The impetus of the car would not permit of this at once, but after running on for a little time longer it answered to the brake, slowed down, stopped, and then began to back, scudding along the rail until Cleek again called it to a halt. They were within gunshot of the station at Sydenham when this occurred; the glaring searchlight was still playing on the metals and the thin layer of snow between, and Cleek's face seemed all eyes as he bent over and studied the ground over which they were gliding. Of a sudden, however, he gave a little satisfied grunt, jumped down, and picked up a shining metal object, about two and a half inches long, which lay in the space between the tracks of the main and the local lines. It was a guard's key for the locking and unlocking of compartment doors, one of the small T-shaped kind that you can buy of almost any iron-monger for sixpence or a shilling any day. It was wet from contact with the snow, but quite unrusted, showing that it had not been lying there long, and it needed but a glance to reveal the fact that it was brand new and of recent purchase.
Cleek held it out on his palm as he climbed back upon the car and rejoined Narkom.
"Wherever he got on, Mr. Narkom, here is where the murderer got off, you see, and either dropped or flung away this key when he had relocked the compartment after him," he said. "And yet, as you see, there is not a footstep, beyond those I have myself just made, to be discovered anywhere. From the position in which this key was lying, one thing is certain, however: our man got out on the opposite side from the platform toward which the train was hastening and in the middle of the right of way."
"What a mad idea! If there had been a main line express passing at the time the fellow ran the risk of being cut to pieces. None of them slow down before they prepare to make their first stop at East Croydon, and about this spot they would be going like the wind."
"Yes," said Cleek, looking fixedly at the shining bit of metal on his palm; "going like the wind. And the suction would be enormous between two speeding trains. A step outside, and he'd have been under the wheels in a wink. Yes, it would have been certain death, instant death, if there had been a main line train passing at the time; and that he was not sucked down and ground under the wheels proves that there wasn't." Then he puckered up his brows in that manner which Narkom had come to understand meant a thoughtfulness it was impolitic to disturb, and stood silent for a long, long time.
"Mr. Narkom," he said suddenly, "I think we have discovered all that there is to be discovered in this direction. Let us get on to Norwood Junction as speedily as possible. I want to examine that compartment and that dead body a little more closely. Besides, our half hour is about up, and the trains will be running again shortly, so we'd better get out of the way."
"Any ideas, old chap?"
"Yes, bushels of them. But they all may be exploded in another half hour. Still, these are the days of scientific marvels. Water does run uphill and men do fly, and both are in defiance of the laws of gravitation."
"Which means?"
"That I shall leave the hand-car at Sydenham, Mr. Narkom, and 'phone up to London Bridge station; there are one or two points I wish to ask some questions about. Afterward I'll hire a motor from some local garage and join you at Norwood Junction in an hour's time. Let no one see the body or enter the compartment where it lies until I come. One question, however: is my memory at fault, or was it not Lord Stavornell who was mixed up in that little affair with the French dancer, Mademoiselle Fifi de Lesparre, who was such a rage in town about a year ago?"
"Yes; that's the chap," said Narkom in reply. "And a rare bad lot he has been all his life, I can tell you. I dare say that Fifi herself was no better than she ought to have been, chucking over her country-bred husband as soon as she came into popularity, and having men of the Stavornell class tagging after her; but whether she was or was not, Stavornell broke up that home. And if that French husband had done the right thing, he would have thrashed him within an inch of his life instead of acting like a fool in a play and challenging him. Stavornell laughed at the challenge, of course; and if all that is said of him is true, he was at the bottom of the shabby trick which finally forced the poor devil to get out of the country. When his wife, Fifi, left him, the poor wretch nearly went off his head; and, as he hadn't fifty shillings in the world, he was in a dickens of a pickle when somebody induced a lot of milliners, dressmakers, and the like, to whom it was said that Fifi owed bills, to put their accounts into the hands of a collecting agency and to proceed against him for settlement of his wife's accounts. That was why he got out of the country post-haste. The case made a great stir at the time, and the scandal of it was so great that, although the fact never got into the papers, Stavornell's wife left him, refusing to live another hour with such a man."
"Oh, he had a wife, then?"
"Yes; one of the most beautiful women in the kingdom. They had been married only a year when the scandal of the Fifi affair arose. That was another of his dirty tricks forcing that poor creature to marry him."
"She did so against her will?"
"Yes. She was engaged to another fellow at the time, an army chap who was out in India. Her father, too, was an army man, a Colonel Something-or-other, poor as the proverbial church mouse, addicted to hard drinking, card-playing, horse-racing, and about as selfish an old brute as they make 'em. The girl took a deep dislike to Lord Stavornell the minute she saw him; knew his reputation, and refused to receive him. That's the very reason he determined to marry her, humble her pride, as it were, and repay her for her scorn of him.
"He got her father into his clutches, deliberately, of course, lent him money, took his I O U's for card debts and all that sort of thing, until the old brute was up to his ears in debt and with no prospect of paying it off. Of course, when he'd got him to that point, Stavornell demanded the money, but finally agreed to wipe the debt out entirely if the daughter married him. They went at her, poor creature, those two, with all the mercilessness of a couple of wolves. Her father would be disgraced, kicked out of the army, barred from all the clubs, reduced to beggary, and all that, if she did not yield; and in the end they so played upon her feelings, that to save him she gave in; Stavornell took out a special license, and they were married. Of course, the man never cared for her; he only wanted his revenge on her, and they say he led her a dog's life from the hour they came back to England from their honeymoon."
"Poor creature!" said Cleek sympathetically. "And what became of the other chap, the lover she wanted to marry and who was out in India at the time all this happened?"
"Oh, they say he went on like a madman when he heard it. Swore he'd kill Stavornell, and all that, but quieted down after a time, and accepted the inevitable with the best grace possible. Crawford is his name. He was a lieutenant at the time, but he's got his captaincy since, and I believe is on leave and in England at present – as madly and as hopelessly in love with the girl of his heart as ever."
"Why 'hopelessly,' Mr. Narkom? Such a man as Stavornell must have given his wife grounds for divorce a dozen times over."
"Not a doubt of it. There isn't a judge in England who wouldn't have set her free from the scoundrel long ago if she had cared to bring the case into the courts. But Lady Stavornell is a strong Church-woman, my dear fellow; she doesn't believe in divorce, and nothing on earth could persuade her to marry Captain Crawford so long as her first husband still remained alive."
"Oho!" said Cleek. "Then Fifi's husband isn't the only man with a grievance and a cause? There's another, eh?"
"Another? I expect there must be a dozen, if the truth were known. There's only one creature in the world I ever heard of as having a good word to say for the man."
"And who might that be?"
"The Hon. Mrs. Brinkworth, widow of his younger brother. You'd think the man was an angel to hear her sing his praises. Her husband, too, was a wild sort. Left her up to her ears in debt, without a penny to bless herself, and with a boy of five to rear and educate. Stavornell seems always to have liked her. At any rate, he came to the rescue, paid off the debts, settled an annuity upon her, and arranged to have the boy sent to Eton as soon as he was old enough. I expect the boy is at the bottom of this good streak in him if all is told; for, having no children of his own – I say! By George, old chap! Why, that nipper, being the heir in the direct line, is Lord Stavornell now that the uncle is dead! A lucky stroke for him, by Jupiter!"
"Yes," agreed Cleek. "Lucky for him; lucky for Lady Stavornell; lucky for Captain Crawford; and unlucky for the Hon. Mrs. Brinkworth and Mademoiselle Fifi de Lesparre. So, of course – Sydenham at last. Good-bye for a little time, Mr. Narkom. Join you at Norwood Junction as soon as possible, and – I say!"
"Yes, old chap?"
"Wire through to the Low Level station at Crystal Palace, will you? and inquire if anybody has mislaid an ironing-board or lost an Indian canoe. See you later. So long."
Then he stepped up on to the station platform, and went in quest of a telephone booth.
II
It was after nine o'clock when he turned up at Norwood Junction, as calm, serene, and imperturbable as ever, and found Narkom awaiting him in a small private room which the station clerk had placed at his disposal.
"My dear fellow, I never was so glad!" exclaimed the superintendent, jumping up excitedly as Cleek entered. "What kept you so long? I've been on thorns. Got bushels to tell you. First off, as Stavornell's identity is established beyond doubt, and no time has been lost in wiring the news of the murder to his relatives, both Lady Stavornell and Mrs. Brinkworth have wired back that they are coming on. I expect them at any minute now. And here's a piece of news for you. Fifi's husband is in England. The Hon. Mrs. Brinkworth has wired me to that effect. Says she has means of knowing that he came over from France the other day; and that she herself saw him in London this morning when she was up there shopping."
"Oho!" commented Cleek. "Got her wits about her, that lady, evidently. Find anything at the Crystal Palace Low Level, Mr. Narkom?"
"Yes. My dear Cleek, I don't know whether you are a wizard or what, and I can't conceive what reason you can have for making such an inquiry, but – "
"Which was it? Canoe or ironing-board?"
"Neither, as it happens. But they've got a lady's folding cutting table; you know the sort, one of those that women use for dressmaking operations; and possible to be folded up flat, so they can be tucked away. Nobody knows who left it; but it's there awaiting an owner; and it was found – "
"Oh, I can guess that," interposed Cleek nonchalantly. "It was in a first-class compartment of the 5.18 from London Bridge, which reached the Low Level at 5.43. No, never mind questions for a few minutes, please. Let's go and have a look at the body. I want to satisfy myself regarding the point of what in the world Stavornell was doing on a suburban train at a time when he ought, properly, to be on his way home to his rooms at the Ritz, preparing to dress for dinner; and I want to find out, if possible, what means that chap with the little dark moustache used to get him to go out of town in his ordinary afternoon dress and by that particular train."
"Chap with the small dark moustache? Who do you mean by that?"
"Party that killed him. My 'phone to London Bridge station has cleared the way a bit. It seems that Lord Stavornell engaged that compartment in that particular train by telephone at three o'clock this afternoon. He arrived all alone, and was in no end of a temper because the carriage was dirty; had it swept out, and stood waiting while it was being done. After that the porter says he found him laughing and talking with a dark-moustached little man, apparently of continental origin, dressed in a Norfolk suit and carrying a brown leather portmanteau. Of course, as the platform was crowded, nobody seems to have taken any notice of the dark-moustached little man; and the porter doesn't know where he went nor when – only that he never saw him again. But I know where he went, Mr. Narkom, and I know, too, what was in that portmanteau. An air pistol, for one thing; also a mallet or hammer and that wet cloth we found, both of which were for the purpose of smashing the electric light globe without sound. And he went into that compartment with his victim!"
"Yes; but, man alive, how did he get out? Where did he go after that, and what became of the brown leather portmanteau?"
"I hope to be able to answer both questions before this night is over, Mr. Narkom. Meantime, let us go and have a look at the body, and settle one of the little points that bother me."
The superintendent led the way to the siding where the shunted carriage stood, closely guarded by the police; and, lanterns having been procured from the lamp-room, Cleek was soon deep in the business of examining the compartment and its silent occupant.
Aided by the better light, he now perceived something which, in the first hurried examination, had escaped him, or, if it had not – which is, perhaps, open to question – he had made no comment upon. It was a spot about the size of an ordinary dinner plate on the crimson carpet which covered the floor of the compartment. It was slightly darker than the rest of the surface, and was at the foot of the corner seat directly facing the dead man.
"I think we can fairly decide, Mr. Narkom, on the evidence of that," said Cleek, pointing to it, "that Lord Stavornell did have a companion in this compartment, and that it was the little dark man with the small moustache. Put your hand on the spot. Damp, you see; the effect of some one who had walked through the snow sitting down with his feet on this particular seat. Now look here." He passed his handkerchief over the stain, and held it out for Narkom's inspection. It was slightly browned by the operation. "Just the amount of dirt the soles of one's boots would be likely to collect if one came with wet feet along the muddy platform of the station."
"Yes; but, my dear chap, that might easily have happened – particularly on such a day as this has been – before Lord Stavornell's arrival. He can't have been the only person to enter this compartment since morning."
"Granted. But he is supposed to have been the only person who entered it after it was swept, Mr. Narkom; and that, as I told you, was done by his orders immediately before the train started. We've got past the point of 'guesswork' now. We've established the presence of the second party beyond all question. We also know that he was a person with whom Stavornell felt at ease, and was intimate enough with to feel no necessity for putting himself out by entertaining with those little courtesies one is naturally obliged to show a guest."
"How do you make that out?"
"This newspaper. He was reading at the time he was shot. You can see for yourself where the bullet went through – this hole here close to the top of the paper. When a man invites another man to occupy with him a compartment which he has engaged for his own exclusive use – and this Stavornell must have done, otherwise the man couldn't have been travelling with him – and then proceeds to read the news instead of troubling himself to treat his companion as a guest, it is pretty safe to say that they are acquaintances of long standing, and upon such terms of intimacy that the social amenities may be dispensed with inoffensively. Now look at the position of this newspaper lying between the dead man's feet. Curved round the ankle and the lower part of the calf of the left leg. If we hadn't found the key we still should have known that the murderer got out on that side of the carriage."
"How should we have known?"
"Because a paper which has simply been dropped could not have assumed that position without the aid of a strong current of air. The opening of that door on the right-hand side of the body supplied that current, and supplied it with such strength and violence that the paper was, as one might say, absolutely sucked round the man's leg. That is a positive proof that the train was moving at the time it happened, for the day, as you know, has been windless.
"Now look! No powder on the face, no smell of it in the compartment; and yet the pistol found in his hand is an ordinary American-made thirty-eight calibre revolver. We have an amateur assassin to deal with, Mr. Narkom, not a hardened criminal; and the witlessness of the fellow is enough to bring the case to an end before this night is over. Why didn't he discharge that revolver to-day, and have enough sense to bring a thimbleful of powder to burn in this compartment after the work was done? One knows in an instant that the weapon used was an air-pistol, and that the fellow's only thought was how to do the thing without sound, not how to do it with sense. I don't suppose that there are three places in all London that stock air-pistols, and I don't suppose that they sell so many as two in a whole year's time. But if one has been sold or repaired at any of the shops in the past six months – well, Dollops will know that in less than no time. I 'phoned him to make inquiries. His task's an easy one, and I've no doubt he will bring back the word I want in short order. And now, Mr. Narkom, as our friend the assassin is such a blundering, short-sighted individual, it's just possible that, forgetting so many other important things, he may have neglected to search the body of his victim. Let us do it for him."
As he spoke he bent over the dead man and commenced to search the clothing. He slid his hand into the inner pocket of the creaseless morning coat and drew out a note-book and two or three letters. All were addressed in the handwriting of women, but only one seemed to possess any interest for Cleek. It was written on pink notepaper, enclosed in a pink envelope, and was postmarked "Croydon, December 9, 2.30 P.M.," and bore those outward marks which betokened its delivery, not in course of post, but by express messenger. One instant after Cleek had looked at it he knew he need seek no further for the information he desired. It read:
Piggy! Stupid boy! The ball of the dress fancy is not for to-morrow, but to-night. I have make sudden discoverment. Come quick, by the train that shall leave London Bridge at the time of twenty-eight minute after the hour of five. You shall not fail of this, or it shall make much difficulties for me, as I come to meet it on arrival. Do not bother of the costume; I will have one ready for you. I have one large joke of the somebody else that is coming, which will make you scream of the laughter. Burn this – Fifi.
And at the bottom of the sheet:
Do burn this. I have hurt the hand, and must use the writing of my maid; and I do not want you to treasure that.
"There's the explanation, Mr. Narkom," said Cleek as he held the letter out. "That's why he came by this particular train. There's the snare. That's how he was lured."
"By Fifi!" said Narkom. "By Jove! I rather fancied from the first that we should find that she or her husband had something to do with it."
"Did you?" said Cleek with a smile. "I didn't, then; and I don't even yet!"
Narkom opened his lips to make some comment upon this, but closed them suddenly and said nothing. For at that moment one of the constables put in an appearance with news that, "Two ladies and two gentlemen have arrived, sir, and are asking permission to view the body for purposes of identification. Here are the names, sir, on this slip of paper."
"Lady Stavornell; Colonel Murchison; Hon. Mrs. Brinkworth; Captain James Crawford," Narkom read aloud; then looked up inquiringly at Cleek.
"Yes," he said. "Let them come. And – Mr. Narkom?"
"Yes?"
"Do you happen to know where they come from?"
"Yes. I learned that when I sent word of Stavornell's death to them this evening. Lady Stavornell and her father have for the past week been stopping at Cleethorp Hydro, to which they went for the purpose of remaining over the Christmas holidays; and, oddly enough, both Mrs. Brinkworth and Captain Crawford turned up at the same place for the same purpose the day before yesterday. It can't be very pleasant for them, I should imagine, for I believe the two ladies are not very friendly."
"Naturally not," said Cleek, half abstractedly. "The one loathing the man, the other loving him. I want to see those two ladies; and I particularly want to see those two men. After that – " Here his voice dropped off. Then he stood looking up at the shattered globe, and rubbing his chin between his thumb and forefinger and wrinkling up his brows after the manner of a man who is trying to solve a problem in mental arithmetic. And Narkom, unwise in that direction for once, chose to interrupt his thoughts, for no greater reason than that he had thrice heard him mutter, "Suction – displacement – resistance."
"Working out a problem, old chap?" he ventured. "Can I help you? I used to be rather good at that sort of thing."
"Were you?" said Cleek, a trifle testily. "Then tell me something. Combating a suction power of about two pounds to the square inch, how much wind does it take to make a cutting-table fly, with an unknown weight upon it, from the Sydenham switch to the Low Level station? When you've worked that out, you've got the murderer. And when you do get him he won't be any man you ever saw or ever heard of in all the days of your life! But he will be light enough to hop like a bird, heavy enough to pull up a wire rope with about three hundred pounds on the end of it, and there will be two holes of about an inch in diameter and a foot apart in one end of the table that flew."
"My dear chap!" began Narkom in tones of blank bewilderment, then stopped suddenly and screwed round on his heel. For a familiar voice had sung out suddenly a yard or two distant: "Ah! keep yer 'air on! Don't get to thinkin' you're Niagara Falls jist because yer got water on the brain!" And there, struggling in the grip of a constable, who had laid strong hands upon him, stood Dollops with a kit-bag in one hand and a half-devoured bath bun in the other.
"All right there, constable; let the boy pass. He's one of us!" rapped out Cleek; and in an instant the detaining hand fell, and Dollops' chest went out like a pouter pigeon's.
"Catch on to that, Suburbs?" said he, giving the constable a look of blighting scorn; and, swaggering by like a mighty conqueror, joined Cleek at the compartment door. "Nailed it at the second rap, guv'ner," he said in an undertone. "Fell down on Gamage's, picked myself up on Loader, Tottenham Court Road; 14127 A, manufactured Stockholm. Valve tightened – old customer – day before yesterday in the afternoon."
"Good boy! good boy!" said Cleek, patting him approvingly. "Keep your tongue between your teeth. Scuttle off, and find out where there's a garage, and then wait outside the station till I come."
"Right you are, sir," responded Dollops, bolting the remainder of the bun. Then he ducked down and slipped away. And Cleek, stepping back into the shadow, where his features might not be too clearly seen until he was ready that they should be, stood and narrowly watched the small procession which was being piloted to the scene of the tragedy. A moment later the four persons already announced passed under Cleek's watchful eye, and stood in the dead man's presence. Lady Stavornell, tall, graceful, beautiful, looking as one might look whose lifelong martyrdom had come at last to a glorious end; Captain Crawford, bronzed, agitated, a trifle nervous, short of stature, slight of build, with a rather cynical mouth and a small dark moustache; the Hon. Mrs. Brinkworth, a timid, dove-eyed, little wisp of a woman, with a clinging, pathetic, almost childish manner, her soft eyes red with grief, her mobile mouth a-quiver with pain, the marks of tears on her lovely little face; and, last of all, Colonel Murchison, heavy, bull-necked, ponderous of body, and purple of visage a living, breathing monument of Self.
"Hum-m-m!" muttered Cleek to himself, as this unattractive person passed by. "Not he – not by his hand. He never struck the blow – too cowardly, too careful. And yet – Poor little woman! poor little woman!" And his sympathetic eyes went past the others – past Mrs. Brinkworth, sobbing and wringing her hands and calling piteously on the dead to speak – and dwelt long and tenderly upon Lady Stavornell.
A moment he stood there silent, watching, listening, making neither movement nor sound; then of a sudden he put forth his hand and tapped Narkom's arm.
"Detain this party, every member of it, by any means, on any pretext, for another forty-five minutes," he whispered. "I said the assassin was a fool; I said the blunders made it possible for the case to be concluded to-night, did I not? Wait for me. In three-quarters of an hour the murderer will be here on this spot with me!" Then he screwed round on his heel, and before Narkom could speak was gone, soundlessly and completely gone, just as he used to go in his Vanishing Cracksman's days, leaving just that promise behind him.