The Riddle of the Frozen Flame 13 – Hanshew · Verses Across
Literature · Detective Fiction
The Riddle of the Frozen Flame 13A Gruesome Discovery
18
Literature · Detective Fiction
The Riddle of the Frozen Flame 13
A Gruesome Discovery
HanshewEnglish
Through the long watches of the night Cleek sat there thinking, his chin sunk in one hand, his eyes narrowed down to pin-points, the whole alert personality of the man vitally dominant. No, he would not tell any one of the happening except Dollops and Mr. Narkom. It would only invite suspicion, throw the house into a state of unrest which was the very thing that he was anxious to avoid. As dawn broke, and the danger for that night was past, he got to his feet, plunged his face into cold water, which cleared away the cobwebs, undressed, and then tackled the question of the injured bedding.
The mattress could be turned--that was easy enough, and the slit would probably not be noticed. The bedclothes, too, might be turned the other way up, and with care the injured parts tucked in tightly at the bottom. It would leave them a little short at the top perhaps, but that couldn't be helped. Suspicion must be allayed at all costs. Time enough to bring the would-be murderer to justice when he had solved the riddle in its entirety. There were two pillows, so he took the damaged one, tore off its case, and tucked that away in his kit-bag, pushed the bag under the bed, and then set about the remaking, with some small success. At least for the time, the incisions in the blanket and sheets would not be noticed, and in the morning he would invent some excuse to have them changed.
The early morning cup of tea, brought at eight by a dainty chambermaid in cap and starched blue dress, supplied the need quite nicely. He nodded to her as she left the room, and then, when the door closed, upset the cup on the coverlet, letting the liquid soak through. Then he got up and dressed himself with something like a smile upon his lips.
At breakfast, a housemaid waited upon them, and Cleek ate lustily, with the appetite that is born of good health, and a mind at peace with the world. Toward the end of the meal, however, Borkins came in. He glanced casually over the group at the table, let his eyes rest for a moment upon Cleek, and then--dropped an empty dish he was carrying. As he stooped to recover it, all chance of seeing how the appearance of the man who had so nearly met his death last night affected him, was gone. He came up again still the same, quiet, dignified Borkins of yore. Not a gleam of anything but the most obsequious interest in the task before him marred the tranquillity of his features. If the man knew anything, then he was a fine actor. But--did he? That was the question that interested Cleek during the remainder of the meal.
After it was over, Mr. Narkom and Sir Nigel went off to the smoking room for a quiet cigarette before setting to the real business of the day, and Cleek was left to follow them at his leisure. Borkins was pottering about the table as the two men left the breakfast room, and Cleek stood in the doorway.
"Peaceful night, last night, eh, Borkins?" he said with a slight laugh. "That's the best of this blessed country life of yours. Chap rests so well. Talk about the simple life--" He broke off and laughed again, watching Borkins pick up a clean fork and carry it to the plate-basket upon the sideboard.
The man retained his perfect dignity and ease of manner.
"Quite so, sir. Quite so. I trust you slept well."
"Pretty well--for a strange bed," returned Cleek with emphasis, and turned upon his heel. "If you see my man you might send him along to me. I want to arrange with him about suits that are coming down from my tailor's."
"Very good, sir."
Cleek joined the two men with something akin to admiration for the butler's impassiveness in his heart. If he knew anything, then he was a past master in the art of repression. On the other hand perhaps he didn't--and there was really no reason why he should. Eavesdropping was a common enough fault with the best of servants, and curiosity a failing of most men. Borkins might be--and possibly was--absolutely innocent of any knowledge of last night's affair. And yet, how did the knowledge, that he was not altogether what he seemed, leak out? It was a puzzle to which, as yet, Cleek could find no answer.
Mr. Narkom greeted Cleek enthusiastically when he joined him.
"I'm off on a tour of investigation in a few minutes," he announced. "Petrie and Hammond arrived last night, as you know, and are putting up at the village inn. I'm meeting them at the edge of the Fens at ten o'clock. Then we're going to have a good look to see if we can find the bodies of the two men who have vanished. You coming along?"
Cleek nodded, and the queer little one-sided smile travelled up his cheek.
"Certainly, my dear Lake. I'd be delighted. Sir Nigel, of course, has other business to attend to. It's ten minutes to ten now. If you're going you'd better step lively. Ah," as Dollops's figure appeared in the doorway, "if you'll excuse me, Sir Nigel, I'll just have a word or two with my man." His voice dropped several tones as he addressed the boy and they moved away together. "Mr. Lake and I are going out for a walk across the Fens. Petrie and Hammond will be there at ten. I'd like you to join 'em. Better nip along now."
"Yessir."
"And--Dollops"--he beckoned him back and bent his head to the lad's ear, speaking in a voice that none heard but the one it was intended for--"keep a sharp look-out. I had a narrow escape last night. Someone tried to stab me in bed but he got my pillow instead--"
"Gawdamercy, Guv'nor!--"
"Ssh. And there's no need to worry. I'm still here, you see. But keep your eyes and your ears open, and if you see any strange men hanging around, report to me at once."
Dollops's usually pale, freckled countenance went a shade paler, and he caught at Cleek's arm as though he were loath to let it go.
"But, sir," he whispered in a hoarse undertone, "you won't go a-knocking about alone, will yer? If anythin' were to 'appen to you--I--I'd go along and commit that there 'harum-scarum' wot the Japanese are so fond o' doin'--on the spot!"
Cleek could barely restrain a laugh. The whispered conversation had taken the merest fraction of a minute and, during it, he had had full view of the green baize door which led down to the servants' quarters. Borkins had gone through it some time before. Then he heard the butler's deep, measured tones in the garden, and caught sight of him talking to one of the grooms in the courtyard. He heaved something like a sigh of relief.
Dollops left, and Cleek then rejoined the two men who stood talking together in low, earnest tones.
"Now," said he, briskly, "if you're ready, Mr. Lake, I am. Let us be off. Sir Nigel, I hope by dinner time to have some sort of news to impart to you, whether good or ill remains to be seen. By the way, have you, in your employ, a dark, square-faced individual, with close-set eyes and a straggling moustache? Rather undershot, too, I believe? It would be interesting to me to know."
Merriton considered for a moment.
"Tell you the truth, Mr. Headland, I can't fit the description in anywhere among the people here," he said after a pause. "Dimmock's fairish--though he has got a moustache, but it's a military one, and Borkins is, of course, smooth shaven. The other men are clean-shaved, too, except for old Doughty, the head gardener, and he wears a full, gray beard. Why?"
Cleek shook his head.
"Nothing important. I was only just wondering. Now then, Lake, you'll be late if you loiter any longer, and our--er--friends will be waiting. Good-bye, Sir Nigel, and good luck. Lunch at one-fifteen, I take it?"
He swung upon his heel and linked his arm with Mr. Narkom's, then, taking his cap from a peg on the hall stand, clapped it on his head and went down and out to the task that awaited him, and a discovery which was, to say the least of it, startling in the extreme.
They walked for some time in comparative silence, puffing at their cigarettes. Then of a sudden, Cleek spoke.
"I say, old man, you'll want to keep a close look-out upon your own personal safety," he said, abruptly, wheeling round and meeting his friend full in the eyes.
"What d'you mean, C--Headland?"
"What I say. Someone's got wind of our real purpose here. I have a grave suspicion that that Borkins was listening at my door last evening when I was talking to Dollops. Later--well, somebody or other tried to get me in bed. But I was one too many for him--"
"My dear Cleek!"
"Mr. Lake, I beg of you--not so loud!" ejaculated Cleek. "There are ears everywhere, which you as a policeman ought to know. Do remember my name and don't go losing any sleep over me. I can take care of myself, all right. But I had to do it pretty energetically last night. A thoughtful visitor stabbed the pillow I'd placed in bed instead of my humble self, and cut an incision three inches deep. Hit the mattress, too!"
"Headland, my God--!"
"Now, don't take on so. I tell you I can take care of myself, but you do the same. No one in the house knows a word about it, and I don't intend that they shall. The less said the better, in a case like this. Only those Frozen Flames are trying to eat up something that is either very serious or very money-making. One thing or the other.... Hello, here we are! Mornin' Petrie; mornin' Hammond. All ready for the search I see."
The two constables, clad in plain clothes and accompanied by Dollops, were holding in their hands long pitchforks which looked more as if they were ready for haymaking than for the gruesome task ahead of them all. Petrie carried upon his arm a roll of rope. They swung into step behind the detectives, across the uneven, marshy ground.
It was a chilly morning, and inclined to rain. Across the flat horizon the mist hung in wraithlike forms of cloudy gray, and the deep grass into which they plunged their feet was beaded with dew. For a time they walked on quietly until they had gone perhaps a quarter of a mile. Then Cleek halted.
"Better separate here," he said, waving his arm out across the sweep of flat country. "Dollops, you take the right with Petrie. Hammond, you'd better try the left. Mr. Narkom and I will go straight ahead together. Any discovery made, just give the usual signal."
They separated at once, their feet upon the thick marshy ground leaving numberless footprints in the moist rank grass, which crushed under them like wet hay. Their heads were bent, their eyes fixed upon the ground, their faces bearing a look of utter concentration. Cleek watched them moving slowly across the wide, flat reaches of the Fens, stopping now and then to poke among the rank marsh-grass, and prod into the earth, and then turned to Mr. Narkom.
"Good fellows--those three," he said with a smile. "What more can you ask than that? Straight ahead for us, Mr. Narkom. Sir Nigel tells me the patch of charred grass lies in a direct line with the edge of the Fens where we started our search. I'm keen to have a look at it."
Mr. Narkom nodded, and walked on, poking here and there with his stout walking stick. Cleek did likewise. They rarely spoke, simply pushed and poked and trod the grass down; searching, searching, searching, as had those other men upon the night of Dacre Wynne's disappearance. But they had searched in vain for any clue which would lead to the elucidation of the mystery.
Suddenly Cleek stopped. He pointed a little ahead of him with his walking stick.
"There you are!" said he briskly. "The patch of charred grass." He strode up to it, stopped and bent his eyes upon it, then suddenly exclaimed: "Look here! Below at the roots the fresh grass is springing up in little tender green shoots. That patch'll disappear shortly. And"--he stopped and sucked in his breath, wheeling round upon Mr. Narkom--"when you come to think of it, why shouldn't it have grown up already? There's been time enough since the man Wynne's disappearance to cover up all those singed ends in a new growth. Can't be that it's done on purpose, and yet--why is it still here?"
"Perhaps some sign or something," suggested Mr. Narkom.
"Possibly, something of the sort. And if we have signs then there must be something human behind all this talk of supernatural agents," returned Cleek. "Let us take it that this patch of charred grass hides something, or marks the way to something, something buried underneath it, or lying near by. Eh--what's that?"
"That" was a cat-call ringing out across the misty silences from the direction in which Dollops and Petrie had gone.
"They've found something!" cried out Mr. Narkom, in a hoarse whisper of excitement.
"Obviously. Well, this other thing will wait. We'll go after them."
The two of them hastened off in the direction of the repeated cat-call, and soon came upon Dollops bending over something, his eyes rather scared, just as Hammond arrived from the other direction in answer to the summons. Petrie, too, appeared rather nervous. As Cleek came up to them, his eyes fell upon the ground, and he stopped stock still.
"Gad!... Where did you find it?"
"Here, sir; half buried, but with the 'ead a-stickin' out!" returned Petrie. "Dollops and I pulled it out and--and 'ere it is."
Cleek glanced down at the body of a heavily built man, clad in evening clothes, and already in an advanced state of decomposition. "Looks like it was that chap Wynne," he said, in a matter-of-fact tone. "Answers the description all right. The other man was short and red-headed. And the evening clothes are well cut from what I can see. Must have been a handsome chap--once.... Well, we'll have to get this very gruesome find back to the Towers as quickly as possible. Got your oilskin with you, Petrie?"
"Yessir!" Petrie miraculously produced the roll from under his tunic and spread the sheet out. Then they lifted up the body and wrapped it about so that the covering hid the awfulness of it from view. Mr. Narkom mopped his forehead with his handkerchief.
"Cinnamon, Cleek!" he ejaculated, breathlessly. "Pretty awful, isn't it? Was it much hidden, Petrie? Funny the other people didn't find it when they searched!"
"No, sir--plain as a pikestaff!" returned Petrie importantly, for he felt the burden of responsibility and hoped that this would mean promotion. Dollops, who was by no means a regular member of the force, simply looked at Cleek with considerable pride fighting through the natural horror that the find had given birth to.
"Funny thing!" broke in Cleek at this juncture. "The only solution must be that the body was placed there some time after death.... Leave it a little longer, boys, and we'll have a further search in this direction. We may come upon poor Collins in a similar fashion--though thank Heaven his disappearance didn't happen quite so long ago."
They took a few steps farther in the same direction and--stopped simultaneously. Before their eyes lay the figure of Collins, in his discreet black clothes, his red head against a tuffet of moss, and a bullet wound in his temple.
"God!" said Cleek, softly, and sucked in his breath. "Two of 'em. And like this!... Looks like a plant, doesn't it? Poor chap!... And yet Merriton declared that he, as well as others, had searched every inch of this ground over and over again. Seems fishy. To find 'em both here--so close together.... Let's have a look at the other poor chap.... Hmm. Bullet wound through the right temple, too. Small-calibre revolver."
He bent down and examined the head carefully through his magnifying glass, then got slowly to his feet.
"Well, Mr. Narkom," said he, steadily, "nothing to be done at present, but to get these bodies back to the Towers. After that they can take 'em to the village mortuary if they like. But I've one or two things I'd like to ask you Merriton, and one or two things I want to examine. Gad! it's a beastly task, boys. That sheet's big enough, thank fortune! Cross the pitchforks, Petrie, and make a sort of stretcher out of them, that way. That's right. Now then, forward.... Gad! what a morning!"
But if he had known just exactly what the rest of that morning was to bring forth, indeed before lunch was served at one-fifteen, he might have hesitated to pass judgment upon it so soon.
Slowly the cavalcade wended its way across the rank grass....
