The Mystery Of An Old Murder Read online

  Greatly distressed, Marjorie hurried on to the house. As she entered the hall Mrs. Bulteel came out of the dining-room, and Marjorie caught a glimpse of Lady Barmouth and the doctor standing by the window, deep in anxious talk.

  Mrs. Bulteel came quickly towards her with an exclamation of relief. "My child, I was frightened about you. The fog came on so suddenly. But you did not lose your way?"

  "Not a bit of it. I got quite easily to the cottage. I could make no one hear, though; they must all be in the town still. But how is Mr. Bulteel?"

  Marjorie asked it very anxiously, holding Mrs. Bulteel's hands tight. Mrs. Bulteel looked up at her, her lips quivering. "He is asleep. He will sleep for hours, Dr. Bell says. And if his mind can be kept at rest he will soon be well. But I am frightened of tomorrow, Marjorie. How are we to keep the truth from him? And it will break his heart if—"

  But Marjorie would not let her go on. She tried to comfort her by talking of the help her cousin Robert was to bring from Plymouth, and after a little while something almost like a smile came to Mrs. Bulteel's pale lips.

  Neither Mr. Prior nor Lady Barmouth had told her how great the chances were against Robert Carew being successful in the object of his long night-journey, and she found it easy to hope. And young as Marjorie was, there was help and comfort in her very presence. She eagerly caught at Marjorie's suggestion that she should spend the night at the Manor House instead of going back to Kitty at the Vicarage. Mr. Bulteel was in the big state bedroom over the dining-room, she told Marjorie, and she and Mrs. Richards meant to sit up with him all night. She would not let Marjorie sit up, but there was a bed in the dressing-room close by, and it would be a comfort to her if Marjorie slept there.

  The night passed quietly. Marjorie lay awake for an hour or two after lying down, and once she stole to the bedroom door to ask Mrs. Bulteel if there was anything she could do. But she fell asleep at last, and did not wake till the gray dawn was breaking.

  She heard Mrs. Richards leave the bedroom and go downstairs, and she hurriedly dressed and followed her. She found her in the great raftered kitchen stirring the smouldering turfs on the hearth into a blaze. She scolded Marjorie for getting up so early, but it was plain that she was glad of her company. Mrs. Bulteel had slept for an hour or two, she told Marjorie, and Mr. Bulteel had not stirred a finger all night.

  "He's slep as peaceful as a newborn babby, my dear. 'Twas that stuff the doctor gave 'en. Hull be glad o' a dish o' tay as soon as the kettle boils. An' I've got a few broth here warmin' for my maister. He's out most nights at lambin'-time. Would 'ee be afeard to stop down here while I take the tay up, Miss Marjorie, an' unbolt the door to 'en when he comes. With highway robbers about us, honest folk have got to bolt the doors, though many a night I've gone to bed and left it on the latch."

  Truth to tell, Marjorie would far rather have taken up the tea to Mrs. Bulteel than remained in the great kitchen, where the shadows only seemed the darker for the light of the solitary candle. But she put a bold face on it, and Mrs. Richards never guessed how her heart beat as she lighted her through the panelled passage, and then stood at the bottom of the broad shallow stairs till the old woman had reached the upper landing, where the daylight shone redly in through an eastern window.

  Carrying the candle carefully in her hand, she set out on her return journey to the kitchen. The kitchen door was open, and there was something friendly in the warm glow that streamed from the hearth. She went quickly towards it, but just as she reached the threshold of the door, she stopped. Her eye had fallen on one of the granite blocks of the pavement close to the panelling on the right hand of the threshold. It bore traces of having once been roughly carved, and Marjorie, forgetting her fears in her curiosity as she remembered what the vicar had told her about the three-dragon stone in the passage, knelt down to examine it. Yes, there was the head of one of the dragons, and something that looked like the tail of another, and again something that was like either the head or tail of a third, just as you chose to regard it. And above it, though a little to the left, was the date 1607.

  Marjorie had placed her candle on the floor to examine the defaced stone, and its light fell strongly on the dark corner of the panelling by the great granite block that formed the threshold. Even here the oak was carved; close to the threshold stone there was one of the heavy knobs or bosses that were found at intervals round the bottom of the panelling. As Marjorie thought of the figures in her Milton, she felt a sudden, thrilling conviction that here in this spot was to be found the clue to their meaning. Trembling with sudden excitement, she began to search for the cross; the next moment a little cry broke from her lips. She had found it! The light was shining full on the bossy knob, and there, almost hidden by the curled-up rim of the ornament, a tiny cross was cut.

  With fingers that shook a little she pressed it, feeling a dull sense of disappointment when no result followed. But she would not give up, she pressed again with all her strength. And there came a sudden click ; the whole heavy panel began to move, to slide into the wall, and Marjorie found herself looking into a narrow stone passage whose walls and floors were dark and damp with age.

  It was only a hasty look she gave; then she quickly pushed the panel back into its place and hurried into the kitchen. She was thankful to hear Mr. Richards' heavy step outside. The sight of that dark mysterious passage had filled her with cold terrors.

  Richards was a stolid, unimaginative man, the most un-Cornish of Cornishmen. But the news of Marjorie's discovery had a remarkable effect on him. He dropped his pipe on the stone floor, where it lay disregarded in a score of pieces, while he stared incredulously at her, a dull flush of excitement rising in his honest face.

  "You'm jokin', miss," he gasped. "It aint true, be it?"

  To convince him Marjorie took him outside the kitchen and showed him how the spring worked. She felt brave with this big strong man at her side, and proposed that they should explore a little. But Richards drew back in unaffected alarm. "I'll wait a bit, miss. Vicar ought to know. I'll go down an' tell 'en. He always belayed there was a secret passage hereabouts."

  But the vicar was too anxious about the fortunes of the bank to be able to spare time to explore the mysterious passage that morning, and if it had not been for Mrs. Richards its secret would have been left undiscovered till later in the day.

  She had been as excited as her husband about the sliding panel, and being endowed with a livelier curiosity and a pluckier spirit she could not rest till she found out where the secret passage led.

  Kitty came from the Vicarage directly after breakfast. Mrs. Bulteel ran down to speak to her for a moment, and then hurried back to her husband, who was slowly beginning to recover consciousness after his long night's sleep.

  Kitty was deeply distressed at her aunt's worn looks. "Oh, Marjorie, how dreadful it all is!" she said. "Do you know that there have been crowds of people going into St Mawan ever since daybreak this morning. I could hear wheels continually passing my window. Mrs. Fortescue says the bank must stop payment today. Even if Mr. Carew was to bring as much as a thousand pounds in gold from Plymouth it would do no good. And she does not believe he can get that. The Plymouth banks will be afraid of a run on them. It is dreadful for Uncle James." And Kitty's eyes filled with real, unaffected tears.

  Marjorie gave her a warm hug. "After all," she was saying to herself, "you cannot tell what people are really like unless you go through some trouble with them." But aloud she said cheerfully: "I am going to believe that cousin Robert will bring money enough, Kitty. I wonder how soon he will be here. Not yet—it is not nine o'clock. How slowly the clock ticks this morning! Do you think he is at Bodmin yet?"

  While Marjorie was speaking, Mrs. Richards came into the hall from the kitchen, holding a candlestick in each hand. There was a determined expression on her small, clearly-featured face.

  "Miss Marjorie, I be goin' down that there passage. Will 'ee come along weth me? I ain't goin' to wait for Richards nor vicar nor nobo
dy. Here's a candle for 'ee, and I've got the tinder-box in my pocket. Come along, do 'ee, my dear. There's that inside me I can't fight against no more; I've got to go. Be 'ee afeard to come?"

  A little bit of Marjorie was afraid, but she scorned to acknowledge that part of herself. She seized the candle, and laughing at Kitty's entreaties, she followed Mrs. Richards.

  Kitty would go no farther than the entrance to the passage, but she promised to wait there till they returned. She sat down on the kitchen step, straining her ears to catch the sound of their retreating footsteps, and fancying every moment that she was about to hear a blood-curdling shriek. But the footsteps died away, and dead silence followed for some moments. Then came the sound of flying steps—Marjorie running back, fast, along the passage.

  Kitty started to her feet, feeling sure something dreadful had happened to make Marjorie run like that. But her first glance at Marjorie's face banished her fears. It was radiant.

  "Kitty, come, do come! It is wonderful! Give me your hand; it is only a few steps. No, I am not going to tell you. I want you to see for yourself."

  Kitty yielded. The look on Marjorie's face would have made her follow her anywhere. And, as Marjorie said, she had not far to go. A few yards along a narrow, unevenly-paved passage, then a sudden turn and a descent of a few steps, then another length of narrow pass-age, and she found herself in a small chamber, or cave, cut out of the solid rock.

  Kitty went no farther than the door. She stopped there, spell-bound, for the place seemed full of gold! The stone table in the middle was literally covered with it—heaped up with guineas, as if someone had been pouring them out upon it from the empty brandy kegs standing by. And there were other brandy kegs against the wall still full of golden coins, while a canvas bag at Mrs. Richards' feet had been half-emptied of its contents, which lay in glorious splendour on the ground about it.

  "Where did it all come from?" gasped Kitty at length, when she could find her voice. "Whose is it, Marjorie?"

  Marjorie was half-crying, half-laughing in her excitement. "It is cousin Robert's, Mrs. Richards says. His grandfather must have hid it here."

  "An' his great-grandfeyther, my dear, an' his feyther afore 'en," said Mrs. Richards solemnly. "It must ha' took a hunderd year an' more to save all this." She bent down and picked up the canvas bag she had begun to empty on the ground. "We’ll carry this back along weth us, Miss Marjorie. Seein' is be-lavin', as they say."

  Marjorie put her hand out to stop her. "Don't you think we had better leave it all as it is for cousin Robert to see, Mrs. Richards. I cannot understand about that bag. It does not look as if it had been here long. And look,"—she took up the top of one of the little kegs as she spoke,—"this wood has been split quite lately. Could somebody have got here through the caves, Mrs. Richards, do you think?"

  Kitty gave a faint shriek. "Oh, Marjorie, those footsteps we saw! Come away. Don't stay here; it isn't safe."

  Mrs. Richards had dropped the bag, staring in a startled fashion at Marjorie. "I do belave you'm right, my dear. Us be jist in time. Don't 'ee be so afeard, Miss Kitty. My master'll be back by now, run an' bring 'en in, my dear. I'll stay here an' look arter the money. Go back weth her, Miss Marjorie, the poor maid's jist frightened to death."

  Kitty was thankful to get back to the daylight, but she would not let go of Marjorie's hand even then. And they hurried out together to find Richards.

  "And then we must go to meet cousin Robert," cried Marjorie, with sparkling eyes, "for the bank will be all right now, Kitty. There must be thousands of pounds there, Mrs. Richards says,—and all in golden guineas!"

  CHAPTER 12

  the run on the bank

  As Kitty said, people had begun to pour into the town before the sun was up. At nine o'clock there was scarcely standing-room in the High Street, and those who had fought for and gained places close to the bank doors had hard work to prevent themselves being pushed away by the surging, swaying crowd.

  Fear is the most selfish of the emotions, and neighbourly feeling, so strong among Cornish folk, was almost forgotten that morning. Not quite, however.

  The vicar, looking down from the drawing-room window with eyes that had pity in them, as well as anxiety, on the faces of those below, changed almost out of recognition by the fear that sharpened every feature, saw old Auntie Polwhele being pushed through the crowd by kindly force, those in front making room for her to pass, and those behind thrusting her gently forwards, till the poor trembling old soul was close to the bank doors, her little bundle of notes safely in her hand. An odd, quavering, half-ashamed cheer went up from the crowd when they saw her on the steps.

  "You'm safe now, Aunt Martha! You'm all right!" they called to her, and then clutched their own notes tighter, each trying to edge a step nearer the pavement and thrust his neighbours back.

  The vicar turned away with a choking sensation in his throat. Deeply anxious as he was for the Bulteels, he had only pity for that panic-stricken crowd.

  He went downstairs to the back parlour, where a group of the banker's friends had gathered to assist the old head-clerk with their advice. They sat, pale and anxious, round the table. Ten o'clock was drawing near, and there was no sign of Robert Carew.

  "I knew he could never do it. I told him it was impossible," said Mr. Hargreaves, the largest land-owner in the parish, except Robert Carew. "Just think of the state of the roads, Fortescue. He cannot be here."

  "He will be," said the vicar confidently. "It is not ten o'clock yet, remember."

  "Very nearly," murmured Mr. Pengelly, the Wesleyan grocer, glancing at the clock on the mantelpiece. How the hands were galloping! He had a large balance in the bank, and the cold grasp of fear had laid hold of him. But he meant to be loyal to Mr. Bulteel, who had helped him over a rough bit of road a year or two before.

  It was now within a minute or two of ten. Fists began to beat on the closed doors; a dull, inarticulate, terrifying sound, the voice of a threatening crowd, swelled louder and louder.

  Mr. Prior, his knees visibly trembling under him, looked from one white face to another. " Gentlemen, what am I to do?" he asked.

  In the dead silence that followed his despairing question, the timepiece began to strike, its silvery chime being followed an instant after by the deeper notes of the church clock. The old clerk wrung his hands, and the tears burst from his eyes. He appealed to those around him again, in a voice that was like a cry :

  "Gentlemen, what am I to do?"

  The question had not left his lips, no one had had time to answer it, when the hammering at the doors suddenly ceased. For an instant there was silence outside the bank, as well as in; then came the sound of shouting from the bottom of the street, a loud unmistakable cheer! Mr. Hargreaves sprang to his feet. "Prior, open the doors! Carew has come! Be quick! Don't let them say Bulteel's kept them waiting for a moment!"

  The old white-headed clerk himself rushed out, and drew back the heavy bolts and flung wide the doors just as the last notes of the church clock died away. He had been waiting in sickening dread for that moment ever since the bank closed the night before. But how different the reality was to his visions of it! The crowd, indeed, flowed in as the doors opened, pressed forward by the weight of those behind. But there was no rush to the counter, no frenzied demands for the gold he could not give. A few over-cautious women, Aunt Polwhele among them, exchanged their notes for gold, but the rest of the crowd had lost all their fears. They were cheering like mad people, throwing hats and caps and handkerchiefs into the air to welcome the trap that was coming up the street with Robert Carew and the young clerk sitting in front, and the back heaped up with brandy kegs that literally overflowed with gold.

  From lip to lip the news had gone like a lightning flash. Robert Carew had found his grandfather's hoards, thousands on thousands of golden guineas, and was bringing them to the bank to pay them into his account. And the panic was over. Bulteel's was safe!

  • • • • • • •

 
; An hour afterwards Robert Carew was sitting alone in the dining-room. Breakfast had been prepared for him, but he had pushed it away untasted; and he was now sitting with his head supported by one hand, staring out into the garden, his dark eyes full of painful thought. The vicar, before going to the Manor House to see how Mr. Bulteel bore the good news, had tried to make him promise to take some rest. But weary as he was—he had not slept for two nights, and had driven more than a hundred miles in the last eighteen hours — sleep was impossible. He had never felt so intensely wakeful in his life. Though for Mr. Bulteel's sake he had rejoiced in Marjorie's discovery, for the coin he had been able to collect in Plymouth at such short notice would have proved wholly insufficient for the needs of the bank; though his heart had throbbed with responsive gladness as he heard the cheers of the crowd, he had hated the sight of the gold itself. He believed that his father must have somehow learnt of the hidden treasure, and finding Mr. Vyvyan alone, had tried to force the secret from the helpless old man. A violent quarrel, a struggle, had ensued, and his father had fled from the house in the darkness, the guilt of murder on his soul.

  For some time Robert Carew had clung to the hope that his father was innocent; that if, indeed, it was he who fired that fatal shot, it had been by accident, with no intent to kill. A thousand times over he had pictured to himself how it might have happened. His grandfather, wild with rage at the unlooked-for appearance of the man he hated, might have rushed upon him, old man as he was, and attacked him with the heavy stick that had been found beside him. To defend himself, his father had drawn the pistol, and in the struggle it went off, killing Mr. Vyvyan on the spot. He could not, would not believe, black as his father's flight had made things look against him, that he had deliberately been guilty of murder. And as for the other charge brought against him, that he had sold information to the French, he put that aside with scorn. His father had no need to be defended against such a lie as that!