women always rush for a man. I was well-nigh the nearest, andcertainly the most authoritative man in the street, and I took it forgranted she would. "

"But suppose she hadn't?" the Home Secretary could not help asking. 

"Then the murder wouldn't have happened, that's all. In due courseArthur Constant would have awoke, or somebody else breaking open thedoor would have found him sleeping; no harm done, nobody any the wiser. I could hardly sleep myself that night. The thought of the extraordinarycrime I was about to commit--a burning curiosity to know whether Wimpwould detect the _modus operandi_--the prospect of sharing the feelingsof murderers with whom I had been in contact all my life without beingin touch with the terrible joys of their inner life--the fear lest Ishould be too fast asleep to hear Mrs. Drabdump's knock--these thingsagitated me and disturbed my rest. I lay tossing on my bed, planningevery detail of poor Constant's end. The hours dragged slowly andwretchedly on toward the misty dawn. I was racked with suspense. Was Ito be disappointed after all? At last the welcome sound came--therat-tat-tat of murder. The echoes of that knock are yet in my ear. 'Comeover and kill him!' I put my night-capped head out of the window andtold her to wait for me. I dressed hurriedly, took my razor, and wentacross to 11 Glover Street. As I broke open the door of the bedroom inwhich Arthur Constant lay sleeping, his head resting on his hands, Icried, 'My God!' as if I saw some awful vision. A mist as of bloodswam before Mrs. Drabdump's eyes. She cowered back, for an instant(I divined rather than saw the action) she shut off the dreadedsight with her hands. In that instant I had made my cut--precisely, scientifically--made so deep a cut and drew out the weapon so sharplythat there was scarce a drop of blood on it; then there came from thethroat a jet of blood which Mrs. Drabdump, conscious only of the horridgash, saw but vaguely. I covered up the face quickly with a handkerchiefto hide any convulsive distortion. But as the medical evidence (in thisdetail accurate) testified, death was instantaneous. I pocketed therazor and the empty sulfonal phial. With a woman like Mrs. Drabdump towatch me, I could do anything I pleased. I got her to draw my attentionto the fact that both the windows were fastened. Some fool, by the by, thought there was a discrepancy in the evidence because the police foundonly one window fastened, forgetting that, in my innocence, I took carenot to fasten the window I had opened to call for aid. Naturally I didnot call for aid before a considerable time had elapsed. There was Mrs. Drabdump to quiet, and the excuse of making notes--as an old hand. Myobject was to gain time. I wanted the body to be fairly cold and stiffbefore being discovered, though there was not much danger here; for, asyou saw by the medical evidence, there is no telling the time of deathto an hour or two. The frank way in which I said the death was veryrecent disarmed all suspicion, and even Dr. Robinson was unconsciouslyworked upon, in adjudging the time of death, by the knowledge (queryhere, Mr. Templeton) that it had preceded my advent on the scene. 

"Before leaving Mrs. Drabdump there is just one point I should like tosay a word about. You have listened so patiently, sir, to my lectures onthe science of sciences that you will not refuse to hear the last. Agood deal of importance has been attached to Mrs. Drabdump'soversleeping herself by half an hour. It happens that this (like theinnocent fog which has also been made responsible for much) is a purelyaccidental and irrelevant circumstance. In all works on inductive logicit is thoroughly recognized that only some of the circumstances of aphenomenon are of its essence and causally interconnected; there isalways a certain proportion of heterogeneous accompaniments which haveno intimate relation whatever with the phenomenon. Yet so crude is asyet the comprehension of the science of evidence, that every feature ofthe phenomenon under investigation is made equally important, and soughtto be linked with the chain of evidence. To attempt to explaineverything is always the mark of the tyro. The fog and Mrs. Drabdump'soversleeping herself were mere accidents. There are always theseirrelevant accompaniments, and the true scientist allows for thiselement of (so to speak) chemically unrelated detail. Even I nevercounted on the unfortunate series of accidental phenomena which have ledto Mortlake's implication in a network of suspicion. On the other hand, the fact that my servant Jane, who usually goes about ten, left a fewminutes earlier on the night of December 3d, so that she didn't know ofConstant's visit, was a relevant accident. In fact, just as the art ofthe artist or the editor consists largely in knowing what to leave out, so does the art of the scientific detector of crime consist in knowingwhat details to ignore. In short, to explain everything is to explaintoo much. And too much is worse than too little. To return to myexperiment. My success exceeded my wildest dreams. None had an inklingof the truth. The insolubility of the Big Bow Mystery teased the acutestminds in Europe and the civilized world. That a man could have beenmurdered in a thoroughly inaccessible room savored of the ages of magic. The redoubtable Wimp, who had been blazoned as my successor, fell backon the theory of suicide. The mystery would have slept till my death, but--I fear--for my own ingenuity. I tried to stand outside myself, andto look at the crime with the eyes of another, or of my old self. Ifound the work of art so perfect as to leave only one sublimely simplesolution. The very terms of the problem were so inconceivable that, hadI not been the murderer, I should have suspected myself, in conjunctionof course with Mrs. Drabdump. The first persons to enter the room wouldhave seemed to me guilty. I wrote at once (in a disguised hand and overthe signature of 'One Who Looks Through His Own Spectacles') to the'Pell Mell Press' to suggest this. By associating myself thus with Mrs. Drabdump I made it difficult for people to dissociate the two whoentered the room together. To dash a half-truth in the world's eyes isthe surest way of blinding it altogether. This letter of mine Icontradicted myself (in my own name) the next day, and in the course ofthe long letter which I was tempted to write I adduced fresh evidenceagainst the theory of suicide. I was disgusted with the open verdict, and wanted men to be up and doing and trying to find me out. I enjoyedthe hunt more. Unfortunately, Wimp, set on the chase again by my ownletter, by dint of persistent blundering, blundered into a trackwhich--by a devilish tissue of coincidences I had neither foreseen nordreamt of--seemed to the world the true. Mortlake was arrested andcondemned. Wimp had apparently crowned his reputation. This was toomuch. I had taken all this trouble merely to put a feather in Wimp'scap, whereas I had expected to shake his reputation by it. It was badenough that an innocent man should suffer; but that Wimp should achievea reputation he did not deserve, and overshadow all his predecessors bydint of a colossal mistake, this seemed to me intolerable. I have movedheaven and earth to get the verdict set aside and to save the prisoner;I have exposed the weakness of the evidence; I have had the worldsearched for the missing girl; I have petitioned and agitated. In vain. I have failed. Now I play my last card. As the overweening Wimp couldnot be allowed to go down to posterity as the solver of this terriblemystery, I decided that the condemned man might just as well profit byhis exposure. That is the reason I make the exposure to-night, before itis too late to save Mortlake. "

"So that is the reason?" said the Home Secretary with a suspicion ofmockery in his tones. 

"The sole reason. "

Even as he spoke a deeper roar than ever penetrated the study. The crowdhad again started cheering. Impatient as the watchers were, they feltthat no news was good news. The longer the interview accorded by theHome Secretary to the chairman of the Defense Committee, the greater thehope his obduracy was melting. The idol of the people would be saved, and "Grodman" and "Tom Mortlake" were mingled in the exultant plaudits. 

"Templeton, " said the Minister, "have you got down every word of Mr. Grodman's confession?"

"Every word, sir. "

"Then bring in the cable you received just as Mr. Grodman entered thehouse. "

Templeton went back into the outer room and brought back the cablegramthat had been lying on the Minister's writing-table when Grodman camein. The Home Secretary silently handed it to his visitor. It was fromthe Chief of Police of Melbourne, announcing that Jessie Dymond had justarrived in that city in a sailing vessel, ignorant of all that hadoccurred, and had been immediately dispatched back to England, havingmade a statement entirely corroborating the theory of the defense. 

"Pending further inquiries into this, " said the Home Secretary, notwithout appreciation of the grim humor of the situation as he glanced atGrodman's ashen cheeks, "I have reprieved the prisoner. Mr. Templetonwas about to dispatch the messenger to the governor of Newgate as youentered this room. Mr. Wimp's card-castle would have tumbled to pieceswithout your assistance. Your still undiscoverable crime would haveshaken his reputation as you intended. "

A sudden explosion shook the room and blent with the cheers of thepopulace. Grodman had shot himself--very scientifically--in the heart. He fell at the Home Secretary's feet, stone dead. 

[Illustration: He fell at the Home Secretary's feet, stone dead. ]

Some of the workingmen who had been standing waiting by the shafts ofthe hansom helped to bear the stretcher. 

THE END. 

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