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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Big Bow Mystery, by I. Zangwill
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Big Bow Mystery
+
+Author: I. Zangwill
+
+Release Date: February 23, 2009 [EBook #28164]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BIG BOW MYSTERY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                          The Big Bow Mystery
+
+                            By I. Zangwill
+
+
+Chicago and New York
+Rand, 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 to
+review it without prejudice. A new book just hot from the brain is
+naturally apt to appear faulty to its begetter, but an old book has got
+into the proper perspective and may be praised by him without fear or
+favor. "The Big Bow Mystery" seems to me an excellent murder story, as
+murder stories go, for, while as sensational as the most of them, it
+contains more humor and character creation than the best. Indeed, the
+humor is too abundant. Mysteries should be sedate and sober. There
+should be a pervasive atmosphere of horror and awe such as Poe manages
+to create. Humor is out of tone; it would be more artistic to preserve a
+somber note throughout. But I was a realist in those days, and in real
+life mysteries occur to real persons with their individual humors, and
+mysterious circumstances are apt to be complicated by comic. The
+indispensable condition of a good mystery is that it should be able and
+unable to be solved by the reader, and that the writer's solution should
+satisfy. Many a mystery runs on breathlessly enough till the dénouement
+is reached, only to leave the reader with the sense of having been
+robbed of his breath under false pretenses. And not only must the
+solution be adequate, but all its data must be given in the body of the
+story. The author must not suddenly spring a new person or a new
+circumstance upon his reader at the end. Thus, if a friend were to ask
+me to guess who dined with him yesterday, it would be fatuous if he had
+in mind somebody of whom he knew I had never heard. The only person who
+has ever solved "The Big Bow Mystery" is myself. This is not paradox but
+plain fact. For long before the book was written, I said to myself one
+night that no mystery-monger had ever murdered a man in a room to which
+there was no possible access. The puzzle was scarcely propounded ere the
+solution 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 him
+with a more original piece of fiction. I might have refused, but there
+was murder in my soul, and here was the opportunity. I went to work
+seriously, though the _Morning Post_ subsequently said the skit was too
+labored, and I succeeded at least in exciting my readers, so many of
+whom sent in unsolicited testimonials in the shape of solutions during
+the run of the story that, when it ended, the editor asked me to say
+something by way of acknowledgement. Thereupon I wrote a letter to the
+paper, thanking the would-be solvers for their kindly attempts to help
+me out of the mess into which I had got the plot. I did not like to
+wound their feelings by saying straight out that they had failed, one
+and all, to hit on the real murderer, just like real police, so I tried
+to 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 is
+obvious that the mystery-story is just the one species of story that can
+not be told impromptu or altered at the last moment, seeing that it
+demands the most careful piecing together and the most elaborate
+dove-tailing. Nevertheless, if you cast your joke upon the waters, you
+shall find it no joke after many days. This is what I read in the
+_Lyttelton Times_, New Zealand: "The chain of circumstantial evidence
+seems fairly irrefragable. From all accounts, Mr. Zangwill himself was
+puzzled, after carefully forging every link, how to break it. The method
+ultimately adopted I consider more ingenious than convincing." After
+that I made up my mind never to joke again, but this good intention now
+helps to pave the beaten path.
+
+    I. ZANGWILL.
+    LONDON, September, 1895.
+
+
+
+
+NOTE.
+
+
+The Mystery which the author will always associate with this story is
+how he got through the task of writing it. It was written in a
+fortnight--day by day--to meet a sudden demand from the "Star," which
+made "a new departure" with it.
+
+The said fortnight was further disturbed by an extraordinary combined
+attack of other troubles and tasks. This is no excuse for the
+shortcomings of the book, as it was always open to the writer to revise
+or 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 on
+the 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 a
+frigid gray mist. There are mornings when King Fog masses his molecules
+of carbon in serried squadrons in the city, while he scatters them
+tenuously in the suburbs; so that your morning train may bear you from
+twilight to darkness. But to-day the enemy's maneuvering was more
+monotonous. From Bow even unto Hammersmith there draggled a dull,
+wretched vapor, like the wraith of an impecunious suicide come into a
+fortune immediately after the fatal deed. The barometers and
+thermometers had sympathetically shared its depression, and their
+spirits (when they had any) were low. The cold cut like a many-bladed
+knife.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump, of 11 Glover Street, Bow, was one of the few persons in
+London whom fog did not depress. She went about her work quite as
+cheerlessly as usual. She had been among the earliest to be aware of the
+enemy's advent, picking out the strands of fog from the coils of
+darkness the moment she rolled up her bedroom blind and unveiled the
+somber picture of the winter morning. She knew that the fog had come to
+stay for the day at least, and that the gas bill for the quarter was
+going to beat the record in high-jumping. She also knew that this was
+because 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 him
+a proportion of the actual account for the whole house. The
+meteorologists might have saved the credit of their science if they had
+reckoned with Mrs. Drabdump's next gas bill when they predicted the
+weather and made "Snow" the favorite, and said that "Fog" would be
+nowhere. Fog was everywhere, yet Mrs. Drabdump took no credit to herself
+for her prescience. Mrs. Drabdump indeed took no credit for anything,
+paying her way along doggedly, and struggling through life like a
+wearied swimmer trying to touch the horizon. That things always went as
+badly as she had foreseen did not exhilarate her in the least.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump was a widow. Widows are not born, but made, else you might
+have fancied Mrs. Drabdump had always been a widow. Nature had given her
+that tall, spare form, and that pale, thin-lipped, elongated, hard-eyed
+visage, and that painfully precise hair, which are always associated
+with widowhood in low life. It is only in higher circles that women can
+lose their husbands and yet remain bewitching. The late Mr. Drabdump had
+scratched the base of his thumb with a rusty nail, and Mrs. Drabdump's
+foreboding that he would die of lockjaw had not prevented her wrestling
+day and night with the shadow of Death, as she had wrestled with it
+vainly twice before, when Katie died of diphtheria and little Johnny of
+scarlet fever. Perhaps it is from overwork among the poor that Death has
+been reduced to a shadow.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump was lighting the kitchen fire. She did it very
+scientifically, as knowing the contrariety of coal and the anxiety of
+flaming sticks to end in smoke unless rigidly kept up to the mark.
+Science was a success as usual; and Mrs. Drabdump rose from her knees
+content, like a Parsee priestess who had duly paid her morning devotions
+to 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 to
+fifteen minutes to seven. Mrs. Drabdump's devotion to the kitchen fire
+invariably terminated at fifteen minutes past six. What was the matter
+with the clock?
+
+Mrs. Drabdump had an immediate vision of Snoppet, the neighboring
+horologist, keeping the clock in hand for weeks and then returning it
+only superficially repaired and secretly injured more vitally "for the
+good of the trade." The evil vision vanished as quickly as it came,
+exorcised by the deep boom of St. Dunstan's bells chiming the
+three-quarters. In its place a great horror surged. Instinct had failed;
+Mrs. Drabdump had risen at half-past six instead of six. Now she
+understood why she had been feeling so dazed and strange and sleepy. She
+had overslept herself.
+
+Chagrined and puzzled, she hastily set the kettle over the crackling
+coal, discovering a second later that she had overslept herself because
+Mr. Constant wished to be woke three-quarters of an hour earlier than
+usual, and to have his breakfast at seven, having to speak at an early
+meeting of discontented tram-men. She ran at once, candle in hand, to
+his bedroom. It was upstairs. All "upstairs" was Arthur Constant's
+domain, 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 at
+once." The usual slumbrous "All right" was not forthcoming; but, as she
+herself had varied her morning salute, her ear was less expectant of the
+echo. She went downstairs, with no foreboding save that the kettle would
+come off second best in the race between its boiling and her lodger's
+dressing.
+
+For she knew there was no fear of Arthur Constant's lying deaf to the
+call of duty--temporarily represented by Mrs. Drabdump. He was a light
+sleeper, and the tram conductors' bells were probably ringing in his
+ears, summoning him to the meeting. Why Arthur Constant, B.
+A.--white-handed and white-shirted, and gentleman to the very purse of
+him--should concern himself with tram-men, when fortune had confined his
+necessary relations with drivers to cabmen at the least, Mrs. Drabdump
+could not quite make out. He probably aspired to represent Bow in
+Parliament; but then it would surely have been wiser to lodge with a
+landlady who possessed a vote by having a husband alive. Nor was there
+much practical wisdom in his wish to black his own boots (an occupation
+in which he shone but little), and to live in every way like a Bow
+working man. Bow working men were not so lavish in their patronage of
+water, whether existing in drinking glasses, morning tubs, or laundress'
+establishments. Nor did they eat the delicacies with which Mrs. Drabdump
+supplied him, with the assurance that they were the artisan's appanage.
+She could not bear to see him eat things unbefitting his station. Arthur
+Constant opened his mouth and ate what his landlady gave him, not first
+deliberately shutting his eyes according to the formula, the rather
+pluming himself on keeping them very wide open. But it is difficult for
+saints to see through their own halos; and in practice an aureola about
+the head is often indistinguishable from a mist. The tea to be scalded
+in Mr. Constant's pot, when that cantankerous kettle should boil, was
+not 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 the
+fog-thickened darkness of a winter night! Well, she hoped his journey
+would be duly rewarded, that his perks would be heavy, and that he would
+make as good a thing out of the "traveling expenses" as rival labor
+leaders roundly accused him of to other people's faces. She did not
+grudge him his gains, nor was it her business if, as they alleged, in
+introducing Mr. Constant to her vacant rooms, his idea was not merely to
+benefit his landlady. He had done her an uncommon good turn, queer as
+was the lodger thus introduced. His own apostleship to the sons of toil
+gave Mrs. Drabdump no twinges of perplexity. Tom Mortlake had been a
+compositor; and apostleship was obviously a profession better paid and
+of a higher social status. Tom Mortlake--the hero of a hundred
+strikes--set up in print on a poster, was unmistakably superior to Tom
+Mortlake setting up other men's names at a case. Still, the work was not
+all beer and skittles, and Mrs. Drabdump felt that Tom's latest job was
+not enviable. She shook his door as she passed it on her way to the
+kitchen, but there was no response. The street door was only a few feet
+off down the passage, and a glance at it dispelled the last hope that
+Tom had abandoned the journey. The door was unbolted and unchained, and
+the only security was the latch-key lock. Mrs. Drabdump felt a whit
+uneasy, though, to give her her due, she never suffered as much as most
+housewives do from criminals who never come. Not quite opposite, but
+still only a few doors off, on the other side of the street, lived the
+celebrated ex-detective, Grodman, and, illogically enough, his presence
+in the street gave Mrs. Drabdump a curious sense of security, as of a
+believer living under the shadow of the fane. That any human being of
+ill-odor should consciously come within a mile of the scent of so famous
+a sleuth-hound seemed to her highly improbable. Grodman had retired
+(with a competence) and was only a sleeping dog now; still, even
+criminals 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 Mortlake
+had been thoughtful enough to slip the loop that held back the bolt of
+the big lock. She allowed herself another throb of sympathy for the
+labor leader whirling on his dreary way toward Devonport Dockyard. Not
+that he had told her anything of his journey beyond the town; but she
+knew Devonport had a Dockyard because Jessie Dymond--Tom's
+sweetheart--once mentioned that her aunt lived near there, and it lay on
+the surface that Tom had gone to help the dockers, who were imitating
+their London brethren. Mrs. Drabdump did not need to be told things to
+be aware of them. She went back to prepare Mr. Constant's superfine tea,
+vaguely wondering why people were so discontented nowadays. But when she
+brought up the tea and the toast and the eggs to Mr. Constant's
+sitting-room (which adjoined his bedroom, though without communicating
+with it), Mr. Constant was not sitting in it. She lit the gas, and laid
+the cloth; then she returned to the landing and beat at the bedroom door
+with an imperative palm. Silence alone answered her. She called him by
+name and told him the hour, but hers was the only voice she heard, and
+it sounded strangely to her in the shadows of the staircase. Then,
+muttering, "Poor gentleman, he had the toothache last night; and p'r'aps
+he's only just got a wink o' sleep. Pity to disturb him for the sake of
+them grizzling conductors. I'll let him sleep his usual time," she bore
+the 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 a
+telegram came soon after. Mrs. Drabdump rattled his door, shouted, and
+at 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. She
+went downstairs again and turned the handle of Mortlake's room, and went
+in without knowing why. The coverlet of the bed showed that the occupant
+had only lain down in his clothes, as if fearing to miss the early
+train. She had not for a moment expected to find him in the room; yet
+somehow the consciousness that she was alone in the house with the
+sleeping Constant seemed to flash for the first time upon her, and the
+clammy 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 in
+the gray mist, blinking bleary eyes at either end, where the street
+lamps smoldered on. No one was visible for the moment, though smoke was
+rising from many of the chimneys to greet its sister mist. At the house
+of the detective across the way the blinds were still down and the
+shutters up. Yet the familiar, prosaic aspect of the street calmed her.
+The bleak air set her coughing; she slammed the door to, and returned to
+the kitchen to make fresh tea for Constant, who could only be in a deep
+sleep. But the canister trembled in her grasp. She did not know whether
+she dropped it or threw it down, but there was nothing in the hand that
+battered again a moment later at the bedroom door. No sound within
+answered the clamor without. She rained blow upon blow in a sort of
+spasm of frenzy, scarce remembering that her object was merely to wake
+her lodger, and almost staving in the lower panels with her kicks. Then
+she turned the handle and tried to open the door, but it was locked. The
+resistance recalled her to herself--she had a moment of shocked decency
+at the thought that she had been about to enter Constant's bedroom. Then
+the terror came over her afresh. She felt that she was alone in the
+house with a corpse. She sank to the floor, cowering; with difficulty
+stifling a desire to scream. Then she rose with a jerk and raced down
+the stairs without looking behind her, and threw open the door and ran
+out into the street, only pulling up with her hand violently agitating
+Grodman's door-knocker. In a moment the first floor window was
+raised--the little house was of the same pattern as her own--and
+Grodman's full, fleshy face loomed through the fog in sleepy irritation
+from under a nightcap. Despite its scowl the ex-detective's face dawned
+upon her like the sun upon an occupant of the haunted chamber.
+
+"What in the devil's the matter?" he growled. Grodman was not an early
+bird, now that he had no worms to catch. He could afford to despise
+proverbs now, for the house in which he lived was his, and he lived in
+it because several other houses in the street were also his, and it is
+well for the landlord to be about his own estate in Bow, where poachers
+often shoot the moon. Perhaps the desire to enjoy his greatness among
+his early cronies counted for something, too, for he had been born and
+bred at Bow, receiving when a youth his first engagement from the local
+police quarters, whence he drew a few shillings a week as an amateur
+detective in his leisure hours.
+
+Grodman was still a bachelor. In the celestial matrimonial bureau a
+partner might have been selected for him, but he had never been able to
+discover her. It was his one failure as a detective. He was a
+self-sufficing person, who preferred a gas stove to a domestic; but in
+deference to Glover Street opinion he admitted a female factotum between
+ten a. m. and ten p. m., and, equally in deference to Glover Street
+opinion, excluded her between ten p. m. and ten a. m.
+
+"I want you to come across at once," Mrs. Drabdump gasped. "Something
+has happened to Mr. Constant."
+
+"What! Not bludgeoned by the police at the meeting this morning, I
+hope?"
+
+"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 does
+not answer."
+
+Grodman's face lit up with relief.
+
+"You silly woman! Is that all? I shall have a cold in my head. Bitter
+weather. He's dog-tired after yesterday--processions, three speeches,
+kindergarten, lecture on 'the moon,' article on co-operation. That's his
+style." 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. Wait
+for me. Down in five minutes." Grodman did not take this Cassandra of
+the kitchen too seriously. Probably he knew his woman. His small,
+bead-like eyes glittered with an almost amused smile as he withdrew them
+from Mrs. Drabdump's ken, and shut down the sash with a bang. The poor
+woman ran back across the road and through her door, which she would not
+close behind her. It seemed to shut her in with the dead. She waited in
+the passage. After an age--seven minutes by any honest clock--Grodman
+made his appearance, looking as dressed as usual, but with unkempt hair
+and with disconsolate side-whisker. He was not quite used to that
+side-whisker yet, for it had only recently come within the margin of
+cultivation. In active service Grodman had been clean-shaven, like all
+members of the profession--for surely your detective is the most
+versatile of actors. Mrs. Drabdump closed the street door quietly, and
+pointed to the stairs, fear operating like a polite desire to give him
+precedence. 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 no
+other sound or movement. His face grew more serious. He waited, then
+knocked, 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 the
+upper panels, but the door seemed bolted as well as locked. He stood
+still, his face set and rigid, for he liked and esteemed the man.
+
+"Ay, knock your loudest," whispered the pale-faced woman. "You'll not
+wake him now."
+
+The gray mist had followed them through the street door, and hovered
+about 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, and
+holding her hands before her as if to ward off the dreadful vision.
+Without another word, Grodman applied his shoulder to the door, and made
+a violent muscular effort. He had been an athlete in his time, and the
+sap 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 bent
+upward, the large upper bolt tore off its iron staple; the door flew
+back 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 "Horrible
+Suicide in Bow," and "The Star" poster added, for the satisfaction of
+those too poor to purchase: "A Philanthropist Cuts His Throat."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+But the newspapers were premature. Scotland Yard refused to prejudge the
+case despite the penny-a-liners. Several arrests were made, so that the
+later editions were compelled to soften "Suicide" into "Mystery." The
+people arrested were a nondescript collection of tramps. Most of them
+had committed other offenses for which the police had not arrested them.
+One bewildered-looking gentleman gave himself up (as if he were a
+riddle), but the police would have none of him, and restored him
+forthwith to his friends and keepers. The number of candidates for each
+new opening in Newgate is astonishing.
+
+The full significance of this tragedy of a noble young life cut short
+had hardly time to filter into the public mind, when a fresh sensation
+absorbed it. Tom Mortlake had been arrested the same day at Liverpool on
+suspicion of being concerned in the death of his fellow-lodger. The news
+fell like a bombshell upon a land in which Tom Mortlake's name was a
+household word. That the gifted artisan orator, who had never shrunk
+upon occasion from launching red rhetoric at Society, should actually
+have shed blood seemed too startling, especially as the blood shed was
+not blue, but the property of a lovable young middle-class idealist, who
+had now literally given his life to the Cause. But this supplementary
+sensation did not grow to a head, and everybody (save a few labor
+leaders) was relieved to hear that Tom had been released almost
+immediately, being merely subpoenaed to appear at the inquest. In an
+interview which he accorded to the representative of a Liverpool paper
+the same afternoon, he stated that he put his arrest down entirely to
+the enmity and rancor entertained toward him by the police throughout
+the country. He had come to Liverpool to trace the movements of a friend
+about whom he was very uneasy, and he was making anxious inquiries at
+the docks to discover at what times steamers left for America, when the
+detectives stationed there in accordance with instructions from
+headquarters had arrested him as a suspicious-looking character.
+"Though," said Tom, "they must very well have known my phiz, as I have
+been sketched and caricatured all over the shop. When I told them who I
+was they had the decency to let me go. They thought they'd scored off me
+enough, I reckon. Yes, it certainly is a strange coincidence that I
+might 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 had
+just come from the 'scene of the crime,' and actually lived in the
+house, they would probably have--let me alone." He laughed
+sarcastically. "They are a queer lot of muddle-heads are the police.
+Their motto is, 'First catch your man, then cook the evidence.' If
+you're on the spot you're guilty because you're there, and if you're
+elsewhere you're guilty because you have gone away. Oh, I know them! If
+they 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 five
+this morning."
+
+"If they clapped you in quod," the interviewer reported himself as
+facetiously 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 excuse
+me. I am so upset about my friend. I'm afraid he has left England, and I
+have 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 were
+billed to preside at a great meeting of clerks at St. James' Hall
+between 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 was
+going to wire, and then the news of poor Constant's end drove it out of
+my 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 the
+public knowledge of his movements on the morning of the Mystery. The
+cabman who drove him to Euston had written indignantly to the papers to
+say that he had picked up his celebrated fare at Bow Railway Station at
+about half-past four a. m., and the arrest was a deliberate insult to
+democracy, and he offered to make an affidavit to that effect, leaving
+it dubious to which effect. But Scotland Yard betrayed no itch for the
+affidavit in question, and No. 2,138 subsided again into the obscurity
+of his rank. Mortlake--whose face was very pale below the black mane
+brushed back from his fine forehead--gave his evidence in low,
+sympathetic tones. He had known the deceased for over a year, coming
+constantly across him in their common political and social work, and had
+found the furnished rooms for him in Glover Street at his own request,
+they just being to let when Constant resolved to leave his rooms at
+Oxford House in Bethnal Green and to share the actual life of the
+people. The locality suited the deceased, as being near the People's
+Palace. He respected and admired the deceased, whose genuine goodness
+had won all hearts. The deceased was an untiring worker; never grumbled,
+was always in fair spirits, regarded his life and wealth as a sacred
+trust to be used for the benefit of humanity. He had last seen him at a
+quarter past nine p. m. on the day preceding his death. He (witness) had
+received a letter by the last post which made him uneasy about a friend.
+Deceased was evidently suffering from toothache, and was fixing a piece
+of cotton-wool in a hollow tooth, but he did not complain. Deceased
+seemed rather upset by the news he brought, and they both discussed it
+rather excitedly.
+
+By a Juryman: Did the news concern him?
+
+Mortlake: Only impersonally. He knew my friend, and was keenly
+sympathetic 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. If
+you, sir, think it relevant or essential, I will state what the trouble
+was.
+
+Coroner: Was the toothache very violent?
+
+Mortlake: I cannot tell. I think not, though he told me it had disturbed
+his 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 I
+returned, and told my landlady I should be leaving by an early train
+for--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, I
+even slipped the bolt of the big lock, which was usually tied back. It
+was impossible for any one to get in even with a latch-key.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump's evidence (which, of course, preceded his) was more
+important, and occupied a considerable time, unduly eked out by
+Drabdumpian padding. Thus she not only deposed that Mr. Constant had the
+toothache, but that it was going to last about a week; in tragic-comic
+indifference to the radical cure that had been effected. Her account of
+the last hours of the deceased tallied with Mortlake's, only that she
+feared Mortlake was quarreling with him over something in the letter
+that came by the nine o'clock post. Deceased had left the house a little
+after Mortlake, but had returned before him, and had gone straight to
+his bedroom. She had not actually seen him come in, having been in the
+kitchen, but she heard his latch-key, followed by his light step up the
+stairs.
+
+A Juryman: How do you know it was not somebody else? (Sensation, of
+which the juryman tries to look unconscious.)
+
+Witness: He called down to me over the banisters, and says in his
+sweetish 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 seventeen
+years, my lud, and have always gave satisfaction; and Mr. Mortlake, he
+wouldn't ha' recommended me otherwise, though I wish to Heaven the poor
+gentleman had never----
+
+Coroner: Yes, yes, of course. You tried to rouse him?
+
+But it was some time before Mrs. Drabdump was sufficiently calm to
+explain that though she had overslept herself, and though it would have
+been all the same anyhow, she had come up to time. Bit by bit the tragic
+story was forced from her lips--a tragedy that even her telling could
+not make tawdry. She told with superfluous detail how--when Mr. Grodman
+broke in the door--she saw her unhappy gentleman lodger lying on his
+back in bed, stone dead, with a gaping red wound in his throat; how her
+stronger-minded companion calmed her a little by spreading a
+handkerchief over the distorted face; how they then looked vainly about
+and under the bed for any instrument by which the deed could have been
+done, the veteran detective carefully making a rapid inventory of the
+contents of the room, and taking notes of the precise position and
+condition of the body before anything was disturbed by the arrival of
+gapers or bunglers; how she had pointed out to him that both the windows
+were firmly bolted to keep out the cold night air; how, having noted
+this down with a puzzled, pitying shake of the head, he had opened the
+window 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 ask
+them to send on an inspector and a surgeon. How they both remained in
+the room till the police arrived, Grodman pondering deeply the while and
+making notes every now and again, as fresh points occurred to him, and
+asking her questions about the poor, weak-headed young man. Pressed as
+to what she meant by calling the deceased "weak-headed," she replied
+that some of her neighbors wrote him begging letters, though, Heaven
+knew, they were better off than herself, who had to scrape her fingers
+to the bone for every penny she earned. Under further pressure from Mr.
+Talbot, who was watching the inquiry on behalf of Arthur Constant's
+family, Mrs. Drabdump admitted that the deceased had behaved like a
+human being, nor was there anything externally eccentric or queer in his
+conduct. He was always cheerful and pleasant spoken, though certainly
+soft--God rest his soul. No; he never shaved, but wore all the hair that
+Heaven had given him.
+
+By a Juryman: She thought deceased was in the habit of locking his door
+when 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 slid
+upward, and was at the top of the door. When she first let lodgings, her
+reasons for which she seemed anxious to publish, there had only been a
+bolt, but a suspicious lodger, she would not call him a gentleman, had
+complained that he could not fasten his door behind him, and so she had
+been put to the expense of having a lock made. The complaining lodger
+went off soon after without paying his rent. (Laughter.) She had always
+known 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 told
+him to be careful. I told him I lost a purse with 3s. 2d. myself on
+Jubilee Day.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump resumed her seat, weeping vaguely.
+
+The Coroner: Gentlemen, we shall have an opportunity of viewing the room
+shortly.
+
+The story of the discovery of the body was retold, though more
+scientifically, by Mr. George Grodman, whose unexpected resurgence into
+the realm of his early exploits excited as keen a curiosity as the
+reappearance "for this occasion only" of a retired prima donna. His
+book, "Criminals I Have Caught," passed from the twenty-third to the
+twenty-fourth edition merely on the strength of it. Mr. Grodman stated
+that the body was still warm when he found it. He thought that death was
+quite recent. The door he had had to burst was bolted as well as locked.
+He confirmed Mrs. Drabdump's statement about the windows; the chimney
+was very narrow. The cut looked as if done by a razor. There was no
+instrument lying about the room. He had known the deceased about a
+month. He seemed a very earnest, simple-minded young fellow who spoke a
+great deal about the brotherhood of man. (The hardened old man-hunter's
+voice was not free from a tremor as he spoke jerkily of the dead man's
+enthusiasms.) He should have thought the deceased the last man in the
+world to commit suicide.
+
+Mr. Denzil Cantercot was next called. He was a poet. (Laughter.) He was
+on his way to Mr. Grodman's house to tell him he had been unable to do
+some writing for him because he was suffering from writer's cramp, when
+Mr. Grodman called to him from the window of No. 11 and asked him to run
+for the police. No, he did not run; he was a philosopher. (Laughter.) He
+returned with them to the door, but did not go up. He had no stomach for
+crude sensations. (Laughter.) The gray fog was sufficiently unbeautiful
+for him for one morning. (Laughter.)
+
+Inspector Howlett said: About 9:45 on the morning of Tuesday, 4th
+December, from information received, he went with Sergeant Runnymede and
+Dr. Robinson to 11 Glover Street, Bow, and there found the dead body of
+a young man, lying on his back with his throat cut. The door of the room
+had been smashed in, and the lock and the bolt evidently forced. The
+room was tidy. There were no marks of blood on the floor. A purse full
+of gold was on the dressing-table beside a big book. A hip-bath with
+cold water stood beside the bed, over which was a hanging bookcase.
+There was a large wardrobe against the wall next to the door. The
+chimney was very narrow. There were two windows, one bolted. It was
+about 18 feet to the pavement. There was no way of climbing up. No one
+could possibly have got out of the room, and then bolted the doors and
+windows behind him; and he had searched all parts of the room in which
+anyone might have been concealed. He had been unable to find any
+instrument in the room, in spite of exhaustive search, there being not
+even a penknife in the pockets of the clothes of the deceased, which lay
+on a chair. The house and the back yard, and the adjacent pavement, had
+also been fruitlessly searched.
+
+Sergeant Runnymede made an identical statement, saving only that he had
+gone with Dr. Robinson and Inspector Howlett.
+
+Dr. Robinson, divisional surgeon, said: The deceased was lying on his
+back, with his throat cut. The body was not yet cold, the abdominal
+region being quite warm. Rigor mortis had set in in the lower jaw, neck
+and upper extremities. The muscles contracted when beaten. I inferred
+that life had been extinct some two or three hours, probably not longer,
+it might have been less. The bedclothes would keep the lower part warm
+for some time. The wound, which was a deep one, was 5-1/2 inches from
+right to left across the throat to a point under the left ear. The upper
+portion of the windpipe was severed, and likewise the jugular vein. The
+muscular coating of the carotid artery was divided. There was a slight
+cut, 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 the
+right hand. The wound could not have been self-inflicted. A sharp
+instrument had been used, such as a razor. The cut might have been made
+by a left-handed person. No doubt death was practically instantaneous. I
+saw no signs of a struggle about the body or the room. I noticed a purse
+on the dressing-table, lying next to Madame Blavatsky's big book on
+Theosophy. Sergeant Runnymede drew my attention to the fact that the
+door had evidently been locked and bolted from within.
+
+By a Juryman: I do not say the cuts could not have been made by a
+right-handed person. I can offer no suggestion as to how the inflicter
+of the wound got in or out. Extremely improbable that the cut was
+self-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 the
+morning of the 4th inst. Glover Street lay within his beat. He saw or
+heard nothing suspicious. The fog was never very dense, though nasty to
+the throat. He had passed through Glover Street about half-past four. He
+had not seen Mr. Mortlake or anybody else leave the house.
+
+The Court here adjourned, the Coroner and the jury repairing in a body
+to 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 had
+been released on suspicion that they were innocent; there was not a
+single case even for a magistrate. Clues, which at such seasons are
+gathered by the police like blackberries off the hedges, were scanty and
+unripe. Inferior specimens were offered them by bushels, but there was
+not a good one among the lot. The police could not even manufacture a
+clue.
+
+Arthur Constant's death was already the theme of every hearth, railway
+carriage and public house. The dead idealist had points of contact with
+so many spheres. The East End and West End alike were moved and excited,
+the Democratic Leagues and the Churches, the Doss-houses and the
+Universities. The pity of it! And then the impenetrable mystery of it!
+
+The evidence given in the concluding portion of the investigation was
+necessarily less sensational. There were no more witnesses to bring the
+scent of blood over the coroner's table; those who had yet to be heard
+were merely relatives and friends of the deceased, who spoke of him as
+he 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 about
+him 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 at
+home. His friends were a motley crew; friends of the same friend are not
+necessarily friends of one another. But their diversity only made the
+congruity of the tale they had to tell more striking. It was the tale of
+a man who had never made an enemy even by benefiting him, nor lost a
+friend even by refusing his favors; the tale of a man whose heart
+overflowed with peace and good will to all men all the year round; of a
+man to whom Christmas came not once, but three hundred and sixty-five
+times a year; it was the tale of a brilliant intellect, who gave up to
+mankind what was meant for himself, and worked as a laborer in the
+vineyard of humanity, never crying that the grapes were sour; of a man
+uniformly cheerful and of good courage, living in that forgetfulness of
+self which is the truest antidote to despair. And yet there was not
+quite wanting the note of pain to jar the harmony and make it human.
+Richard Elton, his chum from boyhood, and vicar of Somerton, in
+Midlandshire, handed to the coroner a letter from the deceased about ten
+days before his death, containing some passages which the coroner read
+aloud: "Do you know anything of Schopenhauer? I mean anything beyond the
+current misconceptions? I have been making his acquaintance lately. He
+is an agreeable rattle of a pessimist; his essay on 'The Misery of
+Mankind' is quite lively reading. At first his assimilation of
+Christianity and Pessimism (it occurs in his essay on 'Suicide') dazzled
+me as an audacious paradox. But there is truth in it. Verily, the whole
+creation groaneth and travaileth, and man is a degraded monster, and sin
+is over all. Ah, my friend, I have shed many of my illusions since I
+came to this seething hive of misery and wrongdoing. What shall one
+man's life--a million men's lives--avail against the corruption, the
+vulgarity and the squalor of civilization? Sometimes I feel like a
+farthing rush-light in the Hall of Eblis. Selfishness is so long and
+life so short. And the worst of it is that everybody is so beastly
+contented. The poor no more desire comfort than the rich culture. The
+woman to whom a penny school fee for her child represents an appreciable
+slice of her income is satisfied that the rich we shall always have with
+us.
+
+"The real crusted old Tories are the paupers in the Workhouse. The
+Radical working men are jealous of their own leaders, and the leaders of
+one another. Schopenhauer must have organized a labor party in his salad
+days. And yet one can't help feeling that he committed suicide as a
+philosopher by not committing it as a man. He claims kinship with
+Buddha, too; though Esoteric Buddhism at least seems spheres removed
+from the philosophy of 'The Will and the Idea'. What a wonderful woman
+Madame Blavatsky must be. I can't say I follow her, for she is up in the
+clouds nearly all the time, and I haven't as yet developed an astral
+body. Shall I send you on her book? It is fascinating.... I am becoming
+quite a fluent orator. One soon gets into the way of it. The horrible
+thing is that you catch yourself saying things to lead up to 'Cheers'
+instead of sticking to the plain realities of the business. Lucy is
+still doing the galleries in Italy. It used to pain me sometimes to
+think of my darling's happiness when I came across a flat-chested
+factory girl. Now I feel her happiness is as important as a factory
+girl's."
+
+Lucy, the witness explained, was Lucy Brent, the betrothed of the
+deceased. The poor girl had been telegraphed for, and had started for
+England. The witness stated that the outburst of despondency in this
+letter was almost a solitary one, most of the letters in his possession
+being bright, buoyant and hopeful. Even this letter ended with a
+humorous statement of the writer's manifold plans and projects for the
+new year. The deceased was a good Churchman.
+
+Coroner: Was there any private trouble in his own life to account for
+the temporary despondency?
+
+Witness: Not so far as I am aware. His financial position was
+exceptionally favorable.
+
+Coroner: There had been no quarrel with Miss Brent?
+
+Witness: I have the best authority for saying that no shadow of
+difference 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 by
+the Freethought Publication Society?
+
+Witness: I do not know who publishes his books.
+
+The Juryman (a small grocer and big raw-boned Scotchman, rejoicing in
+the name of Sandy Sanderson and the dignities of deaconry and membership
+of 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 thank
+Heaven for this small mercy)--who believes that life is not worth
+living.
+
+The Juryman: Were you not shocked to find the friend of a meenister
+reading such impure leeterature?
+
+Witness: The deceased read everything. Schopenhauer is the author of a
+system of philosophy, and not what you seem to imagine. Perhaps you
+would like to inspect the book? (Laughter.)
+
+The Juryman: I would na' touch it with a pitchfork. Such books should be
+burnt. And this Madame Blavatsky's book--what is that? Is that also
+pheelosophy?
+
+Witness: No. It is Theosophy. (Laughter.)
+
+Mr. Allen Smith, secretary of the Trammel's Union, stated that he had
+had an interview with the deceased on the day before his death, when he
+(the deceased) spoke hopefully of the prospects of the movement, and
+wrote him out a check for 10 guineas for his union. Deceased promised to
+speak at a meeting called for a quarter past seven a.m. the next day.
+
+Mr. Edward Wimp, of the Scotland Yard Detective Department, said that
+the letters and papers of the deceased threw no light upon the manner of
+his death, and they would be handed back to the family. His Department
+had 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 of
+Tuesday, the 4th inst., Mrs. Drabdump, a worthy, hard-working widow, who
+lets lodgings at 11 Grover Street, Bow, was unable to arouse the
+deceased, who occupied the entire upper floor of the house. Becoming
+alarmed, she went across to fetch Mr. George Grodman, a gentleman known
+to us all by reputation, and to whose clear and scientific evidence we
+are much indebted, and got him to batter in the door. They found the
+deceased lying back in bed with a deep wound in his throat. Life had
+only recently become extinct. There was no trace of any instrument by
+which the cut could have been effected; there was no trace of any person
+who could have effected the cut. No person could apparently have got in
+or out. The medical evidence goes to show that the deceased could not
+have inflicted the wound himself. And yet, gentlemen, there are, in the
+nature of things, two--and only two--alternative explanations of his
+death. Either the wound was inflicted by his own hand, or it was
+inflicted by another's. I shall take each of these possibilities
+separately. First, did the deceased commit suicide? The medical evidence
+says deceased was lying with his hands clasped behind his head. Now the
+wound was made from right to left, and terminated by a cut on the left
+thumb. If the deceased had made it he would have had to do it with his
+right hand, while his left hand remained under his head--a most peculiar
+and unnatural position to assume. Moreover, in making a cut with the
+right hand, one would naturally move the hand from left to right. It is
+unlikely that the deceased would move his right hand so awkwardly and
+unnaturally, unless, of course, his object was to baffle suspicion.
+Another point is that on this hypothesis, the deceased would have had to
+replace his right hand beneath his head. But Dr. Robinson believes that
+death was instantaneous. If so, deceased could have had no time to pose
+so neatly. It is just possible the cut was made with the left hand, but
+then the deceased was right-handed. The absence of any signs of a
+possible weapon undoubtedly goes to corroborate the medical evidence.
+The police have made an exhaustive search in all places where the razor
+or other weapon or instrument might by any possibility have been
+concealed, including the bedclothes, the mattress, the pillow, and the
+street into which it might have been dropped. But all theories involving
+the willful concealment of the fatal instrument have to reckon with the
+fact or probability that death was instantaneous, also with the fact
+that there was no blood about the floor. Finally, the instrument used
+was in all likelihood a razor, and the deceased did not shave, and was
+never known to be in possession of any such instrument. If, then, we
+were to confine ourselves to the medical and police evidence, there
+would, I think, be little hesitation in dismissing the idea of suicide.
+Nevertheless, it is well to forget the physical aspect of the case for a
+moment and to apply our minds to an unprejudiced inquiry into the mental
+aspect of it. Was there any reason why the deceased should wish to take
+his own life? He was young, wealthy and popular, loving and loved; life
+stretched 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 had
+ambition, an illustrious public career was within reach. He was an
+orator of no mean power, a brilliant and industrious man. His outlook
+was always on the future--he was always sketching out ways in which he
+could be useful to his fellow-men. His purse and his time were ever at
+the command of whosoever could show fair claim upon them. If such a man
+were likely to end his own life, the science of human nature would be at
+an end. Still, some of the shadows of the picture have been presented to
+us. The man had his moments of despondency--as which of us has not? But
+they seem to have been few and passing. Anyhow, he was cheerful enough
+on the day before his death. He was suffering, too, from toothache. But
+it does not seem to have been violent, nor did he complain. Possibly, of
+course, the pain became very acute in the night. Nor must we forget that
+he may have overworked himself, and got his nerves into a morbid state.
+He worked very hard, never rising later than half-past seven, and doing
+far more than the professional 'labor leader.' He taught and wrote as
+well as spoke and organized. But on the other hand all witnesses agree
+that he was looking forward eagerly to the meeting of tram-men on the
+morning of the 4th inst. His whole heart was in the movement. Is it
+likely that this was the night he would choose for quitting the scene of
+his usefulness? Is it likely that if he had chosen it, he would not have
+left 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 is
+it likely he would have concealed the instrument? The only positive sign
+of intention is the bolting of his door in addition to the usual locking
+of it, but one cannot lay much stress on that. Regarding the mental
+aspects alone, the balance is largely against suicide; looking at the
+physical aspects, suicide is well nigh impossible. Putting the two
+together, the case against suicide is all but mathematically complete.
+The answer, then, to our first question, Did the deceased commit
+suicide? is, that he did not."
+
+The coroner paused, and everybody drew a long breath. The lucid
+exposition had been followed with admiration. If the coroner had stopped
+now, 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 of
+homicide? In order to answer that question in the affirmative it is
+essential that we should be able to form some conception of the _modus
+operandi_. It is all very well for Dr. Robinson to say the cut was made
+by another hand; but in the absence of any theory as to how the cut
+could possibly have been made by that other hand, we should be driven
+back to the theory of self-infliction, however improbable it may seem to
+medical gentlemen. Now, what are the facts? When Mrs. Drabdump and Mr.
+Grodman found the body it was yet warm, and Mr. Grodman, a witness
+fortunately qualified by special experience, states that death had been
+quite recent. This tallies closely enough with the view of Dr. Robinson,
+who, examining the body about an hour later, put the time of death at
+two or three hours before, say seven o'clock. Mrs. Drabdump had
+attempted to wake the deceased at a quarter to seven, which would put
+back the act to a little earlier. As I understand from Dr. Robinson,
+that it is impossible to fix the time very precisely, death may have
+very well taken place several hours before Mrs. Drabdump's first attempt
+to wake deceased. Of course, it may have taken place between the first
+and second calls, as he may merely have been sound asleep at first; it
+may also not impossibly have taken place considerably earlier than the
+first call, for all the physical data seem to prove. Nevertheless, on
+the whole, I think we shall be least likely to err if we assume the time
+of 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 know
+exactly how it is constructed. On the ground floor a front room tenanted
+by Mr. Mortlake, with two windows giving on the street, both securely
+bolted; 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 be
+sure all the various doors and windows have not yet been unfastened;
+while the season of the year is a guarantee that nothing had been left
+open. The front door through which Mr. Mortlake has gone out before
+half-past four, is guarded by the latch-key lock and the big lock. On
+the upper floor are two rooms--a front room used by deceased for a
+bedroom, and a back room which he used as a sitting-room. The back room
+has been left open, with the key inside, but the window is fastened. The
+door of the front room is not only locked, but bolted. We have seen the
+splintered mortise and the staple of the upper bolt violently forced
+from the woodwork and resting on the pin. The windows are bolted, the
+fasteners being firmly fixed in the catches. The chimney is too narrow
+to admit of the passage of even a child. This room, in fact, is as
+firmly barred in as if besieged. It has no communication with any other
+part of the house. It is as absolutely self-centered and isolated as if
+it were a fort in the sea or a log-hut in the forest. Even if any
+strange person is in the house, nay, in the very sitting-room of the
+deceased, he cannot get into the bedroom, for the house is one built for
+the poor, with no communication between the different rooms, so that
+separate families, if need be, may inhabit each. Now, however, let us
+grant that some person has achieved the miracle of getting into the
+front room, first floor, 18 feet from the ground. At half-past six, or
+thereabouts, he cuts the throat of the sleeping occupant. How is he then
+to 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 yet
+leave the doors and windows locked and bolted from within? This is a
+degree of miracle at which my credulity must draw the line. No, the room
+had been closed all night--there is scarce a trace of fog in it. No one
+could get in or out. Finally, murders do not take place without motive.
+Robbery and revenge are the only conceivable motives. The deceased had
+not an enemy in the world; his money and valuables were left untouched.
+Everything was in order. There were no signs of a struggle. The answer
+then to our second inquiry--was the deceased killed by another
+person?--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 the
+deceased did not commit suicide. It seems equally clear that the
+deceased was not murdered. There is nothing for it, therefore,
+gentlemen, but to return a verdict tantamount to an acknowledgment of
+our incompetence to come to any adequately grounded conviction whatever
+as to the means or the manner by which the deceased met his death. It is
+the most inexplicable mystery in all my experience." (Sensation.)
+
+The Foreman (after a colloquy with Mr. Sandy Sanderson): "We are not
+agreed, sir. One of the jurors insists on a verdict of "Death from
+visitation by the act of God.""
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+But Sandy Sanderson's burning solicitude to fix the crime flickered out
+in the face of opposition, and in the end he bowed his head to the
+inevitable "open verdict." Then the floodgates of inkland were opened,
+and the deluge pattered for nine days on the deaf coffin where the poor
+idealist moldered. The tongues of the Press were loosened, and the
+leader writers reveled in recapitulating the circumstances of "The Big
+Bow Mystery," though they could contribute nothing but adjectives to the
+solution. The papers teemed with letters--it was a kind of Indian summer
+of the silly season. But the editors could not keep them out, nor cared
+to. The mystery was the one topic of conversation everywhere--it was on
+the carpet and the bare boards alike, in the kitchen and the
+drawing-room. It was discussed with science or stupidity, with aspirates
+or without. It came up for breakfast with the rolls, and was swept off
+the supper table with the last crumbs.
+
+No. 11 Glover Street, Bow, remained for days a shrine of pilgrimage. The
+once sleepy little street buzzed from morning till night. From all parts
+of the town people came to stare up at the bedroom window and wonder
+with a foolish look of horror. The pavement was often blocked for hours
+together, and itinerant vendors of refreshment made it a new market
+center, while vocalists hastened thither to sing the delectable ditty of
+the deed without having any voice in the matter. It was a pity the
+Government did not erect a toll-gate at either end of the street. But
+Chancellors of the Exchequer rarely avail themselves of the more obvious
+expedients for paying off the National debt.
+
+Finally, familiarity bred contempt, and the wits grew facetious at the
+expense of the Mystery. Jokes on the subject appeared even in the comic
+papers.
+
+To the proverb, "You must not say Boo to a goose," one added, "or else
+she will explain you the Mystery." The name of the gentleman who asked
+whether the Bow Mystery was not 'arrowing shall not be divulged. There
+was more point in "Dagonet's" remark that, if he had been one of the
+unhappy jurymen, he should have been driven to "suicide." A professional
+paradox-monger pointed triumphantly to the somewhat similar situation in
+"the murder in the Rue Morgue," and said that Nature had been
+plagiarizing again--like the monkey she was--and he recommended Poe's
+publishers to apply for an injunction. More seriously, Poe's solution
+was re-suggested by "Constant Reader" as an original idea. He thought
+that a small organ-grinder's monkey might have got down the chimney with
+its master's razor, and, after attempting to shave the occupant of the
+bed, have returned the way it came. This idea created considerable
+sensation, but a correspondent with a long train of letters draggling
+after his name pointed out that a monkey small enough to get down so
+narrow 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 keenly
+about the power of monkeys' muscles that it was almost taken for granted
+that 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 blood
+had been discovered on the floor, or on the nightshirt, or the
+counterpane. The "Lancet's" leader on the Mystery was awaited with
+interest. It said: "We cannot join in the praises that have been
+showered upon the coroner's summing up. It shows again the evils
+resulting from having coroners who are not medical men. He seems to have
+appreciated but inadequately the significance of the medical evidence.
+He should certainly have directed the jury to return a verdict of murder
+on that. What was it to do with him that he could see no way by which
+the wound could have been inflicted by an outside agency? It was for the
+police to find how that was done. Enough that it was impossible for the
+unhappy young man to have inflicted such a wound and then have strength
+and will power enough to hide the instrument and to remove perfectly
+every trace of his having left the bed for the purpose." It is
+impossible to enumerate all the theories propounded by the amateur
+detectives, while Scotland Yard religiously held its tongue. Ultimately
+the interest on the subject became confined to a few papers which had
+received the best letters. Those papers that couldn't get interesting
+letters stopped the correspondence and sneered at the "sensationalism"
+of those that could. Among the mass of fantasy there were not a few
+notable solutions, which failed brilliantly, like rockets posing as
+fixed stars. One was that in the obscurity of the fog the murderer had
+ascended to the window of the bedroom by means of a ladder from the
+pavement. He had then with a diamond cut one of the panes away, and
+effected an entry through the aperture. On leaving he fixed in the pane
+of glass again (or another which he had brought with him), and thus the
+room remained with its bolts and locks untouched. On its being pointed
+out that the panes were too small, a third correspondent showed that
+that didn't matter, as it was only necessary to insert the hand and undo
+the fastening, when the entire window could be opened, the process being
+reversed by the murderer on leaving. This pretty edifice of glass was
+smashed by a glazier, who wrote to say that a pane could hardly be fixed
+in from only one side of a window frame, that it would fall out when
+touched, and that in any case the wet putty could not have escaped
+detection. A door panel sliced out and replaced was also put forward,
+and as many trap-doors and secret passages were ascribed to No. 11
+Glover Street as if it were a medieval castle. Another of these clever
+theories was that the murderer was in the room the whole time the police
+were there--hidden in the wardrobe. Or he had got behind the door when
+Grodman broke it open, so that he was not noticed in the excitement of
+the discovery, and escaped with his weapon at the moment when Grodman
+and Mrs. Drabdump were examining the window fastenings.
+
+Scientific explanations also were to hand to explain how the assassin
+locked and bolted the door behind him. Powerful magnets outside the door
+had been used to turn the key and push the bolt within. Murderers armed
+with magnets loomed on the popular imagination like a new microbe. There
+was only one defect in this ingenious theory--the thing could not be
+done. A physiologist recalled the conjurers who swallowed swords--by an
+anatomical peculiarity of the throat--and said that the deceased might
+have swallowed the weapon after cutting his own throat. This was too
+much for the public to swallow. As for the idea that the suicide had
+been effected with a penknife or its blade, or a bit of steel, which had
+got 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 accorded
+to the idea that the cut had been made with a candlestick (or other
+harmless article) constructed like a sword-stick. Theories of this sort
+caused a humorist to explain that the deceased had hidden the razor in
+his hollow tooth! Some kind friend of Messrs. Maskelyne and Cook
+suggested 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 most
+brilliant of these flashes of false fire was the facetious, yet probably
+half-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 it
+drew the following interesting communication from the great detective
+himself:
+
+     "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 the
+paper, 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 committee
+of 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, and
+imparting an air of distinction and an agreeable aroma to the close
+leathery atmosphere. Crowl cobbled away, talking to his tenant without
+raising his eyes. He was a small, big-headed, sallow, sad-eyed man, with
+a 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 he
+removed it and sat in his shirt sleeves. Crowl was a thinker, or thought
+he was--which seems to involve original thinking anyway. His hair was
+thinning rapidly at the top, as if his brain was struggling to get as
+near as possible to the realities of things. He prided himself on having
+no fads. Few men are without some foible or hobby; Crowl felt almost
+lonely at times in his superiority. He was a Vegetarian, a Secularist, a
+Blue 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 a
+fad. "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 stood
+on Mile-end Waste, which was opposite his shop--and held forth to the
+crowd on the evils of kings, priests and mutton chops, the "plain man"
+turned up at intervals like the "theme" of a symphonic movement. "I am
+only a plain man and I want to know." It was a phrase that sabered the
+spider-webs of logical refinement, and held them up scornfully on the
+point. When Crowl went for a little recreation in Victoria Park on
+Sunday afternoons, it was with this phrase that he invariably routed the
+supernaturalists. Crowl knew his Bible better than most ministers, and
+always carried a minutely-printed copy in his pocket, dogs-eared to mark
+contradictions in the text. The second chapter of Jeremiah says one
+thing; the first chapter of Corinthians says another. Two contradictory
+statements may both be true, but "I am only a plain man, and I want to
+know." Crowl spent a large part of his time in setting "the word against
+the word." Cock-fighting affords its votaries no acuter pleasure than
+Crowl derived from setting two texts by the ears. Crowl had a
+metaphysical genius which sent his Sunday morning disciples frantic with
+admiration, and struck the enemy dumb with dismay. He had discovered,
+for instance, that the Deity could not move, owing to already filling
+all space. He was also the first to invent, for the confusion of the
+clerical, the crucial case of a saint dying at the Antipodes
+contemporaneously with another in London. Both went skyward to heaven,
+yet the two traveled in directly opposite directions. In all eternity
+they would never meet. Which, then, got to heaven? Or was there no such
+place? "I am only a plain man, and I want to know." Preserve us our open
+spaces; they exist to testify to the incurable interest of humanity in
+the Unknown and the Misunderstood. Even 'Arry is capable of five
+minutes' 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 hopelessly
+wrong on all subjects under the sun. In only one point did Peter Crowl
+agree with Denzil Cantercot--he admired Denzil Cantercot secretly. When
+he asked him for the True--which was about twice a day on the
+average--he didn't really expect to get it from him. He knew that Denzil
+was a poet.
+
+"The Beautiful," he went on, "is a thing that only appeals to men like
+you. The True is for all men. The majority have the first claim. Till
+then you poets must stand aside. The True and the Useful--that's what we
+want. The Good of Society is the only test of things. Everything stands
+or falls by the Good of Society."
+
+"The Good of Society!" echoed Denzil, scornfully. "What's the Good of
+Society? The Individual is before all. The mass must be sacrificed to
+the 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 a
+blank."
+
+"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 Denzil
+Cantercot bitterly. "Many of us start by following the butterfly through
+the 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 on
+you."
+
+Denzil's wild eyes flashed angrily. He shook his long hair. Life was
+very serious to him. He never wrote comic verse intentionally.
+
+There are three reasons why men of genius have long hair. One is, that
+they forget it is growing. The second is, that they like it. The third
+is, that it comes cheaper; they wear it long for the same reason that
+they wear their hats long.
+
+Owing to this peculiarity of genius, you may get quite a reputation for
+lack of twopence. The economic reason did not apply to Denzil, who could
+always 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 over
+barbers and conspire to promote their interests? Denzil would have told
+you it was not to serve the barbers, but to gratify the crowd's
+instinctive resentment of originality. In his palmy days Denzil had been
+an editor, but he no more thought of turning his scissors against
+himself than of swallowing his paste. The efficacy of hair has changed
+since the days of Samson, otherwise Denzil would have been a Hercules
+instead of a long, thin, nervous man, looking too brittle and delicate
+to be used even for a pipe-cleaner. The narrow oval of his face sloped
+to a pointed, untrimmed beard. His linen was reproachable, his dingy
+boots were down at heel, and his cocked hat was drab with dust. Such are
+the effects of a love for the Beautiful.
+
+Peter Crowl was impressed with Denzil's condemnation of flippancy, and
+he hastened to turn off the joke.
+
+"I'm quite serious," he said. "Butterflies are no good to nothing or
+nobody; 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 elaborate
+courtesy. Mrs. Crowl grunted and looked at her husband with a note of
+interrogation 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, and
+helplessly shook his head in a horizontal direction. It was wonderful
+how Mrs. Crowl towered over Mr. Crowl, even when he stood up in his
+shoes. 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 a
+question of provin' to a lot of chuckleheads that Jollygee and Genesis,
+or some other dead and gone Scripture folk that don't consarn no mortal
+soul, used to contradict each other, your tongue 'ud run thirteen to the
+dozen. 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 a
+lamppost. Here's a man stayin' with you for weeks and weeks--eatin' and
+drinkin' 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 weeks
+come and gone, and not a blessed 'aypenny have I----"
+
+"My dear Mrs. Crowl," said Denzil, removing his cigarette from his mouth
+with 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 bill
+you would have had the money long ago. How do you expect me to think of
+these details?"
+
+"We ain't so grand down here. People pays their way--they don't get no
+bills," 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 to
+know," Mrs. Crowl resumed. "And there ain't a woman in the Mile End Road
+as 'ud a-done it cheaper, with bread at fourpence threefarden a quartern
+and landlords clamorin' for rent every Monday morning almost afore the
+sun's up and folks draggin' and slidderin' on till their shoes is only
+fit to throw after brides, and Christmas comin' and seven-pence a week
+for 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. Peter
+felt that, having brought nine children into the world, it was only fair
+he should pay a penny a week for each of those old enough to bear
+educating. His better half argued that, having so many children, they
+ought in reason to be exempted. Only people who had few children could
+spare the penny. But the one point on which the cobbler-skeptic of the
+Mile End Road got his way was this of the fees. It was a question of
+conscience, and Mrs. Crowl had never made application for their
+remission, though she often slapped her children in vexation instead.
+They were used to slapping, and when nobody else slapped them they
+slapped one another. They were bright, ill-mannered brats, who pestered
+their parents and worried their teachers, and were happy as the Road was
+long.
+
+"Bother the school fees!" Peter retorted, vexed. "Mr. Cantercot's not
+responsible for your children."
+
+"I should hope not, indeed, Mr. Crowl," Mrs. Crowl said sternly. "I'm
+ashamed of you." And with that she flounced out of the shop into the
+back parlor.
+
+"It's all right," Peter called after her soothingly. "The money'll be
+all right, mother."
+
+In lower circles it is customary to call your wife your mother; in
+somewhat superior circles it is the fashion to speak of her as "the
+wife" as you speak of "the Stock Exchange," or "the Thames," without
+claiming any peculiar property. Instinctively men are ashamed of being
+moral and domesticated.
+
+Denzil puffed his cigarette, unembarrassed. Peter bent attentively over
+his work, making nervous stabs with his awl. There was a long silence.
+An organ-grinder played a waltz outside, unregarded; and, failing to
+annoy anybody, moved on. Denzil lit another cigarette. The dirty-faced
+clock 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 visible
+incarnation of Authority."
+
+"What! do you call Queen Victoria visible?"
+
+"Peter, do you want to drive me from the house? Leave frivolousness to
+women, whose minds are only large enough for domestic difficulties.
+Republics are low. Plato mercifully kept the poets out of his. Republics
+are not congenial soil for poetry."
+
+"What nonsense! If England dropped its fad of Monarchy and became a
+Republic 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 a
+button-hook about poets, present company always excepted. I'm only a
+plain man, and I want to know where's the sense of givin' any one person
+authority 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 to
+give you flying angels and to carry you aloft, like a banner,
+huzzahing."
+
+"Ah, that's because he's head and shoulders above 'em already," said
+Crowl, with a flash in his sad gray eyes. "Still, it don't prove that
+I'd talk any different. And I think you're quite wrong about his being
+spoiled. Tom's a fine fellow--a man every inch of him, and that's a good
+many. I don't deny he has his weaknesses, and there was a time when he
+stood in this very shop and denounced that poor dead Constant. 'Crowl,'
+said he, 'that man'll do mischief. I don't like these kid-glove
+philanthropists mixing themselves up in practical labor disputes they
+don't understand.'"
+
+Denzil whistled involuntarily. It was a piece of news.
+
+"I daresay," continued Crowl, "he's a bit jealous of anybody's
+interference with his influence. But in this case the jealousy did wear
+off, you see, for the poor fellow and he got quite pals, as everybody
+knows. Tom's not the man to hug a prejudice. However, all that don't
+prove nothing against Republics. Look at the Czar and the Jews. I'm only
+a plain man, but I wouldn't live in Russia not for--not for all the
+leather in it! An Englishman, taxed as he is to keep up his Fad of
+Monarchy, is at least king in his own castle, whoever bosses it at
+Windsor. Excuse me a minute, the missus is callin'."
+
+"Excuse _me_ a minute. I'm going, and I want to say before I go--I feel
+it is only right you should know at once--that after what has passed
+to-day I can never be on the same footing here as in the--shall I say
+pleasant?--days of yore."
+
+"Oh, no, Cantercot. Don't say that; don't say that!" pleaded the little
+cobbler.
+
+"Well, shall I say unpleasant, then?"
+
+"No, no, Cantercot. Don't misunderstand me. Mother has been very much
+put to it lately to rub along. You see she has such a growing family. It
+grows--daily. But never mind her. You pay whenever you've got the
+money."
+
+Denzil shook his head. "It cannot be. You know when I came here first I
+rented your top room and boarded myself. Then I learnt to know you. We
+talked together. Of the Beautiful. And the Useful. I found you had no
+soul. But you were honest, and I liked you. I went so far as to take my
+meals with your family. I made myself at home in your back parlor. But
+the 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 be
+pieced together--nevermore." He shook his hair sadly and shambled out of
+the shop. Crowl would have gone after him, but Mrs. Crowl was still
+calling, and ladies must have the precedence in all polite societies.
+
+Cantercot went straight--or as straight as his loose gait permitted--to
+46 Glover Street, and knocked at the door. Grodman's factotum opened it.
+She was a pock-marked person, with a brickdust complexion and a
+coquettish 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, suddenly
+appearing in his slippers. "Come in. What the devil have you been doing
+with 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 from
+Drink--and Me."
+
+"I don't know which is worse," said Denzil, irritated. "You both steal
+away my brains."
+
+"Indeed?" said Grodman, with an amused smile. "Well, it's only petty
+pilfering, 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 I
+Have Caught.'"
+
+"'Criminals _I_ Have Caught,'" corrected Grodman. "My dear Denzil, how
+often am I to point out that I went through the experiences that make
+the backbone of my book, not you? In each case I cooked the criminal's
+goose. Any journalist could have supplied the dressing."
+
+"The contrary. The journeymen of journalism would have left the truth
+naked. You yourself could have done that--for there is no man to beat
+you at cold, lucid, scientific statement. But I idealized the bare facts
+and lifted them into the realm of poetry and literature. The
+twenty-fourth edition of the book attests my success."
+
+"Rot! The twenty-fourth edition was all owing to the murder! Did you do
+that?"
+
+"You take one up so sharply, Mr. Grodman," said Denzil, changing his
+tone.
+
+"No--I've retired," laughed Grodman.
+
+Denzil did not reprove the ex-detective's flippancy. He even laughed a
+little.
+
+"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 to
+write that letter to the 'Pell Mell Press' myself. You might have earned
+a crown."
+
+"I've had writer's cramp, and couldn't do your last job. I was coming to
+tell 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 get
+up 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 it
+on?"
+
+"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 something
+for 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 in
+his 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. Grodman
+overheard their whispers, and laughed silently. His hearing was acute.
+Jane had first introduced Denzil to his acquaintance about two years
+ago, when he spoke of getting an amanuensis, and the poet had been doing
+odd 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 to
+conceal, 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 his
+place at the Crowl dinner-table.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+Mrs. Crowl surveyed Denzil Cantercot so stonily and cut him his beef so
+savagely that he said grace when the dinner was over. Peter fed his
+metaphysical genius on tomatoes. He was tolerant enough to allow his
+family to follow their Fads; but no savory smells ever tempted him to be
+false to his vegetable loves. Besides, meat might have reminded him too
+much of his work. There is nothing like leather, but Bow beefsteaks
+occasionally come very near it.
+
+After dinner Denzil usually indulged in poetic reverie. But to-day he
+did not take his nap. He went out at once to "raise the wind." But there
+was a dead calm everywhere. In vain he asked for an advance at the
+office of the "Mile End Mirror," to which he contributed scathing
+leaderettes about vestrymen. In vain he trudged to the city and offered
+to write the "Ham and Eggs Gazette" an essay on the modern methods of
+bacon-curing. Denzil knew a great deal about the breeding and
+slaughtering of pigs, smoke-lofts and drying processes, having for years
+dictated 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 trade
+papers since boyhood. But there is great competition on these papers. So
+many men of literary gifts know all about the intricate technicalities
+of manufactures and markets, and are eager to set the trade right.
+Grodman perhaps hardly allowed sufficiently for the step backward that
+Denzil made when he devoted his whole time for months to "Criminals I
+Have Caught." It was as damaging as a debauch. For when your rivals are
+pushing forward, to stand still is to go back.
+
+In despair Denzil shambled toilsomely to Bethnal Green. He paused before
+the window of a little tobacconist's shop, wherein was displayed a
+placard announcing
+
+     "PLOTS FOR SALE."
+
+The announcement went on to state that a large stock of plots was to be
+obtained on the premises--embracing sensational plots, humorous plots,
+love plots, religious plots, and poetic plots; also complete
+manuscripts, original novels, poems and tales. Apply within.
+
+It was a very dirty-looking shop, with begrimed bricks and blackened
+woodwork. The window contained some musty old books, an assortment of
+pipes and tobacco, and a large number of the vilest daubs unhung,
+painted in oil on Academy boards, and unframed. These were intended for
+landscapes, as you could tell from the titles. The most expensive was
+"Chingford Church," and it was marked 1s. 9d. The others ran from 6d. to
+1s. 3d., and were mostly representations of Scotch scenery--a loch with
+mountains in the background, with solid reflections in the water and a
+tree in the foreground. Sometimes the tree would be in the background.
+Then the loch would be in the foreground. Sky and water were intensely
+blue in all. The name of the collection was "Original oil paintings done
+by hand." Dust lay thick upon everything, as if carefully shoveled on;
+and the proprietor looked as if he slept in his shop window at night
+without taking his clothes off. He was a gaunt man with a red nose, long
+but scanty black locks covered by a smoking cap, and a luxuriant black
+mustache. He smoked a long clay pipe, and had the air of a broken-down
+operatic villain.
+
+"Ah, good afternoon, Mr. Cantercot," he said, rubbing his hands, half
+from cold, half from usage; "what have you brought me?"
+
+"Nothing," said Denzil, "but if you will lend me a sovereign I'll do you
+a 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, and
+Denzil 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 dangerous
+hunted look. Money he must have. But the operatic villain was
+inflexible. No plot, no supper.
+
+Poor Denzil went out flaming. He knew not where to turn. Temporarily he
+turned 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 of
+the words suddenly flashed upon him again, they bore a new significance.
+He went in meekly, and borrowed fourpence of the operatic villain. Then
+he took the 'bus for Scotland Yard. There was a not ill-looking servant
+girl in the 'bus. The rhythm of the vehicle shaped itself into rhymes in
+his brain. He forgot all about his situation and his object. He had
+never really written an epic--except "Paradise Lost"--but he composed
+lyrics about wine and women and often wept to think how miserable he
+was. But nobody ever bought anything of him, except articles on
+bacon-curing or attacks on vestrymen. He was a strange, wild creature,
+and the wench felt quite pretty under his ardent gaze. It almost
+hypnotized her, though, and she looked down at her new French kid boots
+to escape it.
+
+At Scotland Yard Denzil asked for Edward Wimp. Edward Wimp was not on
+view. Like kings and editors, Detectives are difficult of
+approach--unless you are a criminal, when you cannot see anything of
+them at all. Denzil knew of Edward Wimp, principally because of
+Grodman's contempt for his successor. Wimp was a man of taste and
+culture. Grodman's interests were entirely concentrated on the problems
+of logic and evidence. Books about these formed his sole reading; for
+_belles lettres_ he cared not a straw. Wimp, with his flexible
+intellect, had a great contempt for Grodman and his slow, laborious,
+ponderous, almost Teutonic methods. Worse, he almost threatened to
+eclipse the radiant tradition of Grodman by some wonderfully ingenious
+bits of workmanship. Wimp was at his greatest in collecting
+circumstantial evidence; in putting two and two together to make five.
+He would collect together a number of dark and disconnected data and
+flash across them the electric light of some unifying hypothesis in a
+way which would have done credit to a Darwin or a Faraday. An intellect
+which might have served to unveil the secret workings of nature was
+subverted to the protection of a capitalistic civilization.
+
+By the assistance of a friendly policeman, whom the poet magnetized into
+the belief that his business was a matter of life and death, Denzil
+obtained the great detective's private address. It was near King's
+Cross. By a miracle Wimp was at home in the afternoon. He was writing
+when Denzil was ushered up three pairs of stairs into his presence, but
+he 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 himself
+as a gentleman.
+
+"That is my name," he murmured.
+
+"You were one of the witnesses at the inquest on the body of the late
+Arthur Constant. I have your evidence there." He pointed to a file. "Why
+have you come to give fresh evidence?"
+
+Again Denzil started, flushing in addition this time. "I want money," he
+said, almost involuntarily.
+
+"Sit down." Denzil sat. Wimp stood.
+
+Wimp was young and fresh-colored. He had a Roman nose, and was smartly
+dressed. He had beaten Grodman by discovering the wife Heaven meant for
+him. He had a bouncing boy, who stole jam out of the pantry without
+anyone being the wiser. Wimp did what work he could do at home in a
+secluded study at the top of the house. Outside his chamber of horrors
+he was the ordinary husband of commerce. He adored his wife, who thought
+poorly of his intellect, but highly of his heart. In domestic
+difficulties Wimp was helpless. He could not even tell whether the
+servant's "character" was forged or genuine. Probably he could not level
+himself to such petty problems. He was like the senior wrangler who has
+forgotten how to do quadratics, and has to solve equations of the second
+degree by the calculus.
+
+"How much money do you want?" he asked.
+
+"I do not make bargains," Denzil replied, his calm come back by this
+time. "I came to tender you a suggestion. It struck me that you might
+offer me a fiver for my trouble. Should you do so, I shall not refuse
+it."
+
+"You shall not refuse it--if you deserve it."
+
+"Good. I will come to the point at once. My suggestion concerns--Tom
+Mortlake."
+
+Denzil threw out the name as if it were a torpedo. Wimp did not move.
+
+"Tom Mortlake," went on Denzil, looking disappointed, "had a
+sweetheart." 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 before
+Mr. 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. So
+they tell me in Stepney Green, where she lodged and worked."
+
+"What was she?"
+
+"She was a dressmaker. She had a wonderful talent. Quite fashionable
+ladies got to know of it. One of her dresses was presented at Court. I
+think 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. When
+he was earning 36s. a week as a compositor they were saving up to buy a
+home. 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 of
+the Chapel told me all about 'Mortlake and his young woman.' Ye gods!
+How times are changed! Two years ago Mortlake had to struggle with my
+caligraphy--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 beauty
+and intellect foregather. A mere artisan! A manual laborer!" Denzil's
+eyes flashed angrily. He rose with excitement. "They say he always was a
+jabberer in the composing-room, and he has jabbered himself right out of
+it and into a pretty good thing. He didn't have much to say about the
+crimes of capital when he was set up to second the toast of 'Railton and
+Hockes' at the beanfeast."
+
+"Toast and butter, toast and butter," said Wimp genially. "I shouldn't
+blame a man for serving the two together, Mr. Cantercot."
+
+Denzil forced a laugh. "Yes; but consistency's my motto. I like to see
+the royal soul immaculate, unchanging, immovable by fortune. Anyhow,
+when better times came for Mortlake the engagement still dragged on. He
+did 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 of
+an evening. Sometimes there was no light in her room. That meant she was
+downstairs gossiping with the landlady."
+
+"She might have been out with Tom?"
+
+"No, sir; I knew Tom was on the platform somewhere or other. He was
+working 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 strong
+character. 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 real
+to me than the women who pester me for the price for apartments. Jessie
+Dymond, too, was of the race of heroines. Her eyes were clear blue, two
+wells with Truth at the bottom of each. When I looked into those eyes my
+own were dazzled. They were the only eyes I could never make dreamy." He
+waved his hand as if making a pass with it. "It was she who had the
+influence over me."
+
+"You knew her then?"
+
+"Oh, yes. I knew Tom from the old 'New Pork Herald' days, and when I
+first met him with Jessie hanging on his arm he was quite proud to
+introduce 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 Beautiful
+alone is deserving of our regard."
+
+"And when the Beautiful was not gossiping with her landlady, did she
+gossip 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. Whose
+was 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 you
+thoroughly."
+
+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 time
+you 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 in
+his social mission work. I knew she was one of the attendants at the big
+children's tea in the Great Assembly Hall early in November. He treated
+her quite like a lady. She was the only attendant who worked with her
+hands."
+
+"The others carried the cups on their feet, I suppose?"
+
+"No; how could that be? My meaning is that all the other attendants were
+real ladies, and Jessie was only an amateur, so to speak. There was no
+novelty for her in handing kids cups of tea. I daresay she had helped
+her landlady often enough at that--there's quite a bushel of brats below
+stairs. It's almost as bad as at friend Crowl's. Jessie was a real
+brick. But perhaps Tom didn't know her value. Perhaps he didn't like
+Constant to call on her, and it led to a quarrel. Anyhow, she's
+disappeared, like the snowfall on the river. There's not a trace. The
+landlady, who was such a friend of hers that Jessie used to make up her
+stuff into dresses for nothing, tells me that she's dreadfully annoyed
+at not having been left the slightest clue to her late tenant's
+whereabouts."
+
+"You have been making inquiries on your own account apparently."
+
+"Only of the landlady. Jessie never even gave her the week's notice, but
+paid her in lieu of it, and left immediately. The landlady told me I
+could have knocked her down with a feather. Unfortunately, I wasn't
+there to do it, for I should certainly have knocked her down for not
+keeping her eyes open better. She says if she had only had the least
+suspicion beforehand that the minx (she dared to call Jessie a minx) was
+going, she'd have known where, or her name would have been somebody
+else'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 have
+let out that she was going. But, no! not a word. She plumped down the
+money and walked out. The landlady ran upstairs. None of Jessie's things
+were there. She must have quietly sold them off, or transferred them to
+the new place. I never in my life met a girl who so thoroughly knew her
+own mind or had a mind so worth knowing. She always reminded me of the
+Maid 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 end
+of 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. Grodman
+wrote to the 'Pell Mell.' The more we know about Mr. Constant's life the
+more we shall know about the manner of his death. I thought my
+information 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 a
+vengeance.
+
+"Your style, my dear Mr. Cantercot. The unique noble style."
+
+"Yes, I was afraid it would betray me," said Denzil. "And since you
+know, I may tell you that Grodman's a mean curmudgeon. What does he want
+with all that money and those houses--a man with no sense of the
+Beautiful? He'd have taken my information, and given me more kicks than
+ha'pence for it, so to speak."
+
+"Yes, he is a shrewd man after all. I don't see anything valuable in
+your evidence against Mortlake."
+
+"No!" said Denzil in a disappointed tone, and fearing he was going to be
+robbed. "Not when Mortlake was already jealous of Mr. Constant, who was
+a sort of rival organizer, unpaid! A kind of blackleg doing the work
+cheaper--nay, for nothing."
+
+"Did Mortlake tell you he was jealous?" said Wimp, a shade of sarcastic
+contempt piercing through his tones.
+
+"Oh, yes! He said to me, 'That man will work mischief. I don't like your
+kid-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 for
+you."
+
+"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 manage
+on it after all." He took his hat and the sovereign.
+
+Outside the door he met a rather pretty servant just bringing in some
+tea to her master. He nearly upset her tray at sight of her. She seemed
+more amused at the _rencontre_ than he.
+
+"Good afternoon, dear," she said coquettishly. "You might let me have
+that sovereign. I do so want a new Sunday bonnet."
+
+Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the hall door viciously when
+he got to the bottom of the stairs. He seemed to be walking arm-in-arm
+with the long arm of coincidence. Wimp did not hear the duologue. He was
+already busy on his evening's report to headquarters. The next day
+Denzil had a body-guard wherever he went. It might have gratified his
+vanity had he known it. But to-night he was yet unattended, so no one
+noted that he went to 46 Glover Street, after the early Crowl supper. He
+could not help going. He wanted to get another sovereign. He also itched
+to taunt Grodman. Not succeeding in the former object, he felt the road
+open for the second.
+
+"Do you still hope to discover the Bow murderer?" he asked the old
+bloodhound.
+
+"I can lay my hand on him now," Grodman announced curtly.
+
+Denzil hitched his chair back involuntarily. He found conversation with
+detectives as lively as playing at skittles with bombshells. They got on
+his nerves terribly, these undemonstrative gentlemen with no sense of
+the 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's
+Cross Grodman was only a little surprised. The two men were always
+overwhelmingly cordial when they met, in order to disguise their mutual
+detestation. When people really like each other, they make no
+concealment of their mutual contempt. In his letter to Grodman, Wimp
+said that he thought it would be nicer for him to keep Christmas in
+company than in solitary state. There seems to be a general prejudice in
+favor of Christmas numbers, and Grodman yielded to it. Besides, he
+thought that a peep at the Wimp domestic interior would be as good as a
+pantomime. He quite enjoyed the fun that was coming, for he knew that
+Wimp had not invited him out of mere "peace and goodwill."
+
+There was only one other guest at the festive board. This was Wimp's
+wife's mother's mother, a lady of sweet seventy. Only a minority of
+mankind can obtain a grandmother-in-law by marrying, but Wimp was not
+unduly conceited. The old lady suffered from delusions. One of them was
+that she was a centenarian. She dressed for the part. It is
+extraordinary what pains ladies will take to conceal their age. Another
+of Wimp's grandmother-in-law's delusions was that Wimp had married to
+get her into the family. Not to frustrate his design, she always gave
+him her company on high-days and holidays. Wilfred Wimp--the little boy
+who stole the jam--was in great form at the Christmas dinner. The only
+drawback to his enjoyment was that its sweets needed no stealing. His
+mother presided over the platters, and thought how much cleverer Grodman
+was than her husband. When the pretty servant who waited on them was
+momentarily out of the room, Grodman had remarked that she seemed very
+inquisitive. This coincided with Mrs. Wimp's own convictions, though Mr.
+Wimp could never be brought to see anything unsatisfactory or suspicious
+about 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 Denzil
+Cantercot's name was mentioned. Grodman saw it and watched her, and
+fooled Wimp to the top of his bent. It was, of course, Wimp who
+introduced the poet's name, and he did it so casually that Grodman
+perceived at once that he wished to pump him. The idea that the rival
+bloodhound should come to him for confirmation of suspicions against his
+own pet jackal was too funny. It was almost as funny to Grodman that
+evidence of some sort should be obviously lying to hand in the bosom of
+Wimp's hand-maiden; so obviously that Wimp could not see it. Grodman
+enjoyed his Christmas dinner, secure that he had not found a successor
+after all. Wimp, for his part, contemptuously wondered at the way
+Grodman's thought hovered about Denzil without grazing the truth. A man
+constantly about him, too!
+
+"Denzil is a man of genius," said Grodman. "And as such comes under the
+heading of Suspicious Characters. He has written an Epic Poem and read
+it to me. It is morbid from start to finish. There is 'death' in the
+third line. I daresay you know he polished up my book." Grodman's
+artlessness was perfect.
+
+"No. You surprise me," Wimp replied. "I'm sure he couldn't have done
+much to it. Look at your letter in the 'Pell Mell.' Who wants more
+polish 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 was
+clever and cogent. After that quotation from the letter to the poor
+fellow'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 an
+indiscreet. Grodman would plume himself terribly. At this moment Wimp
+felt that Grodman had been right in remaining a bachelor. Grodman
+perceived the humor of the situation, and wore a curious, sub-mocking
+smile.
+
+"On the day I was born," said Wimp's grandmother-in-law, "over a hundred
+years ago, there was a babe murdered." Wimp found himself wishing it had
+been she. He was anxious to get back to Cantercot. "Don't let us talk
+shop on Christmas Day," he said, smiling at Grodman. "Besides, murder
+isn't a very appropriate subject."
+
+"No, it ain't," said Grodman. "How did we get on to it? Oh, yes--Denzil
+Cantercot. Ha! ha! ha! That's curious, for since Denzil wrote 'Criminals
+I have Caught,' his mind's running on nothing but murders. A poet's
+brain is easily turned."
+
+Wimp's eye glittered with excitement and contempt for Grodman's
+blindness. In Grodman's eye there danced an amused scorn of Wimp; to the
+outsider his amusement appeared at the expense of the poet.
+
+Having wrought his rival up to the highest pitch Grodman slyly and
+suddenly unstrung him.
+
+"How lucky for Denzil!" he said, still in the same naive, facetious
+Christmasy 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 overheard
+Grodman had set himself to find out the relation between his two
+employes. By casually referring to Denzil as "your husband" he so
+startled the poor woman that she did not attempt to deny the bond. Only
+once did he use the two words, but he was satisfied. As to the alibi he
+had not yet troubled her; but to take its existence for granted would
+upset and discomfort Wimp. For the moment that was triumph enough for
+Wimp's guest.
+
+"Par," said Wilfred Wimp, "what's a alleybi? A marble?"
+
+"No, my lad," said Grodman, "it means being somewhere else when you're
+supposed to be somewhere."
+
+"Ah, playing truant," said Wilfred self-consciously; his schoolmaster
+had 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 gods
+bidding him mistrust Grodman. Out of the mouths of little children
+issueth wisdom; sometimes even when they are not saying their lessons.
+
+"When I was in my cradle, a century ago," said Wimp's
+grandmother-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 expects
+it. 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's
+chronology. Once let him know that Bank Holiday is coming, and he writes
+to the company for more water. To-day his stock seemed low and he was
+dribbling it out; at times the wintry sun would shine in a feeble,
+diluted way, and though the holiday-makers would have preferred to take
+their sunshine neat, they swarmed forth in their myriads whenever there
+was a ray of hope. But it was only dodging the raindrops; up went the
+umbrellas again, and the streets became meadows of ambulating mushrooms.
+
+Denzil Cantercot sat in his fur overcoat at the open window, looking at
+the landscape in water colors. He smoked an after-dinner cigarette, and
+spoke of the Beautiful. Crowl was with him. They were in the first floor
+front, Crowl's bedroom, which, from its view of the Mile End Road, was
+livelier than the parlor with its outlook on the backyard. Mrs. Crowl
+was an anti-tobacconist as regards the best bedroom; but Peter did not
+like to put the poet or his cigarette out. He felt there was something
+in common between smoke and poetry, over and above their being both
+Fads. Besides, Mrs. Crowl was sulking in the kitchen. She had been
+arranging for an excursion with Peter and the children to Victoria Park.
+She had dreamed of the Crystal Palace, but Santa Claus had put no gifts
+in the cobbler's shoes. Now she could not risk spoiling the feather in
+her bonnet. The nine brats expressed their disappointment by slapping
+one another on the staircases. Peter felt that Mrs. Crowl connected him
+in some way with the rainfall, and was unhappy. Was it not enough that
+he had been deprived of the pleasure of pointing out to a superstitious
+majority 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 to
+the ragged sky and the dripping eaves. "Ugly old scarecrow!"
+
+"Ugly she seems to-day," admitted Denzil. "But what is Ugliness but a
+higher form of Beauty? You have to look deeper into it to see it; such
+vision is the priceless gift of the few. To me this wan desolation of
+sighing 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 he
+spoke 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 if
+Nature isn't a Fad. Hallo, there goes Mortlake! Lord, a minute of this
+will soak him to the skin."
+
+The labor leader was walking along with bowed head. He did not seem to
+mind the shower. It was some seconds before he even heard Crowl's
+invitation to him to take shelter. When he did hear it he shook his
+head.
+
+"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 in
+the world which now galled him more than the suspicion that he was
+stuck-up and wished to cut old friends. He picked his way through the
+nine brats who clung affectionately to his wet knees, dispersing them
+finally by a jet of coppers to scramble for. Peter met him on the stair
+and 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 will
+say what comes uppermost! But it ain't from the soul, Tom, it ain't from
+the soul," said Peter, punning feebly, and letting a mirthless smile
+play over his sallow features. "You know Mr. Cantercot, I suppose? The
+poet."
+
+"Oh, yes; how do you do, Tom? Seen the 'New Pork Herald' lately? Not
+bad, 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 you
+are 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 for
+plain men like me, with no gift but just enough brains to see into the
+realities of things--to understand that we've got no soul and no
+immortality, and all that--and too selfish to look after anybody's
+comfort but my own and mother's and the kid's. But men like you and
+Cantercot--it ain't right that you should be peggin' away at low
+material things. Not that I think Cantercot's gospel's any value to the
+masses. The Beautiful is all very well for folks who've got nothing else
+to 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 little
+enough, Heaven knows; though how a place can know anything, Heaven alone
+knows. You give us the Useful, Tom; that's what the world wants more
+than 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's
+a combination for you. She always reminds me of Grace Darling. How is
+she, 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 meant
+Miss Dymond."
+
+"You needn't be so interested in her," said Tom, surlily. "She don't
+appreciate it. Ah, the shower is over. I must be going."
+
+"No, stay a little longer, Tom," pleaded Peter. "I see a lot about you
+in the papers, but very little of your dear old phiz now. I can't spare
+the 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 next
+big performance is on the twenty-first of January, when that picture of
+poor Mr. Constant is to be unveiled at the Bow Break o' Day Club. They
+have written to Gladstone and other big pots to come down. I do hope the
+old man accepts. A non-political gathering like this is the only
+occasion we could both speak at, and I have never been on the same
+platform with Gladstone."
+
+He forgot his depression and ill-temper in the prospect, and spoke with
+more animation.
+
+"No, I should hope not, Tom," said Peter. "What with his Fads about the
+Bible being a Rock, and Monarchy being the right thing, he is a most
+dangerous man to lead the Radicals. He never lays his ax to the root of
+anything--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 into
+the "gentleman" was delightful. It was almost as good as a week's rent
+to her to give vent to her feelings. The controversial couple had moved
+away from the window when Tom entered, and had not noticed the immediate
+advent of another visitor who had spent his time profitably in listening
+to 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 was
+Wimp. Denzil was rather dubious as to the friendship, but he preferred
+to take Wimp diluted. "Mortlake's upstairs," he said. "Will you come up
+and 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 queer
+quartette. Wimp had hardly expected to find anybody at the house on
+Boxing Day, but he did not care to waste a day. Was not Grodman, too, on
+the track? How lucky it was that Denzil had made the first overtures, so
+that he could approach him without exciting suspicion.
+
+Mortlake scowled when he saw the detective. He objected to the
+police--on principle. But Crowl had no idea who the visitor was, even
+when told his name. He was rather pleased to meet one of Denzil's
+high-class friends, and welcomed him warmly. Probably he was some famous
+editor, which would account for his name stirring vague recollections.
+He summoned the eldest brat and sent him for beer (people would have
+their Fads), and not without trepidation called down to "Mother" for
+glasses. "Mother" observed at night (in the same apartment) that the
+beer 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," said
+the 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 the
+conversation; "mysterious affair that, Mr. Crowl."
+
+"No; it's the right thing," said Peter. "There ought to be some memorial
+of the man in the district where he worked and where he died, poor
+chap." The cobbler brushed away a tear.
+
+"Yes, it's only right," echoed Mortlake a whit eagerly. "He was a noble
+fellow, a true philanthropist. The only thoroughly unselfish worker I've
+ever 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 met
+his like. Ah, I wish there was a Heaven for him to go to!" He blew his
+nose 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 there
+the 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; at
+least, so Mrs. Drabdump said at the inquest."
+
+"That last conversation he had with you, Tom," said Denzil. "He didn't
+say 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," replied
+Tom, testily. "It may have been suicide. Men often get sick of
+life--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, looking
+even worse-tempered than when he came. Wimp went soon after, and Crowl
+and Denzil were left to their interminable argumentation concerning the
+Useful and the Beautiful.
+
+Wimp went west. He had several strings (or cords) to his bow, and he
+ultimately found himself at Kensal Green Cemetery. Being there, he went
+down the avenues of the dead to a grave to note down the exact date of a
+death. It was a day on which the dead seemed enviable. The dull, sodden
+sky, the dripping, leafless trees, the wet spongy soil, the reeking
+grass--everything combined to make one long to be in a warm, comfortable
+grave, away from the leaden ennui of life. Suddenly the detective's keen
+eye caught sight of a figure that made his heart throb with sudden
+excitement. It was that of a woman in a gray shawl and a brown bonnet
+standing before a railed-in grave. She had no umbrella. The rain plashed
+mournfully upon her, but left no trace on her soaking garments. Wimp
+crept up behind her, but she paid no heed to him. Her eyes were lowered
+to the grave, which seemed to be drawing them toward it by some strange
+morbid fascination. His eyes followed hers. The simple headstone bore
+the name: "Arthur Constant."
+
+Wimp tapped her suddenly on the shoulder.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump went deadly white. She turned round, staring at Wimp
+without any recognition.
+
+"You remember me, surely," he said. "I've been down once or twice to
+your place about that poor gentleman's papers." His eye indicated the
+grave.
+
+"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 rheumatics
+this twenty year."
+
+Mrs. Drabdump shrank from accepting Wimp's attentions, not so much
+perhaps because he was a man as because he was a gentleman. Mrs.
+Drabdump liked to see the fine folks keep their place, and not
+contaminate their skirts by contact with the lower castes. "It's set
+wet, it'll rain right into the new year," she announced. "And they say a
+bad beginnin' makes a worse endin'." Mrs. Drabdump was one of those
+persons who give you the idea that they just missed being born
+barometers.
+
+"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 acute
+surprise. "I always make a hexcursion on Bank Holiday."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+The New Year brought Mrs. Drabdump a new lodger. He was an old gentleman
+with 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 be
+haunted if the ghosts of those murdered in them had any
+self-respect--are supposed to fetch a lower rent in the market. The
+whole Irish problem might be solved if the spirits of "Mr. Balfour's
+victims" would only depreciate the value of property to a point
+consistent with the support of an agricultural population. But Mrs.
+Drabdump's new lodger paid so much for his rooms that he laid himself
+open to a suspicion of special interest in ghosts. Perhaps he was a
+member of the Psychical Society. The neighborhood imagined him another
+mad philanthropist, but as he did not appear to be doing any good to
+anybody it relented and conceded his sanity. Mortlake, who occasionally
+stumbled across him in the passage, did not trouble himself to think
+about him at all. He was too full of other troubles and cares. Though he
+worked harder than ever, the spirit seemed to have gone out of him.
+Sometimes he forgot himself in a fine rapture of eloquence--lashing
+himself up into a divine resentment of injustice or a passion of
+sympathy with the sufferings of his brethren--but mostly he plodded on
+in dull, mechanical fashion. He still made brief provincial tours,
+starring a day here and a day there, and everywhere his admirers
+remarked how jaded and overworked he looked. There was talk of starting
+a subscription to give him a holiday on the Continent--a luxury
+obviously unobtainable on the few pounds allowed him per week. The new
+lodger would doubtless have been pleased to subscribe, for he seemed
+quite to like occupying Mortlake's chamber the nights he was absent,
+though he was thoughtful enough not to disturb the hardworked landlady
+in the adjoining room by unseemly noise. Wimp was always a quiet man.
+
+Meantime the 21st of the month approached, and the East End was in
+excitement. Mr. Gladstone had consented to be present at the ceremony of
+unveiling the portrait of Arthur Constant, presented by an unknown donor
+to the Bow Break o' Day Club, and it was to be a great function. The
+whole affair was outside the lines of party politics, so that even
+Conservatives and Socialists considered themselves justified in
+pestering the committee for tickets. To say nothing of ladies. As the
+committee desired to be present themselves, nine-tenths of the
+applications for admission had to be refused, as is usual on these
+occasions. The committee agreed among themselves to exclude the fair sex
+altogether as the only way of disposing of their womankind who were
+making speeches as long as Mr. Gladstone's. Each committeeman told his
+sisters, female cousins and aunts that the other committeemen had
+insisted on divesting the function of all grace; and what could a man do
+when he was in a minority of one?
+
+Crowl, who was not a member of the Break o' Day Club, was particularly
+anxious to hear the great orator whom he despised; fortunately Mortlake
+remembered the cobbler's anxiety to hear himself, and on the eve of the
+ceremony sent him a ticket. Crowl was in the first flush of possession
+when Denzil Cantercot returned, after a sudden and unannounced absence
+of three days. His clothes were muddy and tattered, his cocked hat was
+deformed, 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 dry
+as the Sahara."
+
+Crowl ran inside and got the water, trying hard not to inform Mrs. Crowl
+of their lodger's return. "Mother" had expressed herself freely on the
+subject of the poet during his absence, and not in terms which would
+have 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 might
+be 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 felt
+no sense of victory. He had no desire to crow over his partner and to
+utter that "See! didn't I tell you so?" which is a greater consolation
+than religion in most of the misfortunes of life. Unfortunately, to get
+the water, Crowl had to go to the kitchen; and as he was usually such a
+temperate man, this desire for drink in the middle of the day attracted
+the attention of the lady in possession. Crowl had to explain the
+situation. Mrs. Crowl ran into the shop to improve it. Mr. Crowl
+followed 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 if
+it were brandy.
+
+"Madam," he said, smacking his lips, "I do care. I care intensely. Few
+things in life would grieve me more deeply than to hear that a child, a
+dear little child--the Beautiful in a nutshell--had suffered hunger. You
+wrong me." His voice was tremulous with the sense of injury. Tears stood
+in his eyes.
+
+"Wrong you? I've no wish to wrong you," said Mrs. Crowl. "I should like
+to hang you."
+
+"Don't talk of such ugly things," said Denzil, touching his throat
+nervously.
+
+"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 you
+mean?"
+
+But Mrs. Crowl was glaring too viciously at Mr. Crowl to reply. He
+understood the message as if it were printed. It ran: "You have broken
+one of my best glasses. You have annihilated threepence, or a week's
+school fees for half the family." Peter wished she would turn the
+lightning upon Denzil, a conductor down whom it would run innocuously.
+He stooped down and picked up the pieces as carefully as if they were
+cuttings from the Koh-i-noor. Thus the lightning passed harmlessly over
+his 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 with
+Peter all these years for nothing. "And if you haven't been murdered
+what have you been doing?"
+
+"My dear, my dear," put in Crowl, deprecatingly, looking up from his
+quadrupedal 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 to
+know?"
+
+Peter went on picking up the pieces of the Koh-i-noor.
+
+"I have no secrets from Mrs. Crowl" Denzil explained courteously. "I
+have been working day and night bringing out a new paper. Haven't had a
+wink 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 was
+overjoyed at the _rencontre_ and told him the idea I'd been brooding
+over 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 nights
+but 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 the
+Beautiful."
+
+"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 the
+fun of anonymity comes in? If I had any gifts, I should like to get the
+credit. It's a right and natural feeling, to my thinking."
+
+"Unnatural, Peter; unnatural. We're all born anonymous, and I'm for
+sticking close to Nature. Enough for me that I disseminate the
+Beautiful. Any letters come during my absence, Mrs. Crowl?"
+
+"No," she snapped. "But a gent named Grodman called. He said you hadn't
+been to see him for some time, and looked annoyed to hear you'd
+disappeared. How much have you let him in for?"
+
+"The man's in my debt," said Denzil, annoyed. "I wrote a book for him
+and he's taken all the credit for it, the rogue! My name doesn't appear
+even 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. Gladstone
+speaks. Awful demand for places."
+
+"Gladstone!" sneered Denzil. "Who wants to hear Gladstone? A man who's
+devoted 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 Fads
+of Religion and Monarchy. But, for all that, the man has his gifts, and
+I'm burnin' to hear him."
+
+"I wouldn't go out of my way an inch to hear him," said Denzil; and went
+up to his room, and when Mrs. Crowl sent him up a cup of nice strong tea
+at 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 Road
+swarmed, with noisy life, as though it were a Saturday night. The stars
+flared in the sky like the lights of celestial costermongers. Everybody
+was on the alert for the advent of Mr. Gladstone. He must surely come
+through the Road on his journey from the West Bow-wards. But nobody saw
+him or his carriage, except those about the Hall. Probably he went by
+tram most of the way. He would have caught cold in an open carriage, or
+bobbing his head out of the window of a closed.
+
+"If he had only been a German prince, or a cannibal king," said Crowl
+bitterly, as he plodded toward the Club, "we should have disguised Mile
+End in bunting and blue fire. But perhaps it's a compliment. He knows
+his London, and it's no use trying to hide the facts from him. They must
+have queer notions of cities, those monarchs. They must fancy everybody
+lives in a flutter of flags and walks about under triumphal arches, like
+as if I were to stitch shoes in my Sunday clothes." By a defiance of
+chronology Crowl had them on to-day, and they seemed to accentuate the
+simile.
+
+"And why shouldn't life be fuller of the Beautiful," said Denzil. The
+poet had brushed the reluctant mud off his garments to the extent it was
+willing to go, and had washed his face, but his eyes were still
+bloodshot from the cultivation of the Beautiful. Denzil was accompanying
+Crowl to the door of the Club out of good-fellowship. Denzil was himself
+accompanied by Grodman, though less obtrusively. Least obtrusively was
+he accompanied by his usual Scotland Yard shadows, Wimp's agents. There
+was a surging nondescript crowd about the Club, and the police, and the
+door-keeper, and the stewards could with difficulty keep out the tide of
+the ticketless, through which the current of the privileged had equal
+difficulty in permeating. The streets all around were thronged with
+people longing for a glimpse of Gladstone. Mortlake drove up in a hansom
+(his head a self-conscious pendulum of popularity, swaying and bowing to
+right 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. He
+had only found him by accident, for he was himself bound to the
+unveiling ceremony, to which he had been invited in view of his known
+devotion to the task of unveiling the Mystery. He spoke to one of the
+policemen about, who said, "Ay, ay, sir," and he was prepared to follow
+Denzil, if necessary, and to give up the pleasure of hearing Gladstone
+for an acuter thrill. The arrest must be delayed no longer.
+
+But Denzil seemed as if he were going in on the heels of Crowl. This
+would suit Grodman better. He could then have the two pleasures. But
+Denzil 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 the
+Fourth Estate were concentrated in that haughty monosyllable. Heaven
+itself is full of journalists who have overawed St. Peter. But the
+door-keeper was a veritable dragon.
+
+"What paper, sir?"
+
+"'New Pork Herald,'" said Denzil sharply. He did not relish his word
+being distrusted.
+
+"'New York Herald,'" said one of the bystanding stewards, scarce
+catching 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 not
+make his face quite impassive, and there was a suppressed intensity in
+the 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 their
+coming _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 going
+to be executed under very sensational circumstances. Everything would
+combine to turn the eyes of the country upon him--nay, of the world, for
+had not the Big Bow Mystery been discussed in every language under the
+sun? In these electric times the criminal achieves a cosmopolitan
+reputation. It is a privilege he shares with few other artists. This
+time Wimp would be one of them; and, he felt, deservedly so. If the
+criminal had been cunning to the point of genius in planning the murder,
+he had been acute to the point of divination in detecting it. Never
+before had he pieced together so broken a chain. He could not resist the
+unique opportunity of setting a sensational scheme in a sensational
+frame-work. The dramatic instinct was strong in him; he felt like a
+playwright who has constructed a strong melodramatic plot, and has the
+Drury Lane stage suddenly offered him to present it on. It would be
+folly to deny himself the luxury, though the presence of Mr. Gladstone
+and the nature of the ceremony should perhaps have given him pause. Yet,
+on the other hand, these were the very factors of the temptation. Wimp
+went in and took a seat behind Denzil. All the seats were numbered, so
+that everybody might have the satisfaction of occupying somebody else's.
+Denzil was in the special reserved places in the front row just by the
+central gangway; Crowl was squeezed into a corner behind a pillar near
+the back of the hall. Grodman had been honored with a seat on the
+platform, which was accessible by steps on the right and left, but he
+kept his eye on Denzil. The picture of the poor idealist hung on the
+wall behind Grodman's head, covered by its curtain of brown holland.
+There was a subdued buzz of excitement about the hall, which swelled
+into cheers every now and again as some gentleman known to fame or Bow
+took his place upon the platform. It was occupied by several local M.
+P.'s of varying politics, a number of other Parliamentary satellites of
+the great man, three or four labor leaders, a peer or two of
+philanthropic pretensions, a sprinkling of Toynbee and Oxford Hall men,
+the president and other honorary officials, some of the family and
+friends of the deceased, together with the inevitable percentage of
+persons who had no claim to be there save cheek. Gladstone was
+late--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 a
+political meeting. Gladstone came in just in time to acknowledge the
+compliment. The noise of the song, trolled out from iron lungs, had
+drowned the huzzahs heralding the old man's advent. The convivial chorus
+went to Mortlake's head, as if champagne had really preceded it. His
+eyes grew moist and dim. He saw himself swimming to the Millenium on
+waves of enthusiasm. Ah, how his brother-toilers should be rewarded for
+their trust in him!
+
+With his usual courtesy and consideration, Mr. Gladstone had refused to
+perform the actual unveiling of Arthur Constant's portrait. "That," he
+said in his postcard, "will fall most appropriately to Mr. Mortlake, a
+gentleman who has, I am given to understand, enjoyed the personal
+friendship of the late Mr. Constant, and has co-operated with him in
+various schemes for the organization of skilled and unskilled classes of
+labor, as well as for the diffusion of better ideals--ideals of
+self-culture and self-restraint--among the workingmen of Bow, who have
+been fortunate, so far as I can perceive, in the possession (if in one
+case unhappily only temporary possession) of two such men of undoubted
+ability and honesty to direct their divided counsels and to lead them
+along a road, which, though I cannot pledge myself to approve of it in
+all its turnings and windings, is yet not unfitted to bring them
+somewhat nearer to goals to which there are few of us but would extend
+some measure of hope that the working classes of this great Empire may
+in due course, yet with no unnecessary delay, be enabled to arrive."
+
+Mr. Gladstone's speech was an expansion of his postcard, punctuated by
+cheers. The only new thing in it was the graceful and touching way in
+which he revealed what had been a secret up till then--that the portrait
+had been painted and presented to the Bow Break o' Day Club, by Lucy
+Brent, who in the fulness of time would have been Arthur Constant's
+wife. It was a painting for which he had sat to her while alive, and she
+had stifled yet pampered her grief by working hard at it since his
+death. The fact added the last touch of pathos to the occasion. Crowl's
+face was hidden behind his red handkerchief; even the fire of excitement
+in Wimp's eye was quenched for a moment by a tear-drop, as he thought of
+Mrs. Wimp and Wilfred. As for Grodman, there was almost a lump in his
+throat. Denzil Cantercot was the only unmoved man in the room. He
+thought the episode quite too Beautiful, and was already weaving it into
+rhyme.
+
+At the conclusion of his speech Mr. Gladstone called upon Tom Mortlake
+to unveil the portrait. Tom rose, pale and excited. His hand faltered as
+he touched the cord. He seemed overcome with emotion. Was it the mention
+of Lucy Brent that had moved him to his depths?
+
+The brown holland fell away--the dead stood revealed as he had been in
+life. Every feature, painted by the hand of Love, was instinct with
+vitality: the fine, earnest face, the sad kindly eyes, the noble brow
+seeming still a-throb with the thought of Humanity. A thrill ran through
+the room--there was a low, undefinable murmur. O, the pathos and the
+tragedy of it! Every eye was fixed, misty with emotion, upon the dead
+man in the picture and the living man who stood, pale and agitated, and
+visibly unable to commence his speech, at the side of the canvas.
+Suddenly a hand was laid upon the labor leader's shoulder, and there
+rang through the hall in Wimp's clear, decisive tones the words: "Tom
+Mortlake, I arrest you for the murder of Arthur Constant!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+For a moment there was an acute, terrible silence. Mortlake's face was
+that of a corpse; the face of the dead man at his side was flushed with
+the hues of life. To the overstrung nerves of the onlookers, the
+brooding eyes of the picture seemed sad and stern with menace, and
+charged with the lightnings of doom.
+
+It was a horrible contrast. For Wimp, alone, the painted face had
+fuller, more tragical, meanings. The audience seemed turned to stone.
+They sat or stood--in every variety of attitude--frozen, rigid. Arthur
+Constant's picture dominated the scene, the only living thing in a hall
+of 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 police
+conspiracy."
+
+His words relaxed the tension. The stony figures were agitated. A dull,
+excited hubbub answered him. The little cobbler darted from behind his
+pillar, and leaped upon a bench. The cords of his brow were swollen with
+excitement. He seemed a giant overshadowing the hall.
+
+"Boys!" he roared, in his best Victoria Park voice, "listen to me. This
+charge is a foul and damnable lie."
+
+"Bravo!" "Hear, hear!" "Hooray!" "It is!" was roared back at him from
+all 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 want
+to 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 the
+platform, 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 the
+ceremony 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 whose
+ears is borne the ominous sibilance of the pit. He almost wished he had
+not followed the curtain-raiser with his own stronger drama.
+Unconsciously the police, scattered about the hall, drew together. The
+people on the platform knew not what to do. They had all risen and stood
+in a densely-packed mass. Even Mr. Gladstone's speech failed him in
+circumstances so novel. The groans died away; the cheers for Mortlake
+rose and swelled and fell and rose again. Sticks and umbrellas were
+banged and rattled, handkerchiefs were waved, the thunder deepened. The
+motley crowd still surging about the hall took up the cheers, and for
+hundreds of yards around people were going black in the face out of mere
+irresponsible enthusiasm. At last Tom waved his hand--the thunder
+dwindled, died. The prisoner was master of the situation.
+
+Grodman stood on the platform, grasping the back of his chair, a curious
+mocking Mephistophelian glitter about his eyes, his lips wreathed into a
+half smile. There was no hurry for him to get Denzil Cantercot arrested
+now. Wimp had made an egregious, a colossal blunder. In Grodman's heart
+there was a great glad calm as of a man who has strained his sinews to
+win in a famous match, and has heard the judge's word. He felt almost
+kindly to Denzil now.
+
+Tom Mortlake spoke. His face was set and stony. His tall figure was
+drawn up haughtily to its full height. He pushed the black mane back
+from his forehead with a characteristic gesture. The fevered audience
+hung upon his lips--the men at the back leaned eagerly forward--the
+reporters were breathless with fear lest they should miss a word. What
+would the great labor leader have to say at this supreme moment?
+
+"Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: It is to me a melancholy pleasure to have
+been honored with the task of unveiling to-night this portrait of a
+great benefactor to Bow and a true friend to the laboring classes.
+Except that he honored me with his friendship while living, and that the
+aspirations of my life have, in my small and restricted way, been
+identical with his, there is little reason why this honorable duty
+should have fallen upon me. Gentlemen, I trust that we shall all find an
+inspiring influence in the daily vision of the dead, who yet liveth in
+our hearts and in this noble work of art--wrought, as Mr. Gladstone has
+told us, by the hand of one who loved him." The speaker paused a moment,
+his low vibrant tones faltering into silence. "If we humble workingmen
+of Bow can never hope to exert individually a tithe of the beneficial
+influence wielded by Arthur Constant, it is yet possible for each of us
+to walk in the light he has kindled in our midst--a perpetual lamp of
+self-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 the
+Beautiful. Again there was a breathless hush. Mr. Gladstone's mobile
+face was working with excitement. No such extraordinary scene had
+occurred in the whole of his extraordinary experience. He seemed about
+to rise. The cheering subsided to a painful stillness. Wimp cut the
+situation by laying his hand again upon Tom's shoulder.
+
+"Come quietly with me," he said. The words were almost a whisper, but in
+the supreme silence they traveled to the ends of the hall.
+
+"Don't you go, Tom!" The trumpet tones were Peter's. The call thrilled
+an answering chord of defiance in every breast, and a low, ominous
+murmur 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 hurtling
+mass of men struggled confusedly from their seats. In a moment all was
+chaos. Tom did not move. Half-a-dozen men, headed by Peter, scaled the
+platform. Wimp was thrown to one side, and the invaders formed a ring
+round Tom's chair. The platform people scampered like mice from the
+center. Some huddled together in the corners, others slipped out at the
+rear. The committee congratulated themselves on having had the
+self-denial to exclude ladies. Mr. Gladstone's satellites hurried the
+old man off and into his carriage; though the fight promised to become
+Homeric. Grodman stood at the side of the platform secretly more amused
+than ever, concerning himself no more with Denzil Cantercot, who was
+already strengthening his nerves at the bar upstairs. The police about
+the hall blew their whistles, and policemen came rushing in from outside
+and the neighborhood. An Irish M. P. on the platform was waving his
+gingham like a shillalah in sheer excitement, forgetting his new-found
+respectability and dreaming himself back at Donnybrook Fair. Him a
+conscientious constable floored with a truncheon. But a shower of fists
+fell on the zealot's face, and he tottered back bleeding. Then the storm
+broke in all its fury. The upper air was black with staves, sticks, and
+umbrellas, mingled with the pallid hailstones of knobby fists. Yells and
+groans and hoots and battle-cries blent in grotesque chorus, like one of
+Dvorák's weird diabolical movements. Mortlake stood impassive, with arms
+folded, making no further effort, and the battle raged round him as the
+water swirls around some steadfast rock. A posse of police from the back
+fought their way steadily toward him, and charged up the heights of the
+platform steps, only to be sent tumbling backward, as their leader was
+hurled 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 been
+taken, after being well shaken. Then the miracle happened.
+
+As when of old a reputable goddess _ex machina_ saw her favorite hero in
+dire peril, straightway she drew down a cloud from the celestial stores
+of Jupiter and enveloped her fondling in kindly night, so that his
+adversary strove with the darkness, so did Crowl, the cunning cobbler,
+the much-daring, essay to insure his friend's safety. He turned off the
+gas at the meter.
+
+An Arctic night--unpreceded by twilight--fell, and there dawned the
+sabbath of the witches. The darkness could be felt--and it left blood
+and bruises behind it. When the lights were turned on again, Mortlake
+was gone. But several of the rioters were arrested, triumphantly.
+
+And through all, and over all, the face of the dead man who had sought
+to bring peace on earth, brooded.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese, with his head
+bandaged, while Denzil Cantercot told him the story of how he had
+rescued 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 battle
+till 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't
+quite sure he would."
+
+"Yes; but I wish some cowardly fool hadn't turned off the gas. I like
+men 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 be
+easier, 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 Peter
+thoughtfully. "But I didn't think of that at the time."
+
+He swallowed his water quickly and it went the wrong way and added to
+his confusion. It also began to dawn upon him that he might be called to
+account. Let it be said at once that he wasn't. He had taken too
+prominent a part.
+
+Meantime, Mrs. Wimp was bathing Mr. Wimp's eye, and rubbing him
+generally with arnica. Wimp's melodrama had been, indeed, a sight for
+the gods. Only, virtue was vanquished and vice triumphant. The villain
+had escaped, and without striking a blow.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+There was matter and to spare for the papers the next day. The striking
+ceremony--Mr. Gladstone's speech--the sensational arrest--these would of
+themselves have made excellent themes for reports and leaders. But the
+personality of the man arrested, and the Big Bow Mystery Battle--as it
+came to be called--gave additional piquancy to the paragraphs and the
+posters. The behavior of Mortlake put the last touch to the
+picturesqueness of the position. He left the hall when the lights went
+out, and walked unnoticed and unmolested through pleiads of policemen to
+the nearest police station, where the superintendent was almost too
+excited to take any notice of his demand to be arrested. But to do him
+justice, the official yielded as soon as he understood the situation. It
+seems inconceivable that he did not violate some red-tape regulation in
+so doing. To some this self-surrender was limpid proof of innocence; to
+others it was the damning token of despairing guilt.
+
+The morning papers were pleasant reading for Grodman, who chuckled as
+continuously over his morning egg, as if he had laid it. Jane was
+alarmed for the sanity of her saturnine master. As her husband would
+have said, Grodman's grins were not Beautiful. But he made no effort to
+suppress them. Not only had Wimp perpetrated a grotesque blunder, but
+the journalists to a man were down on his great sensation tableau,
+though their denunciations did not appear in the dramatic columns. The
+Liberal papers said that he had endangered Mr. Gladstone's life; the
+Conservative that he had unloosed the raging elements of Bow
+blackguardism, and set in motion forces which might have easily swelled
+to a riot, involving severe destruction of property. But "Tom Mortlake,"
+was, after all, the thought swamping every other. It was, in a sense, a
+triumph for the man.
+
+But Wimp's turn came when Mortlake, who reserved his defense, was
+brought up before a magistrate, and, by force of the new evidence, fully
+committed for trial on the charge of murdering Arthur Constant. Then
+men's thoughts centered again on the Mystery, and the solution of the
+inexplicable problem agitated mankind from China to Peru.
+
+In the middle of February, the great trial befell. It was another of the
+opportunities which the Chancellor of the Exchequer neglects. So
+stirring a drama might have easily cleared its expenses--despite the
+length of the cast, the salaries of the stars, and the rent of the
+house--in mere advance booking. For it was a drama which (by the rights
+of Magna Charta) could never be repeated; a drama which ladies of
+fashion would have given their earrings to witness, even with the
+central figure not a woman. And there was a woman in it anyhow, to judge
+by the little that had transpired at the magisterial examination, and
+the fact that the country was placarded with bills offering a reward for
+information concerning a Miss Jessie Dymond. Mortlake was defended by
+Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C., retained at the expense of the
+Mortlake Defense Fund (subscriptions to which came also from Australia
+and the Continent), and set on his mettle by the fact that he was the
+accepted 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 that
+the prisoner murdered his friend and fellow-lodger, Mr. Arthur Constant,
+in cold blood, and with the most careful premeditation; premeditation so
+studied, as to leave the circumstances of the death an impenetrable
+mystery for weeks to all the world, though fortunately without
+altogether baffling the almost superhuman ingenuity of Mr. Edward Wimp,
+of the Scotland Yard Detective Department. I propose to show that the
+motives of the prisoner were jealousy and revenge; jealousy not only of
+his friend's superior influence over the workingmen he himself aspired
+to lead, but the more commonplace animosity engendered by the disturbing
+element of a woman having relations to both. If, before my case is
+complete, it will be my painful duty to show that the murdered man was
+not the saint the world has agreed to paint him, I shall not shrink from
+unveiling the truer picture, in the interests of justice, which cannot
+say _nil nisi bonum_ even of the dead. I propose to show that the murder
+was committed by the prisoner shortly before half-past six on the
+morning of December 4th, and that the prisoner having, with the
+remarkable ingenuity which he has shown throughout, attempted to prepare
+an alibi by feigning to leave London by the first train to Liverpool,
+returned home, got in with his latch-key through the street-door, which
+he had left on the latch, unlocked his victim's bedroom with a key which
+he possessed, cut the sleeping man's throat, pocketed his razor, locked
+the door again, and gave it the appearance of being bolted, went
+downstairs, unslipped the bolt of the big lock, closed the door behind
+him, and got to Euston in time for the second train to Liverpool. The
+fog helped his proceedings throughout." Such was in sum the theory of
+the prosecution. The pale defiant figure in the dock winced perceptibly
+under parts of it.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump was the first witness called for the prosecution. She was
+quite used to legal inquisitiveness by this time, but did not appear in
+good 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's
+room, and I'm afraid he quarreled with him. He might have left his last
+hours peaceful." (Amusement.)
+
+"What happened then?"
+
+"Mr. Mortlake went out in a passion, and came in again in about an
+hour."
+
+"He told you he was going away to Liverpool very early the next
+morning."
+
+"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 always
+steadies my nerves."
+
+"Quite so. Where were you when the prisoner told you he was going to
+Devonport?"
+
+"Drinkin' my tea in the kitchen."
+
+"What should you say if prisoner dropped something in it to make you
+sleep 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 clever
+enough to try and poison me."
+
+The Judge: "The witness in her replies must confine herself to the
+evidence."
+
+Mr. Spigot, Q. C.: "I must submit to your lordship that it is a very
+logical answer, and exactly illustrates the interdependence of the
+probabilities. Now, Mrs. Drabdump, let us know what happened when you
+awoke at half-past six the next morning."
+
+Thereupon Mrs. Drabdump recapitulated the evidence (with new
+redundancies, but slight variations) given by her at the inquest. How
+she became alarmed--how she found the street-door locked by the big
+lock--how she roused Grodman, and got him to burst open the door--how
+they 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 am
+sure 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 I
+set 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 two
+rooms on the same floor?"
+
+"Yes, but he didn't pay as much."
+
+"And, while occupying this front bedroom, did not the prisoner once lose
+his key and have another made?"
+
+"He did; he was very careless."
+
+"Do you know what the prisoner and Mr. Constant spoke about on the night
+of 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 to
+you 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 a
+murder?"
+
+"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 not
+that 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 care
+for Miss Dymond?"
+
+"He didn't seem to think of her, my lud. When he got a letter in her
+handwriting among his heap he used to throw it aside till he'd torn open
+the 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 had
+ceased to care for Miss Dymond. Might not this have been in consequence
+of 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 you
+ever see anything--say when Miss Dymond came to your house--to make you
+suspect 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 the
+door." (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. Constant
+and the prisoner. He knew very little about Miss Dymond, having scarcely
+seen her. Prisoner had never spoken to him much about her. He should not
+think she was much in prisoner's thoughts. Naturally the prisoner had
+been depressed by the death of his friend. Besides, he was overworked.
+Witness thought highly of Mortlake's character. It was incredible that
+Constant had had improper relations of any kind with his friend's
+promised wife. Grodman's evidence made a very favorable impression on
+the jury; the prisoner looked his gratitude; and the prosecution felt
+sorry it had been necessary to call this witness.
+
+Inspector Howlett and Sergeant Runnymede had also to repeat their
+evidence. Dr. Robinson, police-surgeon, likewise retendered his evidence
+as to the nature of the wound, and the approximate hour of death. But
+this time he was much more severely examined. He would not bind himself
+down to state the time within an hour or two. He thought life had been
+extinct two or three hours when he arrived, so that the deed had been
+committed between seven and eight. Under gentle pressure from the
+prosecuting counsel, he admitted that it might possibly have been
+between six and seven. Cross-examined, he reiterated his impression in
+favor of the later hour.
+
+Supplementary evidence from medical experts proved as dubious and
+uncertain as if the court had confined itself to the original witness.
+It seemed to be generally agreed that the data for determining the time
+of death of anybody were too complex and variable to admit of very
+precise inference; _rigor mortis_ and other symptoms setting in within
+very wide limits and differing largely in different persons. All agreed
+that death from such a cut must have been practically instantaneous, and
+the theory of suicide was rejected by all. As a whole the medical
+evidence tended to fix the time of death, with a high degree of
+probability, between the hours of six and half-past eight. The efforts
+of the Prosecution were bent upon throwing back the time of death to as
+early as possible after about half-past five. The Defense spent all its
+strength upon pinning the experts to the conclusion that death could not
+have been earlier than seven. Evidently the Prosecution was going to
+fight hard for the hypothesis that Mortlake had committed the crime in
+the interval between the first and second trains for Liverpool; while
+the Defense was concentrating itself on an alibi, showing that the
+prisoner had traveled by the second train which left Euston Station at a
+quarter-past seven, so that there could have been no possible time for
+the passage between Bow and Euston. It was an exciting struggle. As yet
+the contending forces seemed equally matched. The evidence had gone as
+much for as against the prisoner. But everybody knew that worse lay
+behind.
+
+"Call Edward Wimp."
+
+The story Edward Wimp had to tell began tamely enough with
+thrice-threshed-out facts. But at last the new facts came.
+
+"In consequence of suspicions that had formed in your mind you took up
+your quarters, disguised, in the late Mr. Constant's rooms?"
+
+"I did; at the commencement of the year. My suspicions had gradually
+gathered against the occupants of No. 11, Glover Street, and I resolved
+to 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. I
+found the key of Mr. Constant's bedroom buried deeply in the side of
+prisoner's leather sofa. I found what I imagine to be the letter he
+received on December 3d, in the pages of a 'Bradshaw' lying under the
+same 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 wigs
+or without, were observed to be polishing their glasses. Mr. Wimp's
+examination was resumed.
+
+"After making these discoveries what did you do?"
+
+"I made inquiries about Miss Dymond, and found Mr. Constant had visited
+her once or twice in the evening. I imagined there would be some traces
+of 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 the
+name of Miss Dymond. By inquiry at the Bank, I found it had been cashed
+on November 12th of last year. I then applied for a warrant against the
+prisoner."
+
+Cross-examined: "Do you suggest that the prisoner opened Mr. Constant's
+bedroom with the key you found?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+Brown-Harland, Q. C. (sarcastically): "And locked the door from within
+with 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 from
+the outside. Those who broke it open naturally imagined it had been
+locked from the inside when they found the key inside. The key would, on
+this theory, be on the floor as the outside locking could not have been
+effected if it had been in the lock. The first persons to enter the room
+would naturally believe it had been thrown down in the bursting of the
+door. Or it might have been left sticking very loosely inside the lock
+so as not to interfere with the turning of the outside key in which case
+it would also probably have been thrown to the ground."
+
+"Indeed. Very ingenious. And can you also explain how the prisoner could
+have bolted the door within from the outside?"
+
+"I can. (Renewed sensation.) There is only one way in which it was
+possible--and that was, of course, a mere conjurer's illusion. To cause
+a locked door to appear bolted in addition, it would only be necessary
+for the person on the inside of the door to wrest the staple containing
+the bolt from the woodwork. The bolt in Mr. Constant's bedroom worked
+perpendicularly. When the staple was torn off, it would simply remain at
+rest on the pin of the bolt instead of supporting it or keeping it
+fixed. A person bursting open the door and finding the staple resting on
+the 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 been
+done beforehand." (Applause in court, which was instantly checked by the
+ushers.) The counsel for the defense felt he had been entrapped in
+attempting to be sarcastic with the redoubtable detective. Grodman
+seemed green with envy. It was the one thing he had not thought of.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump, Grodman, Inspector Howlett, and Sergeant Runnymede were
+recalled and re-examined by the embarrassed Sir Charles Brown-Harland as
+to the exact condition of the lock and the bolt and the position of the
+key. It turned out as Wimp had suggested; so prepossessed were the
+witnesses with the conviction that the door was locked and bolted from
+the inside when it was burst open that they were a little hazy about the
+exact details. The damage had been repaired, so that it was all a
+question of precise past observation. The inspector and the sergeant
+testified that the key was in the lock when they saw it, though both the
+mortise and the bolt were broken. They were not prepared to say that
+Wimp's theory was impossible; they would even admit it was quite
+possible 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 her
+immediate engrossing interest in the horrible sight of the corpse.
+Grodman alone was positive that the key was in the door when he burst it
+open. No, he did not remember picking it up from the floor and putting
+it 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 panels
+of the door.
+
+By the Prosecution: "Don't you think, from the comparative ease with
+which the door yielded to your onslaught, that it is highly probable
+that the pin of the bolt was not in a firmly fixed staple, but in one
+already 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 was
+new and shoddy. But I have always been a strong man."
+
+"Very well, Mr. Grodman. I hope you will never appear at the
+music-halls." (Laughter.)
+
+Jessie Dymond's landlady was the next witness for the prosecution. She
+corroborated Wimp's statements as to Constant's occasional visits, and
+narrated how the girl had been enlisted by the dead philanthropist as a
+collaborator in some of his enterprises. But the most telling portion of
+her evidence was the story of how, late at night, on December 3d, the
+prisoner called upon her and inquired wildly about the whereabouts of
+his sweetheart. He said he had just received a mysterious letter from
+Miss Dymond saying she was gone. She (the landlady) replied that she
+could have told him that weeks ago, as her ungrateful lodger was gone
+now some three weeks without leaving a hint behind her. In answer to his
+most ungentlemanly raging and raving, she told him it served him right,
+as he should have looked after her better, and not kept away for so
+long. She reminded him that there were as good fish in the sea as ever
+came out, and a girl of Jessie's attractions need not pine away (as she
+had seemed to be pining away) for lack of appreciation. He then called
+her 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 check
+produced. He particularly remembered it, because he paid the money to a
+very pretty girl. She took the entire amount in gold. At this point the
+case was adjourned.
+
+Denzil Cantercot was the first witness called for the prosecution on the
+resumption of the trial. Pressed as to whether he had not told Mr. Wimp
+that he had overheard the prisoner denouncing Mr. Constant, he could not
+say. He had not actually heard the prisoner's denunciations; he might
+have given Mr. Wimp a false impression, but then Mr. Wimp was so
+prosaically literal. (Laughter.) Mr. Crowl had told him something of the
+kind. Cross-examined, he said Jessie Dymond was a rare spirit and she
+always reminded him of Joan of Arc.
+
+Mr. Crowl, being called, was extremely agitated. He refused to take the
+oath, and informed the court that the Bible was a Fad. He could not
+swear by anything so self-contradictory. He would affirm. He could not
+deny--though he looked like wishing to--that the prisoner had at first
+been rather mistrustful of Mr. Constant, but he was certain that the
+feeling had quickly worn off. Yes, he was a great friend of the
+prisoner, but he didn't see why that should invalidate his testimony,
+especially as he had not taken an oath. Certainly the prisoner seemed
+rather depressed when he saw him on Bank Holiday, but it was overwork on
+behalf of the people and for the demolition of the Fads.
+
+Several other familiars of the prisoner gave more or less reluctant
+testimony as to his sometime prejudice against the amateur rival labor
+leader. His expressions of dislike had been strong and bitter. The
+Prosecution also produced a poster announcing that the prisoner would
+preside at a great meeting of clerks on December 4th. He had not turned
+up at this meeting nor sent any explanation. Finally, there was the
+evidence of the detectives who originally arrested him at Liverpool
+Docks in view of his suspicious demeanor. This completed the case for
+the prosecution.
+
+Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C., rose with a swagger and a rustle of
+his silk gown, and proceeded to set forth the theory of the defense. He
+said he did not purpose to call any witnesses. The hypothesis of the
+prosecution was so inherently childish and inconsequential, and so
+dependent upon a bundle of interdependent probabilities that it crumbled
+away at the merest touch. The prisoner's character was of unblemished
+integrity, his last public appearance had been made on the same platform
+with Mr. Gladstone, and his honesty and highmindedness had been vouched
+for by statesmen of the highest standing. His movements could be
+accounted for from hour to hour--and those with which the prosecution
+credited him rested on no tangible evidence whatever. He was also
+credited with superhuman ingenuity and diabolical cunning of which he
+had shown no previous symptom. Hypothesis was piled on hypothesis, as in
+the old Oriental legend, where the world rested on the elephant and the
+elephant on the tortoise. It might be worth while, however, to point out
+that it was at least quite likely that the death of Mr. Constant had not
+taken place before seven, and as the prisoner left Euston Station at
+7:15 a. m. for Liverpool, he could certainly not have got there from Bow
+in the time; also that it was hardly possible for the prisoner, who
+could prove being at Euston Station at 5:25 a. m., to travel backward
+and forward to Glover Street and commit the crime all within less than
+two hours. "The real facts," said Sir Charles impressively, "are most
+simple. The prisoner, partly from pressure of work, partly (he had no
+wish to conceal) from worldly ambition, had begun to neglect Miss
+Dymond, to whom he was engaged to be married. The man was but human, and
+his head was a little turned by his growing importance. Nevertheless, at
+heart he was still deeply attached to Miss Dymond. She, however, appears
+to have jumped to the conclusion that he had ceased to love her, that
+she was unworthy of him, unfitted by education to take her place side by
+side with him in the new spheres to which he was mounting--that, in
+short, she was a drag on his career. Being, by all accounts, a girl of
+remarkable force of character, she resolved to cut the Gordian knot by
+leaving London, and, fearing lest her affianced husband's
+conscientiousness 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 which
+drags an honored name in the mire--a theory so superfluous that I shall
+only allude to it. That Arthur Constant could have seduced, or had any
+improper relations with his friend's betrothed is a hypothesis to which
+the lives of both give the lie. Before leaving London--or England--Miss
+Dymond wrote to her aunt in Devonport--her only living relative in this
+country--asking her as a great favor to forward an addressed letter to
+the prisoner, a fortnight after receipt. The aunt obeyed implicitly.
+This was the letter which fell like a thunderbolt on the prisoner on the
+night of December 3d. All his old love returned--he was full of
+self-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 to
+rush up to his friend, Constant, to seek his advice. Perhaps Constant
+knew something of the affair. The prisoner knew the two were in not
+infrequent communication. It is possible--my lord and gentlemen of the
+jury, I do not wish to follow the methods of the prosecution and confuse
+theory with fact, so I say it is possible--that Mr. Constant had
+supplied her with the £25 to leave the country. He was like a brother to
+her, perhaps even acted imprudently in calling upon her, though neither
+dreamed of evil. It is possible that he may have encouraged her in her
+abnegation and in her altruistic aspirations, perhaps even without
+knowing their exact drift, for does he not speak in his very last letter
+of the fine female characters he was meeting, and the influence for good
+he had over individual human souls? Still, this we can now never know,
+unless the dead speak or the absent return. It is also not impossible
+that Miss Dymond was entrusted with the £25 for charitable purposes. But
+to come back to certainties. The prisoner consulted Mr. Constant about
+the letter. He then ran to Miss Dymond's lodgings in Stepney Green,
+knowing beforehand his trouble would be futile. The letter bore the
+postmark of Devonport. He knew the girl had an aunt there; possibly she
+might have gone to her. He could not telegraph, for he was ignorant of
+the address. He consulted his 'Bradshaw,' and resolved to leave by the
+5:30 a. m. from Paddington, and told his landlady so. He left the letter
+in the 'Bradshaw,' which ultimately got thrust among a pile of papers
+under the sofa, so that he had to get another. He was careless and
+disorderly, and the key found by Mr. Wimp in his sofa must have lain
+there for some years, having been lost there in the days when he
+occupied the bedroom afterward rented by Mr. Constant. Afraid to miss
+his train, he did not undress on that distressful night. Meantime the
+thought occurred to him that Jessie was too clever a girl to leave so
+easy a trail, and he jumped to the conclusion that she would be going to
+her married brother in America, and had gone to Devonport merely to bid
+her aunt farewell. He determined therefore to get to Liverpool, without
+wasting time at Devonport, to institute inquiries. Not suspecting the
+delay 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 went
+slowly in the fog, he missed the first train, and wandered about
+brooding disconsolately in the mist till the second. At Liverpool his
+suspicious, excited demeanor procured his momentary arrest. Since then
+the thought of the lost girl has haunted and broken him. That is the
+whole, the plain, and the sufficing story." The effective witnesses for
+the defense were, indeed, few. It is so hard to prove a negative. There
+was Jessie's aunt, who bore out the statement of the counsel for the
+defense. There were the porters who saw him leave Euston by the 7:15
+train for Liverpool, and arrive just too late for the 5:15; there was
+the 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 got
+a little confused; he was asked whether, if he really picked up the
+prisoner at Bow Railway Station at about 4:30, he ought not to have
+caught the first train at Euston. He said the fog made him drive rather
+slowly, but admitted the mist was transparent enough to warrant full
+speed. He also admitted being a strong trade unionist, Spigot, Q. C.,
+artfully extorting the admission as if it were of the utmost
+significance. Finally, there were numerous witnesses--of all sorts and
+conditions--to the prisoner's high character, as well as to Arthur
+Constant's blameless and moral life.
+
+In his closing speech on the third day of the trial, Sir Charles pointed
+out with great exhaustiveness and cogency the flimsiness of the case for
+the prosecution, the number of hypotheses it involved, and their mutual
+interdependence. Mrs. Drabdump was a witness whose evidence must be
+accepted with extreme caution. The jury must remember that she was
+unable to dissociate her observations from her inferences, and thought
+that the prisoner and Mr. Constant were quarreling merely because they
+were agitated. He dissected her evidence, and showed that it entirely
+bore out the story of the defense. He asked the jury to bear in mind
+that no positive evidence (whether of cabmen or others) had been given
+of the various and complicated movements attributed to the prisoner on
+the 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--he
+meant, of course, Miss Dymond--had not been produced. Even if she were
+dead, and her body were found, no countenance would be given to the
+theory of the prosecution, for the mere conviction that her lover had
+deserted her would be a sufficient explanation of her suicide. Beyond
+the ambiguous letter, no tittle of evidence of her dishonor--on which
+the bulk of the case against the prisoner rested--had been adduced. As
+for the motive of political jealousy that had been a mere passing cloud.
+The two men had become fast friends. As to the circumstances of the
+alleged crime, the medical evidence was on the whole in favor of the
+time of death being late; and the prisoner had left London at a quarter
+past seven. The drugging theory was absurd, and as for the too clever
+bolt and lock theories, Mr. Grodman, a trained scientific observer, had
+pooh-poohed them. He would solemnly exhort the jury to remember that if
+they condemned the prisoner they would not only send an innocent man to
+an ignominious death on the flimsiest circumstantial evidence, but they
+would deprive the workingmen of this country of one of their truest
+friends and their ablest leader.
+
+The conclusion of Sir Charles' vigorous speech was greeted with
+irrepressible applause.
+
+Mr. Spigot, Q. C., in closing the case for the prosecution, asked the
+jury to return a verdict against the prisoner for as malicious and
+premeditated a crime as ever disgraced the annals of any civilized
+country. His cleverness and education had only been utilized for the
+devil's ends, while his reputation had been used as a cloak. Everything
+pointed strongly to the prisoner's guilt. On receiving Miss Dymond's
+letter announcing her shame, and (probably) her intention to commit
+suicide, he had hastened upstairs to denounce Constant. He had then
+rushed to the girl's lodgings, and, finding his worst fears confirmed,
+planned at once his diabolically ingenious scheme of revenge. He told
+his landlady he was going to Devonport, so that if he bungled, the
+police would be put temporarily off his track. His real destination was
+Liverpool, for he intended to leave the country. Lest, however, his plan
+should break down here, too, he arranged an ingenious alibi by being
+driven to Euston for the 5:15 train to Liverpool. The cabman would not
+know he did not intend to go by it, but meant to return to 11, Glover
+Street, there to perpetrate this foul crime, interruption to which he
+had possibly barred by drugging his landlady. His presence at Liverpool
+(whither he really went by the second train) would corroborate the
+cabman's story. That night he had not undressed nor gone to bed; he had
+plotted out his devilish scheme till it was perfect; the fog came as an
+unexpected 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 the
+crime.
+
+Mr. Justice Crogie, summing up, began dead against the prisoner.
+Reviewing the evidence, he pointed out that plausible hypotheses neatly
+dove-tailed did not necessarily weaken one another, the fitting so well
+together 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 the
+case for the defense was from excluding hypothesis. The key, the letter,
+the reluctance to produce the letter, the heated interview with
+Constant, the misstatement about the prisoner's destination, the flight
+to Liverpool, the false tale about searching for a "him," the
+denunciations 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's
+presence at Euston at 5:25 a. m., there was no attempt to account for
+his movements between that and 7:15 a. m. It was as possible that he
+returned to Bow as that he lingered about Euston. There was nothing in
+the medical evidence to make his guilt impossible. Nor was there
+anything inherently impossible in Constant's yielding to the sudden
+temptation of a beautiful girl, nor in a working-girl deeming herself
+deserted, temporarily succumbing to the fascinations of a gentleman and
+regretting it bitterly afterward. What had become of the girl was a
+mystery. Hers might have been one of those nameless corpses which the
+tide swirls up on slimy river banks. The jury must remember, too, that
+the relation might not have actually passed into dishonor, it might have
+been just grave enough to smite the girl's conscience, and to induce her
+to behave as she had done. It was enough that her letter should have
+excited the jealousy of the prisoner. There was one other point which he
+would like to impress on the jury, and which the counsel for the
+prosecution had not sufficiently insisted upon. This was that the
+prisoner's guiltiness was the only plausible solution that had ever been
+advanced of the Bow Mystery. The medical evidence agreed that Mr.
+Constant did not die by his own hand. Someone must therefore have
+murdered him. The number of people who could have had any possible
+reason or opportunity to murder him was extremely small. The prisoner
+had both reason and opportunity. By what logicians called the method of
+exclusion, suspicion would attach to him on even slight evidence. The
+actual evidence was strong and plausible, and now that Mr. Wimp's
+ingenious theory had enabled them to understand how the door could have
+been apparently locked and bolted from within, the last difficulty and
+the last argument for suicide had been removed. The prisoner's guilt was
+as clear as circumstantial evidence could make it. If they let him go
+free, the Bow Mystery might henceforward be placed among the archives of
+unavenged assassinations. Having thus well-nigh hung the prisoner, the
+judge wound up by insisting on the high probability of the story for the
+defense, though that, too, was dependent in important details upon the
+prisoner's mere private statements to his counsel. The jury, being by
+this time sufficiently muddled by his impartiality, were dismissed, with
+the exhortation to allow due weight to every fact and probability in
+determining their righteous verdict.
+
+The minutes ran into hours, but the jury did not return. The shadows of
+night fell across the reeking, fevered court before they announced their
+verdict--
+
+"Guilty."
+
+The judge put on his black cap.
+
+The great reception arranged outside was a fiasco; the evening banquet
+was indefinitely postponed. Wimp had won; Grodman felt like a whipped
+cur.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+"So you were right," Denzil could not help saying as he greeted Grodman
+a week afterward. "I shall not live to tell the story of how you
+discovered the Bow murderer."
+
+"Sit down," growled Grodman; "perhaps you will after all." There was a
+dangerous gleam in his eyes. Denzil was sorry he had spoken.
+
+"I sent for you," Grodman said, "to tell you that on the night Wimp
+arrested 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 the
+confusion of the poetic. The greatest exponent of the Beautiful is only
+allowed the same number of wives as the greengrocer. I do not blame you
+for not being satisfied with Jane--she is a good servant but a bad
+mistress--but it was cruel to Kitty not to inform her that Jane had a
+prior right in you, and unjust to Jane not to let her know of the
+contract 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 of
+an arrest for bigamy. Neither loves me."
+
+"I should think they would come in very useful to you. You plant one in
+my house to tell my secrets to Wimp, and you plant one in Wimp's house
+to 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 for
+Kitty, I never had such a shock in my life as at finding her installed
+in 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 must
+do something for a living; you wouldn't do anything for hers. And so you
+couldn't go anywhere without meeting a wife! Ha! ha! ha! Serve you
+right, 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 my
+book, smoked my cigars, and pocketed my money. And yet, when you have an
+important piece of information bearing on a mystery about which I am
+thinking 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 I
+discovered your two marriages I determined to have you arrested
+for--your treachery. But when I found you had, as I thought, put Wimp on
+the wrong scent, when I felt sure that by arresting Mortlake he was
+going to make a greater ass of himself than even nature had been able to
+do, then I forgave you. I let you walk about the earth--and
+drink--freely. Now it is Wimp who crows--everybody pats him on the
+back--they call him the mystery man of the Scotland-Yard tribe. Poor Tom
+Mortlake will be hanged, and all through your telling Wimp about Jessie
+Dymond!"
+
+"It was you yourself," said Denzil sullenly. "Everybody was giving it
+up. But you said 'Let us find out all that Arthur Constant did in the
+last few months of his life.' Wimp couldn't miss stumbling on Jessie
+sooner or later. I'd have throttled Constant, if I had known he'd
+touched her," he wound up with irrelevant indignation.
+
+Grodman winced at the idea that he himself had worked _ad majorem
+gloriam_ of Wimp. And yet, had not Mrs. Wimp let out as much at the
+Christmas dinner?
+
+"What's past is past," he said gruffly. "But if Tom Mortlake hangs, you
+go to Portland."
+
+"How can I help Tom hanging?"
+
+"Help the agitation as much as you can. Write letters under all sorts of
+names to all the papers. Get everybody you know to sign the great
+petition. Find out where Jessie Dymond is--the girl who holds the proof
+of Tom Mortlake's innocence."
+
+"You really believe him innocent?"
+
+"Don't be satirical, Denzil. Haven't I taken the chair at all the
+meetings? 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 Constant
+than--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 had
+become the leader of the rescue party--suggestions, subscriptions came
+from all sides. The suggestions were burnt, the subscriptions
+acknowledged in the papers and used for hunting up the missing girl.
+Lucy Brent headed the list with a hundred pounds. It was a fine
+testimony to her faith in her dead lover's honor.
+
+The release of the Jury had unloosed "The Greater Jury," which always
+now sits upon the smaller. Every means was taken to nullify the value of
+the "palladium of British liberty." The foreman and the jurors were
+interviewed, the judge was judged, and by those who were no judges. The
+Home Secretary (who had done nothing beyond accepting office under the
+Crown) was vituperated, and sundry provincial persons wrote
+confidentially to the Queen. Arthur Constant's backsliding cheered many
+by convincing them that others were as bad as themselves; and well-to-do
+tradesmen saw in Mortlake's wickedness the pernicious effects of
+socialism. A dozen new theories were afloat. Constant had committed
+suicide 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 great
+point was--Jessie Dymond must be produced, dead or alive. The electric
+current scoured the civilized world in search of her. What wonder if the
+shrewder sort divined that the indomitable detective had fixed his last
+hope on the girl's guilt? If Jessie had wrongs why should she not have
+avenged 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 the
+horizon. The Home Secretary remained inflexible; the great petitions
+discharged their signatures at him in vain. He was a Conservative,
+sternly conscientious; and the mere insinuation that his obstinacy was
+due to the politics of the condemned only hardened him against the
+temptation of a cheap reputation for magnanimity. He would not even
+grant a respite, to increase the chances of the discovery of Jessie
+Dymond. In the last of the three weeks there was a final monster meeting
+of protest. Grodman again took the chair, and several distinguished
+faddists were present, as well as numerous respectable members of
+society. The Home Secretary acknowledged the receipt of their
+resolutions. The Trade Unions were divided in their allegiance; some
+whispered of faith and hope, others of financial defalcations. The
+former essayed to organize a procession and an indignation meeting on
+the Sunday preceding the Tuesday fixed for the execution, but it fell
+through on a rumor of confession. The Monday papers contained a last
+masterly letter from Grodman exposing the weakness of the evidence, but
+they knew nothing of a confession. The prisoner was mute and disdainful,
+professing little regard for a life empty of love and burdened with
+self-reproach. He refused to see clergymen. He was accorded an interview
+with Miss Brent in the presence of a jailer, and solemnly asseverated
+his respect for her dead lover's memory. Monday buzzed with rumors; the
+evening papers chronicled them hour by hour. A poignant anxiety was
+abroad. The girl would be found. Some miracle would happen. A reprieve
+would arrive. The sentence would be commuted. But the short day darkened
+into night even as Mortlake's short day was darkening. And the shadow of
+the 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 eyes
+were heavy with unshed tears. The dingy wintry road seemed one vast
+cemetery; the street lamps twinkled like corpse-lights. The confused
+sounds of the street-life reached his ear as from another world. He did
+not see the people who flitted to and fro amid the gathering shadows of
+the cold, dreary night. One ghastly vision flashed and faded and flashed
+upon the background of the duskiness.
+
+Denzil stood beside him, smoking in silence. A cold fear was at his
+heart. That terrible Grodman! As the hangman's cord was tightening round
+Mortlake, he felt the convict's chains tightening round himself. And yet
+there was one gleam of hope, feeble as the yellow flicker of the
+gas-lamp across the way. Grodman had obtained an interview with the
+condemned late that afternoon, and the parting had been painful, but the
+evening paper, that in its turn had obtained an interview with the
+ex-detective, announced on its placard:
+
+     "GRODMAN STILL CONFIDENT,"
+
+and the thousands who yet pinned their faith on this extraordinary man
+refused to extinguish the last sparks of hope. Denzil had bought the
+paper and scanned it eagerly, but there was nothing save the vague
+assurance that the indefatigable Grodman was still almost pathetically
+expectant of the miracle. Denzil did not share the expectation; he
+meditated flight.
+
+"Peter," he said at last, "I'm afraid it's all over."
+
+Crowl nodded, heart-broken. "All over!" he repeated, "and to think that
+he dies--and it is--all over!"
+
+He looked despairingly at the blank winter sky, where leaden clouds shut
+out 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 of
+leather! No compensation nowhere for being cut off innocent in the pride
+of youth and strength! A man who has always preached the Useful day and
+night, and toiled and suffered for his fellows. Where's the justice of
+it, where's the justice of it?" he demanded fiercely. Again his wet eyes
+wandered upward toward heaven, that heaven away from which the soul of a
+dead saint at the Antipodes was speeding into infinite space.
+
+"Well, where was the justice for Arthur Constant if he, too, was
+innocent?" said Denzil. "Really, Peter, I don't see why you should take
+it for granted that Tom is so dreadfully injured. Your horny-handed
+labor leaders are, after all, men of no aesthetic refinement, with no
+sense of the Beautiful; you cannot expect them to be exempt from the
+coarser forms of crime. Humanity must look to for other leaders--to the
+seers and the poets!"
+
+"Cantercot, if you say Tom's guilty I'll knock you down." The little
+cobbler 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 no
+grounds. The judge is an honest man, and with gifts I can't lay claim
+to. But I believe in Tom with all my heart. And if Tom is guilty I
+believe in the Cause of the People with all my heart all the same. The
+Fads are doomed to death, they may be reprieved, but they must die at
+last."
+
+He drew a deep sigh, and looked along the dreary Road. It was quite dark
+now, but by the light of the lamps and the gas in the shop windows the
+dull, 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 the
+little cobbler like an icy wind. He saw his own life, and a hundred
+million lives like his, swelling and breaking like bubbles on a dark
+ocean, unheeded, uncared for.
+
+A newsboy passed along, clamoring "The Bow murderer, preparations for
+the hexecution!"
+
+A terrible shudder shook the cobbler's frame. His eyes ranged
+sightlessly after the boy; the merciful tears filled them at last.
+
+"The Cause of the People," he murmured, brokenly, "I believe in the
+Cause 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, an
+ever-augmenting crowd was gathered, eager to catch the first whisper of
+a reprieve.
+
+The house was guarded by a cordon of police, for there was no
+inconsiderable danger of a popular riot. At times a section of the crowd
+groaned and hooted. Once a volley of stones was discharged at the
+windows. The news-boys were busy vending their special editions, and the
+reporters struggled through the crowd, clutching descriptive pencils,
+and ready to rush off to telegraph offices should anything "extra
+special" occur. Telegraph boys were coming up every now and again with
+threats, messages, petitions and exhortations from all parts of the
+country to the unfortunate Home Secretary, who was striving to keep his
+aching head cool as he went through the voluminous evidence for the last
+time and pondered over the more important letters which "The Greater
+Jury" had contributed to the obscuration of the problem. Grodman's
+letter in that morning's paper shook him most; under his scientific
+analysis the circumstantial chain seemed forged of painted cardboard.
+Then the poor man read the judge's summing up, and the chain became
+tempered steel. The noise of the crowd outside broke upon his ear in his
+study 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. There
+were many that loved the man who lay in the jaws of death, and a spirit
+of mad revolt surged in their breasts. And the sky was gray, and the
+bleak night deepened and the shadow of the gallows crept on.
+
+Suddenly a strange inarticulate murmur spread through the crowd, a vague
+whisper of no one knew what. Something had happened. Somebody was
+coming. A second later and one of the outskirts of the throng was
+agitated, and a convulsive cheer went up from it, and was taken up
+infectiously all along the street. The crowd parted--a hansom dashed
+through the center. "Grodman! Grodman!" shouted those who recognized the
+occupant. "Grodman! Hurrah!" Grodman was outwardly calm and pale, but
+his eyes glittered; he waved his hand encouragingly as the hansom dashed
+up to the door, cleaving the turbulent crowd as a canoe cleaves the
+waters. Grodman sprang out, the constables at the portal made way for
+him respectfully. He knocked imperatively, the door was opened
+cautiously; a boy rushed up and delivered a telegram; Grodman forced his
+way in, gave his name, and insisted on seeing the Home Secretary on a
+matter of life and death. Those near the door heard his words and
+cheered, and the crowd divined the good omen, and the air throbbed with
+cannonades of joyous sound. The cheers rang in Grodman's ears as the
+door slammed behind him. The reporters struggled to the front. An
+excited knot of working men pressed round the arrested hansom, they took
+the horse out. A dozen enthusiasts struggled for the honor of placing
+themselves between the shafts. And the crowd awaited Grodman.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+Grodman was ushered into the conscientious Minister's study. The doughty
+chief of the agitation was, perhaps, the one man who could not be
+denied. As he entered, the Home Secretary's face seemed lit up with
+relief. At a sign from his master, the amanuensis who had brought in the
+last 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 came
+under his own eyes.
+
+"You have a valid reason for troubling me, I suppose, Mr. Grodman?" said
+the 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 any
+attention 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 never
+been a criminal lawyer, like some of my predecessors. But I should
+hardly speak of it as a science; I look upon it as a question of
+common-sense."
+
+"Pardon me, sir. It is the most subtle and difficult of all the
+sciences. It is, indeed, rather the science of the sciences. What is the
+whole of Inductive Logic, as laid down, say, by Bacon and Mill, but an
+attempt to appraise the value of evidence, the said evidence being the
+trails left by the Creator, so to speak? The Creator has--I say it in
+all reverence--drawn a myriad red herrings across the track, but the
+true scientist refuses to be baffled by superficial appearances in
+detecting the secrets of Nature. The vulgar herd catches at the gross
+apparent fact, but the man of insight knows that what lies on the
+surface does lie."
+
+"Very interesting, Mr. Grodman, but really----"
+
+"Bear with me, sir. The science of evidence being thus so extremely
+subtle, and demanding the most acute and trained observation of facts,
+the most comprehensive understanding of human psychology, is naturally
+given over to professors who have not the remotest idea that 'things are
+not what they seem,' and that everything is other than it appears; to
+professors, most of whom, by their year-long devotion to the
+shop-counter or the desk, have acquired an intimate acquaintance with
+all 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 a
+witness. The retailing of evidence--the observation of the facts--is
+given over to people who go through their lives without eyes; the
+appreciation of evidence--the judging of these facts--is surrendered to
+people who may possibly be adepts in weighing out pounds of sugar. Apart
+from their sheer inability to fulfill either function--to observe, or to
+judge--their observation and their judgment alike are vitiated by all
+sorts of irrelevant prejudices."
+
+"You are attacking trial by jury."
+
+"Not necessarily. I am prepared to accept that scientifically, on the
+ground that, as there are, as a rule, only two alternatives, the balance
+of probability is slightly in favor of the true decision being come to.
+Then, in cases where experts like myself have got up the evidence, the
+jury 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 fresh
+concrete 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 but
+the truth'?"
+
+"Fifty?" said the Minister, humoring him a little.
+
+"Not five. I say nothing of lapses of memory, of inborn defects of
+observational power--though the suspiciously precise recollection of
+dates and events possessed by ordinary witnesses in important trials
+taking place years after the occurrences involved, is one of the most
+amazing things in the curiosities of modern jurisprudence. I defy you,
+sir, to tell me what you had for dinner last Monday, or what exactly you
+were saying and doing at five o'clock last Tuesday afternoon. Nobody
+whose life does not run in mechanical grooves can do anything of the
+sort; unless, of course, the facts have been very impressive. But this
+by the way. The great obstacle to veracious observation is the element
+of prepossession in all vision. Has it ever struck you, sir, that we
+never see anyone more than once, if that? The first time we meet a man
+we may possibly see him as he is; the second time our vision is colored
+and modified by the memory of the first. Do our friends appear to us as
+they appear to strangers? Do our rooms, our furniture, our pipes strike
+our eye as they would strike the eye of an outsider, looking on them for
+the first time? Can a mother see her babe's ugliness, or a lover his
+mistress' shortcomings, though they stare everybody else in the face?
+Can we see ourselves as others see us? No; habit, prepossession changes
+all. The mind is a large factor of every so-called external fact. The
+eye sees, sometimes, what it wishes to see, more often what it expects
+to see. You follow me, sir?"
+
+The Home Secretary nodded his head less impatiently. He was beginning to
+be interested. The hubbub from without broke faintly upon their ears.
+
+"To give you a definite example. Mr. Wimp says that when I burst open
+the door of Mr. Constant's room on the morning of December 4th, and saw
+that 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 I
+admit that this was so, only in things like this you do not seem to
+conclude, 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 burning
+stick, you do not believe in its continuous existence. It is the same
+when witnessing a legerdemain performance. Seeing is not always
+believing, despite the proverb; but believing is often seeing. It is not
+to the point that in that little matter of the door Wimp was as
+hopelessly and incurably wrong as he has been in everything all along.
+Though the door was securely bolted, I confess that I should have seen
+that I had broken the bolt in forcing the door, even if it had been
+broken beforehand. Never once since December 4th did this possibility
+occur to me, till Wimp with perverted ingenuity suggested it. If this is
+the case with a trained observer, one moreover fully conscious of this
+ineradicable tendency of the human mind, how must it be with an
+untrained observer?"
+
+"Come to the point, come to the point," said the Home Secretary, putting
+out his hand as if it itched to touch the bell on the writing-table.
+
+"Such as," went on Grodman imperturbably, "such as--Mrs. Drabdump. That
+worthy person is unable, by repeated violent knocking, to arouse her
+lodger who yet desires to be aroused; she becomes alarmed, she rushes
+across to get my assistance; I burst open the door--what do you think
+the 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 condition
+of Arthur Constant when the door yielded to my violent exertions and
+flew open?"
+
+"Why, was he not dead?" gasped the Home Secretary, his heart fluttering
+violently.
+
+"Dead? A young, healthy fellow like that! When the door flew open Arthur
+Constant was sleeping the sleep of the just. It was a deep, a very deep
+sleep, of course, else the blows at his door would long since have
+awakened him. But all the while Mrs. Drabdump's fancy was picturing her
+lodger cold and stark the poor young fellow was lying in bed in a nice
+warm 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 of
+exhaustion. 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 alarmed
+at. It was a solitary experiment, and I intend it to remain so." The
+noise 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 Home
+Secretary's home secretary appeared. He looked at the great man's
+agitated face with suppressed surprise.
+
+"Thank you for calling in your amanuensis," said Grodman. "I intended to
+ask 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 appendix
+to the twenty-fifth edition--sort of silver wedding--of my book,
+'Criminals I Have Caught,' Mr. Denzil Cantercot, who, by the will I have
+made to-day, is appointed my literary executor, will have the task of
+working it up with literary and dramatic touches after the model of the
+other chapters of my book. I have every confidence he will be able to do
+me as much justice, from a literary point of view, as you, sir, no doubt
+will from a legal. I feel certain he will succeed in catching the style
+of 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 his
+statement in shorthand."
+
+"Thank you, sir," said Grodman, heartily. "Ready, Mr. Templeton? Here
+goes. My career till I left the Scotland-Yard Detective Department is
+known to all the world. Is that too fast for you, Mr. Templeton? A
+little? Well, I'll go slower; but pull me up if I forget to keep the
+brake on. When I retired, I discovered that I was a bachelor. But it was
+too 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 was
+published I had nothing more to do but think. I had plenty of money, and
+it was safely invested; there was no call for speculation. The future
+was 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 my
+ancient exploits; I re-read my book. And as I thought and thought, away
+from the excitement of the actual hunt, and seeing the facts in a truer
+perspective, so it grew daily clearer to me that criminals were more
+fools than rogues. Every crime I had traced, however cleverly
+perpetrated, was from the point of view of penetrability a weak failure.
+Traces and trails were left on all sides--ragged edges, rough-hewn
+corners; in short, the job was botched, artistic completeness
+unattained. To the vulgar, my feats might seem marvelous--the average
+man is mystified to grasp how you detect the letter 'e' in a simple
+cryptogram--to myself they were as commonplace as the crimes they
+unveiled. To me now, with my lifelong study of the science of evidence,
+it seemed possible to commit not merely one, but a thousand crimes that
+should be absolutely undiscoverable. And yet criminals would go on
+sinning, and giving themselves away, in the same old grooves--no
+originality, no dash, no individual insight, no fresh conception! One
+would imagine there were an Academy of crime with forty thousand
+armchairs. And gradually, as I pondered and brooded over the thought,
+there came upon me the desire to commit a crime that should baffle
+detection. I could invent hundreds of such crimes, and please myself by
+imagining them done; but would they really work out in practice?
+Evidently the sole performer of my experiment must be myself; the
+subject--whom or what? Accident should determine. I itched to commence
+with murder--to tackle the stiffest problems first, and I burned to
+startle and baffle the world--especially the world of which I had ceased
+to 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 sported
+with my pet theories, and fitted them mentally on everyone I met. Every
+friend or acquaintance I sat and gossiped with, I was plotting how to
+murder without leaving a clue. There is not one of my friends or
+acquaintances I have not done away with in thought. There is no public
+man--have no fear, my dear Home Secretary--I have not planned to
+assassinate secretly, mysteriously, unintelligibly, undiscoverably. Ah,
+how I could give the stock criminals points--with their second-hand
+motives, their conventional conceptions, their commonplace details,
+their lack of artistic feeling and restraint.
+
+"The late Arthur Constant came to live nearly opposite me. I cultivated
+his acquaintance--he was a lovable young fellow, an excellent subject
+for experiment. I do not know when I have ever taken to a man more. From
+the moment I first set eyes on him, there was a peculiar sympathy
+between us. We were drawn to each other. I felt instinctively he would
+be the man. I loved to hear him speak enthusiastically of the
+Brotherhood 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 stealing
+a moment's chat with me from his engrossing self-appointed duties. It is
+a pity humanity should have been robbed of so valuable a life. But it
+had to be. At a quarter to ten on the night of December 3d he came to
+me. Naturally I said nothing about this visit at the inquest or the
+trial. His object was to consult me mysteriously about some girl. He
+said he had privately lent her money--which she was to repay at her
+convenience. What the money was for he did not know, except that it was
+somehow connected with an act of abnegation in which he had vaguely
+encouraged her. The girl had since disappeared, and he was in distress
+about her. He would not tell me who it was--of course now, sir, you know
+as well as I it was Jessie Dymond--but asked for advice as to how to set
+about finding her. He mentioned that Mortlake was leaving for Devonport
+by the first train on the next day. Of old I should have connected these
+two facts and sought the thread; now, as he spoke, all my thoughts were
+dyed red. He was suffering perceptibly from toothache, and in answer to
+my sympathetic inquiries told me it had been allowing him very little
+sleep. Everything combined to invite the trial of one of my favorite
+theories. I spoke to him in a fatherly way, and when I had tendered some
+vague advice about the girl, and made him promise to secure a night's
+rest (before he faced the arduous tram-men's meeting in the morning) by
+taking a sleeping-draught, I gave him some sulfonal in a phial. It is a
+new drug, which produces protracted sleep without disturbing the
+digestion, and which I use myself. He promised faithfully to take the
+draught; and I also exhorted him earnestly to bolt and bar and lock
+himself in so as to stop up every chink or aperture by which the cold
+air of the winter's night might creep into the room. I remonstrated with
+him on the careless manner he treated his body, and he laughed in his
+good-humored, gentle way, and promised to obey me in all things. And he
+did. That Mrs. Drabdump, failing to rouse him, would cry 'Murder!' I
+took for certain. She is built that way. As even Sir Charles
+Brown-Harland remarked, she habitually takes her prepossessions for
+facts, her inferences for observations. She forecasts the future in
+gray. 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 on
+almost any woman under similar conditions. The only uncertain link in
+the chain was: Would Mrs. Drabdump rush across to get me to break open
+the door? Women always rush for a man. I was well-nigh the nearest, and
+certainly the most authoritative man in the street, and I took it for
+granted 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 course
+Arthur Constant would have awoke, or somebody else breaking open the
+door would have found him sleeping; no harm done, nobody any the wiser.
+I could hardly sleep myself that night. The thought of the extraordinary
+crime I was about to commit--a burning curiosity to know whether Wimp
+would detect the _modus operandi_--the prospect of sharing the feelings
+of murderers with whom I had been in contact all my life without being
+in touch with the terrible joys of their inner life--the fear lest I
+should be too fast asleep to hear Mrs. Drabdump's knock--these things
+agitated me and disturbed my rest. I lay tossing on my bed, planning
+every detail of poor Constant's end. The hours dragged slowly and
+wretchedly on toward the misty dawn. I was racked with suspense. Was I
+to be disappointed after all? At last the welcome sound came--the
+rat-tat-tat of murder. The echoes of that knock are yet in my ear. 'Come
+over and kill him!' I put my night-capped head out of the window and
+told her to wait for me. I dressed hurriedly, took my razor, and went
+across to 11 Glover Street. As I broke open the door of the bedroom in
+which Arthur Constant lay sleeping, his head resting on his hands, I
+cried, 'My God!' as if I saw some awful vision. A mist as of blood
+swam before Mrs. Drabdump's eyes. She cowered back, for an instant
+(I divined rather than saw the action) she shut off the dreaded
+sight with her hands. In that instant I had made my cut--precisely,
+scientifically--made so deep a cut and drew out the weapon so sharply
+that there was scarce a drop of blood on it; then there came from the
+throat a jet of blood which Mrs. Drabdump, conscious only of the horrid
+gash, saw but vaguely. I covered up the face quickly with a handkerchief
+to hide any convulsive distortion. But as the medical evidence (in this
+detail accurate) testified, death was instantaneous. I pocketed the
+razor and the empty sulfonal phial. With a woman like Mrs. Drabdump to
+watch me, I could do anything I pleased. I got her to draw my attention
+to the fact that both the windows were fastened. Some fool, by the by,
+thought there was a discrepancy in the evidence because the police found
+only one window fastened, forgetting that, in my innocence, I took care
+not to fasten the window I had opened to call for aid. Naturally I did
+not 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. My
+object was to gain time. I wanted the body to be fairly cold and stiff
+before being discovered, though there was not much danger here; for, as
+you saw by the medical evidence, there is no telling the time of death
+to an hour or two. The frank way in which I said the death was very
+recent disarmed all suspicion, and even Dr. Robinson was unconsciously
+worked upon, in adjudging the time of death, by the knowledge (query
+here, Mr. Templeton) that it had preceded my advent on the scene.
+
+"Before leaving Mrs. Drabdump there is just one point I should like to
+say a word about. You have listened so patiently, sir, to my lectures on
+the science of sciences that you will not refuse to hear the last. A
+good deal of importance has been attached to Mrs. Drabdump's
+oversleeping herself by half an hour. It happens that this (like the
+innocent fog which has also been made responsible for much) is a purely
+accidental and irrelevant circumstance. In all works on inductive logic
+it is thoroughly recognized that only some of the circumstances of a
+phenomenon are of its essence and causally interconnected; there is
+always a certain proportion of heterogeneous accompaniments which have
+no intimate relation whatever with the phenomenon. Yet so crude is as
+yet the comprehension of the science of evidence, that every feature of
+the phenomenon under investigation is made equally important, and sought
+to be linked with the chain of evidence. To attempt to explain
+everything is always the mark of the tyro. The fog and Mrs. Drabdump's
+oversleeping herself were mere accidents. There are always these
+irrelevant accompaniments, and the true scientist allows for this
+element of (so to speak) chemically unrelated detail. Even I never
+counted on the unfortunate series of accidental phenomena which have led
+to 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 few
+minutes earlier on the night of December 3d, so that she didn't know of
+Constant's visit, was a relevant accident. In fact, just as the art of
+the artist or the editor consists largely in knowing what to leave out,
+so does the art of the scientific detector of crime consist in knowing
+what details to ignore. In short, to explain everything is to explain
+too much. And too much is worse than too little. To return to my
+experiment. My success exceeded my wildest dreams. None had an inkling
+of the truth. The insolubility of the Big Bow Mystery teased the acutest
+minds in Europe and the civilized world. That a man could have been
+murdered in a thoroughly inaccessible room savored of the ages of magic.
+The redoubtable Wimp, who had been blazoned as my successor, fell back
+on 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, and
+to look at the crime with the eyes of another, or of my old self. I
+found the work of art so perfect as to leave only one sublimely simple
+solution. The very terms of the problem were so inconceivable that, had
+I not been the murderer, I should have suspected myself, in conjunction
+of course with Mrs. Drabdump. The first persons to enter the room would
+have seemed to me guilty. I wrote at once (in a disguised hand and over
+the 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 who
+entered the room together. To dash a half-truth in the world's eyes is
+the surest way of blinding it altogether. This letter of mine I
+contradicted myself (in my own name) the next day, and in the course of
+the long letter which I was tempted to write I adduced fresh evidence
+against 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 enjoyed
+the hunt more. Unfortunately, Wimp, set on the chase again by my own
+letter, by dint of persistent blundering, blundered into a track
+which--by a devilish tissue of coincidences I had neither foreseen nor
+dreamt of--seemed to the world the true. Mortlake was arrested and
+condemned. Wimp had apparently crowned his reputation. This was too
+much. I had taken all this trouble merely to put a feather in Wimp's
+cap, whereas I had expected to shake his reputation by it. It was bad
+enough that an innocent man should suffer; but that Wimp should achieve
+a reputation he did not deserve, and overshadow all his predecessors by
+dint of a colossal mistake, this seemed to me intolerable. I have moved
+heaven 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 world
+searched for the missing girl; I have petitioned and agitated. In vain.
+I have failed. Now I play my last card. As the overweening Wimp could
+not be allowed to go down to posterity as the solver of this terrible
+mystery, I decided that the condemned man might just as well profit by
+his exposure. That is the reason I make the exposure to-night, before it
+is too late to save Mortlake."
+
+"So that is the reason?" said the Home Secretary with a suspicion of
+mockery in his tones.
+
+"The sole reason."
+
+Even as he spoke a deeper roar than ever penetrated the study. The crowd
+had again started cheering. Impatient as the watchers were, they felt
+that no news was good news. The longer the interview accorded by the
+Home Secretary to the chairman of the Defense Committee, the greater the
+hope 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 the
+house."
+
+Templeton went back into the outer room and brought back the cablegram
+that had been lying on the Minister's writing-table when Grodman came
+in. The Home Secretary silently handed it to his visitor. It was from
+the Chief of Police of Melbourne, announcing that Jessie Dymond had just
+arrived in that city in a sailing vessel, ignorant of all that had
+occurred, and had been immediately dispatched back to England, having
+made a statement entirely corroborating the theory of the defense.
+
+"Pending further inquiries into this," said the Home Secretary, not
+without appreciation of the grim humor of the situation as he glanced at
+Grodman's ashen cheeks, "I have reprieved the prisoner. Mr. Templeton
+was about to dispatch the messenger to the governor of Newgate as you
+entered this room. Mr. Wimp's card-castle would have tumbled to pieces
+without your assistance. Your still undiscoverable crime would have
+shaken his reputation as you intended."
+
+A sudden explosion shook the room and blent with the cheers of the
+populace. 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 of
+the hansom helped to bear the stretcher.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+The Antique Library of Standard and Popular 12mos.
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+    AN AMERICAN GIRL IN LONDON. Duncan.
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+    HANS OF ICELAND. Hugo.
+    HAROLD. Lytton.
+    HEART OF MIDLOTHIAN. Scott.
+    HEIR OF LINNE. Buchanan.
+    HEIR OF REDCLYFFE. Yonge.
+    HORTENSE. Heimburg.
+    HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES. Hawthorne.
+    HOUSE OF THE WOLF. Weyman.
+    HOUSE PARTY. Ouida.
+    HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME. Hugo.
+    HYPATIA. Kingsley.
+    IN ALL SHADES. Allen.
+    IN LOVE'S DOMAINS. Ryan.
+    INTO MOROCCO. Loti.
+    IRONMASTER. Ohnet.
+    IRON PIRATE. Pemberton.
+    IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO MEND. Reade.
+    IVANHOE. Scott.
+    JANE EYRE. Bronte.
+    JOHN HALIFAX, GENTLEMAN. Mulock.
+    JOSEPH BALSAMO. Dumas.
+    KARMA. Sinnett.
+    KENELM CHILLINGLY. Lytton.
+    KENILWORTH. Scott.
+    KIDNAPPED. Stevenson.
+    KINGS IN EXILE. Daudet.
+    LAST DAYS OF POMPEII. Lytton.
+    LAST OF THE MOHICANS. Cooper.
+    LIGHT OF ASIA. Arnold.
+    LIGHT THAT FAILED. Kipling.
+    LORNA DOONE. Blackmore.
+    LUCILE. Meredith.
+    LUCRETIA. Lytton.
+    MAN OF MARK. Hope.
+    MAROONED. Russell.
+    MARRIAGE AT SEA. Russell.
+    MARTIN HEWITT. Morrison.
+    MASTER OF BALLANTRAE. Stevenson.
+    MASTER OF THE MINE. Buchanan.
+    MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE. Hardy.
+    MEMOIRS OF A PHYSICIAN. Dumas.
+    MERZE. Ryan.
+    MICAH CLARKE. Doyle.
+    MICHAEL'S CRAG. Allen.
+    MIDDLEMARCH. Eliot.
+    MILL ON THE FLOSS. Eliot.
+    MINE OWN PEOPLE AND IN BLACK AND WHITE. Kipling.
+    MONASTERY, THE Scott.
+    MRS. ANNIE GREEN. Read.
+    MY LADY NICOTINE. Barrie.
+    NEWCOMES. Thackeray.
+    NICHOLAS NICKLEBY. Dickens.
+    NORTH AGAINST SOUTH. Verne.
+    OLD MORTALITY. Scott.
+    ONE OF THE FORTY. Daudet.
+    ON THE HEIGHTS. Auerbach.
+    ORIGIN OF SPECIES. Darwin.
+    OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. Dickens.
+    PAGAN OF THE ALLEGHANIES. Ryan.
+    PATHFINDER. Cooper.
+    PAUL CLIFFORD. Lytton.
+    PELHAM. Lytton.
+    PERE GORIOT. Balzac.
+    PHANTOM RICKSHAW. Kipling.
+    PICKWICK PAPERS. Dickens.
+    PILGRIMS OF THE RHINE. Lytton.
+    PILGRIM'S PROGRESS. Bunyan.
+    PIONEERS. Cooper.
+    PIRATE. Scott.
+    PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS. Kipling.
+    PRAIRIE. Cooper.
+    PRETTY MICHAL. Jokai.
+    PRINCE OF THE HOUSE OF DAVID. Ingraham.
+    QUENTIN DURWARD. Scott.
+    RED GAUNTLET. Scott.
+    REPROACH OF ANNESLEY. Grey.
+    RETURN OF THE NATIVE. Hardy.
+    RIENZI. Lytton.
+    ROBINSON CRUSOE. Defoe.
+    ROB ROY. Scott.
+    ROMANCE OF TWO WORLDS. Corelli.
+    ROMOLA. Eliot.
+    ST. RONAN'S WELL. Scott.
+    SARCHEDON. Whyte-Melville.
+    SCARLET LETTER. Hawthorne.
+    SCOTT'S POEMS. Scott.
+    SCOTTISH CHIEFS. Porter.
+    SEA WOLVES. Pemberton.
+    SHADOW OF A CRIME. Caine.
+    SHE FELL IN LOVE WITH HER HUSBAND. Werner.
+    SIGN OF THE FOUR. Doyle.
+    SILENCE OF DEAN MAITLAND. Grey.
+    SKETCH BOOK. Irving.
+    SOLDIERS THREE. Kipling.
+    SON OF HAGAR. Caine.
+    SONG OF HIAWATHA. Longfellow.
+    SQUAW ELOUISE. Ryan.
+    STORY OF AN AFRICAN FARM. Schreiner.
+    STRANGE STORY. Lytton.
+    STRONGER THAN DEATH. Gautier.
+    STUDY IN SCARLET. Doyle.
+    STUDY OF GENIUS. Royse.
+    SURGEON'S DAUGHTER. Scott.
+    SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON. Wyss.
+    TALE OF TWO CITIES. Dickens.
+    TALES FROM SHAKESPEARE. Lamb.
+    TALISMAN. Scott.
+    THADDEUS OF WARSAW. Porter.
+    THELMA. Corelli.
+    THREE MEN IN A BOAT. Jerome.
+    TOILERS OF THE SEA. Hugo.
+    TOLD IN THE HILLS. Ryan.
+    TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. Hughes.
+    TOM BROWN'S SCHOOL DAYS. Hughes.
+    TREASURE ISLAND. Stevenson.
+    UNCLE TOM'S CABIN. Stowe.
+    UNDER THE DEODARS AND STORY OF THE GADSBYS. Kipling.
+    UNDER TWO FLAGS. Ouida.
+    UP TERRAPIN RIVER. Read.
+    VANITY FAIR. Thackeray.
+    VICAR OF WAKEFIELD. Goldsmith.
+    WAVERLY. Scott.
+    WEE WILLIE WINKIE. Kipling.
+    WESTWARD HO. Kingsley.
+    WE TWO. Lyall.
+    WHAT'S BRED IN THE BONE. Allen.
+    WHITE COMPANY. Doyle.
+    WOODLANDERS. Hardy.
+    WOODSTOCK. Scott.
+    ZANONI. Lytton.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Big Bow Mystery, by I. Zangwill
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Big Bow Mystery, by I. Zangwill
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Big Bow Mystery
+
+Author: I. Zangwill
+
+Release Date: February 23, 2009 [EBook #28164]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BIG BOW MYSTERY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<h1>The Big Bow Mystery</h1>
+
+<h2>By I. Zangwill</h2>
+
+
+<h3>Chicago and New York<br />
+Rand, McNally &amp; Company</h3>
+
+<h3>Copyright, 1895, by Rand, McNally &amp; Co.</h3>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a name="illus1" id="illus1"></a>
+<img src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""/>
+</div>
+
+<h3>"My God!" he cried.</h3>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. -->
+<p>
+<a href="#INTRODUCTION">INTRODUCTION.</a><br />
+<a href="#NOTE">NOTE.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII.</a><br /><br />
+<a href="#The_Antique_Library_of_Standard_and_Popular_12mos">The Antique Library of Standard and Popular 12mos.</a><br />
+</p>
+<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. -->
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2>
+
+<p><a href="#illus1">"My God!" he cried.</a></p>
+
+<p><a href="#illus2">Denzil Cantercot stood smoking a cigarette.</a></p>
+
+<p><a href="#illus3">Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese.</a></p>
+
+<p><a href="#illus4">He fell at the Home Secretary's feet, stone dead.</a></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="INTRODUCTION" id="INTRODUCTION"></a>INTRODUCTION.</h3>
+
+<h3>OF MURDERS AND MYSTERIES.</h3>
+
+
+<p>As this little book was written some four years ago, I feel able to
+review it without prejudice. A new book just hot from the brain is
+naturally apt to appear faulty to its begetter, but an old book has got
+into the proper perspective and may be praised by him without fear or
+favor. "The Big Bow Mystery" seems to me an excellent murder story, as
+murder stories go, for, while as sensational as the most of them, it
+contains more humor and character creation than the best. Indeed, the
+humor is too abundant. Mysteries should be sedate and sober. There
+should be a pervasive atmosphere of horror and awe such as Poe manages
+to create. Humor is out of tone; it would be more artistic to preserve a
+somber note throughout. But I was a realist in those days, and in real
+life mysteries occur to real persons with their individual humors, and
+mysterious circumstances are apt to be complicated by comic. The
+indispensable condition of a good mystery is that it should be able and
+unable to be solved by the reader, and that the writer's solution should
+satisfy. Many a mystery runs on breathlessly enough till the d&eacute;nouement
+is reached, only to leave the reader with the sense of having been
+robbed of his breath under false pretenses. And not only must the
+solution be adequate, but all its data must be given in the body of the
+story. The author must not suddenly spring a new person or a new
+circumstance upon his reader at the end. Thus, if a friend were to ask
+me to guess who dined with him yesterday, it would be fatuous if he had
+in mind somebody of whom he knew I had never heard. The only person who
+has ever solved "The Big Bow Mystery" is myself. This is not paradox but
+plain fact. For long before the book was written, I said to myself one
+night that no mystery-monger had ever murdered a man in a room to which
+there was no possible access. The puzzle was scarcely propounded ere the
+solution 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 him
+with a more original piece of fiction. I might have refused, but there
+was murder in my soul, and here was the opportunity. I went to work
+seriously, though the <i>Morning Post</i> subsequently said the skit was too
+labored, and I succeeded at least in exciting my readers, so many of
+whom sent in unsolicited testimonials in the shape of solutions during
+the run of the story that, when it ended, the editor asked me to say
+something by way of acknowledgement. Thereupon I wrote a letter to the
+paper, thanking the would-be solvers for their kindly attempts to help
+me out of the mess into which I had got the plot. I did not like to
+wound their feelings by saying straight out that they had failed, one
+and all, to hit on the real murderer, just like real police, so I tried
+to break the truth to them in a roundabout, mendacious fashion, as thus:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>To the Editor of "The Star."</i></p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Sir:</span> 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&mdash;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, <i>at any rate in a story</i>." 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 <i>am</i> 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.</p>
+
+<p>Again thanking your readers for their valuable assistance, Yours,
+etc.</p></div>
+
+<p>One would have imagined that nobody could take this seriously, for it is
+obvious that the mystery-story is just the one species of story that can
+not be told impromptu or altered at the last moment, seeing that it
+demands the most careful piecing together and the most elaborate
+dove-tailing. Nevertheless, if you cast your joke upon the waters, you
+shall find it no joke after many days. This is what I read in the
+<i>Lyttelton Times</i>, New Zealand: "The chain of circumstantial evidence
+seems fairly irrefragable. From all accounts, Mr. Zangwill himself was
+puzzled, after carefully forging every link, how to break it. The method
+ultimately adopted I consider more ingenious than convincing." After
+that I made up my mind never to joke again, but this good intention now
+helps to pave the beaten path.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">I. Zangwill.</span><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">London</span>, September, 1895.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="NOTE" id="NOTE"></a>NOTE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The Mystery which the author will always associate with this story is
+how he got through the task of writing it. It was written in a
+fortnight&mdash;day by day&mdash;to meet a sudden demand from the "Star," which
+made "a new departure" with it.</p>
+
+<p>The said fortnight was further disturbed by an extraordinary combined
+attack of other troubles and tasks. This is no excuse for the
+shortcomings of the book, as it was always open to the writer to revise
+or suppress it. The latter function may safely be left to the public,
+while if the work stands&mdash;almost to a letter&mdash;as it appeared in the
+"Star," it is because the author cannot tell a story more than once.</p>
+
+<p>The introduction of Mr. Gladstone into a fictitious scene is defended on
+the ground that he is largely mythical.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">I. Z.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>THE BIG BOW MYSTERY.</h2>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2>
+
+
+<p>On a memorable morning of early December London opened its eyes on a
+frigid gray mist. There are mornings when King Fog masses his molecules
+of carbon in serried squadrons in the city, while he scatters them
+tenuously in the suburbs; so that your morning train may bear you from
+twilight to darkness. But to-day the enemy's maneuvering was more
+monotonous. From Bow even unto Hammersmith there draggled a dull,
+wretched vapor, like the wraith of an impecunious suicide come into a
+fortune immediately after the fatal deed. The barometers and
+thermometers had sympathetically shared its depression, and their
+spirits (when they had any) were low. The cold cut like a many-bladed
+knife.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump, of 11 Glover Street, Bow, was one of the few persons in
+London whom fog did not depress. She went about her work quite as
+cheerlessly as usual. She had been among the earliest to be aware of the
+enemy's advent, picking out the strands of fog from the coils of
+darkness the moment she rolled up her bedroom blind and unveiled the
+somber picture of the winter morning. She knew that the fog had come to
+stay for the day at least, and that the gas bill for the quarter was
+going to beat the record in high-jumping. She also knew that this was
+because 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 him
+a proportion of the actual account for the whole house. The
+meteorologists might have saved the credit of their science if they had
+reckoned with Mrs. Drabdump's next gas bill when they predicted the
+weather and made "Snow" the favorite, and said that "Fog" would be
+nowhere. Fog was everywhere, yet Mrs. Drabdump took no credit to herself
+for her prescience. Mrs. Drabdump indeed took no credit for anything,
+paying her way along doggedly, and struggling through life like a
+wearied swimmer trying to touch the horizon. That things always went as
+badly as she had foreseen did not exhilarate her in the least.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump was a widow. Widows are not born, but made, else you might
+have fancied Mrs. Drabdump had always been a widow. Nature had given her
+that tall, spare form, and that pale, thin-lipped, elongated, hard-eyed
+visage, and that painfully precise hair, which are always associated
+with widowhood in low life. It is only in higher circles that women can
+lose their husbands and yet remain bewitching. The late Mr. Drabdump had
+scratched the base of his thumb with a rusty nail, and Mrs. Drabdump's
+foreboding that he would die of lockjaw had not prevented her wrestling
+day and night with the shadow of Death, as she had wrestled with it
+vainly twice before, when Katie died of diphtheria and little Johnny of
+scarlet fever. Perhaps it is from overwork among the poor that Death has
+been reduced to a shadow.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump was lighting the kitchen fire. She did it very
+scientifically, as knowing the contrariety of coal and the anxiety of
+flaming sticks to end in smoke unless rigidly kept up to the mark.
+Science was a success as usual; and Mrs. Drabdump rose from her knees
+content, like a Parsee priestess who had duly paid her morning devotions
+to 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 to
+fifteen minutes to seven. Mrs. Drabdump's devotion to the kitchen fire
+invariably terminated at fifteen minutes past six. What was the matter
+with the clock?</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump had an immediate vision of Snoppet, the neighboring
+horologist, keeping the clock in hand for weeks and then returning it
+only superficially repaired and secretly injured more vitally "for the
+good of the trade." The evil vision vanished as quickly as it came,
+exorcised by the deep boom of St. Dunstan's bells chiming the
+three-quarters. In its place a great horror surged. Instinct had failed;
+Mrs. Drabdump had risen at half-past six instead of six. Now she
+understood why she had been feeling so dazed and strange and sleepy. She
+had overslept herself.</p>
+
+<p>Chagrined and puzzled, she hastily set the kettle over the crackling
+coal, discovering a second later that she had overslept herself because
+Mr. Constant wished to be woke three-quarters of an hour earlier than
+usual, and to have his breakfast at seven, having to speak at an early
+meeting of discontented tram-men. She ran at once, candle in hand, to
+his bedroom. It was upstairs. All "upstairs" was Arthur Constant's
+domain, 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 at
+once." The usual slumbrous "All right" was not forthcoming; but, as she
+herself had varied her morning salute, her ear was less expectant of the
+echo. She went downstairs, with no foreboding save that the kettle would
+come off second best in the race between its boiling and her lodger's
+dressing.</p>
+
+<p>For she knew there was no fear of Arthur Constant's lying deaf to the
+call of duty&mdash;temporarily represented by Mrs. Drabdump. He was a light
+sleeper, and the tram conductors' bells were probably ringing in his
+ears, summoning him to the meeting. Why Arthur Constant, B.
+A.&mdash;white-handed and white-shirted, and gentleman to the very purse of
+him&mdash;should concern himself with tram-men, when fortune had confined his
+necessary relations with drivers to cabmen at the least, Mrs. Drabdump
+could not quite make out. He probably aspired to represent Bow in
+Parliament; but then it would surely have been wiser to lodge with a
+landlady who possessed a vote by having a husband alive. Nor was there
+much practical wisdom in his wish to black his own boots (an occupation
+in which he shone but little), and to live in every way like a Bow
+working man. Bow working men were not so lavish in their patronage of
+water, whether existing in drinking glasses, morning tubs, or laundress'
+establishments. Nor did they eat the delicacies with which Mrs. Drabdump
+supplied him, with the assurance that they were the artisan's appanage.
+She could not bear to see him eat things unbefitting his station. Arthur
+Constant opened his mouth and ate what his landlady gave him, not first
+deliberately shutting his eyes according to the formula, the rather
+pluming himself on keeping them very wide open. But it is difficult for
+saints to see through their own halos; and in practice an aureola about
+the head is often indistinguishable from a mist. The tea to be scalded
+in Mr. Constant's pot, when that cantankerous kettle should boil, was
+not 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 the
+fog-thickened darkness of a winter night! Well, she hoped his journey
+would be duly rewarded, that his perks would be heavy, and that he would
+make as good a thing out of the "traveling expenses" as rival labor
+leaders roundly accused him of to other people's faces. She did not
+grudge him his gains, nor was it her business if, as they alleged, in
+introducing Mr. Constant to her vacant rooms, his idea was not merely to
+benefit his landlady. He had done her an uncommon good turn, queer as
+was the lodger thus introduced. His own apostleship to the sons of toil
+gave Mrs. Drabdump no twinges of perplexity. Tom Mortlake had been a
+compositor; and apostleship was obviously a profession better paid and
+of a higher social status. Tom Mortlake&mdash;the hero of a hundred
+strikes&mdash;set up in print on a poster, was unmistakably superior to Tom
+Mortlake setting up other men's names at a case. Still, the work was not
+all beer and skittles, and Mrs. Drabdump felt that Tom's latest job was
+not enviable. She shook his door as she passed it on her way to the
+kitchen, but there was no response. The street door was only a few feet
+off down the passage, and a glance at it dispelled the last hope that
+Tom had abandoned the journey. The door was unbolted and unchained, and
+the only security was the latch-key lock. Mrs. Drabdump felt a whit
+uneasy, though, to give her her due, she never suffered as much as most
+housewives do from criminals who never come. Not quite opposite, but
+still only a few doors off, on the other side of the street, lived the
+celebrated ex-detective, Grodman, and, illogically enough, his presence
+in the street gave Mrs. Drabdump a curious sense of security, as of a
+believer living under the shadow of the fane. That any human being of
+ill-odor should consciously come within a mile of the scent of so famous
+a sleuth-hound seemed to her highly improbable. Grodman had retired
+(with a competence) and was only a sleeping dog now; still, even
+criminals would have sense enough to let him lie.</p>
+
+<p>So Mrs. Drabdump did not really feel that there had been any danger,
+especially as a second glance at the street door showed that Mortlake
+had been thoughtful enough to slip the loop that held back the bolt of
+the big lock. She allowed herself another throb of sympathy for the
+labor leader whirling on his dreary way toward Devonport Dockyard. Not
+that he had told her anything of his journey beyond the town; but she
+knew Devonport had a Dockyard because Jessie Dymond&mdash;Tom's
+sweetheart&mdash;once mentioned that her aunt lived near there, and it lay on
+the surface that Tom had gone to help the dockers, who were imitating
+their London brethren. Mrs. Drabdump did not need to be told things to
+be aware of them. She went back to prepare Mr. Constant's superfine tea,
+vaguely wondering why people were so discontented nowadays. But when she
+brought up the tea and the toast and the eggs to Mr. Constant's
+sitting-room (which adjoined his bedroom, though without communicating
+with it), Mr. Constant was not sitting in it. She lit the gas, and laid
+the cloth; then she returned to the landing and beat at the bedroom door
+with an imperative palm. Silence alone answered her. She called him by
+name and told him the hour, but hers was the only voice she heard, and
+it sounded strangely to her in the shadows of the staircase. Then,
+muttering, "Poor gentleman, he had the toothache last night; and p'r'aps
+he's only just got a wink o' sleep. Pity to disturb him for the sake of
+them grizzling conductors. I'll let him sleep his usual time," she bore
+the tea-pot downstairs with a mournful, almost poetic, consciousness,
+that soft-boiled eggs (like love) must grow cold.</p>
+
+<p>Half-past seven came&mdash;and she knocked again. But Constant slept on.</p>
+
+<p>His letters, always a strange assortment, arrived at eight, and a
+telegram came soon after. Mrs. Drabdump rattled his door, shouted, and
+at 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. She
+went downstairs again and turned the handle of Mortlake's room, and went
+in without knowing why. The coverlet of the bed showed that the occupant
+had only lain down in his clothes, as if fearing to miss the early
+train. She had not for a moment expected to find him in the room; yet
+somehow the consciousness that she was alone in the house with the
+sleeping Constant seemed to flash for the first time upon her, and the
+clammy snake tightened its folds round her heart.</p>
+
+<p>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 in
+the gray mist, blinking bleary eyes at either end, where the street
+lamps smoldered on. No one was visible for the moment, though smoke was
+rising from many of the chimneys to greet its sister mist. At the house
+of the detective across the way the blinds were still down and the
+shutters up. Yet the familiar, prosaic aspect of the street calmed her.
+The bleak air set her coughing; she slammed the door to, and returned to
+the kitchen to make fresh tea for Constant, who could only be in a deep
+sleep. But the canister trembled in her grasp. She did not know whether
+she dropped it or threw it down, but there was nothing in the hand that
+battered again a moment later at the bedroom door. No sound within
+answered the clamor without. She rained blow upon blow in a sort of
+spasm of frenzy, scarce remembering that her object was merely to wake
+her lodger, and almost staving in the lower panels with her kicks. Then
+she turned the handle and tried to open the door, but it was locked. The
+resistance recalled her to herself&mdash;she had a moment of shocked decency
+at the thought that she had been about to enter Constant's bedroom. Then
+the terror came over her afresh. She felt that she was alone in the
+house with a corpse. She sank to the floor, cowering; with difficulty
+stifling a desire to scream. Then she rose with a jerk and raced down
+the stairs without looking behind her, and threw open the door and ran
+out into the street, only pulling up with her hand violently agitating
+Grodman's door-knocker. In a moment the first floor window was
+raised&mdash;the little house was of the same pattern as her own&mdash;and
+Grodman's full, fleshy face loomed through the fog in sleepy irritation
+from under a nightcap. Despite its scowl the ex-detective's face dawned
+upon her like the sun upon an occupant of the haunted chamber.</p>
+
+<p>"What in the devil's the matter?" he growled. Grodman was not an early
+bird, now that he had no worms to catch. He could afford to despise
+proverbs now, for the house in which he lived was his, and he lived in
+it because several other houses in the street were also his, and it is
+well for the landlord to be about his own estate in Bow, where poachers
+often shoot the moon. Perhaps the desire to enjoy his greatness among
+his early cronies counted for something, too, for he had been born and
+bred at Bow, receiving when a youth his first engagement from the local
+police quarters, whence he drew a few shillings a week as an amateur
+detective in his leisure hours.</p>
+
+<p>Grodman was still a bachelor. In the celestial matrimonial bureau a
+partner might have been selected for him, but he had never been able to
+discover her. It was his one failure as a detective. He was a
+self-sufficing person, who preferred a gas stove to a domestic; but in
+deference to Glover Street opinion he admitted a female factotum between
+ten a. m. and ten p. m., and, equally in deference to Glover Street
+opinion, excluded her between ten p. m. and ten a. m.</p>
+
+<p>"I want you to come across at once," Mrs. Drabdump gasped. "Something
+has happened to Mr. Constant."</p>
+
+<p>"What! Not bludgeoned by the police at the meeting this morning, I
+hope?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, no! He didn't go. He is dead."</p>
+
+<p>"Dead?" Grodman's face grew very serious now.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Murdered!"</p>
+
+<p>"What?" almost shouted the ex-detective. "How? When? Where? Who?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. I can't get to him. I have beaten at his door. He does
+not answer."</p>
+
+<p>Grodman's face lit up with relief.</p>
+
+<p>"You silly woman! Is that all? I shall have a cold in my head. Bitter
+weather. He's dog-tired after yesterday&mdash;processions, three speeches,
+kindergarten, lecture on 'the moon,' article on co-operation. That's his
+style." It was also Grodman's style. He never wasted words.</p>
+
+<p>"No," Mrs. Drabdump breathed up at him solemnly, "he's dead."</p>
+
+<p>"All right; go back. Don't alarm the neighborhood unnecessarily. Wait
+for me. Down in five minutes." Grodman did not take this Cassandra of
+the kitchen too seriously. Probably he knew his woman. His small,
+bead-like eyes glittered with an almost amused smile as he withdrew them
+from Mrs. Drabdump's ken, and shut down the sash with a bang. The poor
+woman ran back across the road and through her door, which she would not
+close behind her. It seemed to shut her in with the dead. She waited in
+the passage. After an age&mdash;seven minutes by any honest clock&mdash;Grodman
+made his appearance, looking as dressed as usual, but with unkempt hair
+and with disconsolate side-whisker. He was not quite used to that
+side-whisker yet, for it had only recently come within the margin of
+cultivation. In active service Grodman had been clean-shaven, like all
+members of the profession&mdash;for surely your detective is the most
+versatile of actors. Mrs. Drabdump closed the street door quietly, and
+pointed to the stairs, fear operating like a polite desire to give him
+precedence. 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 no
+other sound or movement. His face grew more serious. He waited, then
+knocked, 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 the
+upper panels, but the door seemed bolted as well as locked. He stood
+still, his face set and rigid, for he liked and esteemed the man.</p>
+
+<p>"Ay, knock your loudest," whispered the pale-faced woman. "You'll not
+wake him now."</p>
+
+<p>The gray mist had followed them through the street door, and hovered
+about the staircase, charging the air with a moist, sepulchral odor.</p>
+
+<p>"Locked and bolted," muttered Grodman, shaking the door afresh.</p>
+
+<p>"Burst it open," breathed the woman, trembling violently all over, and
+holding her hands before her as if to ward off the dreadful vision.
+Without another word, Grodman applied his shoulder to the door, and made
+a violent muscular effort. He had been an athlete in his time, and the
+sap 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 bent
+upward, the large upper bolt tore off its iron staple; the door flew
+back with a crash. Grodman rushed in.</p>
+
+<p>"My God!" he cried. The woman shrieked. The sight was too terrible.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Within a few hours the jubilant news-boys were shrieking "Horrible
+Suicide in Bow," and "The Star" poster added, for the satisfaction of
+those too poor to purchase: "A Philanthropist Cuts His Throat."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2>
+
+
+<p>But the newspapers were premature. Scotland Yard refused to prejudge the
+case despite the penny-a-liners. Several arrests were made, so that the
+later editions were compelled to soften "Suicide" into "Mystery." The
+people arrested were a nondescript collection of tramps. Most of them
+had committed other offenses for which the police had not arrested them.
+One bewildered-looking gentleman gave himself up (as if he were a
+riddle), but the police would have none of him, and restored him
+forthwith to his friends and keepers. The number of candidates for each
+new opening in Newgate is astonishing.</p>
+
+<p>The full significance of this tragedy of a noble young life cut short
+had hardly time to filter into the public mind, when a fresh sensation
+absorbed it. Tom Mortlake had been arrested the same day at Liverpool on
+suspicion of being concerned in the death of his fellow-lodger. The news
+fell like a bombshell upon a land in which Tom Mortlake's name was a
+household word. That the gifted artisan orator, who had never shrunk
+upon occasion from launching red rhetoric at Society, should actually
+have shed blood seemed too startling, especially as the blood shed was
+not blue, but the property of a lovable young middle-class idealist, who
+had now literally given his life to the Cause. But this supplementary
+sensation did not grow to a head, and everybody (save a few labor
+leaders) was relieved to hear that Tom had been released almost
+immediately, being merely subpoenaed to appear at the inquest. In an
+interview which he accorded to the representative of a Liverpool paper
+the same afternoon, he stated that he put his arrest down entirely to
+the enmity and rancor entertained toward him by the police throughout
+the country. He had come to Liverpool to trace the movements of a friend
+about whom he was very uneasy, and he was making anxious inquiries at
+the docks to discover at what times steamers left for America, when the
+detectives stationed there in accordance with instructions from
+headquarters had arrested him as a suspicious-looking character.
+"Though," said Tom, "they must very well have known my phiz, as I have
+been sketched and caricatured all over the shop. When I told them who I
+was they had the decency to let me go. They thought they'd scored off me
+enough, I reckon. Yes, it certainly is a strange coincidence that I
+might 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 had
+just come from the 'scene of the crime,' and actually lived in the
+house, they would probably have&mdash;let me alone." He laughed
+sarcastically. "They are a queer lot of muddle-heads are the police.
+Their motto is, 'First catch your man, then cook the evidence.' If
+you're on the spot you're guilty because you're there, and if you're
+elsewhere you're guilty because you have gone away. Oh, I know them! If
+they 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 five
+this morning."</p>
+
+<p>"If they clapped you in quod," the interviewer reported himself as
+facetiously observing, "the prisoners would be on strike in a week."</p>
+
+<p>"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 excuse
+me. I am so upset about my friend. I'm afraid he has left England, and I
+have to make inquiries; and now there's poor Constant gone&mdash;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."</p>
+
+<p>"One last word, Mr. Mortlake, if you please. Is it true that you were
+billed to preside at a great meeting of clerks at St. James' Hall
+between one and two to-day to protest against the German invasion?"</p>
+
+<p>"Whew! so I had. But the beggars arrested me just before one, when I was
+going to wire, and then the news of poor Constant's end drove it out of
+my head. What a nuisance! Lord, how troubles do come together! Well,
+good-by, send me a copy of the paper."</p>
+
+<p>Tom Mortlake's evidence at the inquest added little beyond this to the
+public knowledge of his movements on the morning of the Mystery. The
+cabman who drove him to Euston had written indignantly to the papers to
+say that he had picked up his celebrated fare at Bow Railway Station at
+about half-past four a. m., and the arrest was a deliberate insult to
+democracy, and he offered to make an affidavit to that effect, leaving
+it dubious to which effect. But Scotland Yard betrayed no itch for the
+affidavit in question, and No. 2,138 subsided again into the obscurity
+of his rank. Mortlake&mdash;whose face was very pale below the black mane
+brushed back from his fine forehead&mdash;gave his evidence in low,
+sympathetic tones. He had known the deceased for over a year, coming
+constantly across him in their common political and social work, and had
+found the furnished rooms for him in Glover Street at his own request,
+they just being to let when Constant resolved to leave his rooms at
+Oxford House in Bethnal Green and to share the actual life of the
+people. The locality suited the deceased, as being near the People's
+Palace. He respected and admired the deceased, whose genuine goodness
+had won all hearts. The deceased was an untiring worker; never grumbled,
+was always in fair spirits, regarded his life and wealth as a sacred
+trust to be used for the benefit of humanity. He had last seen him at a
+quarter past nine p. m. on the day preceding his death. He (witness) had
+received a letter by the last post which made him uneasy about a friend.
+Deceased was evidently suffering from toothache, and was fixing a piece
+of cotton-wool in a hollow tooth, but he did not complain. Deceased
+seemed rather upset by the news he brought, and they both discussed it
+rather excitedly.</p>
+
+<p>By a Juryman: Did the news concern him?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: Only impersonally. He knew my friend, and was keenly
+sympathetic when one was in trouble.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: Could you show the jury the letter you received?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: I have mislaid it, and cannot make out where it has got to. If
+you, sir, think it relevant or essential, I will state what the trouble
+was.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: Was the toothache very violent?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: I cannot tell. I think not, though he told me it had disturbed
+his rest the night before.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: What time did you leave him?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: About twenty to ten.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: And what did you do then?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: I went out for an hour or so to make some inquiries. Then I
+returned, and told my landlady I should be leaving by an early train
+for&mdash;for the country.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: And that was the last you saw of the deceased?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake (with emotion): The last.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: How was he when you left him?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: Mainly concerned about my trouble.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: Otherwise you saw nothing unusual about him?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: Nothing.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: What time did you leave the house on Tuesday morning?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: At about five and twenty minutes past four.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: Are you sure that you shut the street door?</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake: Quite sure. Knowing my landlady was rather a timid person, I
+even slipped the bolt of the big lock, which was usually tied back. It
+was impossible for any one to get in even with a latch-key.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump's evidence (which, of course, preceded his) was more
+important, and occupied a considerable time, unduly eked out by
+Drabdumpian padding. Thus she not only deposed that Mr. Constant had the
+toothache, but that it was going to last about a week; in tragic-comic
+indifference to the radical cure that had been effected. Her account of
+the last hours of the deceased tallied with Mortlake's, only that she
+feared Mortlake was quarreling with him over something in the letter
+that came by the nine o'clock post. Deceased had left the house a little
+after Mortlake, but had returned before him, and had gone straight to
+his bedroom. She had not actually seen him come in, having been in the
+kitchen, but she heard his latch-key, followed by his light step up the
+stairs.</p>
+
+<p>A Juryman: How do you know it was not somebody else? (Sensation, of
+which the juryman tries to look unconscious.)</p>
+
+<p>Witness: He called down to me over the banisters, and says in his
+sweetish voice: "Be hextra sure to wake me at a quarter to seven, Mrs.
+Drabdump, or else I shan't get to my tram meeting."</p>
+
+<p>(Juryman collapses.)</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: And did you wake him?</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump (breaking down): Oh, my lud, how can you ask?</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: There, there, compose yourself. I mean did you try to wake him?</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump: I have taken in and done for lodgers this seventeen
+years, my lud, and have always gave satisfaction; and Mr. Mortlake, he
+wouldn't ha' recommended me otherwise, though I wish to Heaven the poor
+gentleman had never&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: Yes, yes, of course. You tried to rouse him?</p>
+
+<p>But it was some time before Mrs. Drabdump was sufficiently calm to
+explain that though she had overslept herself, and though it would have
+been all the same anyhow, she had come up to time. Bit by bit the tragic
+story was forced from her lips&mdash;a tragedy that even her telling could
+not make tawdry. She told with superfluous detail how&mdash;when Mr. Grodman
+broke in the door&mdash;she saw her unhappy gentleman lodger lying on his
+back in bed, stone dead, with a gaping red wound in his throat; how her
+stronger-minded companion calmed her a little by spreading a
+handkerchief over the distorted face; how they then looked vainly about
+and under the bed for any instrument by which the deed could have been
+done, the veteran detective carefully making a rapid inventory of the
+contents of the room, and taking notes of the precise position and
+condition of the body before anything was disturbed by the arrival of
+gapers or bunglers; how she had pointed out to him that both the windows
+were firmly bolted to keep out the cold night air; how, having noted
+this down with a puzzled, pitying shake of the head, he had opened the
+window 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 ask
+them to send on an inspector and a surgeon. How they both remained in
+the room till the police arrived, Grodman pondering deeply the while and
+making notes every now and again, as fresh points occurred to him, and
+asking her questions about the poor, weak-headed young man. Pressed as
+to what she meant by calling the deceased "weak-headed," she replied
+that some of her neighbors wrote him begging letters, though, Heaven
+knew, they were better off than herself, who had to scrape her fingers
+to the bone for every penny she earned. Under further pressure from Mr.
+Talbot, who was watching the inquiry on behalf of Arthur Constant's
+family, Mrs. Drabdump admitted that the deceased had behaved like a
+human being, nor was there anything externally eccentric or queer in his
+conduct. He was always cheerful and pleasant spoken, though certainly
+soft&mdash;God rest his soul. No; he never shaved, but wore all the hair that
+Heaven had given him.</p>
+
+<p>By a Juryman: She thought deceased was in the habit of locking his door
+when 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 slid
+upward, and was at the top of the door. When she first let lodgings, her
+reasons for which she seemed anxious to publish, there had only been a
+bolt, but a suspicious lodger, she would not call him a gentleman, had
+complained that he could not fasten his door behind him, and so she had
+been put to the expense of having a lock made. The complaining lodger
+went off soon after without paying his rent. (Laughter.) She had always
+known he would.</p>
+
+<p>The Coroner: Was deceased at all nervous?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: No, he was a very nice gentleman. (A laugh.)</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: I mean did he seem afraid of being robbed?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: No, he was always goin' to demonstrations. (Laughter.) I told
+him to be careful. I told him I lost a purse with 3s. 2d. myself on
+Jubilee Day.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump resumed her seat, weeping vaguely.</p>
+
+<p>The Coroner: Gentlemen, we shall have an opportunity of viewing the room
+shortly.</p>
+
+<p>The story of the discovery of the body was retold, though more
+scientifically, by Mr. George Grodman, whose unexpected resurgence into
+the realm of his early exploits excited as keen a curiosity as the
+reappearance "for this occasion only" of a retired prima donna. His
+book, "Criminals I Have Caught," passed from the twenty-third to the
+twenty-fourth edition merely on the strength of it. Mr. Grodman stated
+that the body was still warm when he found it. He thought that death was
+quite recent. The door he had had to burst was bolted as well as locked.
+He confirmed Mrs. Drabdump's statement about the windows; the chimney
+was very narrow. The cut looked as if done by a razor. There was no
+instrument lying about the room. He had known the deceased about a
+month. He seemed a very earnest, simple-minded young fellow who spoke a
+great deal about the brotherhood of man. (The hardened old man-hunter's
+voice was not free from a tremor as he spoke jerkily of the dead man's
+enthusiasms.) He should have thought the deceased the last man in the
+world to commit suicide.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Denzil Cantercot was next called. He was a poet. (Laughter.) He was
+on his way to Mr. Grodman's house to tell him he had been unable to do
+some writing for him because he was suffering from writer's cramp, when
+Mr. Grodman called to him from the window of No. 11 and asked him to run
+for the police. No, he did not run; he was a philosopher. (Laughter.) He
+returned with them to the door, but did not go up. He had no stomach for
+crude sensations. (Laughter.) The gray fog was sufficiently unbeautiful
+for him for one morning. (Laughter.)</p>
+
+<p>Inspector Howlett said: About 9:45 on the morning of Tuesday, 4th
+December, from information received, he went with Sergeant Runnymede and
+Dr. Robinson to 11 Glover Street, Bow, and there found the dead body of
+a young man, lying on his back with his throat cut. The door of the room
+had been smashed in, and the lock and the bolt evidently forced. The
+room was tidy. There were no marks of blood on the floor. A purse full
+of gold was on the dressing-table beside a big book. A hip-bath with
+cold water stood beside the bed, over which was a hanging bookcase.
+There was a large wardrobe against the wall next to the door. The
+chimney was very narrow. There were two windows, one bolted. It was
+about 18 feet to the pavement. There was no way of climbing up. No one
+could possibly have got out of the room, and then bolted the doors and
+windows behind him; and he had searched all parts of the room in which
+anyone might have been concealed. He had been unable to find any
+instrument in the room, in spite of exhaustive search, there being not
+even a penknife in the pockets of the clothes of the deceased, which lay
+on a chair. The house and the back yard, and the adjacent pavement, had
+also been fruitlessly searched.</p>
+
+<p>Sergeant Runnymede made an identical statement, saving only that he had
+gone with Dr. Robinson and Inspector Howlett.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Robinson, divisional surgeon, said: The deceased was lying on his
+back, with his throat cut. The body was not yet cold, the abdominal
+region being quite warm. Rigor mortis had set in in the lower jaw, neck
+and upper extremities. The muscles contracted when beaten. I inferred
+that life had been extinct some two or three hours, probably not longer,
+it might have been less. The bedclothes would keep the lower part warm
+for some time. The wound, which was a deep one, was 5-1/2 inches from
+right to left across the throat to a point under the left ear. The upper
+portion of the windpipe was severed, and likewise the jugular vein. The
+muscular coating of the carotid artery was divided. There was a slight
+cut, 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 the
+right hand. The wound could not have been self-inflicted. A sharp
+instrument had been used, such as a razor. The cut might have been made
+by a left-handed person. No doubt death was practically instantaneous. I
+saw no signs of a struggle about the body or the room. I noticed a purse
+on the dressing-table, lying next to Madame Blavatsky's big book on
+Theosophy. Sergeant Runnymede drew my attention to the fact that the
+door had evidently been locked and bolted from within.</p>
+
+<p>By a Juryman: I do not say the cuts could not have been made by a
+right-handed person. I can offer no suggestion as to how the inflicter
+of the wound got in or out. Extremely improbable that the cut was
+self-inflicted. There was little trace of the outside fog in the room.</p>
+
+<p>Police Constable Williams said he was on duty in the early hours of the
+morning of the 4th inst. Glover Street lay within his beat. He saw or
+heard nothing suspicious. The fog was never very dense, though nasty to
+the throat. He had passed through Glover Street about half-past four. He
+had not seen Mr. Mortlake or anybody else leave the house.</p>
+
+<p>The Court here adjourned, the Coroner and the jury repairing in a body
+to 11 Glover Street to view the house and the bedroom of the deceased.
+And the evening posters announced, "The Bow Mystery Thickens."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+
+
+<p>Before the inquiry was resumed, all the poor wretches in custody had
+been released on suspicion that they were innocent; there was not a
+single case even for a magistrate. Clues, which at such seasons are
+gathered by the police like blackberries off the hedges, were scanty and
+unripe. Inferior specimens were offered them by bushels, but there was
+not a good one among the lot. The police could not even manufacture a
+clue.</p>
+
+<p>Arthur Constant's death was already the theme of every hearth, railway
+carriage and public house. The dead idealist had points of contact with
+so many spheres. The East End and West End alike were moved and excited,
+the Democratic Leagues and the Churches, the Doss-houses and the
+Universities. The pity of it! And then the impenetrable mystery of it!</p>
+
+<p>The evidence given in the concluding portion of the investigation was
+necessarily less sensational. There were no more witnesses to bring the
+scent of blood over the coroner's table; those who had yet to be heard
+were merely relatives and friends of the deceased, who spoke of him as
+he 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 about
+him 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 at
+home. His friends were a motley crew; friends of the same friend are not
+necessarily friends of one another. But their diversity only made the
+congruity of the tale they had to tell more striking. It was the tale of
+a man who had never made an enemy even by benefiting him, nor lost a
+friend even by refusing his favors; the tale of a man whose heart
+overflowed with peace and good will to all men all the year round; of a
+man to whom Christmas came not once, but three hundred and sixty-five
+times a year; it was the tale of a brilliant intellect, who gave up to
+mankind what was meant for himself, and worked as a laborer in the
+vineyard of humanity, never crying that the grapes were sour; of a man
+uniformly cheerful and of good courage, living in that forgetfulness of
+self which is the truest antidote to despair. And yet there was not
+quite wanting the note of pain to jar the harmony and make it human.
+Richard Elton, his chum from boyhood, and vicar of Somerton, in
+Midlandshire, handed to the coroner a letter from the deceased about ten
+days before his death, containing some passages which the coroner read
+aloud: "Do you know anything of Schopenhauer? I mean anything beyond the
+current misconceptions? I have been making his acquaintance lately. He
+is an agreeable rattle of a pessimist; his essay on 'The Misery of
+Mankind' is quite lively reading. At first his assimilation of
+Christianity and Pessimism (it occurs in his essay on 'Suicide') dazzled
+me as an audacious paradox. But there is truth in it. Verily, the whole
+creation groaneth and travaileth, and man is a degraded monster, and sin
+is over all. Ah, my friend, I have shed many of my illusions since I
+came to this seething hive of misery and wrongdoing. What shall one
+man's life&mdash;a million men's lives&mdash;avail against the corruption, the
+vulgarity and the squalor of civilization? Sometimes I feel like a
+farthing rush-light in the Hall of Eblis. Selfishness is so long and
+life so short. And the worst of it is that everybody is so beastly
+contented. The poor no more desire comfort than the rich culture. The
+woman to whom a penny school fee for her child represents an appreciable
+slice of her income is satisfied that the rich we shall always have with
+us.</p>
+
+<p>"The real crusted old Tories are the paupers in the Workhouse. The
+Radical working men are jealous of their own leaders, and the leaders of
+one another. Schopenhauer must have organized a labor party in his salad
+days. And yet one can't help feeling that he committed suicide as a
+philosopher by not committing it as a man. He claims kinship with
+Buddha, too; though Esoteric Buddhism at least seems spheres removed
+from the philosophy of 'The Will and the Idea'. What a wonderful woman
+Madame Blavatsky must be. I can't say I follow her, for she is up in the
+clouds nearly all the time, and I haven't as yet developed an astral
+body. Shall I send you on her book? It is fascinating.... I am becoming
+quite a fluent orator. One soon gets into the way of it. The horrible
+thing is that you catch yourself saying things to lead up to 'Cheers'
+instead of sticking to the plain realities of the business. Lucy is
+still doing the galleries in Italy. It used to pain me sometimes to
+think of my darling's happiness when I came across a flat-chested
+factory girl. Now I feel her happiness is as important as a factory
+girl's."</p>
+
+<p>Lucy, the witness explained, was Lucy Brent, the betrothed of the
+deceased. The poor girl had been telegraphed for, and had started for
+England. The witness stated that the outburst of despondency in this
+letter was almost a solitary one, most of the letters in his possession
+being bright, buoyant and hopeful. Even this letter ended with a
+humorous statement of the writer's manifold plans and projects for the
+new year. The deceased was a good Churchman.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: Was there any private trouble in his own life to account for
+the temporary despondency?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: Not so far as I am aware. His financial position was
+exceptionally favorable.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: There had been no quarrel with Miss Brent?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: I have the best authority for saying that no shadow of
+difference had ever come between them.</p>
+
+<p>Coroner: Was the deceased left-handed?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: Certainly not. He was not even ambidextrous.</p>
+
+<p>A Juryman: Isn't Shoppinhour one of the infidel writers, published by
+the Freethought Publication Society?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: I do not know who publishes his books.</p>
+
+<p>The Juryman (a small grocer and big raw-boned Scotchman, rejoicing in
+the name of Sandy Sanderson and the dignities of deaconry and membership
+of the committee of the Bow Conservative Association): No equeevocation,
+sir. Is he not a secularist, who has lectured at the Hall of Science?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: No, he is a foreign writer&mdash;(Mr. Sanderson was heard to thank
+Heaven for this small mercy)&mdash;who believes that life is not worth
+living.</p>
+
+<p>The Juryman: Were you not shocked to find the friend of a meenister
+reading such impure leeterature?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: The deceased read everything. Schopenhauer is the author of a
+system of philosophy, and not what you seem to imagine. Perhaps you
+would like to inspect the book? (Laughter.)</p>
+
+<p>The Juryman: I would na' touch it with a pitchfork. Such books should be
+burnt. And this Madame Blavatsky's book&mdash;what is that? Is that also
+pheelosophy?</p>
+
+<p>Witness: No. It is Theosophy. (Laughter.)</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Allen Smith, secretary of the Trammel's Union, stated that he had
+had an interview with the deceased on the day before his death, when he
+(the deceased) spoke hopefully of the prospects of the movement, and
+wrote him out a check for 10 guineas for his union. Deceased promised to
+speak at a meeting called for a quarter past seven a.m. the next day.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Edward Wimp, of the Scotland Yard Detective Department, said that
+the letters and papers of the deceased threw no light upon the manner of
+his death, and they would be handed back to the family. His Department
+had not formed any theory on the subject.</p>
+
+<p>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 of
+Tuesday, the 4th inst., Mrs. Drabdump, a worthy, hard-working widow, who
+lets lodgings at 11 Grover Street, Bow, was unable to arouse the
+deceased, who occupied the entire upper floor of the house. Becoming
+alarmed, she went across to fetch Mr. George Grodman, a gentleman known
+to us all by reputation, and to whose clear and scientific evidence we
+are much indebted, and got him to batter in the door. They found the
+deceased lying back in bed with a deep wound in his throat. Life had
+only recently become extinct. There was no trace of any instrument by
+which the cut could have been effected; there was no trace of any person
+who could have effected the cut. No person could apparently have got in
+or out. The medical evidence goes to show that the deceased could not
+have inflicted the wound himself. And yet, gentlemen, there are, in the
+nature of things, two&mdash;and only two&mdash;alternative explanations of his
+death. Either the wound was inflicted by his own hand, or it was
+inflicted by another's. I shall take each of these possibilities
+separately. First, did the deceased commit suicide? The medical evidence
+says deceased was lying with his hands clasped behind his head. Now the
+wound was made from right to left, and terminated by a cut on the left
+thumb. If the deceased had made it he would have had to do it with his
+right hand, while his left hand remained under his head&mdash;a most peculiar
+and unnatural position to assume. Moreover, in making a cut with the
+right hand, one would naturally move the hand from left to right. It is
+unlikely that the deceased would move his right hand so awkwardly and
+unnaturally, unless, of course, his object was to baffle suspicion.
+Another point is that on this hypothesis, the deceased would have had to
+replace his right hand beneath his head. But Dr. Robinson believes that
+death was instantaneous. If so, deceased could have had no time to pose
+so neatly. It is just possible the cut was made with the left hand, but
+then the deceased was right-handed. The absence of any signs of a
+possible weapon undoubtedly goes to corroborate the medical evidence.
+The police have made an exhaustive search in all places where the razor
+or other weapon or instrument might by any possibility have been
+concealed, including the bedclothes, the mattress, the pillow, and the
+street into which it might have been dropped. But all theories involving
+the willful concealment of the fatal instrument have to reckon with the
+fact or probability that death was instantaneous, also with the fact
+that there was no blood about the floor. Finally, the instrument used
+was in all likelihood a razor, and the deceased did not shave, and was
+never known to be in possession of any such instrument. If, then, we
+were to confine ourselves to the medical and police evidence, there
+would, I think, be little hesitation in dismissing the idea of suicide.
+Nevertheless, it is well to forget the physical aspect of the case for a
+moment and to apply our minds to an unprejudiced inquiry into the mental
+aspect of it. Was there any reason why the deceased should wish to take
+his own life? He was young, wealthy and popular, loving and loved; life
+stretched 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 had
+ambition, an illustrious public career was within reach. He was an
+orator of no mean power, a brilliant and industrious man. His outlook
+was always on the future&mdash;he was always sketching out ways in which he
+could be useful to his fellow-men. His purse and his time were ever at
+the command of whosoever could show fair claim upon them. If such a man
+were likely to end his own life, the science of human nature would be at
+an end. Still, some of the shadows of the picture have been presented to
+us. The man had his moments of despondency&mdash;as which of us has not? But
+they seem to have been few and passing. Anyhow, he was cheerful enough
+on the day before his death. He was suffering, too, from toothache. But
+it does not seem to have been violent, nor did he complain. Possibly, of
+course, the pain became very acute in the night. Nor must we forget that
+he may have overworked himself, and got his nerves into a morbid state.
+He worked very hard, never rising later than half-past seven, and doing
+far more than the professional 'labor leader.' He taught and wrote as
+well as spoke and organized. But on the other hand all witnesses agree
+that he was looking forward eagerly to the meeting of tram-men on the
+morning of the 4th inst. His whole heart was in the movement. Is it
+likely that this was the night he would choose for quitting the scene of
+his usefulness? Is it likely that if he had chosen it, he would not have
+left 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 is
+it likely he would have concealed the instrument? The only positive sign
+of intention is the bolting of his door in addition to the usual locking
+of it, but one cannot lay much stress on that. Regarding the mental
+aspects alone, the balance is largely against suicide; looking at the
+physical aspects, suicide is well nigh impossible. Putting the two
+together, the case against suicide is all but mathematically complete.
+The answer, then, to our first question, Did the deceased commit
+suicide? is, that he did not."</p>
+
+<p>The coroner paused, and everybody drew a long breath. The lucid
+exposition had been followed with admiration. If the coroner had stopped
+now, the jury would have unhesitatingly returned a verdict of "murder."
+But the coroner swallowed a mouthful of water and went on.</p>
+
+<p>"We now come to the second alternative&mdash;was the deceased the victim of
+homicide? In order to answer that question in the affirmative it is
+essential that we should be able to form some conception of the <i>modus
+operandi</i>. It is all very well for Dr. Robinson to say the cut was made
+by another hand; but in the absence of any theory as to how the cut
+could possibly have been made by that other hand, we should be driven
+back to the theory of self-infliction, however improbable it may seem to
+medical gentlemen. Now, what are the facts? When Mrs. Drabdump and Mr.
+Grodman found the body it was yet warm, and Mr. Grodman, a witness
+fortunately qualified by special experience, states that death had been
+quite recent. This tallies closely enough with the view of Dr. Robinson,
+who, examining the body about an hour later, put the time of death at
+two or three hours before, say seven o'clock. Mrs. Drabdump had
+attempted to wake the deceased at a quarter to seven, which would put
+back the act to a little earlier. As I understand from Dr. Robinson,
+that it is impossible to fix the time very precisely, death may have
+very well taken place several hours before Mrs. Drabdump's first attempt
+to wake deceased. Of course, it may have taken place between the first
+and second calls, as he may merely have been sound asleep at first; it
+may also not impossibly have taken place considerably earlier than the
+first call, for all the physical data seem to prove. Nevertheless, on
+the whole, I think we shall be least likely to err if we assume the time
+of 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 know
+exactly how it is constructed. On the ground floor a front room tenanted
+by Mr. Mortlake, with two windows giving on the street, both securely
+bolted; 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 be
+sure all the various doors and windows have not yet been unfastened;
+while the season of the year is a guarantee that nothing had been left
+open. The front door through which Mr. Mortlake has gone out before
+half-past four, is guarded by the latch-key lock and the big lock. On
+the upper floor are two rooms&mdash;a front room used by deceased for a
+bedroom, and a back room which he used as a sitting-room. The back room
+has been left open, with the key inside, but the window is fastened. The
+door of the front room is not only locked, but bolted. We have seen the
+splintered mortise and the staple of the upper bolt violently forced
+from the woodwork and resting on the pin. The windows are bolted, the
+fasteners being firmly fixed in the catches. The chimney is too narrow
+to admit of the passage of even a child. This room, in fact, is as
+firmly barred in as if besieged. It has no communication with any other
+part of the house. It is as absolutely self-centered and isolated as if
+it were a fort in the sea or a log-hut in the forest. Even if any
+strange person is in the house, nay, in the very sitting-room of the
+deceased, he cannot get into the bedroom, for the house is one built for
+the poor, with no communication between the different rooms, so that
+separate families, if need be, may inhabit each. Now, however, let us
+grant that some person has achieved the miracle of getting into the
+front room, first floor, 18 feet from the ground. At half-past six, or
+thereabouts, he cuts the throat of the sleeping occupant. How is he then
+to 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 yet
+leave the doors and windows locked and bolted from within? This is a
+degree of miracle at which my credulity must draw the line. No, the room
+had been closed all night&mdash;there is scarce a trace of fog in it. No one
+could get in or out. Finally, murders do not take place without motive.
+Robbery and revenge are the only conceivable motives. The deceased had
+not an enemy in the world; his money and valuables were left untouched.
+Everything was in order. There were no signs of a struggle. The answer
+then to our second inquiry&mdash;was the deceased killed by another
+person?&mdash;is, that he was not.</p>
+
+<p>"Gentlemen, I am aware that this sounds impossible and contradictory.
+But it is the facts that contradict themselves. It seems clear that the
+deceased did not commit suicide. It seems equally clear that the
+deceased was not murdered. There is nothing for it, therefore,
+gentlemen, but to return a verdict tantamount to an acknowledgment of
+our incompetence to come to any adequately grounded conviction whatever
+as to the means or the manner by which the deceased met his death. It is
+the most inexplicable mystery in all my experience." (Sensation.)</p>
+
+<p>The Foreman (after a colloquy with Mr. Sandy Sanderson): "We are not
+agreed, sir. One of the jurors insists on a verdict of "Death from
+visitation by the act of God.""</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2>
+
+
+<p>But Sandy Sanderson's burning solicitude to fix the crime flickered out
+in the face of opposition, and in the end he bowed his head to the
+inevitable "open verdict." Then the floodgates of inkland were opened,
+and the deluge pattered for nine days on the deaf coffin where the poor
+idealist moldered. The tongues of the Press were loosened, and the
+leader writers reveled in recapitulating the circumstances of "The Big
+Bow Mystery," though they could contribute nothing but adjectives to the
+solution. The papers teemed with letters&mdash;it was a kind of Indian summer
+of the silly season. But the editors could not keep them out, nor cared
+to. The mystery was the one topic of conversation everywhere&mdash;it was on
+the carpet and the bare boards alike, in the kitchen and the
+drawing-room. It was discussed with science or stupidity, with aspirates
+or without. It came up for breakfast with the rolls, and was swept off
+the supper table with the last crumbs.</p>
+
+<p>No. 11 Glover Street, Bow, remained for days a shrine of pilgrimage. The
+once sleepy little street buzzed from morning till night. From all parts
+of the town people came to stare up at the bedroom window and wonder
+with a foolish look of horror. The pavement was often blocked for hours
+together, and itinerant vendors of refreshment made it a new market
+center, while vocalists hastened thither to sing the delectable ditty of
+the deed without having any voice in the matter. It was a pity the
+Government did not erect a toll-gate at either end of the street. But
+Chancellors of the Exchequer rarely avail themselves of the more obvious
+expedients for paying off the National debt.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, familiarity bred contempt, and the wits grew facetious at the
+expense of the Mystery. Jokes on the subject appeared even in the comic
+papers.</p>
+
+<p>To the proverb, "You must not say Boo to a goose," one added, "or else
+she will explain you the Mystery." The name of the gentleman who asked
+whether the Bow Mystery was not 'arrowing shall not be divulged. There
+was more point in "Dagonet's" remark that, if he had been one of the
+unhappy jurymen, he should have been driven to "suicide." A professional
+paradox-monger pointed triumphantly to the somewhat similar situation in
+"the murder in the Rue Morgue," and said that Nature had been
+plagiarizing again&mdash;like the monkey she was&mdash;and he recommended Poe's
+publishers to apply for an injunction. More seriously, Poe's solution
+was re-suggested by "Constant Reader" as an original idea. He thought
+that a small organ-grinder's monkey might have got down the chimney with
+its master's razor, and, after attempting to shave the occupant of the
+bed, have returned the way it came. This idea created considerable
+sensation, but a correspondent with a long train of letters draggling
+after his name pointed out that a monkey small enough to get down so
+narrow 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 keenly
+about the power of monkeys' muscles that it was almost taken for granted
+that 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 blood
+had been discovered on the floor, or on the nightshirt, or the
+counterpane. The "Lancet's" leader on the Mystery was awaited with
+interest. It said: "We cannot join in the praises that have been
+showered upon the coroner's summing up. It shows again the evils
+resulting from having coroners who are not medical men. He seems to have
+appreciated but inadequately the significance of the medical evidence.
+He should certainly have directed the jury to return a verdict of murder
+on that. What was it to do with him that he could see no way by which
+the wound could have been inflicted by an outside agency? It was for the
+police to find how that was done. Enough that it was impossible for the
+unhappy young man to have inflicted such a wound and then have strength
+and will power enough to hide the instrument and to remove perfectly
+every trace of his having left the bed for the purpose." It is
+impossible to enumerate all the theories propounded by the amateur
+detectives, while Scotland Yard religiously held its tongue. Ultimately
+the interest on the subject became confined to a few papers which had
+received the best letters. Those papers that couldn't get interesting
+letters stopped the correspondence and sneered at the "sensationalism"
+of those that could. Among the mass of fantasy there were not a few
+notable solutions, which failed brilliantly, like rockets posing as
+fixed stars. One was that in the obscurity of the fog the murderer had
+ascended to the window of the bedroom by means of a ladder from the
+pavement. He had then with a diamond cut one of the panes away, and
+effected an entry through the aperture. On leaving he fixed in the pane
+of glass again (or another which he had brought with him), and thus the
+room remained with its bolts and locks untouched. On its being pointed
+out that the panes were too small, a third correspondent showed that
+that didn't matter, as it was only necessary to insert the hand and undo
+the fastening, when the entire window could be opened, the process being
+reversed by the murderer on leaving. This pretty edifice of glass was
+smashed by a glazier, who wrote to say that a pane could hardly be fixed
+in from only one side of a window frame, that it would fall out when
+touched, and that in any case the wet putty could not have escaped
+detection. A door panel sliced out and replaced was also put forward,
+and as many trap-doors and secret passages were ascribed to No. 11
+Glover Street as if it were a medieval castle. Another of these clever
+theories was that the murderer was in the room the whole time the police
+were there&mdash;hidden in the wardrobe. Or he had got behind the door when
+Grodman broke it open, so that he was not noticed in the excitement of
+the discovery, and escaped with his weapon at the moment when Grodman
+and Mrs. Drabdump were examining the window fastenings.</p>
+
+<p>Scientific explanations also were to hand to explain how the assassin
+locked and bolted the door behind him. Powerful magnets outside the door
+had been used to turn the key and push the bolt within. Murderers armed
+with magnets loomed on the popular imagination like a new microbe. There
+was only one defect in this ingenious theory&mdash;the thing could not be
+done. A physiologist recalled the conjurers who swallowed swords&mdash;by an
+anatomical peculiarity of the throat&mdash;and said that the deceased might
+have swallowed the weapon after cutting his own throat. This was too
+much for the public to swallow. As for the idea that the suicide had
+been effected with a penknife or its blade, or a bit of steel, which had
+got buried in the wound, not even the quotation of Shelley's line:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>could secure it a moment's acceptance. The same reception was accorded
+to the idea that the cut had been made with a candlestick (or other
+harmless article) constructed like a sword-stick. Theories of this sort
+caused a humorist to explain that the deceased had hidden the razor in
+his hollow tooth! Some kind friend of Messrs. Maskelyne and Cook
+suggested 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 most
+brilliant of these flashes of false fire was the facetious, yet probably
+half-seriously meant, letter that appeared in the "Pell Mell Press"
+under the heading of</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+
+<h3>THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED.</h3>
+
+<p>"Sir&mdash;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."</p>
+
+<p>("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.&mdash;Ed. P. M. P.")</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<p>The editor had reason to be pleased that he inserted this letter, for it
+drew the following interesting communication from the great detective
+himself:</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+
+<h3>"THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED.</h3>
+
+<p>"Sir&mdash;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,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"George Grodman.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">"46 Glover Street, Bow."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"P. S.&mdash;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:</p>
+
+<p>"'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.</p>
+
+<p>"'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&mdash;especially in the women&mdash;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&mdash;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....'"</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+
+<h3>"THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED.</h3>
+
+<p>"Sir&mdash;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,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Your obedient servant,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">"Scotland Yard."<br /></span>
+</div></div></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<p>George Grodman read this letter with annoyance, and, crumpling up the
+paper, murmured scornfully, "Edward Wimp."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2>
+
+
+<p>"Yes, but what will become of the Beautiful?" said Denzil Cantercot.</p>
+
+<p>"Hang the Beautiful!" said Peter Crowl, as if he were on the committee
+of the Academy. "Give me the True."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil did nothing of the sort. He didn't happen to have it about him.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a name="illus2" id="illus2"></a>
+<img src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""/>
+</div>
+
+<h3>Denzil Cantercot stood smoking a cigarette.</h3>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<p>Denzil Cantercot stood smoking a cigarette in his landlord's shop, and
+imparting an air of distinction and an agreeable aroma to the close
+leathery atmosphere. Crowl cobbled away, talking to his tenant without
+raising his eyes. He was a small, big-headed, sallow, sad-eyed man, with
+a 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 he
+removed it and sat in his shirt sleeves. Crowl was a thinker, or thought
+he was&mdash;which seems to involve original thinking anyway. His hair was
+thinning rapidly at the top, as if his brain was struggling to get as
+near as possible to the realities of things. He prided himself on having
+no fads. Few men are without some foible or hobby; Crowl felt almost
+lonely at times in his superiority. He was a Vegetarian, a Secularist, a
+Blue 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 a
+fad. "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 stood
+on Mile-end Waste, which was opposite his shop&mdash;and held forth to the
+crowd on the evils of kings, priests and mutton chops, the "plain man"
+turned up at intervals like the "theme" of a symphonic movement. "I am
+only a plain man and I want to know." It was a phrase that sabered the
+spider-webs of logical refinement, and held them up scornfully on the
+point. When Crowl went for a little recreation in Victoria Park on
+Sunday afternoons, it was with this phrase that he invariably routed the
+supernaturalists. Crowl knew his Bible better than most ministers, and
+always carried a minutely-printed copy in his pocket, dogs-eared to mark
+contradictions in the text. The second chapter of Jeremiah says one
+thing; the first chapter of Corinthians says another. Two contradictory
+statements may both be true, but "I am only a plain man, and I want to
+know." Crowl spent a large part of his time in setting "the word against
+the word." Cock-fighting affords its votaries no acuter pleasure than
+Crowl derived from setting two texts by the ears. Crowl had a
+metaphysical genius which sent his Sunday morning disciples frantic with
+admiration, and struck the enemy dumb with dismay. He had discovered,
+for instance, that the Deity could not move, owing to already filling
+all space. He was also the first to invent, for the confusion of the
+clerical, the crucial case of a saint dying at the Antipodes
+contemporaneously with another in London. Both went skyward to heaven,
+yet the two traveled in directly opposite directions. In all eternity
+they would never meet. Which, then, got to heaven? Or was there no such
+place? "I am only a plain man, and I want to know." Preserve us our open
+spaces; they exist to testify to the incurable interest of humanity in
+the Unknown and the Misunderstood. Even 'Arry is capable of five
+minutes' attention to speculative theology, if 'Arriet isn't in a 'urry.</p>
+
+<p>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 hopelessly
+wrong on all subjects under the sun. In only one point did Peter Crowl
+agree with Denzil Cantercot&mdash;he admired Denzil Cantercot secretly. When
+he asked him for the True&mdash;which was about twice a day on the
+average&mdash;he didn't really expect to get it from him. He knew that Denzil
+was a poet.</p>
+
+<p>"The Beautiful," he went on, "is a thing that only appeals to men like
+you. The True is for all men. The majority have the first claim. Till
+then you poets must stand aside. The True and the Useful&mdash;that's what we
+want. The Good of Society is the only test of things. Everything stands
+or falls by the Good of Society."</p>
+
+<p>"The Good of Society!" echoed Denzil, scornfully. "What's the Good of
+Society? The Individual is before all. The mass must be sacrificed to
+the 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 a
+blank."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, but we should fill it up with bread and butter," said Peter Crowl.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it is bread and butter that kills the Beautiful," said Denzil
+Cantercot bitterly. "Many of us start by following the butterfly through
+the verdant meadows, but we turn aside&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"To get the grub," chuckled Peter, cobbling away.</p>
+
+<p>"Peter, if you make a jest of everything, I'll not waste my time on
+you."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil's wild eyes flashed angrily. He shook his long hair. Life was
+very serious to him. He never wrote comic verse intentionally.</p>
+
+<p>There are three reasons why men of genius have long hair. One is, that
+they forget it is growing. The second is, that they like it. The third
+is, that it comes cheaper; they wear it long for the same reason that
+they wear their hats long.</p>
+
+<p>Owing to this peculiarity of genius, you may get quite a reputation for
+lack of twopence. The economic reason did not apply to Denzil, who could
+always 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 over
+barbers and conspire to promote their interests? Denzil would have told
+you it was not to serve the barbers, but to gratify the crowd's
+instinctive resentment of originality. In his palmy days Denzil had been
+an editor, but he no more thought of turning his scissors against
+himself than of swallowing his paste. The efficacy of hair has changed
+since the days of Samson, otherwise Denzil would have been a Hercules
+instead of a long, thin, nervous man, looking too brittle and delicate
+to be used even for a pipe-cleaner. The narrow oval of his face sloped
+to a pointed, untrimmed beard. His linen was reproachable, his dingy
+boots were down at heel, and his cocked hat was drab with dust. Such are
+the effects of a love for the Beautiful.</p>
+
+<p>Peter Crowl was impressed with Denzil's condemnation of flippancy, and
+he hastened to turn off the joke.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm quite serious," he said. "Butterflies are no good to nothing or
+nobody; caterpillars at least save the birds from starving."</p>
+
+<p>"Just like your view of things, Peter," said Denzil. "Good morning,
+madam." This to Mrs. Crowl, to whom he removed his hat with elaborate
+courtesy. Mrs. Crowl grunted and looked at her husband with a note of
+interrogation 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, and
+helplessly shook his head in a horizontal direction. It was wonderful
+how Mrs. Crowl towered over Mr. Crowl, even when he stood up in his
+shoes. She measured half an inch less. It was quite an optical illusion.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Crowl," said Mrs. Crowl, "then I'll tell him."</p>
+
+<p>"No, no, my dear, not yet," faltered Peter helplessly; "leave it to me."</p>
+
+<p>"I've left it to you long enough. You'll never do nothing. If it was a
+question of provin' to a lot of chuckleheads that Jollygee and Genesis,
+or some other dead and gone Scripture folk that don't consarn no mortal
+soul, used to contradict each other, your tongue 'ud run thirteen to the
+dozen. 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 a
+lamppost. Here's a man stayin' with you for weeks and weeks&mdash;eatin' and
+drinkin' the flesh off your bones&mdash;without payin' a far&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Hush, hush, mother; it's all right," said poor Crowl, red as fire.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil looked at her dreamily. "Is it possible you are alluding to me,
+Mrs. Crowl?" he said.</p>
+
+<p>"Who then should I be alludin' to, Mr. Cantercot? Here's seven weeks
+come and gone, and not a blessed 'aypenny have I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"My dear Mrs. Crowl," said Denzil, removing his cigarette from his mouth
+with a pained air, "why reproach me for your neglect?"</p>
+
+<p>"My neglect! I like that!"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't," said Denzil, more sharply. "If you had sent me in the bill
+you would have had the money long ago. How do you expect me to think of
+these details?"</p>
+
+<p>"We ain't so grand down here. People pays their way&mdash;they don't get no
+bills," said Mrs. Crowl, accentuating the word with infinite scorn.</p>
+
+<p>Peter hammered away at a nail, as though to drown his spouse's voice.</p>
+
+<p>"It's three pounds fourteen and eight-pence, if you're so anxious to
+know," Mrs. Crowl resumed. "And there ain't a woman in the Mile End Road
+as 'ud a-done it cheaper, with bread at fourpence threefarden a quartern
+and landlords clamorin' for rent every Monday morning almost afore the
+sun's up and folks draggin' and slidderin' on till their shoes is only
+fit to throw after brides, and Christmas comin' and seven-pence a week
+for schoolin'!"</p>
+
+<p>Peter winced under the last item. He had felt it coming&mdash;like Christmas.
+His wife and he parted company on the question of Free Education. Peter
+felt that, having brought nine children into the world, it was only fair
+he should pay a penny a week for each of those old enough to bear
+educating. His better half argued that, having so many children, they
+ought in reason to be exempted. Only people who had few children could
+spare the penny. But the one point on which the cobbler-skeptic of the
+Mile End Road got his way was this of the fees. It was a question of
+conscience, and Mrs. Crowl had never made application for their
+remission, though she often slapped her children in vexation instead.
+They were used to slapping, and when nobody else slapped them they
+slapped one another. They were bright, ill-mannered brats, who pestered
+their parents and worried their teachers, and were happy as the Road was
+long.</p>
+
+<p>"Bother the school fees!" Peter retorted, vexed. "Mr. Cantercot's not
+responsible for your children."</p>
+
+<p>"I should hope not, indeed, Mr. Crowl," Mrs. Crowl said sternly. "I'm
+ashamed of you." And with that she flounced out of the shop into the
+back parlor.</p>
+
+<p>"It's all right," Peter called after her soothingly. "The money'll be
+all right, mother."</p>
+
+<p>In lower circles it is customary to call your wife your mother; in
+somewhat superior circles it is the fashion to speak of her as "the
+wife" as you speak of "the Stock Exchange," or "the Thames," without
+claiming any peculiar property. Instinctively men are ashamed of being
+moral and domesticated.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil puffed his cigarette, unembarrassed. Peter bent attentively over
+his work, making nervous stabs with his awl. There was a long silence.
+An organ-grinder played a waltz outside, unregarded; and, failing to
+annoy anybody, moved on. Denzil lit another cigarette. The dirty-faced
+clock on the shop wall chimed twelve.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think," said Crowl, "of Republics?"</p>
+
+<p>"They are low," Denzil replied. "Without a Monarch there is no visible
+incarnation of Authority."</p>
+
+<p>"What! do you call Queen Victoria visible?"</p>
+
+<p>"Peter, do you want to drive me from the house? Leave frivolousness to
+women, whose minds are only large enough for domestic difficulties.
+Republics are low. Plato mercifully kept the poets out of his. Republics
+are not congenial soil for poetry."</p>
+
+<p>"What nonsense! If England dropped its fad of Monarchy and became a
+Republic to-morrow, do you mean to say that&mdash;&mdash;?"</p>
+
+<p>"I mean to say that there would be no Poet Laureate to begin with."</p>
+
+<p>"Who's fribbling now, you or me, Cantercot? But I don't care a
+button-hook about poets, present company always excepted. I'm only a
+plain man, and I want to know where's the sense of givin' any one person
+authority over everybody else?"</p>
+
+<p>"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 to
+give you flying angels and to carry you aloft, like a banner,
+huzzahing."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, that's because he's head and shoulders above 'em already," said
+Crowl, with a flash in his sad gray eyes. "Still, it don't prove that
+I'd talk any different. And I think you're quite wrong about his being
+spoiled. Tom's a fine fellow&mdash;a man every inch of him, and that's a good
+many. I don't deny he has his weaknesses, and there was a time when he
+stood in this very shop and denounced that poor dead Constant. 'Crowl,'
+said he, 'that man'll do mischief. I don't like these kid-glove
+philanthropists mixing themselves up in practical labor disputes they
+don't understand.'"</p>
+
+<p>Denzil whistled involuntarily. It was a piece of news.</p>
+
+<p>"I daresay," continued Crowl, "he's a bit jealous of anybody's
+interference with his influence. But in this case the jealousy did wear
+off, you see, for the poor fellow and he got quite pals, as everybody
+knows. Tom's not the man to hug a prejudice. However, all that don't
+prove nothing against Republics. Look at the Czar and the Jews. I'm only
+a plain man, but I wouldn't live in Russia not for&mdash;not for all the
+leather in it! An Englishman, taxed as he is to keep up his Fad of
+Monarchy, is at least king in his own castle, whoever bosses it at
+Windsor. Excuse me a minute, the missus is callin'."</p>
+
+<p>"Excuse <i>me</i> a minute. I'm going, and I want to say before I go&mdash;I feel
+it is only right you should know at once&mdash;that after what has passed
+to-day I can never be on the same footing here as in the&mdash;shall I say
+pleasant?&mdash;days of yore."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no, Cantercot. Don't say that; don't say that!" pleaded the little
+cobbler.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, shall I say unpleasant, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, no, Cantercot. Don't misunderstand me. Mother has been very much
+put to it lately to rub along. You see she has such a growing family. It
+grows&mdash;daily. But never mind her. You pay whenever you've got the
+money."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil shook his head. "It cannot be. You know when I came here first I
+rented your top room and boarded myself. Then I learnt to know you. We
+talked together. Of the Beautiful. And the Useful. I found you had no
+soul. But you were honest, and I liked you. I went so far as to take my
+meals with your family. I made myself at home in your back parlor. But
+the 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 be
+pieced together&mdash;nevermore." He shook his hair sadly and shambled out of
+the shop. Crowl would have gone after him, but Mrs. Crowl was still
+calling, and ladies must have the precedence in all polite societies.</p>
+
+<p>Cantercot went straight&mdash;or as straight as his loose gait permitted&mdash;to
+46 Glover Street, and knocked at the door. Grodman's factotum opened it.
+She was a pock-marked person, with a brickdust complexion and a
+coquettish manner.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, here we are again!" she said vivaciously.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't talk like a clown," Cantercot snapped. "Is Mr. Grodman in?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, you've put him out," growled the gentleman himself, suddenly
+appearing in his slippers. "Come in. What the devil have you been doing
+with yourself since the inquest? Drinking again?"</p>
+
+<p>"I've sworn off. Haven't touched a drop since&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"The murder?"</p>
+
+<p>"Eh?" said Denzil Cantercot, startled. "What do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"What I say. Since December 4, I reckon everything from that murder,
+now, as they reckon longitude from Greenwich."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," said Denzil Cantercot.</p>
+
+<p>"Let me see. Nearly a fortnight. What a long time to keep away from
+Drink&mdash;and Me."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know which is worse," said Denzil, irritated. "You both steal
+away my brains."</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed?" said Grodman, with an amused smile. "Well, it's only petty
+pilfering, after all. What's put salt on your wounds?"</p>
+
+<p>"The twenty-fourth edition of my book."</p>
+
+<p>"Whose book?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, your book. You must be making piles of money out of 'Criminals I
+Have Caught.'"</p>
+
+<p>"'Criminals <i>I</i> Have Caught,'" corrected Grodman. "My dear Denzil, how
+often am I to point out that I went through the experiences that make
+the backbone of my book, not you? In each case I cooked the criminal's
+goose. Any journalist could have supplied the dressing."</p>
+
+<p>"The contrary. The journeymen of journalism would have left the truth
+naked. You yourself could have done that&mdash;for there is no man to beat
+you at cold, lucid, scientific statement. But I idealized the bare facts
+and lifted them into the realm of poetry and literature. The
+twenty-fourth edition of the book attests my success."</p>
+
+<p>"Rot! The twenty-fourth edition was all owing to the murder! Did you do
+that?"</p>
+
+<p>"You take one up so sharply, Mr. Grodman," said Denzil, changing his
+tone.</p>
+
+<p>"No&mdash;I've retired," laughed Grodman.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil did not reprove the ex-detective's flippancy. He even laughed a
+little.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, give me another fiver, and I'll cry 'quits.' I'm in debt."</p>
+
+<p>"Not a penny. Why haven't you been to see me since the murder? I had to
+write that letter to the 'Pell Mell Press' myself. You might have earned
+a crown."</p>
+
+<p>"I've had writer's cramp, and couldn't do your last job. I was coming to
+tell you so on the morning of the&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Murder. So you said at the inquest."</p>
+
+<p>"It's true."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. Weren't you on your oath? It was very zealous of you to get
+up so early to tell me. In which hand did you have this cramp?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, in the right, of course."</p>
+
+<p>"And you couldn't write with your left?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think I could even hold a pen."</p>
+
+<p>"Or any other instrument, mayhap. What had you been doing to bring it
+on?"</p>
+
+<p>"Writing too much. That is the only possible cause."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't know. Writing what?"</p>
+
+<p>Denzil hesitated. "An epic poem."</p>
+
+<p>"No wonder you're in debt. Will a sovereign get you out of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; it wouldn't be the least use to me."</p>
+
+<p>"Here it is, then."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil took the coin and his hat.</p>
+
+<p>"Aren't you going to earn it, you beggar? Sit down and write something
+for me."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil got pen and paper, and took his place.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you want me to write?"</p>
+
+<p>"The Epic Poem."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil started and flushed. But he set to work. Grodman leaned back in
+his armchair and laughed, studying the poet's grave face.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil wrote three lines and paused.</p>
+
+<p>"Can't remember any more? Well, read me the start."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil read:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Of man's first disobedience and the fruit<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Brought death into the world&mdash;"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"Hold on!" cried Grodman; "what morbid subjects you choose, to be sure."</p>
+
+<p>"Morbid! Why, Milton chose the same subject!"</p>
+
+<p>"Blow Milton. Take yourself off&mdash;you and your Epics."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil went. The pock-marked person opened the street door for him.</p>
+
+<p>"When am I to have that new dress, dear?" she whispered coquettishly.</p>
+
+<p>"I have no money, Jane," he said shortly.</p>
+
+<p>"You have a sovereign."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the door viciously. Grodman
+overheard their whispers, and laughed silently. His hearing was acute.
+Jane had first introduced Denzil to his acquaintance about two years
+ago, when he spoke of getting an amanuensis, and the poet had been doing
+odd 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&mdash;and women&mdash;have something to
+conceal, and you have only to pretend to know what it is. Thus Grodman,
+who was nothing if not scientific.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil Cantercot shambled home thoughtfully, and abstractedly took his
+place at the Crowl dinner-table.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Crowl surveyed Denzil Cantercot so stonily and cut him his beef so
+savagely that he said grace when the dinner was over. Peter fed his
+metaphysical genius on tomatoes. He was tolerant enough to allow his
+family to follow their Fads; but no savory smells ever tempted him to be
+false to his vegetable loves. Besides, meat might have reminded him too
+much of his work. There is nothing like leather, but Bow beefsteaks
+occasionally come very near it.</p>
+
+<p>After dinner Denzil usually indulged in poetic reverie. But to-day he
+did not take his nap. He went out at once to "raise the wind." But there
+was a dead calm everywhere. In vain he asked for an advance at the
+office of the "Mile End Mirror," to which he contributed scathing
+leaderettes about vestrymen. In vain he trudged to the city and offered
+to write the "Ham and Eggs Gazette" an essay on the modern methods of
+bacon-curing. Denzil knew a great deal about the breeding and
+slaughtering of pigs, smoke-lofts and drying processes, having for years
+dictated 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 trade
+papers since boyhood. But there is great competition on these papers. So
+many men of literary gifts know all about the intricate technicalities
+of manufactures and markets, and are eager to set the trade right.
+Grodman perhaps hardly allowed sufficiently for the step backward that
+Denzil made when he devoted his whole time for months to "Criminals I
+Have Caught." It was as damaging as a debauch. For when your rivals are
+pushing forward, to stand still is to go back.</p>
+
+<p>In despair Denzil shambled toilsomely to Bethnal Green. He paused before
+the window of a little tobacconist's shop, wherein was displayed a
+placard announcing</p>
+
+<h3>"PLOTS FOR SALE."</h3>
+
+<p>The announcement went on to state that a large stock of plots was to be
+obtained on the premises&mdash;embracing sensational plots, humorous plots,
+love plots, religious plots, and poetic plots; also complete
+manuscripts, original novels, poems and tales. Apply within.</p>
+
+<p>It was a very dirty-looking shop, with begrimed bricks and blackened
+woodwork. The window contained some musty old books, an assortment of
+pipes and tobacco, and a large number of the vilest daubs unhung,
+painted in oil on Academy boards, and unframed. These were intended for
+landscapes, as you could tell from the titles. The most expensive was
+"Chingford Church," and it was marked 1s. 9d. The others ran from 6d. to
+1s. 3d., and were mostly representations of Scotch scenery&mdash;a loch with
+mountains in the background, with solid reflections in the water and a
+tree in the foreground. Sometimes the tree would be in the background.
+Then the loch would be in the foreground. Sky and water were intensely
+blue in all. The name of the collection was "Original oil paintings done
+by hand." Dust lay thick upon everything, as if carefully shoveled on;
+and the proprietor looked as if he slept in his shop window at night
+without taking his clothes off. He was a gaunt man with a red nose, long
+but scanty black locks covered by a smoking cap, and a luxuriant black
+mustache. He smoked a long clay pipe, and had the air of a broken-down
+operatic villain.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, good afternoon, Mr. Cantercot," he said, rubbing his hands, half
+from cold, half from usage; "what have you brought me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing," said Denzil, "but if you will lend me a sovereign I'll do you
+a stunner."</p>
+
+<p>The operatic villain shook his locks, his eyes full of pawky cunning.
+"If you did it after that it would be a stunner."</p>
+
+<p>What the operatic villain did with these plots, and who bought them,
+Cantercot never knew nor cared to know. Brains are cheap to-day, and
+Denzil was glad enough to find a customer.</p>
+
+<p>"Surely you've known me long enough to trust me," he cried.</p>
+
+<p>"Trust is dead," said the operatic villain, puffing away.</p>
+
+<p>"So is Queen Anne," cried the irritated poet. His eyes took a dangerous
+hunted look. Money he must have. But the operatic villain was
+inflexible. No plot, no supper.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Denzil went out flaming. He knew not where to turn. Temporarily he
+turned on his heel again and stared despairingly at the shop window.
+Again he read the legend:</p>
+
+<h3>"PLOTS FOR SALE."</h3>
+
+<p>He stared so long at this that it lost its meaning. When the sense of
+the words suddenly flashed upon him again, they bore a new significance.
+He went in meekly, and borrowed fourpence of the operatic villain. Then
+he took the 'bus for Scotland Yard. There was a not ill-looking servant
+girl in the 'bus. The rhythm of the vehicle shaped itself into rhymes in
+his brain. He forgot all about his situation and his object. He had
+never really written an epic&mdash;except "Paradise Lost"&mdash;but he composed
+lyrics about wine and women and often wept to think how miserable he
+was. But nobody ever bought anything of him, except articles on
+bacon-curing or attacks on vestrymen. He was a strange, wild creature,
+and the wench felt quite pretty under his ardent gaze. It almost
+hypnotized her, though, and she looked down at her new French kid boots
+to escape it.</p>
+
+<p>At Scotland Yard Denzil asked for Edward Wimp. Edward Wimp was not on
+view. Like kings and editors, Detectives are difficult of
+approach&mdash;unless you are a criminal, when you cannot see anything of
+them at all. Denzil knew of Edward Wimp, principally because of
+Grodman's contempt for his successor. Wimp was a man of taste and
+culture. Grodman's interests were entirely concentrated on the problems
+of logic and evidence. Books about these formed his sole reading; for
+<i>belles lettres</i> he cared not a straw. Wimp, with his flexible
+intellect, had a great contempt for Grodman and his slow, laborious,
+ponderous, almost Teutonic methods. Worse, he almost threatened to
+eclipse the radiant tradition of Grodman by some wonderfully ingenious
+bits of workmanship. Wimp was at his greatest in collecting
+circumstantial evidence; in putting two and two together to make five.
+He would collect together a number of dark and disconnected data and
+flash across them the electric light of some unifying hypothesis in a
+way which would have done credit to a Darwin or a Faraday. An intellect
+which might have served to unveil the secret workings of nature was
+subverted to the protection of a capitalistic civilization.</p>
+
+<p>By the assistance of a friendly policeman, whom the poet magnetized into
+the belief that his business was a matter of life and death, Denzil
+obtained the great detective's private address. It was near King's
+Cross. By a miracle Wimp was at home in the afternoon. He was writing
+when Denzil was ushered up three pairs of stairs into his presence, but
+he got up and flashed the bull's-eye of his glance upon the visitor.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Denzil Cantercot, I believe!" said Wimp.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil started. He had not sent up his name, merely describing himself
+as a gentleman.</p>
+
+<p>"That is my name," he murmured.</p>
+
+<p>"You were one of the witnesses at the inquest on the body of the late
+Arthur Constant. I have your evidence there." He pointed to a file. "Why
+have you come to give fresh evidence?"</p>
+
+<p>Again Denzil started, flushing in addition this time. "I want money," he
+said, almost involuntarily.</p>
+
+<p>"Sit down." Denzil sat. Wimp stood.</p>
+
+<p>Wimp was young and fresh-colored. He had a Roman nose, and was smartly
+dressed. He had beaten Grodman by discovering the wife Heaven meant for
+him. He had a bouncing boy, who stole jam out of the pantry without
+anyone being the wiser. Wimp did what work he could do at home in a
+secluded study at the top of the house. Outside his chamber of horrors
+he was the ordinary husband of commerce. He adored his wife, who thought
+poorly of his intellect, but highly of his heart. In domestic
+difficulties Wimp was helpless. He could not even tell whether the
+servant's "character" was forged or genuine. Probably he could not level
+himself to such petty problems. He was like the senior wrangler who has
+forgotten how to do quadratics, and has to solve equations of the second
+degree by the calculus.</p>
+
+<p>"How much money do you want?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"I do not make bargains," Denzil replied, his calm come back by this
+time. "I came to tender you a suggestion. It struck me that you might
+offer me a fiver for my trouble. Should you do so, I shall not refuse
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"You shall not refuse it&mdash;if you deserve it."</p>
+
+<p>"Good. I will come to the point at once. My suggestion concerns&mdash;Tom
+Mortlake."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil threw out the name as if it were a torpedo. Wimp did not move.</p>
+
+<p>"Tom Mortlake," went on Denzil, looking disappointed, "had a
+sweetheart." He paused impressively.</p>
+
+<p>Wimp said "Yes?"</p>
+
+<p>"Where is that sweetheart now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Where, indeed?"</p>
+
+<p>"You know about her disappearance?"</p>
+
+<p>"You have just informed me of it."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, she is gone&mdash;without a trace. She went about a fortnight before
+Mr. Constant's murder."</p>
+
+<p>"Murder? How do you know it was a murder?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Grodman says so," said Denzil, startled again.</p>
+
+<p>"H'm! Isn't that rather a proof that it was suicide? Well, go on."</p>
+
+<p>"About a fortnight before the suicide, Jessie Dymond disappeared. So
+they tell me in Stepney Green, where she lodged and worked."</p>
+
+<p>"What was she?"</p>
+
+<p>"She was a dressmaker. She had a wonderful talent. Quite fashionable
+ladies got to know of it. One of her dresses was presented at Court. I
+think the lady forgot to pay for it; so Jessie's landlady said."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she live alone?"</p>
+
+<p>"She had no parents, but the house was respectable."</p>
+
+<p>"Good-looking, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"As a poet's dream."</p>
+
+<p>"As yours, for instance?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am a poet; I dream."</p>
+
+<p>"You dream you are a poet. Well, well! She was engaged to Mortlake?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes! They made no secret of it. The engagement was an old one. When
+he was earning 36s. a week as a compositor they were saving up to buy a
+home. 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 of
+the Chapel told me all about 'Mortlake and his young woman.' Ye gods!
+How times are changed! Two years ago Mortlake had to struggle with my
+caligraphy&mdash;now he is in with all the nobs, and goes to the 'at homes'
+of the aristocracy."</p>
+
+<p>"Radical M. P.'s," murmured Wimp, smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"While I am still barred from the dazzling drawing-rooms, where beauty
+and intellect foregather. A mere artisan! A manual laborer!" Denzil's
+eyes flashed angrily. He rose with excitement. "They say he always was a
+jabberer in the composing-room, and he has jabbered himself right out of
+it and into a pretty good thing. He didn't have much to say about the
+crimes of capital when he was set up to second the toast of 'Railton and
+Hockes' at the beanfeast."</p>
+
+<p>"Toast and butter, toast and butter," said Wimp genially. "I shouldn't
+blame a man for serving the two together, Mr. Cantercot."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil forced a laugh. "Yes; but consistency's my motto. I like to see
+the royal soul immaculate, unchanging, immovable by fortune. Anyhow,
+when better times came for Mortlake the engagement still dragged on. He
+did not visit her so much. This last autumn he saw very little of her."</p>
+
+<p>"How do you know?"</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;I was often in Stepney Green. My business took me past the house of
+an evening. Sometimes there was no light in her room. That meant she was
+downstairs gossiping with the landlady."</p>
+
+<p>"She might have been out with Tom?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir; I knew Tom was on the platform somewhere or other. He was
+working up to all hours organizing the eight hours working movement."</p>
+
+<p>"A very good reason for relaxing his sweethearting."</p>
+
+<p>"It was. He never went to Stepney Green on a week night."</p>
+
+<p>"But you always did."</p>
+
+<p>"No&mdash;not every night."</p>
+
+<p>"You didn't go in?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never. She wouldn't permit my visits. She was a girl of strong
+character. She always reminded me of Flora Macdonald."</p>
+
+<p>"Another lady of your acquaintance?"</p>
+
+<p>"A lady I know better than the shadows who surround me; who is more real
+to me than the women who pester me for the price for apartments. Jessie
+Dymond, too, was of the race of heroines. Her eyes were clear blue, two
+wells with Truth at the bottom of each. When I looked into those eyes my
+own were dazzled. They were the only eyes I could never make dreamy." He
+waved his hand as if making a pass with it. "It was she who had the
+influence over me."</p>
+
+<p>"You knew her then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes. I knew Tom from the old 'New Pork Herald' days, and when I
+first met him with Jessie hanging on his arm he was quite proud to
+introduce her to a poet. When he got on he tried to shake me off."</p>
+
+<p>"You should have repaid him what you borrowed."</p>
+
+<p>"It&mdash;it&mdash;was only a trifle," stammered Denzil.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but the world turns on trifles," said the wise Wimp.</p>
+
+<p>"The world is itself a trifle," said the pensive poet. "The Beautiful
+alone is deserving of our regard."</p>
+
+<p>"And when the Beautiful was not gossiping with her landlady, did she
+gossip with you as you passed the door?"</p>
+
+<p>"Alas, no! She sat in her room reading, and cast a shadow&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"On your life?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; on the blind."</p>
+
+<p>"Always one shadow?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir. Once or twice, two."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, you had been drinking."</p>
+
+<p>"On my life, not. I have sworn off the treacherous wine-cup."</p>
+
+<p>"That's right. Beer is bad for poets. It makes their feet shaky. Whose
+was the second shadow?"</p>
+
+<p>"A man's."</p>
+
+<p>"Naturally. Mortlake's, perhaps?"</p>
+
+<p>"Impossible. He was still striking eight hours."</p>
+
+<p>"You found out whose? You didn't leave it a shadow of doubt?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; I waited till the substance came out."</p>
+
+<p>"It was Arthur Constant."</p>
+
+<p>"You are a magician! You&mdash;you terrify me. Yes, it was he."</p>
+
+<p>"Only once or twice, you say?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't keep watch over them."</p>
+
+<p>"No, no, of course not. You only passed casually. I understand you
+thoroughly."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil did not feel comfortable at the assertion.</p>
+
+<p>"What did he go there for?" Wimp went on.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. I'd stake my soul on Jessie's honor."</p>
+
+<p>"You might double your stake without risk."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I might! I would! You see her with my eyes."</p>
+
+<p>"For the moment they are the only ones available. When was the last time
+you saw the two together?"</p>
+
+<p>"About the middle of November."</p>
+
+<p>"Mortlake knew nothing of their meetings?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. Perhaps he did. Mr. Constant had probably enlisted her in
+his social mission work. I knew she was one of the attendants at the big
+children's tea in the Great Assembly Hall early in November. He treated
+her quite like a lady. She was the only attendant who worked with her
+hands."</p>
+
+<p>"The others carried the cups on their feet, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; how could that be? My meaning is that all the other attendants were
+real ladies, and Jessie was only an amateur, so to speak. There was no
+novelty for her in handing kids cups of tea. I daresay she had helped
+her landlady often enough at that&mdash;there's quite a bushel of brats below
+stairs. It's almost as bad as at friend Crowl's. Jessie was a real
+brick. But perhaps Tom didn't know her value. Perhaps he didn't like
+Constant to call on her, and it led to a quarrel. Anyhow, she's
+disappeared, like the snowfall on the river. There's not a trace. The
+landlady, who was such a friend of hers that Jessie used to make up her
+stuff into dresses for nothing, tells me that she's dreadfully annoyed
+at not having been left the slightest clue to her late tenant's
+whereabouts."</p>
+
+<p>"You have been making inquiries on your own account apparently."</p>
+
+<p>"Only of the landlady. Jessie never even gave her the week's notice, but
+paid her in lieu of it, and left immediately. The landlady told me I
+could have knocked her down with a feather. Unfortunately, I wasn't
+there to do it, for I should certainly have knocked her down for not
+keeping her eyes open better. She says if she had only had the least
+suspicion beforehand that the minx (she dared to call Jessie a minx) was
+going, she'd have known where, or her name would have been somebody
+else's. And yet she admits that Jessie was looking ill and worried.
+Stupid old hag!"</p>
+
+<p>"A woman of character," murmured the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't I tell you so?" cried Denzil eagerly. "Another girl would have
+let out that she was going. But, no! not a word. She plumped down the
+money and walked out. The landlady ran upstairs. None of Jessie's things
+were there. She must have quietly sold them off, or transferred them to
+the new place. I never in my life met a girl who so thoroughly knew her
+own mind or had a mind so worth knowing. She always reminded me of the
+Maid of Saragossa."</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed! And when did she leave?"</p>
+
+<p>"On the 19th of November."</p>
+
+<p>"Mortlake of course knows where she is?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't say. Last time I was at the house to inquire&mdash;it was at the end
+of November&mdash;he hadn't been seen there for six weeks. He wrote to her,
+of course, sometimes&mdash;the landlady knew his writing."</p>
+
+<p>Wimp looked Denzil straight in the eyes, and said, "You mean, of course,
+to accuse Mortlake of the murder of Mr. Constant?"</p>
+
+<p>"N-n-no, not at all," stammered Denzil, "only you know what Mr. Grodman
+wrote to the 'Pell Mell.' The more we know about Mr. Constant's life the
+more we shall know about the manner of his death. I thought my
+information would be valuable to you, and I brought it."</p>
+
+<p>"And why didn't you take it to Mr. Grodman?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because I thought it wouldn't be valuable to me."</p>
+
+<p>"You wrote 'Criminals I Have Caught.'"</p>
+
+<p>"How&mdash;how do you know that?" Wimp was startling him to-day with a
+vengeance.</p>
+
+<p>"Your style, my dear Mr. Cantercot. The unique noble style."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I was afraid it would betray me," said Denzil. "And since you
+know, I may tell you that Grodman's a mean curmudgeon. What does he want
+with all that money and those houses&mdash;a man with no sense of the
+Beautiful? He'd have taken my information, and given me more kicks than
+ha'pence for it, so to speak."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, he is a shrewd man after all. I don't see anything valuable in
+your evidence against Mortlake."</p>
+
+<p>"No!" said Denzil in a disappointed tone, and fearing he was going to be
+robbed. "Not when Mortlake was already jealous of Mr. Constant, who was
+a sort of rival organizer, unpaid! A kind of blackleg doing the work
+cheaper&mdash;nay, for nothing."</p>
+
+<p>"Did Mortlake tell you he was jealous?" said Wimp, a shade of sarcastic
+contempt piercing through his tones.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes! He said to me, 'That man will work mischief. I don't like your
+kid-glove philanthropists meddling in matters they don't understand.'"</p>
+
+<p>"Those were his very words?"</p>
+
+<p>"His <i>ipsissima verba</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well. I have your address in my files. Here is a sovereign for
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"Only one sovereign! It's not the least use to me."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well. It's of great use to me. I have a wife to keep."</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't," said Denzil with a sickly smile, "so perhaps I can manage
+on it after all." He took his hat and the sovereign.</p>
+
+<p>Outside the door he met a rather pretty servant just bringing in some
+tea to her master. He nearly upset her tray at sight of her. She seemed
+more amused at the <i>rencontre</i> than he.</p>
+
+<p>"Good afternoon, dear," she said coquettishly. "You might let me have
+that sovereign. I do so want a new Sunday bonnet."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the hall door viciously when
+he got to the bottom of the stairs. He seemed to be walking arm-in-arm
+with the long arm of coincidence. Wimp did not hear the duologue. He was
+already busy on his evening's report to headquarters. The next day
+Denzil had a body-guard wherever he went. It might have gratified his
+vanity had he known it. But to-night he was yet unattended, so no one
+noted that he went to 46 Glover Street, after the early Crowl supper. He
+could not help going. He wanted to get another sovereign. He also itched
+to taunt Grodman. Not succeeding in the former object, he felt the road
+open for the second.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you still hope to discover the Bow murderer?" he asked the old
+bloodhound.</p>
+
+<p>"I can lay my hand on him now," Grodman announced curtly.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil hitched his chair back involuntarily. He found conversation with
+detectives as lively as playing at skittles with bombshells. They got on
+his nerves terribly, these undemonstrative gentlemen with no sense of
+the Beautiful.</p>
+
+<p>"But why don't you give him up to justice?" he murmured.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah&mdash;it has to be proved yet. But it is only a matter of time."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh!" said Denzil, "and shall I write the story for you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. You will not live long enough."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil turned white. "Nonsense! I am years younger than you," he gasped.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said Grodman, "but you drink so much."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2>
+
+
+<p>When Wimp invited Grodman to eat his Christmas plum-pudding at King's
+Cross Grodman was only a little surprised. The two men were always
+overwhelmingly cordial when they met, in order to disguise their mutual
+detestation. When people really like each other, they make no
+concealment of their mutual contempt. In his letter to Grodman, Wimp
+said that he thought it would be nicer for him to keep Christmas in
+company than in solitary state. There seems to be a general prejudice in
+favor of Christmas numbers, and Grodman yielded to it. Besides, he
+thought that a peep at the Wimp domestic interior would be as good as a
+pantomime. He quite enjoyed the fun that was coming, for he knew that
+Wimp had not invited him out of mere "peace and goodwill."</p>
+
+<p>There was only one other guest at the festive board. This was Wimp's
+wife's mother's mother, a lady of sweet seventy. Only a minority of
+mankind can obtain a grandmother-in-law by marrying, but Wimp was not
+unduly conceited. The old lady suffered from delusions. One of them was
+that she was a centenarian. She dressed for the part. It is
+extraordinary what pains ladies will take to conceal their age. Another
+of Wimp's grandmother-in-law's delusions was that Wimp had married to
+get her into the family. Not to frustrate his design, she always gave
+him her company on high-days and holidays. Wilfred Wimp&mdash;the little boy
+who stole the jam&mdash;was in great form at the Christmas dinner. The only
+drawback to his enjoyment was that its sweets needed no stealing. His
+mother presided over the platters, and thought how much cleverer Grodman
+was than her husband. When the pretty servant who waited on them was
+momentarily out of the room, Grodman had remarked that she seemed very
+inquisitive. This coincided with Mrs. Wimp's own convictions, though Mr.
+Wimp could never be brought to see anything unsatisfactory or suspicious
+about the girl, not even though there were faults in spelling in the
+"character" with which her last mistress had supplied her.</p>
+
+<p>It was true that the puss had pricked up her ears when Denzil
+Cantercot's name was mentioned. Grodman saw it and watched her, and
+fooled Wimp to the top of his bent. It was, of course, Wimp who
+introduced the poet's name, and he did it so casually that Grodman
+perceived at once that he wished to pump him. The idea that the rival
+bloodhound should come to him for confirmation of suspicions against his
+own pet jackal was too funny. It was almost as funny to Grodman that
+evidence of some sort should be obviously lying to hand in the bosom of
+Wimp's hand-maiden; so obviously that Wimp could not see it. Grodman
+enjoyed his Christmas dinner, secure that he had not found a successor
+after all. Wimp, for his part, contemptuously wondered at the way
+Grodman's thought hovered about Denzil without grazing the truth. A man
+constantly about him, too!</p>
+
+<p>"Denzil is a man of genius," said Grodman. "And as such comes under the
+heading of Suspicious Characters. He has written an Epic Poem and read
+it to me. It is morbid from start to finish. There is 'death' in the
+third line. I daresay you know he polished up my book." Grodman's
+artlessness was perfect.</p>
+
+<p>"No. You surprise me," Wimp replied. "I'm sure he couldn't have done
+much to it. Look at your letter in the 'Pell Mell.' Who wants more
+polish and refinement than that showed?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, I didn't know you did me the honor of reading that."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes; we both read it," put in Mrs. Wimp. "I told Mr. Wimp it was
+clever and cogent. After that quotation from the letter to the poor
+fellow's <i>fianc&eacute;e</i> there could be no more doubt but that it was murder.
+Mr. Wimp was convinced by it, too, weren't you, Edward?"</p>
+
+<p>Edward coughed uneasily. It was a true statement, and therefore an
+indiscreet. Grodman would plume himself terribly. At this moment Wimp
+felt that Grodman had been right in remaining a bachelor. Grodman
+perceived the humor of the situation, and wore a curious, sub-mocking
+smile.</p>
+
+<p>"On the day I was born," said Wimp's grandmother-in-law, "over a hundred
+years ago, there was a babe murdered." Wimp found himself wishing it had
+been she. He was anxious to get back to Cantercot. "Don't let us talk
+shop on Christmas Day," he said, smiling at Grodman. "Besides, murder
+isn't a very appropriate subject."</p>
+
+<p>"No, it ain't," said Grodman. "How did we get on to it? Oh, yes&mdash;Denzil
+Cantercot. Ha! ha! ha! That's curious, for since Denzil wrote 'Criminals
+I have Caught,' his mind's running on nothing but murders. A poet's
+brain is easily turned."</p>
+
+<p>Wimp's eye glittered with excitement and contempt for Grodman's
+blindness. In Grodman's eye there danced an amused scorn of Wimp; to the
+outsider his amusement appeared at the expense of the poet.</p>
+
+<p>Having wrought his rival up to the highest pitch Grodman slyly and
+suddenly unstrung him.</p>
+
+<p>"How lucky for Denzil!" he said, still in the same naive, facetious
+Christmasy tone, "that he can prove an alibi in this Constant affair."</p>
+
+<p>"An alibi!" gasped Wimp. "Really?"</p>
+
+<p>"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."</p>
+
+<p>Jane had done nothing of the kind. After the colloquy he had overheard
+Grodman had set himself to find out the relation between his two
+employes. By casually referring to Denzil as "your husband" he so
+startled the poor woman that she did not attempt to deny the bond. Only
+once did he use the two words, but he was satisfied. As to the alibi he
+had not yet troubled her; but to take its existence for granted would
+upset and discomfort Wimp. For the moment that was triumph enough for
+Wimp's guest.</p>
+
+<p>"Par," said Wilfred Wimp, "what's a alleybi? A marble?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, my lad," said Grodman, "it means being somewhere else when you're
+supposed to be somewhere."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, playing truant," said Wilfred self-consciously; his schoolmaster
+had often proved an alibi against him. "Then Denzil will be hanged."</p>
+
+<p>Was it a prophecy? Wimp accepted it as such; as an oracle from the gods
+bidding him mistrust Grodman. Out of the mouths of little children
+issueth wisdom; sometimes even when they are not saying their lessons.</p>
+
+<p>"When I was in my cradle, a century ago," said Wimp's
+grandmother-in-law, "men were hanged for stealing horses."</p>
+
+<p>They silenced her with snapdragon performances.</p>
+
+<p>Wimp was busy thinking how to get at Grodman's factotum.</p>
+
+<p>Grodman was busy thinking how to get at Wimp's domestic.</p>
+
+<p>Neither received any of the usual messages from the Christmas Bells.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>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 expects
+it. 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's
+chronology. Once let him know that Bank Holiday is coming, and he writes
+to the company for more water. To-day his stock seemed low and he was
+dribbling it out; at times the wintry sun would shine in a feeble,
+diluted way, and though the holiday-makers would have preferred to take
+their sunshine neat, they swarmed forth in their myriads whenever there
+was a ray of hope. But it was only dodging the raindrops; up went the
+umbrellas again, and the streets became meadows of ambulating mushrooms.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil Cantercot sat in his fur overcoat at the open window, looking at
+the landscape in water colors. He smoked an after-dinner cigarette, and
+spoke of the Beautiful. Crowl was with him. They were in the first floor
+front, Crowl's bedroom, which, from its view of the Mile End Road, was
+livelier than the parlor with its outlook on the backyard. Mrs. Crowl
+was an anti-tobacconist as regards the best bedroom; but Peter did not
+like to put the poet or his cigarette out. He felt there was something
+in common between smoke and poetry, over and above their being both
+Fads. Besides, Mrs. Crowl was sulking in the kitchen. She had been
+arranging for an excursion with Peter and the children to Victoria Park.
+She had dreamed of the Crystal Palace, but Santa Claus had put no gifts
+in the cobbler's shoes. Now she could not risk spoiling the feather in
+her bonnet. The nine brats expressed their disappointment by slapping
+one another on the staircases. Peter felt that Mrs. Crowl connected him
+in some way with the rainfall, and was unhappy. Was it not enough that
+he had been deprived of the pleasure of pointing out to a superstitious
+majority the mutual contradictions of Leviticus and the Song of Solomon?
+It was not often that Crowl could count on such an audience.</p>
+
+<p>"And you still call Nature beautiful?" he said to Denzil, pointing to
+the ragged sky and the dripping eaves. "Ugly old scarecrow!"</p>
+
+<p>"Ugly she seems to-day," admitted Denzil. "But what is Ugliness but a
+higher form of Beauty? You have to look deeper into it to see it; such
+vision is the priceless gift of the few. To me this wan desolation of
+sighing rain is lovely as the sea-washed ruins of cities."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, but you wouldn't like to go out in it," said Peter Crowl. As he
+spoke the drizzle suddenly thickened into a torrent.</p>
+
+<p>"We do not always kiss the woman we love."</p>
+
+<p>"Speak for yourself, Denzil. I'm only a plain man, and I want to know if
+Nature isn't a Fad. Hallo, there goes Mortlake! Lord, a minute of this
+will soak him to the skin."</p>
+
+<p>The labor leader was walking along with bowed head. He did not seem to
+mind the shower. It was some seconds before he even heard Crowl's
+invitation to him to take shelter. When he did hear it he shook his
+head.</p>
+
+<p>"I know I can't offer you a drawing-room with duchesses stuck about it,"
+said Peter, vexed.</p>
+
+<p>Tom turned the handle of the shop door and went in. There was nothing in
+the world which now galled him more than the suspicion that he was
+stuck-up and wished to cut old friends. He picked his way through the
+nine brats who clung affectionately to his wet knees, dispersing them
+finally by a jet of coppers to scramble for. Peter met him on the stair
+and shook his hand lovingly and admiringly, and took him into Mrs.
+Crowl's bedroom.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't mind what I say, Tom. I'm only a plain man, and my tongue will
+say what comes uppermost! But it ain't from the soul, Tom, it ain't from
+the soul," said Peter, punning feebly, and letting a mirthless smile
+play over his sallow features. "You know Mr. Cantercot, I suppose? The
+poet."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes; how do you do, Tom? Seen the 'New Pork Herald' lately? Not
+bad, those old times, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Tom, "I wish I was back in them."</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense, nonsense," said Peter, in much concern. "Look at the good you
+are 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 for
+plain men like me, with no gift but just enough brains to see into the
+realities of things&mdash;to understand that we've got no soul and no
+immortality, and all that&mdash;and too selfish to look after anybody's
+comfort but my own and mother's and the kid's. But men like you and
+Cantercot&mdash;it ain't right that you should be peggin' away at low
+material things. Not that I think Cantercot's gospel's any value to the
+masses. The Beautiful is all very well for folks who've got nothing else
+to 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 little
+enough, Heaven knows; though how a place can know anything, Heaven alone
+knows. You give us the Useful, Tom; that's what the world wants more
+than the Beautiful."</p>
+
+<p>"Socrates said that the Useful is the Beautiful," said Denzil.</p>
+
+<p>"That may be," said Peter, "but the Beautiful ain't the Useful."</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense!" said Denzil. "What about Jessie&mdash;I mean Miss Dymond? There's
+a combination for you. She always reminds me of Grace Darling. How is
+she, Tom?"</p>
+
+<p>"She's dead!" snapped Tom.</p>
+
+<p>"What?" Denzil turned as white as a Christmas ghost.</p>
+
+<p>"It was in the papers," said Tom; "all about her and the lifeboat."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you mean Grace Darling," said Denzil, visibly relieved. "I meant
+Miss Dymond."</p>
+
+<p>"You needn't be so interested in her," said Tom, surlily. "She don't
+appreciate it. Ah, the shower is over. I must be going."</p>
+
+<p>"No, stay a little longer, Tom," pleaded Peter. "I see a lot about you
+in the papers, but very little of your dear old phiz now. I can't spare
+the time to go and hear you. But I really must give myself a treat.
+When's your next show?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I am always giving shows," said Tom, smiling a little. "But my next
+big performance is on the twenty-first of January, when that picture of
+poor Mr. Constant is to be unveiled at the Bow Break o' Day Club. They
+have written to Gladstone and other big pots to come down. I do hope the
+old man accepts. A non-political gathering like this is the only
+occasion we could both speak at, and I have never been on the same
+platform with Gladstone."</p>
+
+<p>He forgot his depression and ill-temper in the prospect, and spoke with
+more animation.</p>
+
+<p>"No, I should hope not, Tom," said Peter. "What with his Fads about the
+Bible being a Rock, and Monarchy being the right thing, he is a most
+dangerous man to lead the Radicals. He never lays his ax to the root of
+anything&mdash;except oak trees."</p>
+
+<p>"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 into
+the "gentleman" was delightful. It was almost as good as a week's rent
+to her to give vent to her feelings. The controversial couple had moved
+away from the window when Tom entered, and had not noticed the immediate
+advent of another visitor who had spent his time profitably in listening
+to Mrs. Crowl before asking to see the presumable object of his visit.</p>
+
+<p>"Ask him up if it's a friend of yours, Cantercot," said Peter. It was
+Wimp. Denzil was rather dubious as to the friendship, but he preferred
+to take Wimp diluted. "Mortlake's upstairs," he said. "Will you come up
+and see him?"</p>
+
+<p>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 queer
+quartette. Wimp had hardly expected to find anybody at the house on
+Boxing Day, but he did not care to waste a day. Was not Grodman, too, on
+the track? How lucky it was that Denzil had made the first overtures, so
+that he could approach him without exciting suspicion.</p>
+
+<p>Mortlake scowled when he saw the detective. He objected to the
+police&mdash;on principle. But Crowl had no idea who the visitor was, even
+when told his name. He was rather pleased to meet one of Denzil's
+high-class friends, and welcomed him warmly. Probably he was some famous
+editor, which would account for his name stirring vague recollections.
+He summoned the eldest brat and sent him for beer (people would have
+their Fads), and not without trepidation called down to "Mother" for
+glasses. "Mother" observed at night (in the same apartment) that the
+beer money might have paid the week's school fees for half the family.</p>
+
+<p>"We were just talking of poor Mr. Constant's portrait, Mr. Wimp," said
+the 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."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah," said Wimp, elated at being spared the trouble of maneuvering the
+conversation; "mysterious affair that, Mr. Crowl."</p>
+
+<p>"No; it's the right thing," said Peter. "There ought to be some memorial
+of the man in the district where he worked and where he died, poor
+chap." The cobbler brushed away a tear.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it's only right," echoed Mortlake a whit eagerly. "He was a noble
+fellow, a true philanthropist. The only thoroughly unselfish worker I've
+ever met."</p>
+
+<p>"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 met
+his like. Ah, I wish there was a Heaven for him to go to!" He blew his
+nose violently with a red pocket-handkerchief.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, he's there, if there <i>is</i>," said Tom.</p>
+
+<p>"I hope he is," added Wimp fervently; "but I shouldn't like to go there
+the way he did."</p>
+
+<p>"You were the last person to see him, Tom, weren't you?" said Denzil.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no," answered Tom quickly. "You remember he went out after me; at
+least, so Mrs. Drabdump said at the inquest."</p>
+
+<p>"That last conversation he had with you, Tom," said Denzil. "He didn't
+say anything to you that would lead you to suppose&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No, of course not!" interrupted Mortlake impatiently.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you really think he was murdered, Tom?" said Denzil.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Wimp's opinion on that point is more valuable than mine," replied
+Tom, testily. "It may have been suicide. Men often get sick of
+life&mdash;especially if they are bored," he added meaningly.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, but you were the last person known to be with him," said Denzil.</p>
+
+<p>Crowl laughed. "Had you there, Tom."</p>
+
+<p>But they did not have Tom there much longer, for he departed, looking
+even worse-tempered than when he came. Wimp went soon after, and Crowl
+and Denzil were left to their interminable argumentation concerning the
+Useful and the Beautiful.</p>
+
+<p>Wimp went west. He had several strings (or cords) to his bow, and he
+ultimately found himself at Kensal Green Cemetery. Being there, he went
+down the avenues of the dead to a grave to note down the exact date of a
+death. It was a day on which the dead seemed enviable. The dull, sodden
+sky, the dripping, leafless trees, the wet spongy soil, the reeking
+grass&mdash;everything combined to make one long to be in a warm, comfortable
+grave, away from the leaden ennui of life. Suddenly the detective's keen
+eye caught sight of a figure that made his heart throb with sudden
+excitement. It was that of a woman in a gray shawl and a brown bonnet
+standing before a railed-in grave. She had no umbrella. The rain plashed
+mournfully upon her, but left no trace on her soaking garments. Wimp
+crept up behind her, but she paid no heed to him. Her eyes were lowered
+to the grave, which seemed to be drawing them toward it by some strange
+morbid fascination. His eyes followed hers. The simple headstone bore
+the name: "Arthur Constant."</p>
+
+<p>Wimp tapped her suddenly on the shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump went deadly white. She turned round, staring at Wimp
+without any recognition.</p>
+
+<p>"You remember me, surely," he said. "I've been down once or twice to
+your place about that poor gentleman's papers." His eye indicated the
+grave.</p>
+
+<p>"Lor! I remember you now," said Mrs. Drabdump.</p>
+
+<p>"Won't you come under my umbrella? You must be drenched to the skin."</p>
+
+<p>"It don't matter, sir. I can't take no hurt. I've had the rheumatics
+this twenty year."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump shrank from accepting Wimp's attentions, not so much
+perhaps because he was a man as because he was a gentleman. Mrs.
+Drabdump liked to see the fine folks keep their place, and not
+contaminate their skirts by contact with the lower castes. "It's set
+wet, it'll rain right into the new year," she announced. "And they say a
+bad beginnin' makes a worse endin'." Mrs. Drabdump was one of those
+persons who give you the idea that they just missed being born
+barometers.</p>
+
+<p>"But what are you doing in this miserable spot, so far from home?"
+queried the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"It's Bank Holiday," Mrs. Drabdump reminded him in tones of acute
+surprise. "I always make a hexcursion on Bank Holiday."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2>
+
+
+<p>The New Year brought Mrs. Drabdump a new lodger. He was an old gentleman
+with a long gray beard. He rented the rooms of the late Mr. Constant,
+and lived a very retired life. Haunted rooms&mdash;or rooms that ought to be
+haunted if the ghosts of those murdered in them had any
+self-respect&mdash;are supposed to fetch a lower rent in the market. The
+whole Irish problem might be solved if the spirits of "Mr. Balfour's
+victims" would only depreciate the value of property to a point
+consistent with the support of an agricultural population. But Mrs.
+Drabdump's new lodger paid so much for his rooms that he laid himself
+open to a suspicion of special interest in ghosts. Perhaps he was a
+member of the Psychical Society. The neighborhood imagined him another
+mad philanthropist, but as he did not appear to be doing any good to
+anybody it relented and conceded his sanity. Mortlake, who occasionally
+stumbled across him in the passage, did not trouble himself to think
+about him at all. He was too full of other troubles and cares. Though he
+worked harder than ever, the spirit seemed to have gone out of him.
+Sometimes he forgot himself in a fine rapture of eloquence&mdash;lashing
+himself up into a divine resentment of injustice or a passion of
+sympathy with the sufferings of his brethren&mdash;but mostly he plodded on
+in dull, mechanical fashion. He still made brief provincial tours,
+starring a day here and a day there, and everywhere his admirers
+remarked how jaded and overworked he looked. There was talk of starting
+a subscription to give him a holiday on the Continent&mdash;a luxury
+obviously unobtainable on the few pounds allowed him per week. The new
+lodger would doubtless have been pleased to subscribe, for he seemed
+quite to like occupying Mortlake's chamber the nights he was absent,
+though he was thoughtful enough not to disturb the hardworked landlady
+in the adjoining room by unseemly noise. Wimp was always a quiet man.</p>
+
+<p>Meantime the 21st of the month approached, and the East End was in
+excitement. Mr. Gladstone had consented to be present at the ceremony of
+unveiling the portrait of Arthur Constant, presented by an unknown donor
+to the Bow Break o' Day Club, and it was to be a great function. The
+whole affair was outside the lines of party politics, so that even
+Conservatives and Socialists considered themselves justified in
+pestering the committee for tickets. To say nothing of ladies. As the
+committee desired to be present themselves, nine-tenths of the
+applications for admission had to be refused, as is usual on these
+occasions. The committee agreed among themselves to exclude the fair sex
+altogether as the only way of disposing of their womankind who were
+making speeches as long as Mr. Gladstone's. Each committeeman told his
+sisters, female cousins and aunts that the other committeemen had
+insisted on divesting the function of all grace; and what could a man do
+when he was in a minority of one?</p>
+
+<p>Crowl, who was not a member of the Break o' Day Club, was particularly
+anxious to hear the great orator whom he despised; fortunately Mortlake
+remembered the cobbler's anxiety to hear himself, and on the eve of the
+ceremony sent him a ticket. Crowl was in the first flush of possession
+when Denzil Cantercot returned, after a sudden and unannounced absence
+of three days. His clothes were muddy and tattered, his cocked hat was
+deformed, 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?"</p>
+
+<p>"Terribly busy!" said Denzil. "Here, give me a glass of water. I'm dry
+as the Sahara."</p>
+
+<p>Crowl ran inside and got the water, trying hard not to inform Mrs. Crowl
+of their lodger's return. "Mother" had expressed herself freely on the
+subject of the poet during his absence, and not in terms which would
+have 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 might
+be 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 felt
+no sense of victory. He had no desire to crow over his partner and to
+utter that "See! didn't I tell you so?" which is a greater consolation
+than religion in most of the misfortunes of life. Unfortunately, to get
+the water, Crowl had to go to the kitchen; and as he was usually such a
+temperate man, this desire for drink in the middle of the day attracted
+the attention of the lady in possession. Crowl had to explain the
+situation. Mrs. Crowl ran into the shop to improve it. Mr. Crowl
+followed in dismay, leaving a trail of spilled water in his wake.</p>
+
+<p>"You good-for-nothing, disreputable scarecrow, where have&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Hush, mother. Let him drink. Mr. Cantercot is thirsty."</p>
+
+<p>"Does he care if my children are hungry?"</p>
+
+<p>Denzil tossed the water greedily down his throat almost at a gulp, as if
+it were brandy.</p>
+
+<p>"Madam," he said, smacking his lips, "I do care. I care intensely. Few
+things in life would grieve me more deeply than to hear that a child, a
+dear little child&mdash;the Beautiful in a nutshell&mdash;had suffered hunger. You
+wrong me." His voice was tremulous with the sense of injury. Tears stood
+in his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Wrong you? I've no wish to wrong you," said Mrs. Crowl. "I should like
+to hang you."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't talk of such ugly things," said Denzil, touching his throat
+nervously.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what have you been doin' all this time?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, what should I be doing?"</p>
+
+<p>"How should I know what became of you? I thought it was another murder."</p>
+
+<p>"What!" Denzil's glass dashed to fragments on the floor. "What do you
+mean?"</p>
+
+<p>But Mrs. Crowl was glaring too viciously at Mr. Crowl to reply. He
+understood the message as if it were printed. It ran: "You have broken
+one of my best glasses. You have annihilated threepence, or a week's
+school fees for half the family." Peter wished she would turn the
+lightning upon Denzil, a conductor down whom it would run innocuously.
+He stooped down and picked up the pieces as carefully as if they were
+cuttings from the Koh-i-noor. Thus the lightning passed harmlessly over
+his head and flew toward Cantercot.</p>
+
+<p>"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."</p>
+
+<p>"What unbeautiful ideas you have, to be sure!" murmured Denzil.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; but they'd be useful," said Mrs. Crowl, who had not lived with
+Peter all these years for nothing. "And if you haven't been murdered
+what have you been doing?"</p>
+
+<p>"My dear, my dear," put in Crowl, deprecatingly, looking up from his
+quadrupedal position like a sad dog, "you are not Cantercot's keeper."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, ain't I?" flashed his spouse. "Who else keeps him I should like to
+know?"</p>
+
+<p>Peter went on picking up the pieces of the Koh-i-noor.</p>
+
+<p>"I have no secrets from Mrs. Crowl" Denzil explained courteously. "I
+have been working day and night bringing out a new paper. Haven't had a
+wink of sleep for three nights."</p>
+
+<p>Peter looked up at his bloodshot eyes with respectful interest.</p>
+
+<p>"The capitalist met me in the street&mdash;an old friend of mine&mdash;I was
+overjoyed at the <i>rencontre</i> and told him the idea I'd been brooding
+over for months and he promised to stand all the racket."</p>
+
+<p>"What sort of a paper?" said Peter.</p>
+
+<p>"Can you ask? To what do you think I've been devoting my days and nights
+but to the cultivation of the Beautiful?"</p>
+
+<p>"Is that what the paper will be devoted to?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. To the Beautiful."</p>
+
+<p>"I know," snorted Mrs. Crowl, "with portraits of actresses."</p>
+
+<p>"Portraits? Oh, no!" said Denzil. "That would be the True&mdash;not the
+Beautiful."</p>
+
+<p>"And what's the name of the paper?" asked Crowl.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, that's a secret, Peter. Like Scott, I prefer to remain anonymous."</p>
+
+<p>"Just like your Fads. I'm only a plain man, and I want to know where the
+fun of anonymity comes in? If I had any gifts, I should like to get the
+credit. It's a right and natural feeling, to my thinking."</p>
+
+<p>"Unnatural, Peter; unnatural. We're all born anonymous, and I'm for
+sticking close to Nature. Enough for me that I disseminate the
+Beautiful. Any letters come during my absence, Mrs. Crowl?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," she snapped. "But a gent named Grodman called. He said you hadn't
+been to see him for some time, and looked annoyed to hear you'd
+disappeared. How much have you let him in for?"</p>
+
+<p>"The man's in my debt," said Denzil, annoyed. "I wrote a book for him
+and he's taken all the credit for it, the rogue! My name doesn't appear
+even in the Preface. What's that ticket you're looking so lovingly at,
+Peter?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's for to-night&mdash;the unveiling of Constant's portrait. Gladstone
+speaks. Awful demand for places."</p>
+
+<p>"Gladstone!" sneered Denzil. "Who wants to hear Gladstone? A man who's
+devoted his life to pulling down the pillars of Church and State."</p>
+
+<p>"A man's who's devoted his whole life to propping up the crumbling Fads
+of Religion and Monarchy. But, for all that, the man has his gifts, and
+I'm burnin' to hear him."</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't go out of my way an inch to hear him," said Denzil; and went
+up to his room, and when Mrs. Crowl sent him up a cup of nice strong tea
+at tea time, the brat who bore it found him lying dressed on the bed,
+snoring unbeautifully.</p>
+
+<p>The evening wore on. It was fine frosty weather. The Whitechapel Road
+swarmed, with noisy life, as though it were a Saturday night. The stars
+flared in the sky like the lights of celestial costermongers. Everybody
+was on the alert for the advent of Mr. Gladstone. He must surely come
+through the Road on his journey from the West Bow-wards. But nobody saw
+him or his carriage, except those about the Hall. Probably he went by
+tram most of the way. He would have caught cold in an open carriage, or
+bobbing his head out of the window of a closed.</p>
+
+<p>"If he had only been a German prince, or a cannibal king," said Crowl
+bitterly, as he plodded toward the Club, "we should have disguised Mile
+End in bunting and blue fire. But perhaps it's a compliment. He knows
+his London, and it's no use trying to hide the facts from him. They must
+have queer notions of cities, those monarchs. They must fancy everybody
+lives in a flutter of flags and walks about under triumphal arches, like
+as if I were to stitch shoes in my Sunday clothes." By a defiance of
+chronology Crowl had them on to-day, and they seemed to accentuate the
+simile.</p>
+
+<p>"And why shouldn't life be fuller of the Beautiful," said Denzil. The
+poet had brushed the reluctant mud off his garments to the extent it was
+willing to go, and had washed his face, but his eyes were still
+bloodshot from the cultivation of the Beautiful. Denzil was accompanying
+Crowl to the door of the Club out of good-fellowship. Denzil was himself
+accompanied by Grodman, though less obtrusively. Least obtrusively was
+he accompanied by his usual Scotland Yard shadows, Wimp's agents. There
+was a surging nondescript crowd about the Club, and the police, and the
+door-keeper, and the stewards could with difficulty keep out the tide of
+the ticketless, through which the current of the privileged had equal
+difficulty in permeating. The streets all around were thronged with
+people longing for a glimpse of Gladstone. Mortlake drove up in a hansom
+(his head a self-conscious pendulum of popularity, swaying and bowing to
+right and left) and received all the pent-up enthusiasm.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, good-by, Cantercot," said Crowl.</p>
+
+<p>"No, I'll see you to the door, Peter."</p>
+
+<p>They fought their way shoulder to shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>Now that Grodman had found Denzil he was not going to lose him again. He
+had only found him by accident, for he was himself bound to the
+unveiling ceremony, to which he had been invited in view of his known
+devotion to the task of unveiling the Mystery. He spoke to one of the
+policemen about, who said, "Ay, ay, sir," and he was prepared to follow
+Denzil, if necessary, and to give up the pleasure of hearing Gladstone
+for an acuter thrill. The arrest must be delayed no longer.</p>
+
+<p>But Denzil seemed as if he were going in on the heels of Crowl. This
+would suit Grodman better. He could then have the two pleasures. But
+Denzil was stopped half-way through the door.</p>
+
+<p>"Ticket, sir!"</p>
+
+<p>Denzil drew himself up to his full height.</p>
+
+<p>"Press," he said, majestically. All the glories and grandeurs of the
+Fourth Estate were concentrated in that haughty monosyllable. Heaven
+itself is full of journalists who have overawed St. Peter. But the
+door-keeper was a veritable dragon.</p>
+
+<p>"What paper, sir?"</p>
+
+<p>"'New Pork Herald,'" said Denzil sharply. He did not relish his word
+being distrusted.</p>
+
+<p>"'New York Herald,'" said one of the bystanding stewards, scarce
+catching the sounds. "Pass him in."</p>
+
+<p>And in the twinkling of an eye, Denzil had eagerly slipped inside.</p>
+
+<p>But during the brief altercation Wimp had come up. Even he could not
+make his face quite impassive, and there was a suppressed intensity in
+the 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 their
+coming <i>coups</i> that they struggled for some seconds, side by side,
+before they recognized each other. Then they shook hands heartily.</p>
+
+<p>"That was Cantercot just went in, wasn't it, Grodman?" said Wimp.</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't notice," said Grodman, in tones of utter indifference.</p>
+
+<p>At bottom Wimp was terribly excited. He felt that his <i>coup</i> was going
+to be executed under very sensational circumstances. Everything would
+combine to turn the eyes of the country upon him&mdash;nay, of the world, for
+had not the Big Bow Mystery been discussed in every language under the
+sun? In these electric times the criminal achieves a cosmopolitan
+reputation. It is a privilege he shares with few other artists. This
+time Wimp would be one of them; and, he felt, deservedly so. If the
+criminal had been cunning to the point of genius in planning the murder,
+he had been acute to the point of divination in detecting it. Never
+before had he pieced together so broken a chain. He could not resist the
+unique opportunity of setting a sensational scheme in a sensational
+frame-work. The dramatic instinct was strong in him; he felt like a
+playwright who has constructed a strong melodramatic plot, and has the
+Drury Lane stage suddenly offered him to present it on. It would be
+folly to deny himself the luxury, though the presence of Mr. Gladstone
+and the nature of the ceremony should perhaps have given him pause. Yet,
+on the other hand, these were the very factors of the temptation. Wimp
+went in and took a seat behind Denzil. All the seats were numbered, so
+that everybody might have the satisfaction of occupying somebody else's.
+Denzil was in the special reserved places in the front row just by the
+central gangway; Crowl was squeezed into a corner behind a pillar near
+the back of the hall. Grodman had been honored with a seat on the
+platform, which was accessible by steps on the right and left, but he
+kept his eye on Denzil. The picture of the poor idealist hung on the
+wall behind Grodman's head, covered by its curtain of brown holland.
+There was a subdued buzz of excitement about the hall, which swelled
+into cheers every now and again as some gentleman known to fame or Bow
+took his place upon the platform. It was occupied by several local M.
+P.'s of varying politics, a number of other Parliamentary satellites of
+the great man, three or four labor leaders, a peer or two of
+philanthropic pretensions, a sprinkling of Toynbee and Oxford Hall men,
+the president and other honorary officials, some of the family and
+friends of the deceased, together with the inevitable percentage of
+persons who had no claim to be there save cheek. Gladstone was
+late&mdash;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 a
+political meeting. Gladstone came in just in time to acknowledge the
+compliment. The noise of the song, trolled out from iron lungs, had
+drowned the huzzahs heralding the old man's advent. The convivial chorus
+went to Mortlake's head, as if champagne had really preceded it. His
+eyes grew moist and dim. He saw himself swimming to the Millenium on
+waves of enthusiasm. Ah, how his brother-toilers should be rewarded for
+their trust in him!</p>
+
+<p>With his usual courtesy and consideration, Mr. Gladstone had refused to
+perform the actual unveiling of Arthur Constant's portrait. "That," he
+said in his postcard, "will fall most appropriately to Mr. Mortlake, a
+gentleman who has, I am given to understand, enjoyed the personal
+friendship of the late Mr. Constant, and has co-operated with him in
+various schemes for the organization of skilled and unskilled classes of
+labor, as well as for the diffusion of better ideals&mdash;ideals of
+self-culture and self-restraint&mdash;among the workingmen of Bow, who have
+been fortunate, so far as I can perceive, in the possession (if in one
+case unhappily only temporary possession) of two such men of undoubted
+ability and honesty to direct their divided counsels and to lead them
+along a road, which, though I cannot pledge myself to approve of it in
+all its turnings and windings, is yet not unfitted to bring them
+somewhat nearer to goals to which there are few of us but would extend
+some measure of hope that the working classes of this great Empire may
+in due course, yet with no unnecessary delay, be enabled to arrive."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Gladstone's speech was an expansion of his postcard, punctuated by
+cheers. The only new thing in it was the graceful and touching way in
+which he revealed what had been a secret up till then&mdash;that the portrait
+had been painted and presented to the Bow Break o' Day Club, by Lucy
+Brent, who in the fulness of time would have been Arthur Constant's
+wife. It was a painting for which he had sat to her while alive, and she
+had stifled yet pampered her grief by working hard at it since his
+death. The fact added the last touch of pathos to the occasion. Crowl's
+face was hidden behind his red handkerchief; even the fire of excitement
+in Wimp's eye was quenched for a moment by a tear-drop, as he thought of
+Mrs. Wimp and Wilfred. As for Grodman, there was almost a lump in his
+throat. Denzil Cantercot was the only unmoved man in the room. He
+thought the episode quite too Beautiful, and was already weaving it into
+rhyme.</p>
+
+<p>At the conclusion of his speech Mr. Gladstone called upon Tom Mortlake
+to unveil the portrait. Tom rose, pale and excited. His hand faltered as
+he touched the cord. He seemed overcome with emotion. Was it the mention
+of Lucy Brent that had moved him to his depths?</p>
+
+<p>The brown holland fell away&mdash;the dead stood revealed as he had been in
+life. Every feature, painted by the hand of Love, was instinct with
+vitality: the fine, earnest face, the sad kindly eyes, the noble brow
+seeming still a-throb with the thought of Humanity. A thrill ran through
+the room&mdash;there was a low, undefinable murmur. O, the pathos and the
+tragedy of it! Every eye was fixed, misty with emotion, upon the dead
+man in the picture and the living man who stood, pale and agitated, and
+visibly unable to commence his speech, at the side of the canvas.
+Suddenly a hand was laid upon the labor leader's shoulder, and there
+rang through the hall in Wimp's clear, decisive tones the words: "Tom
+Mortlake, I arrest you for the murder of Arthur Constant!"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2>
+
+
+<p>For a moment there was an acute, terrible silence. Mortlake's face was
+that of a corpse; the face of the dead man at his side was flushed with
+the hues of life. To the overstrung nerves of the onlookers, the
+brooding eyes of the picture seemed sad and stern with menace, and
+charged with the lightnings of doom.</p>
+
+<p>It was a horrible contrast. For Wimp, alone, the painted face had
+fuller, more tragical, meanings. The audience seemed turned to stone.
+They sat or stood&mdash;in every variety of attitude&mdash;frozen, rigid. Arthur
+Constant's picture dominated the scene, the only living thing in a hall
+of the dead.</p>
+
+<p>But only for a moment. Mortlake shook off the detective's hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Boys!" he cried, in accents of infinite indignation, "this is a police
+conspiracy."</p>
+
+<p>His words relaxed the tension. The stony figures were agitated. A dull,
+excited hubbub answered him. The little cobbler darted from behind his
+pillar, and leaped upon a bench. The cords of his brow were swollen with
+excitement. He seemed a giant overshadowing the hall.</p>
+
+<p>"Boys!" he roared, in his best Victoria Park voice, "listen to me. This
+charge is a foul and damnable lie."</p>
+
+<p>"Bravo!" "Hear, hear!" "Hooray!" "It is!" was roared back at him from
+all parts of the room. Everybody rose and stood in tentative attitudes,
+excited to the last degree.</p>
+
+<p>"Boys!" Peter roared on, "you all know me. I'm a plain man, and I want
+to know if it's likely a man would murder his best friend."</p>
+
+<p>"No," in a mighty volume of sound.</p>
+
+<p>Wimp had scarcely calculated upon Mortlake's popularity. He stood on the
+platform, pale and anxious as his prisoner.</p>
+
+<p>"And if he did, why didn't they prove it the first time?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hear, hear!"</p>
+
+<p>"And if they want to arrest him, why couldn't they leave it till the
+ceremony was over? Tom Mortlake's not the man to run away."</p>
+
+<p>"Tom Mortlake! Tom Mortlake! Three cheers for Tom Mortlake! Hip, hip,
+hip, hooray!"</p>
+
+<p>"Three groans for the police." "Hoo! Oo! Oo!"</p>
+
+<p>Wimp's melodrama was not going well. He felt like the author to whose
+ears is borne the ominous sibilance of the pit. He almost wished he had
+not followed the curtain-raiser with his own stronger drama.
+Unconsciously the police, scattered about the hall, drew together. The
+people on the platform knew not what to do. They had all risen and stood
+in a densely-packed mass. Even Mr. Gladstone's speech failed him in
+circumstances so novel. The groans died away; the cheers for Mortlake
+rose and swelled and fell and rose again. Sticks and umbrellas were
+banged and rattled, handkerchiefs were waved, the thunder deepened. The
+motley crowd still surging about the hall took up the cheers, and for
+hundreds of yards around people were going black in the face out of mere
+irresponsible enthusiasm. At last Tom waved his hand&mdash;the thunder
+dwindled, died. The prisoner was master of the situation.</p>
+
+<p>Grodman stood on the platform, grasping the back of his chair, a curious
+mocking Mephistophelian glitter about his eyes, his lips wreathed into a
+half smile. There was no hurry for him to get Denzil Cantercot arrested
+now. Wimp had made an egregious, a colossal blunder. In Grodman's heart
+there was a great glad calm as of a man who has strained his sinews to
+win in a famous match, and has heard the judge's word. He felt almost
+kindly to Denzil now.</p>
+
+<p>Tom Mortlake spoke. His face was set and stony. His tall figure was
+drawn up haughtily to its full height. He pushed the black mane back
+from his forehead with a characteristic gesture. The fevered audience
+hung upon his lips&mdash;the men at the back leaned eagerly forward&mdash;the
+reporters were breathless with fear lest they should miss a word. What
+would the great labor leader have to say at this supreme moment?</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: It is to me a melancholy pleasure to have
+been honored with the task of unveiling to-night this portrait of a
+great benefactor to Bow and a true friend to the laboring classes.
+Except that he honored me with his friendship while living, and that the
+aspirations of my life have, in my small and restricted way, been
+identical with his, there is little reason why this honorable duty
+should have fallen upon me. Gentlemen, I trust that we shall all find an
+inspiring influence in the daily vision of the dead, who yet liveth in
+our hearts and in this noble work of art&mdash;wrought, as Mr. Gladstone has
+told us, by the hand of one who loved him." The speaker paused a moment,
+his low vibrant tones faltering into silence. "If we humble workingmen
+of Bow can never hope to exert individually a tithe of the beneficial
+influence wielded by Arthur Constant, it is yet possible for each of us
+to walk in the light he has kindled in our midst&mdash;a perpetual lamp of
+self-sacrifice and brotherhood."</p>
+
+<p>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 the
+Beautiful. Again there was a breathless hush. Mr. Gladstone's mobile
+face was working with excitement. No such extraordinary scene had
+occurred in the whole of his extraordinary experience. He seemed about
+to rise. The cheering subsided to a painful stillness. Wimp cut the
+situation by laying his hand again upon Tom's shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>"Come quietly with me," he said. The words were almost a whisper, but in
+the supreme silence they traveled to the ends of the hall.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you go, Tom!" The trumpet tones were Peter's. The call thrilled
+an answering chord of defiance in every breast, and a low, ominous
+murmur swept through the hall.</p>
+
+<p>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."</p>
+
+<p>But the blood of the Break o' Day boys was at fever heat. A hurtling
+mass of men struggled confusedly from their seats. In a moment all was
+chaos. Tom did not move. Half-a-dozen men, headed by Peter, scaled the
+platform. Wimp was thrown to one side, and the invaders formed a ring
+round Tom's chair. The platform people scampered like mice from the
+center. Some huddled together in the corners, others slipped out at the
+rear. The committee congratulated themselves on having had the
+self-denial to exclude ladies. Mr. Gladstone's satellites hurried the
+old man off and into his carriage; though the fight promised to become
+Homeric. Grodman stood at the side of the platform secretly more amused
+than ever, concerning himself no more with Denzil Cantercot, who was
+already strengthening his nerves at the bar upstairs. The police about
+the hall blew their whistles, and policemen came rushing in from outside
+and the neighborhood. An Irish M. P. on the platform was waving his
+gingham like a shillalah in sheer excitement, forgetting his new-found
+respectability and dreaming himself back at Donnybrook Fair. Him a
+conscientious constable floored with a truncheon. But a shower of fists
+fell on the zealot's face, and he tottered back bleeding. Then the storm
+broke in all its fury. The upper air was black with staves, sticks, and
+umbrellas, mingled with the pallid hailstones of knobby fists. Yells and
+groans and hoots and battle-cries blent in grotesque chorus, like one of
+Dvor&aacute;k's weird diabolical movements. Mortlake stood impassive, with arms
+folded, making no further effort, and the battle raged round him as the
+water swirls around some steadfast rock. A posse of police from the back
+fought their way steadily toward him, and charged up the heights of the
+platform steps, only to be sent tumbling backward, as their leader was
+hurled 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 been
+taken, after being well shaken. Then the miracle happened.</p>
+
+<p>As when of old a reputable goddess <i>ex machina</i> saw her favorite hero in
+dire peril, straightway she drew down a cloud from the celestial stores
+of Jupiter and enveloped her fondling in kindly night, so that his
+adversary strove with the darkness, so did Crowl, the cunning cobbler,
+the much-daring, essay to insure his friend's safety. He turned off the
+gas at the meter.</p>
+
+<p>An Arctic night&mdash;unpreceded by twilight&mdash;fell, and there dawned the
+sabbath of the witches. The darkness could be felt&mdash;and it left blood
+and bruises behind it. When the lights were turned on again, Mortlake
+was gone. But several of the rioters were arrested, triumphantly.</p>
+
+<p>And through all, and over all, the face of the dead man who had sought
+to bring peace on earth, brooded.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese, with his head
+bandaged, while Denzil Cantercot told him the story of how he had
+rescued 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 battle
+till he had seen him safely outside and into a by-street.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a name="illus3" id="illus3"></a>
+<img src="images/illus3.jpg" alt=""/>
+</div>
+
+<h3>Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese.</h3>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+
+
+<p>"I am so glad you saw that he got away safely," said Crowl, "I wasn't
+quite sure he would."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; but I wish some cowardly fool hadn't turned off the gas. I like
+men to see that they are beaten."</p>
+
+<p>"But it seemed&mdash;easier," faltered Crowl.</p>
+
+<p>"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 be
+easier, but it's shabby. It shocks one's sense of the Beautiful."</p>
+
+<p>Crowl ate his bread and cheese shame-facedly.</p>
+
+<p>"But what was the use of breaking your head to save him?" said Mrs.
+Crowl with an unconscious pun. "He must be caught."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, I don't see how the Useful does come in, now," said Peter
+thoughtfully. "But I didn't think of that at the time."</p>
+
+<p>He swallowed his water quickly and it went the wrong way and added to
+his confusion. It also began to dawn upon him that he might be called to
+account. Let it be said at once that he wasn't. He had taken too
+prominent a part.</p>
+
+<p>Meantime, Mrs. Wimp was bathing Mr. Wimp's eye, and rubbing him
+generally with arnica. Wimp's melodrama had been, indeed, a sight for
+the gods. Only, virtue was vanquished and vice triumphant. The villain
+had escaped, and without striking a blow.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2>
+
+
+<p>There was matter and to spare for the papers the next day. The striking
+ceremony&mdash;Mr. Gladstone's speech&mdash;the sensational arrest&mdash;these would of
+themselves have made excellent themes for reports and leaders. But the
+personality of the man arrested, and the Big Bow Mystery Battle&mdash;as it
+came to be called&mdash;gave additional piquancy to the paragraphs and the
+posters. The behavior of Mortlake put the last touch to the
+picturesqueness of the position. He left the hall when the lights went
+out, and walked unnoticed and unmolested through pleiads of policemen to
+the nearest police station, where the superintendent was almost too
+excited to take any notice of his demand to be arrested. But to do him
+justice, the official yielded as soon as he understood the situation. It
+seems inconceivable that he did not violate some red-tape regulation in
+so doing. To some this self-surrender was limpid proof of innocence; to
+others it was the damning token of despairing guilt.</p>
+
+<p>The morning papers were pleasant reading for Grodman, who chuckled as
+continuously over his morning egg, as if he had laid it. Jane was
+alarmed for the sanity of her saturnine master. As her husband would
+have said, Grodman's grins were not Beautiful. But he made no effort to
+suppress them. Not only had Wimp perpetrated a grotesque blunder, but
+the journalists to a man were down on his great sensation tableau,
+though their denunciations did not appear in the dramatic columns. The
+Liberal papers said that he had endangered Mr. Gladstone's life; the
+Conservative that he had unloosed the raging elements of Bow
+blackguardism, and set in motion forces which might have easily swelled
+to a riot, involving severe destruction of property. But "Tom Mortlake,"
+was, after all, the thought swamping every other. It was, in a sense, a
+triumph for the man.</p>
+
+<p>But Wimp's turn came when Mortlake, who reserved his defense, was
+brought up before a magistrate, and, by force of the new evidence, fully
+committed for trial on the charge of murdering Arthur Constant. Then
+men's thoughts centered again on the Mystery, and the solution of the
+inexplicable problem agitated mankind from China to Peru.</p>
+
+<p>In the middle of February, the great trial befell. It was another of the
+opportunities which the Chancellor of the Exchequer neglects. So
+stirring a drama might have easily cleared its expenses&mdash;despite the
+length of the cast, the salaries of the stars, and the rent of the
+house&mdash;in mere advance booking. For it was a drama which (by the rights
+of Magna Charta) could never be repeated; a drama which ladies of
+fashion would have given their earrings to witness, even with the
+central figure not a woman. And there was a woman in it anyhow, to judge
+by the little that had transpired at the magisterial examination, and
+the fact that the country was placarded with bills offering a reward for
+information concerning a Miss Jessie Dymond. Mortlake was defended by
+Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C., retained at the expense of the
+Mortlake Defense Fund (subscriptions to which came also from Australia
+and the Continent), and set on his mettle by the fact that he was the
+accepted labor candidate for an East-end constituency. Their Majesties,
+Victoria and the Law, were represented by Mr. Robert Spigot, Q. C.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Spigot, Q. C., in presenting his case, said: "I propose to show that
+the prisoner murdered his friend and fellow-lodger, Mr. Arthur Constant,
+in cold blood, and with the most careful premeditation; premeditation so
+studied, as to leave the circumstances of the death an impenetrable
+mystery for weeks to all the world, though fortunately without
+altogether baffling the almost superhuman ingenuity of Mr. Edward Wimp,
+of the Scotland Yard Detective Department. I propose to show that the
+motives of the prisoner were jealousy and revenge; jealousy not only of
+his friend's superior influence over the workingmen he himself aspired
+to lead, but the more commonplace animosity engendered by the disturbing
+element of a woman having relations to both. If, before my case is
+complete, it will be my painful duty to show that the murdered man was
+not the saint the world has agreed to paint him, I shall not shrink from
+unveiling the truer picture, in the interests of justice, which cannot
+say <i>nil nisi bonum</i> even of the dead. I propose to show that the murder
+was committed by the prisoner shortly before half-past six on the
+morning of December 4th, and that the prisoner having, with the
+remarkable ingenuity which he has shown throughout, attempted to prepare
+an alibi by feigning to leave London by the first train to Liverpool,
+returned home, got in with his latch-key through the street-door, which
+he had left on the latch, unlocked his victim's bedroom with a key which
+he possessed, cut the sleeping man's throat, pocketed his razor, locked
+the door again, and gave it the appearance of being bolted, went
+downstairs, unslipped the bolt of the big lock, closed the door behind
+him, and got to Euston in time for the second train to Liverpool. The
+fog helped his proceedings throughout." Such was in sum the theory of
+the prosecution. The pale defiant figure in the dock winced perceptibly
+under parts of it.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump was the first witness called for the prosecution. She was
+quite used to legal inquisitiveness by this time, but did not appear in
+good spirits.</p>
+
+<p>"On the night of December 3d, you gave the prisoner a letter?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, your ludship."</p>
+
+<p>"How did he behave when he read it?"</p>
+
+<p>"He turned very pale and excited. He went up to the poor gentleman's
+room, and I'm afraid he quarreled with him. He might have left his last
+hours peaceful." (Amusement.)</p>
+
+<p>"What happened then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Mortlake went out in a passion, and came in again in about an
+hour."</p>
+
+<p>"He told you he was going away to Liverpool very early the next
+morning."</p>
+
+<p>"No, your ludship, he said he was going to Devonport." (Sensation.)</p>
+
+<p>"What time did you get up the next morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"Half-past six."</p>
+
+<p>"That is not your usual time?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I always get up at six."</p>
+
+<p>"How do you account for the extra sleepiness?"</p>
+
+<p>"Misfortunes will happen."</p>
+
+<p>"It wasn't the dull, foggy weather?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, my lud, else I should never get up early." (Laughter.)</p>
+
+<p>"You drink something before going to bed?"</p>
+
+<p>"I like my cup o' tea. I take it strong, without sugar. It always
+steadies my nerves."</p>
+
+<p>"Quite so. Where were you when the prisoner told you he was going to
+Devonport?"</p>
+
+<p>"Drinkin' my tea in the kitchen."</p>
+
+<p>"What should you say if prisoner dropped something in it to make you
+sleep late?"</p>
+
+<p>Witness (startled): "He ought to be shot."</p>
+
+<p>"He might have done it without your noticing it, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"If he was clever enough to murder the poor gentleman, he was clever
+enough to try and poison me."</p>
+
+<p>The Judge: "The witness in her replies must confine herself to the
+evidence."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Spigot, Q. C.: "I must submit to your lordship that it is a very
+logical answer, and exactly illustrates the interdependence of the
+probabilities. Now, Mrs. Drabdump, let us know what happened when you
+awoke at half-past six the next morning."</p>
+
+<p>Thereupon Mrs. Drabdump recapitulated the evidence (with new
+redundancies, but slight variations) given by her at the inquest. How
+she became alarmed&mdash;how she found the street-door locked by the big
+lock&mdash;how she roused Grodman, and got him to burst open the door&mdash;how
+they found the body&mdash;all this with which the public was already familiar
+<i>ad nauseam</i> was extorted from her afresh.</p>
+
+<p>"Look at this key" (key passed to the witness). "Do you recognize it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; how did you get it? It's the key of my first-floor front. I am
+sure I left it sticking in the door."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you know a Miss Dymond?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Mr. Mortlake's sweetheart. But I knew he would never marry her,
+poor thing." (Sensation.)</p>
+
+<p>"Why not?"</p>
+
+<p>"He was getting too grand for her." (Amusement).</p>
+
+<p>"You don't mean anything more than that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know; she only came to my place once or twice. The last time I
+set eyes on her must have been in October."</p>
+
+<p>"How did she appear?"</p>
+
+<p>"She was very miserable, but she wouldn't let you see it." (Laughter.)</p>
+
+<p>"How has the prisoner behaved since the murder?"</p>
+
+<p>"He always seemed very glum and sorry for it."</p>
+
+<p>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 two
+rooms on the same floor?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but he didn't pay as much."</p>
+
+<p>"And, while occupying this front bedroom, did not the prisoner once lose
+his key and have another made?"</p>
+
+<p>"He did; he was very careless."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know what the prisoner and Mr. Constant spoke about on the night
+of December 3d?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; I couldn't hear."</p>
+
+<p>"Then how did you know they were quarreling?"</p>
+
+<p>"They were talkin' so loud."</p>
+
+<p>Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C. (sharply): "But I'm talking loudly to
+you now. Should you say I was quarreling?"</p>
+
+<p>"It takes two to make a quarrel." (Laughter.)</p>
+
+<p>"Was the prisoner the sort of man who, in your opinion, would commit a
+murder?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I never should ha' guessed it was him."</p>
+
+<p>"He always struck you as a thorough gentleman?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, my lud. I knew he was only a comp."</p>
+
+<p>"You say the prisoner has seemed depressed since the murder. Might not
+that have been due to the disappearance of his sweetheart?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, he'd more likely be glad to get rid of her."</p>
+
+<p>"Then he wouldn't be jealous if Mr. Constant took her off his hands?"
+(Sensation.)</p>
+
+<p>"Men are dog-in-the-mangers."</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind about men, Mrs. Drabdump. Had the prisoner ceased to care
+for Miss Dymond?"</p>
+
+<p>"He didn't seem to think of her, my lud. When he got a letter in her
+handwriting among his heap he used to throw it aside till he'd torn open
+the others."</p>
+
+<p>Brown-Harland, Q. C. (with a triumphant ring in his voice): "Thank you,
+Mrs. Drabdump. You may sit down."</p>
+
+<p>Spigot, Q. C.: "One moment, Mrs. Drabdump. You say the prisoner had
+ceased to care for Miss Dymond. Might not this have been in consequence
+of his suspecting for some time that she had relations with Mr.
+Constant?"</p>
+
+<p>The Judge: "That is not a fair question."</p>
+
+<p>Spigot, Q. C.: "That will do, thank you, Mrs. Drabdump."</p>
+
+<p>Brown-Harland, Q. C.: "No; one question more, Mrs. Drabdump. Did you
+ever see anything&mdash;say when Miss Dymond came to your house&mdash;to make you
+suspect anything between Mr. Constant and the prisoner's sweetheart?"</p>
+
+<p>"She did meet him once when Mr. Mortlake was out." (Sensation.)</p>
+
+<p>"Where did she meet him?"</p>
+
+<p>"In the passage. He was going out when she knocked and he opened the
+door." (Amusement.)</p>
+
+<p>"You didn't hear what they said?"</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't a eavesdropper. They spoke friendly and went away together."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. George Grodman was called and repeated his evidence at the inquest.
+Cross-examined, he testified to the warm friendship between Mr. Constant
+and the prisoner. He knew very little about Miss Dymond, having scarcely
+seen her. Prisoner had never spoken to him much about her. He should not
+think she was much in prisoner's thoughts. Naturally the prisoner had
+been depressed by the death of his friend. Besides, he was overworked.
+Witness thought highly of Mortlake's character. It was incredible that
+Constant had had improper relations of any kind with his friend's
+promised wife. Grodman's evidence made a very favorable impression on
+the jury; the prisoner looked his gratitude; and the prosecution felt
+sorry it had been necessary to call this witness.</p>
+
+<p>Inspector Howlett and Sergeant Runnymede had also to repeat their
+evidence. Dr. Robinson, police-surgeon, likewise retendered his evidence
+as to the nature of the wound, and the approximate hour of death. But
+this time he was much more severely examined. He would not bind himself
+down to state the time within an hour or two. He thought life had been
+extinct two or three hours when he arrived, so that the deed had been
+committed between seven and eight. Under gentle pressure from the
+prosecuting counsel, he admitted that it might possibly have been
+between six and seven. Cross-examined, he reiterated his impression in
+favor of the later hour.</p>
+
+<p>Supplementary evidence from medical experts proved as dubious and
+uncertain as if the court had confined itself to the original witness.
+It seemed to be generally agreed that the data for determining the time
+of death of anybody were too complex and variable to admit of very
+precise inference; <i>rigor mortis</i> and other symptoms setting in within
+very wide limits and differing largely in different persons. All agreed
+that death from such a cut must have been practically instantaneous, and
+the theory of suicide was rejected by all. As a whole the medical
+evidence tended to fix the time of death, with a high degree of
+probability, between the hours of six and half-past eight. The efforts
+of the Prosecution were bent upon throwing back the time of death to as
+early as possible after about half-past five. The Defense spent all its
+strength upon pinning the experts to the conclusion that death could not
+have been earlier than seven. Evidently the Prosecution was going to
+fight hard for the hypothesis that Mortlake had committed the crime in
+the interval between the first and second trains for Liverpool; while
+the Defense was concentrating itself on an alibi, showing that the
+prisoner had traveled by the second train which left Euston Station at a
+quarter-past seven, so that there could have been no possible time for
+the passage between Bow and Euston. It was an exciting struggle. As yet
+the contending forces seemed equally matched. The evidence had gone as
+much for as against the prisoner. But everybody knew that worse lay
+behind.</p>
+
+<p>"Call Edward Wimp."</p>
+
+<p>The story Edward Wimp had to tell began tamely enough with
+thrice-threshed-out facts. But at last the new facts came.</p>
+
+<p>"In consequence of suspicions that had formed in your mind you took up
+your quarters, disguised, in the late Mr. Constant's rooms?"</p>
+
+<p>"I did; at the commencement of the year. My suspicions had gradually
+gathered against the occupants of No. 11, Glover Street, and I resolved
+to quash or confirm these suspicions once for all."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you tell the jury what followed?"</p>
+
+<p>"Whenever the prisoner was away for the night I searched his room. I
+found the key of Mr. Constant's bedroom buried deeply in the side of
+prisoner's leather sofa. I found what I imagine to be the letter he
+received on December 3d, in the pages of a 'Bradshaw' lying under the
+same sofa. There were two razors about."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Spigot, Q. C., said: "The key has already been identified by Mrs.
+Drabdump. The letter I now propose to read."</p>
+
+<p>It was undated, and ran as follows:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Dear Tom&mdash;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,</p>
+
+<p>"Jessie."</p></div>
+
+<p>By the time this letter was finished numerous old gentlemen, with wigs
+or without, were observed to be polishing their glasses. Mr. Wimp's
+examination was resumed.</p>
+
+<p>"After making these discoveries what did you do?"</p>
+
+<p>"I made inquiries about Miss Dymond, and found Mr. Constant had visited
+her once or twice in the evening. I imagined there would be some traces
+of a pecuniary connection. I was allowed by the family to inspect Mr.
+Constant's check-book, and found a paid check made out for &pound;25 in the
+name of Miss Dymond. By inquiry at the Bank, I found it had been cashed
+on November 12th of last year. I then applied for a warrant against the
+prisoner."</p>
+
+<p>Cross-examined: "Do you suggest that the prisoner opened Mr. Constant's
+bedroom with the key you found?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>Brown-Harland, Q. C. (sarcastically): "And locked the door from within
+with it on leaving?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you have the goodness to explain how the trick was done?"</p>
+
+<p>"It wasn't done. (Laughter.) The prisoner probably locked the door from
+the outside. Those who broke it open naturally imagined it had been
+locked from the inside when they found the key inside. The key would, on
+this theory, be on the floor as the outside locking could not have been
+effected if it had been in the lock. The first persons to enter the room
+would naturally believe it had been thrown down in the bursting of the
+door. Or it might have been left sticking very loosely inside the lock
+so as not to interfere with the turning of the outside key in which case
+it would also probably have been thrown to the ground."</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed. Very ingenious. And can you also explain how the prisoner could
+have bolted the door within from the outside?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can. (Renewed sensation.) There is only one way in which it was
+possible&mdash;and that was, of course, a mere conjurer's illusion. To cause
+a locked door to appear bolted in addition, it would only be necessary
+for the person on the inside of the door to wrest the staple containing
+the bolt from the woodwork. The bolt in Mr. Constant's bedroom worked
+perpendicularly. When the staple was torn off, it would simply remain at
+rest on the pin of the bolt instead of supporting it or keeping it
+fixed. A person bursting open the door and finding the staple resting on
+the 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 been
+done beforehand." (Applause in court, which was instantly checked by the
+ushers.) The counsel for the defense felt he had been entrapped in
+attempting to be sarcastic with the redoubtable detective. Grodman
+seemed green with envy. It was the one thing he had not thought of.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Drabdump, Grodman, Inspector Howlett, and Sergeant Runnymede were
+recalled and re-examined by the embarrassed Sir Charles Brown-Harland as
+to the exact condition of the lock and the bolt and the position of the
+key. It turned out as Wimp had suggested; so prepossessed were the
+witnesses with the conviction that the door was locked and bolted from
+the inside when it was burst open that they were a little hazy about the
+exact details. The damage had been repaired, so that it was all a
+question of precise past observation. The inspector and the sergeant
+testified that the key was in the lock when they saw it, though both the
+mortise and the bolt were broken. They were not prepared to say that
+Wimp's theory was impossible; they would even admit it was quite
+possible 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 her
+immediate engrossing interest in the horrible sight of the corpse.
+Grodman alone was positive that the key was in the door when he burst it
+open. No, he did not remember picking it up from the floor and putting
+it 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 panels
+of the door.</p>
+
+<p>By the Prosecution: "Don't you think, from the comparative ease with
+which the door yielded to your onslaught, that it is highly probable
+that the pin of the bolt was not in a firmly fixed staple, but in one
+already detached from the woodwork of the lintel?"</p>
+
+<p>"The door did not yield so easily."</p>
+
+<p>"But you must be a Hercules."</p>
+
+<p>"Not quite; the bolt was old, and the woodwork crumbling; the lock was
+new and shoddy. But I have always been a strong man."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well, Mr. Grodman. I hope you will never appear at the
+music-halls." (Laughter.)</p>
+
+<p>Jessie Dymond's landlady was the next witness for the prosecution. She
+corroborated Wimp's statements as to Constant's occasional visits, and
+narrated how the girl had been enlisted by the dead philanthropist as a
+collaborator in some of his enterprises. But the most telling portion of
+her evidence was the story of how, late at night, on December 3d, the
+prisoner called upon her and inquired wildly about the whereabouts of
+his sweetheart. He said he had just received a mysterious letter from
+Miss Dymond saying she was gone. She (the landlady) replied that she
+could have told him that weeks ago, as her ungrateful lodger was gone
+now some three weeks without leaving a hint behind her. In answer to his
+most ungentlemanly raging and raving, she told him it served him right,
+as he should have looked after her better, and not kept away for so
+long. She reminded him that there were as good fish in the sea as ever
+came out, and a girl of Jessie's attractions need not pine away (as she
+had seemed to be pining away) for lack of appreciation. He then called
+her 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.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Fitzjames Montgomery, a bank clerk, remembered cashing the check
+produced. He particularly remembered it, because he paid the money to a
+very pretty girl. She took the entire amount in gold. At this point the
+case was adjourned.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil Cantercot was the first witness called for the prosecution on the
+resumption of the trial. Pressed as to whether he had not told Mr. Wimp
+that he had overheard the prisoner denouncing Mr. Constant, he could not
+say. He had not actually heard the prisoner's denunciations; he might
+have given Mr. Wimp a false impression, but then Mr. Wimp was so
+prosaically literal. (Laughter.) Mr. Crowl had told him something of the
+kind. Cross-examined, he said Jessie Dymond was a rare spirit and she
+always reminded him of Joan of Arc.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Crowl, being called, was extremely agitated. He refused to take the
+oath, and informed the court that the Bible was a Fad. He could not
+swear by anything so self-contradictory. He would affirm. He could not
+deny&mdash;though he looked like wishing to&mdash;that the prisoner had at first
+been rather mistrustful of Mr. Constant, but he was certain that the
+feeling had quickly worn off. Yes, he was a great friend of the
+prisoner, but he didn't see why that should invalidate his testimony,
+especially as he had not taken an oath. Certainly the prisoner seemed
+rather depressed when he saw him on Bank Holiday, but it was overwork on
+behalf of the people and for the demolition of the Fads.</p>
+
+<p>Several other familiars of the prisoner gave more or less reluctant
+testimony as to his sometime prejudice against the amateur rival labor
+leader. His expressions of dislike had been strong and bitter. The
+Prosecution also produced a poster announcing that the prisoner would
+preside at a great meeting of clerks on December 4th. He had not turned
+up at this meeting nor sent any explanation. Finally, there was the
+evidence of the detectives who originally arrested him at Liverpool
+Docks in view of his suspicious demeanor. This completed the case for
+the prosecution.</p>
+
+<p>Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C., rose with a swagger and a rustle of
+his silk gown, and proceeded to set forth the theory of the defense. He
+said he did not purpose to call any witnesses. The hypothesis of the
+prosecution was so inherently childish and inconsequential, and so
+dependent upon a bundle of interdependent probabilities that it crumbled
+away at the merest touch. The prisoner's character was of unblemished
+integrity, his last public appearance had been made on the same platform
+with Mr. Gladstone, and his honesty and highmindedness had been vouched
+for by statesmen of the highest standing. His movements could be
+accounted for from hour to hour&mdash;and those with which the prosecution
+credited him rested on no tangible evidence whatever. He was also
+credited with superhuman ingenuity and diabolical cunning of which he
+had shown no previous symptom. Hypothesis was piled on hypothesis, as in
+the old Oriental legend, where the world rested on the elephant and the
+elephant on the tortoise. It might be worth while, however, to point out
+that it was at least quite likely that the death of Mr. Constant had not
+taken place before seven, and as the prisoner left Euston Station at
+7:15 a. m. for Liverpool, he could certainly not have got there from Bow
+in the time; also that it was hardly possible for the prisoner, who
+could prove being at Euston Station at 5:25 a. m., to travel backward
+and forward to Glover Street and commit the crime all within less than
+two hours. "The real facts," said Sir Charles impressively, "are most
+simple. The prisoner, partly from pressure of work, partly (he had no
+wish to conceal) from worldly ambition, had begun to neglect Miss
+Dymond, to whom he was engaged to be married. The man was but human, and
+his head was a little turned by his growing importance. Nevertheless, at
+heart he was still deeply attached to Miss Dymond. She, however, appears
+to have jumped to the conclusion that he had ceased to love her, that
+she was unworthy of him, unfitted by education to take her place side by
+side with him in the new spheres to which he was mounting&mdash;that, in
+short, she was a drag on his career. Being, by all accounts, a girl of
+remarkable force of character, she resolved to cut the Gordian knot by
+leaving London, and, fearing lest her affianced husband's
+conscientiousness 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 which
+drags an honored name in the mire&mdash;a theory so superfluous that I shall
+only allude to it. That Arthur Constant could have seduced, or had any
+improper relations with his friend's betrothed is a hypothesis to which
+the lives of both give the lie. Before leaving London&mdash;or England&mdash;Miss
+Dymond wrote to her aunt in Devonport&mdash;her only living relative in this
+country&mdash;asking her as a great favor to forward an addressed letter to
+the prisoner, a fortnight after receipt. The aunt obeyed implicitly.
+This was the letter which fell like a thunderbolt on the prisoner on the
+night of December 3d. All his old love returned&mdash;he was full of
+self-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 to
+rush up to his friend, Constant, to seek his advice. Perhaps Constant
+knew something of the affair. The prisoner knew the two were in not
+infrequent communication. It is possible&mdash;my lord and gentlemen of the
+jury, I do not wish to follow the methods of the prosecution and confuse
+theory with fact, so I say it is possible&mdash;that Mr. Constant had
+supplied her with the &pound;25 to leave the country. He was like a brother to
+her, perhaps even acted imprudently in calling upon her, though neither
+dreamed of evil. It is possible that he may have encouraged her in her
+abnegation and in her altruistic aspirations, perhaps even without
+knowing their exact drift, for does he not speak in his very last letter
+of the fine female characters he was meeting, and the influence for good
+he had over individual human souls? Still, this we can now never know,
+unless the dead speak or the absent return. It is also not impossible
+that Miss Dymond was entrusted with the &pound;25 for charitable purposes. But
+to come back to certainties. The prisoner consulted Mr. Constant about
+the letter. He then ran to Miss Dymond's lodgings in Stepney Green,
+knowing beforehand his trouble would be futile. The letter bore the
+postmark of Devonport. He knew the girl had an aunt there; possibly she
+might have gone to her. He could not telegraph, for he was ignorant of
+the address. He consulted his 'Bradshaw,' and resolved to leave by the
+5:30 a. m. from Paddington, and told his landlady so. He left the letter
+in the 'Bradshaw,' which ultimately got thrust among a pile of papers
+under the sofa, so that he had to get another. He was careless and
+disorderly, and the key found by Mr. Wimp in his sofa must have lain
+there for some years, having been lost there in the days when he
+occupied the bedroom afterward rented by Mr. Constant. Afraid to miss
+his train, he did not undress on that distressful night. Meantime the
+thought occurred to him that Jessie was too clever a girl to leave so
+easy a trail, and he jumped to the conclusion that she would be going to
+her married brother in America, and had gone to Devonport merely to bid
+her aunt farewell. He determined therefore to get to Liverpool, without
+wasting time at Devonport, to institute inquiries. Not suspecting the
+delay 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 went
+slowly in the fog, he missed the first train, and wandered about
+brooding disconsolately in the mist till the second. At Liverpool his
+suspicious, excited demeanor procured his momentary arrest. Since then
+the thought of the lost girl has haunted and broken him. That is the
+whole, the plain, and the sufficing story." The effective witnesses for
+the defense were, indeed, few. It is so hard to prove a negative. There
+was Jessie's aunt, who bore out the statement of the counsel for the
+defense. There were the porters who saw him leave Euston by the 7:15
+train for Liverpool, and arrive just too late for the 5:15; there was
+the 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 got
+a little confused; he was asked whether, if he really picked up the
+prisoner at Bow Railway Station at about 4:30, he ought not to have
+caught the first train at Euston. He said the fog made him drive rather
+slowly, but admitted the mist was transparent enough to warrant full
+speed. He also admitted being a strong trade unionist, Spigot, Q. C.,
+artfully extorting the admission as if it were of the utmost
+significance. Finally, there were numerous witnesses&mdash;of all sorts and
+conditions&mdash;to the prisoner's high character, as well as to Arthur
+Constant's blameless and moral life.</p>
+
+<p>In his closing speech on the third day of the trial, Sir Charles pointed
+out with great exhaustiveness and cogency the flimsiness of the case for
+the prosecution, the number of hypotheses it involved, and their mutual
+interdependence. Mrs. Drabdump was a witness whose evidence must be
+accepted with extreme caution. The jury must remember that she was
+unable to dissociate her observations from her inferences, and thought
+that the prisoner and Mr. Constant were quarreling merely because they
+were agitated. He dissected her evidence, and showed that it entirely
+bore out the story of the defense. He asked the jury to bear in mind
+that no positive evidence (whether of cabmen or others) had been given
+of the various and complicated movements attributed to the prisoner on
+the 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&mdash;he
+meant, of course, Miss Dymond&mdash;had not been produced. Even if she were
+dead, and her body were found, no countenance would be given to the
+theory of the prosecution, for the mere conviction that her lover had
+deserted her would be a sufficient explanation of her suicide. Beyond
+the ambiguous letter, no tittle of evidence of her dishonor&mdash;on which
+the bulk of the case against the prisoner rested&mdash;had been adduced. As
+for the motive of political jealousy that had been a mere passing cloud.
+The two men had become fast friends. As to the circumstances of the
+alleged crime, the medical evidence was on the whole in favor of the
+time of death being late; and the prisoner had left London at a quarter
+past seven. The drugging theory was absurd, and as for the too clever
+bolt and lock theories, Mr. Grodman, a trained scientific observer, had
+pooh-poohed them. He would solemnly exhort the jury to remember that if
+they condemned the prisoner they would not only send an innocent man to
+an ignominious death on the flimsiest circumstantial evidence, but they
+would deprive the workingmen of this country of one of their truest
+friends and their ablest leader.</p>
+
+<p>The conclusion of Sir Charles' vigorous speech was greeted with
+irrepressible applause.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Spigot, Q. C., in closing the case for the prosecution, asked the
+jury to return a verdict against the prisoner for as malicious and
+premeditated a crime as ever disgraced the annals of any civilized
+country. His cleverness and education had only been utilized for the
+devil's ends, while his reputation had been used as a cloak. Everything
+pointed strongly to the prisoner's guilt. On receiving Miss Dymond's
+letter announcing her shame, and (probably) her intention to commit
+suicide, he had hastened upstairs to denounce Constant. He had then
+rushed to the girl's lodgings, and, finding his worst fears confirmed,
+planned at once his diabolically ingenious scheme of revenge. He told
+his landlady he was going to Devonport, so that if he bungled, the
+police would be put temporarily off his track. His real destination was
+Liverpool, for he intended to leave the country. Lest, however, his plan
+should break down here, too, he arranged an ingenious alibi by being
+driven to Euston for the 5:15 train to Liverpool. The cabman would not
+know he did not intend to go by it, but meant to return to 11, Glover
+Street, there to perpetrate this foul crime, interruption to which he
+had possibly barred by drugging his landlady. His presence at Liverpool
+(whither he really went by the second train) would corroborate the
+cabman's story. That night he had not undressed nor gone to bed; he had
+plotted out his devilish scheme till it was perfect; the fog came as an
+unexpected ally to cover his movements. Jealousy, outraged affection,
+the desire for revenge, the lust for political power&mdash;these were human.
+They might pity the criminal, they could not find him innocent of the
+crime.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Justice Crogie, summing up, began dead against the prisoner.
+Reviewing the evidence, he pointed out that plausible hypotheses neatly
+dove-tailed did not necessarily weaken one another, the fitting so well
+together 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 the
+case for the defense was from excluding hypothesis. The key, the letter,
+the reluctance to produce the letter, the heated interview with
+Constant, the misstatement about the prisoner's destination, the flight
+to Liverpool, the false tale about searching for a "him," the
+denunciations 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's
+presence at Euston at 5:25 a. m., there was no attempt to account for
+his movements between that and 7:15 a. m. It was as possible that he
+returned to Bow as that he lingered about Euston. There was nothing in
+the medical evidence to make his guilt impossible. Nor was there
+anything inherently impossible in Constant's yielding to the sudden
+temptation of a beautiful girl, nor in a working-girl deeming herself
+deserted, temporarily succumbing to the fascinations of a gentleman and
+regretting it bitterly afterward. What had become of the girl was a
+mystery. Hers might have been one of those nameless corpses which the
+tide swirls up on slimy river banks. The jury must remember, too, that
+the relation might not have actually passed into dishonor, it might have
+been just grave enough to smite the girl's conscience, and to induce her
+to behave as she had done. It was enough that her letter should have
+excited the jealousy of the prisoner. There was one other point which he
+would like to impress on the jury, and which the counsel for the
+prosecution had not sufficiently insisted upon. This was that the
+prisoner's guiltiness was the only plausible solution that had ever been
+advanced of the Bow Mystery. The medical evidence agreed that Mr.
+Constant did not die by his own hand. Someone must therefore have
+murdered him. The number of people who could have had any possible
+reason or opportunity to murder him was extremely small. The prisoner
+had both reason and opportunity. By what logicians called the method of
+exclusion, suspicion would attach to him on even slight evidence. The
+actual evidence was strong and plausible, and now that Mr. Wimp's
+ingenious theory had enabled them to understand how the door could have
+been apparently locked and bolted from within, the last difficulty and
+the last argument for suicide had been removed. The prisoner's guilt was
+as clear as circumstantial evidence could make it. If they let him go
+free, the Bow Mystery might henceforward be placed among the archives of
+unavenged assassinations. Having thus well-nigh hung the prisoner, the
+judge wound up by insisting on the high probability of the story for the
+defense, though that, too, was dependent in important details upon the
+prisoner's mere private statements to his counsel. The jury, being by
+this time sufficiently muddled by his impartiality, were dismissed, with
+the exhortation to allow due weight to every fact and probability in
+determining their righteous verdict.</p>
+
+<p>The minutes ran into hours, but the jury did not return. The shadows of
+night fell across the reeking, fevered court before they announced their
+verdict&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Guilty."</p>
+
+<p>The judge put on his black cap.</p>
+
+<p>The great reception arranged outside was a fiasco; the evening banquet
+was indefinitely postponed. Wimp had won; Grodman felt like a whipped
+cur.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2>
+
+
+<p>"So you were right," Denzil could not help saying as he greeted Grodman
+a week afterward. "I shall not live to tell the story of how you
+discovered the Bow murderer."</p>
+
+<p>"Sit down," growled Grodman; "perhaps you will after all." There was a
+dangerous gleam in his eyes. Denzil was sorry he had spoken.</p>
+
+<p>"I sent for you," Grodman said, "to tell you that on the night Wimp
+arrested Mortlake I had made preparations for your arrest."</p>
+
+<p>Denzil gasped, "What for?"</p>
+
+<p>"My dear Denzil, there is a little law in this country invented for the
+confusion of the poetic. The greatest exponent of the Beautiful is only
+allowed the same number of wives as the greengrocer. I do not blame you
+for not being satisfied with Jane&mdash;she is a good servant but a bad
+mistress&mdash;but it was cruel to Kitty not to inform her that Jane had a
+prior right in you, and unjust to Jane not to let her know of the
+contract with Kitty."</p>
+
+<p>"They both know it now well enough, curse 'em," said the poet.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; your secrets are like your situations&mdash;you can't keep them long.
+My poor poet, I pity you&mdash;betwixt the devil and the deep sea."</p>
+
+<p>"They're a pair of harpies, each holding over me the Damocles sword of
+an arrest for bigamy. Neither loves me."</p>
+
+<p>"I should think they would come in very useful to you. You plant one in
+my house to tell my secrets to Wimp, and you plant one in Wimp's house
+to tell Wimp's secrets to me, I suppose. Out with some, then."</p>
+
+<p>"Upon my honor you wrong me. Jane brought me here, not I Jane. As for
+Kitty, I never had such a shock in my life as at finding her installed
+in Wimp's house."</p>
+
+<p>"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 must
+do something for a living; you wouldn't do anything for hers. And so you
+couldn't go anywhere without meeting a wife! Ha! ha! ha! Serve you
+right, my polygamous poet."</p>
+
+<p>"But why should you arrest me?"</p>
+
+<p>"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 my
+book, smoked my cigars, and pocketed my money. And yet, when you have an
+important piece of information bearing on a mystery about which I am
+thinking day and night, you calmly go and sell it to Wimp."</p>
+
+<p>"I did-didn't," stammered Denzil.</p>
+
+<p>"Liar! Do you think Kitty has any secrets from me? As soon as I
+discovered your two marriages I determined to have you arrested
+for&mdash;your treachery. But when I found you had, as I thought, put Wimp on
+the wrong scent, when I felt sure that by arresting Mortlake he was
+going to make a greater ass of himself than even nature had been able to
+do, then I forgave you. I let you walk about the earth&mdash;and
+drink&mdash;freely. Now it is Wimp who crows&mdash;everybody pats him on the
+back&mdash;they call him the mystery man of the Scotland-Yard tribe. Poor Tom
+Mortlake will be hanged, and all through your telling Wimp about Jessie
+Dymond!"</p>
+
+<p>"It was you yourself," said Denzil sullenly. "Everybody was giving it
+up. But you said 'Let us find out all that Arthur Constant did in the
+last few months of his life.' Wimp couldn't miss stumbling on Jessie
+sooner or later. I'd have throttled Constant, if I had known he'd
+touched her," he wound up with irrelevant indignation.</p>
+
+<p>Grodman winced at the idea that he himself had worked <i>ad majorem
+gloriam</i> of Wimp. And yet, had not Mrs. Wimp let out as much at the
+Christmas dinner?</p>
+
+<p>"What's past is past," he said gruffly. "But if Tom Mortlake hangs, you
+go to Portland."</p>
+
+<p>"How can I help Tom hanging?"</p>
+
+<p>"Help the agitation as much as you can. Write letters under all sorts of
+names to all the papers. Get everybody you know to sign the great
+petition. Find out where Jessie Dymond is&mdash;the girl who holds the proof
+of Tom Mortlake's innocence."</p>
+
+<p>"You really believe him innocent?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't be satirical, Denzil. Haven't I taken the chair at all the
+meetings? Am I not the most copious correspondent of the Press?"</p>
+
+<p>"I thought it was only to spite Wimp."</p>
+
+<p>"Rubbish. It's to save poor Tom. He no more murdered Arthur Constant
+than&mdash;you did!" He laughed an unpleasant laugh.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil bade him farewell, frigid with fear.</p>
+
+<p>Grodman was up to his ears in letters and telegrams. Somehow he had
+become the leader of the rescue party&mdash;suggestions, subscriptions came
+from all sides. The suggestions were burnt, the subscriptions
+acknowledged in the papers and used for hunting up the missing girl.
+Lucy Brent headed the list with a hundred pounds. It was a fine
+testimony to her faith in her dead lover's honor.</p>
+
+<p>The release of the Jury had unloosed "The Greater Jury," which always
+now sits upon the smaller. Every means was taken to nullify the value of
+the "palladium of British liberty." The foreman and the jurors were
+interviewed, the judge was judged, and by those who were no judges. The
+Home Secretary (who had done nothing beyond accepting office under the
+Crown) was vituperated, and sundry provincial persons wrote
+confidentially to the Queen. Arthur Constant's backsliding cheered many
+by convincing them that others were as bad as themselves; and well-to-do
+tradesmen saw in Mortlake's wickedness the pernicious effects of
+socialism. A dozen new theories were afloat. Constant had committed
+suicide 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 great
+point was&mdash;Jessie Dymond must be produced, dead or alive. The electric
+current scoured the civilized world in search of her. What wonder if the
+shrewder sort divined that the indomitable detective had fixed his last
+hope on the girl's guilt? If Jessie had wrongs why should she not have
+avenged them herself? Did she not always remind the poet of Joan of Arc?</p>
+
+<p>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 the
+horizon. The Home Secretary remained inflexible; the great petitions
+discharged their signatures at him in vain. He was a Conservative,
+sternly conscientious; and the mere insinuation that his obstinacy was
+due to the politics of the condemned only hardened him against the
+temptation of a cheap reputation for magnanimity. He would not even
+grant a respite, to increase the chances of the discovery of Jessie
+Dymond. In the last of the three weeks there was a final monster meeting
+of protest. Grodman again took the chair, and several distinguished
+faddists were present, as well as numerous respectable members of
+society. The Home Secretary acknowledged the receipt of their
+resolutions. The Trade Unions were divided in their allegiance; some
+whispered of faith and hope, others of financial defalcations. The
+former essayed to organize a procession and an indignation meeting on
+the Sunday preceding the Tuesday fixed for the execution, but it fell
+through on a rumor of confession. The Monday papers contained a last
+masterly letter from Grodman exposing the weakness of the evidence, but
+they knew nothing of a confession. The prisoner was mute and disdainful,
+professing little regard for a life empty of love and burdened with
+self-reproach. He refused to see clergymen. He was accorded an interview
+with Miss Brent in the presence of a jailer, and solemnly asseverated
+his respect for her dead lover's memory. Monday buzzed with rumors; the
+evening papers chronicled them hour by hour. A poignant anxiety was
+abroad. The girl would be found. Some miracle would happen. A reprieve
+would arrive. The sentence would be commuted. But the short day darkened
+into night even as Mortlake's short day was darkening. And the shadow of
+the gallows crept on and on and seemed to mingle with the twilight.</p>
+
+<p>Crowl stood at the door of his shop, unable to work. His big gray eyes
+were heavy with unshed tears. The dingy wintry road seemed one vast
+cemetery; the street lamps twinkled like corpse-lights. The confused
+sounds of the street-life reached his ear as from another world. He did
+not see the people who flitted to and fro amid the gathering shadows of
+the cold, dreary night. One ghastly vision flashed and faded and flashed
+upon the background of the duskiness.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil stood beside him, smoking in silence. A cold fear was at his
+heart. That terrible Grodman! As the hangman's cord was tightening round
+Mortlake, he felt the convict's chains tightening round himself. And yet
+there was one gleam of hope, feeble as the yellow flicker of the
+gas-lamp across the way. Grodman had obtained an interview with the
+condemned late that afternoon, and the parting had been painful, but the
+evening paper, that in its turn had obtained an interview with the
+ex-detective, announced on its placard:</p>
+
+<h3>"GRODMAN STILL CONFIDENT"</h3>
+
+<p>and the thousands who yet pinned their faith on this extraordinary man
+refused to extinguish the last sparks of hope. Denzil had bought the
+paper and scanned it eagerly, but there was nothing save the vague
+assurance that the indefatigable Grodman was still almost pathetically
+expectant of the miracle. Denzil did not share the expectation; he
+meditated flight.</p>
+
+<p>"Peter," he said at last, "I'm afraid it's all over."</p>
+
+<p>Crowl nodded, heart-broken. "All over!" he repeated, "and to think that
+he dies&mdash;and it is&mdash;all over!"</p>
+
+<p>He looked despairingly at the blank winter sky, where leaden clouds shut
+out 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 of
+leather! No compensation nowhere for being cut off innocent in the pride
+of youth and strength! A man who has always preached the Useful day and
+night, and toiled and suffered for his fellows. Where's the justice of
+it, where's the justice of it?" he demanded fiercely. Again his wet eyes
+wandered upward toward heaven, that heaven away from which the soul of a
+dead saint at the Antipodes was speeding into infinite space.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, where was the justice for Arthur Constant if he, too, was
+innocent?" said Denzil. "Really, Peter, I don't see why you should take
+it for granted that Tom is so dreadfully injured. Your horny-handed
+labor leaders are, after all, men of no aesthetic refinement, with no
+sense of the Beautiful; you cannot expect them to be exempt from the
+coarser forms of crime. Humanity must look to for other leaders&mdash;to the
+seers and the poets!"</p>
+
+<p>"Cantercot, if you say Tom's guilty I'll knock you down." The little
+cobbler 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 no
+grounds. The judge is an honest man, and with gifts I can't lay claim
+to. But I believe in Tom with all my heart. And if Tom is guilty I
+believe in the Cause of the People with all my heart all the same. The
+Fads are doomed to death, they may be reprieved, but they must die at
+last."</p>
+
+<p>He drew a deep sigh, and looked along the dreary Road. It was quite dark
+now, but by the light of the lamps and the gas in the shop windows the
+dull, 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.</p>
+
+<p>A sudden consciousness of the futility of his existence pierced the
+little cobbler like an icy wind. He saw his own life, and a hundred
+million lives like his, swelling and breaking like bubbles on a dark
+ocean, unheeded, uncared for.</p>
+
+<p>A newsboy passed along, clamoring "The Bow murderer, preparations for
+the hexecution!"</p>
+
+<p>A terrible shudder shook the cobbler's frame. His eyes ranged
+sightlessly after the boy; the merciful tears filled them at last.</p>
+
+<p>"The Cause of the People," he murmured, brokenly, "I believe in the
+Cause of the People. There is nothing else."</p>
+
+<p>"Peter, come in to tea, you'll catch cold," said Mrs. Crowl.</p>
+
+<p>Denzil went in to tea and Peter followed.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Meantime, round the house of the Home Secretary, who was in town, an
+ever-augmenting crowd was gathered, eager to catch the first whisper of
+a reprieve.</p>
+
+<p>The house was guarded by a cordon of police, for there was no
+inconsiderable danger of a popular riot. At times a section of the crowd
+groaned and hooted. Once a volley of stones was discharged at the
+windows. The news-boys were busy vending their special editions, and the
+reporters struggled through the crowd, clutching descriptive pencils,
+and ready to rush off to telegraph offices should anything "extra
+special" occur. Telegraph boys were coming up every now and again with
+threats, messages, petitions and exhortations from all parts of the
+country to the unfortunate Home Secretary, who was striving to keep his
+aching head cool as he went through the voluminous evidence for the last
+time and pondered over the more important letters which "The Greater
+Jury" had contributed to the obscuration of the problem. Grodman's
+letter in that morning's paper shook him most; under his scientific
+analysis the circumstantial chain seemed forged of painted cardboard.
+Then the poor man read the judge's summing up, and the chain became
+tempered steel. The noise of the crowd outside broke upon his ear in his
+study 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. There
+were many that loved the man who lay in the jaws of death, and a spirit
+of mad revolt surged in their breasts. And the sky was gray, and the
+bleak night deepened and the shadow of the gallows crept on.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly a strange inarticulate murmur spread through the crowd, a vague
+whisper of no one knew what. Something had happened. Somebody was
+coming. A second later and one of the outskirts of the throng was
+agitated, and a convulsive cheer went up from it, and was taken up
+infectiously all along the street. The crowd parted&mdash;a hansom dashed
+through the center. "Grodman! Grodman!" shouted those who recognized the
+occupant. "Grodman! Hurrah!" Grodman was outwardly calm and pale, but
+his eyes glittered; he waved his hand encouragingly as the hansom dashed
+up to the door, cleaving the turbulent crowd as a canoe cleaves the
+waters. Grodman sprang out, the constables at the portal made way for
+him respectfully. He knocked imperatively, the door was opened
+cautiously; a boy rushed up and delivered a telegram; Grodman forced his
+way in, gave his name, and insisted on seeing the Home Secretary on a
+matter of life and death. Those near the door heard his words and
+cheered, and the crowd divined the good omen, and the air throbbed with
+cannonades of joyous sound. The cheers rang in Grodman's ears as the
+door slammed behind him. The reporters struggled to the front. An
+excited knot of working men pressed round the arrested hansom, they took
+the horse out. A dozen enthusiasts struggled for the honor of placing
+themselves between the shafts. And the crowd awaited Grodman.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2>
+
+
+<p>Grodman was ushered into the conscientious Minister's study. The doughty
+chief of the agitation was, perhaps, the one man who could not be
+denied. As he entered, the Home Secretary's face seemed lit up with
+relief. At a sign from his master, the amanuensis who had brought in the
+last 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 came
+under his own eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"You have a valid reason for troubling me, I suppose, Mr. Grodman?" said
+the Home Secretary, almost cheerfully. "Of course it is about Mortlake?"</p>
+
+<p>"It is; and I have the best of all reasons."</p>
+
+<p>"Take a seat. Proceed."</p>
+
+<p>"Pray do not consider me impertinent, but have you ever given any
+attention to the science of evidence?"</p>
+
+<p>"How do you mean?" asked the Home Secretary, rather puzzled, adding,
+with a melancholy smile, "I have had to lately. Of course, I've never
+been a criminal lawyer, like some of my predecessors. But I should
+hardly speak of it as a science; I look upon it as a question of
+common-sense."</p>
+
+<p>"Pardon me, sir. It is the most subtle and difficult of all the
+sciences. It is, indeed, rather the science of the sciences. What is the
+whole of Inductive Logic, as laid down, say, by Bacon and Mill, but an
+attempt to appraise the value of evidence, the said evidence being the
+trails left by the Creator, so to speak? The Creator has&mdash;I say it in
+all reverence&mdash;drawn a myriad red herrings across the track, but the
+true scientist refuses to be baffled by superficial appearances in
+detecting the secrets of Nature. The vulgar herd catches at the gross
+apparent fact, but the man of insight knows that what lies on the
+surface does lie."</p>
+
+<p>"Very interesting, Mr. Grodman, but really&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Bear with me, sir. The science of evidence being thus so extremely
+subtle, and demanding the most acute and trained observation of facts,
+the most comprehensive understanding of human psychology, is naturally
+given over to professors who have not the remotest idea that 'things are
+not what they seem,' and that everything is other than it appears; to
+professors, most of whom, by their year-long devotion to the
+shop-counter or the desk, have acquired an intimate acquaintance with
+all 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 a
+witness. The retailing of evidence&mdash;the observation of the facts&mdash;is
+given over to people who go through their lives without eyes; the
+appreciation of evidence&mdash;the judging of these facts&mdash;is surrendered to
+people who may possibly be adepts in weighing out pounds of sugar. Apart
+from their sheer inability to fulfill either function&mdash;to observe, or to
+judge&mdash;their observation and their judgment alike are vitiated by all
+sorts of irrelevant prejudices."</p>
+
+<p>"You are attacking trial by jury."</p>
+
+<p>"Not necessarily. I am prepared to accept that scientifically, on the
+ground that, as there are, as a rule, only two alternatives, the balance
+of probability is slightly in favor of the true decision being come to.
+Then, in cases where experts like myself have got up the evidence, the
+jury can be made to see through trained eyes."</p>
+
+<p>The Home Secretary tapped impatiently with his foot.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't listen to abstract theorizing," he said. "Have you any fresh
+concrete evidence?"</p>
+
+<p>"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 but
+the truth'?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fifty?" said the Minister, humoring him a little.</p>
+
+<p>"Not five. I say nothing of lapses of memory, of inborn defects of
+observational power&mdash;though the suspiciously precise recollection of
+dates and events possessed by ordinary witnesses in important trials
+taking place years after the occurrences involved, is one of the most
+amazing things in the curiosities of modern jurisprudence. I defy you,
+sir, to tell me what you had for dinner last Monday, or what exactly you
+were saying and doing at five o'clock last Tuesday afternoon. Nobody
+whose life does not run in mechanical grooves can do anything of the
+sort; unless, of course, the facts have been very impressive. But this
+by the way. The great obstacle to veracious observation is the element
+of prepossession in all vision. Has it ever struck you, sir, that we
+never see anyone more than once, if that? The first time we meet a man
+we may possibly see him as he is; the second time our vision is colored
+and modified by the memory of the first. Do our friends appear to us as
+they appear to strangers? Do our rooms, our furniture, our pipes strike
+our eye as they would strike the eye of an outsider, looking on them for
+the first time? Can a mother see her babe's ugliness, or a lover his
+mistress' shortcomings, though they stare everybody else in the face?
+Can we see ourselves as others see us? No; habit, prepossession changes
+all. The mind is a large factor of every so-called external fact. The
+eye sees, sometimes, what it wishes to see, more often what it expects
+to see. You follow me, sir?"</p>
+
+<p>The Home Secretary nodded his head less impatiently. He was beginning to
+be interested. The hubbub from without broke faintly upon their ears.</p>
+
+<p>"To give you a definite example. Mr. Wimp says that when I burst open
+the door of Mr. Constant's room on the morning of December 4th, and saw
+that 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 I
+admit that this was so, only in things like this you do not seem to
+conclude, 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 burning
+stick, you do not believe in its continuous existence. It is the same
+when witnessing a legerdemain performance. Seeing is not always
+believing, despite the proverb; but believing is often seeing. It is not
+to the point that in that little matter of the door Wimp was as
+hopelessly and incurably wrong as he has been in everything all along.
+Though the door was securely bolted, I confess that I should have seen
+that I had broken the bolt in forcing the door, even if it had been
+broken beforehand. Never once since December 4th did this possibility
+occur to me, till Wimp with perverted ingenuity suggested it. If this is
+the case with a trained observer, one moreover fully conscious of this
+ineradicable tendency of the human mind, how must it be with an
+untrained observer?"</p>
+
+<p>"Come to the point, come to the point," said the Home Secretary, putting
+out his hand as if it itched to touch the bell on the writing-table.</p>
+
+<p>"Such as," went on Grodman imperturbably, "such as&mdash;Mrs. Drabdump. That
+worthy person is unable, by repeated violent knocking, to arouse her
+lodger who yet desires to be aroused; she becomes alarmed, she rushes
+across to get my assistance; I burst open the door&mdash;what do you think
+the good lady expected to see?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Constant murdered, I suppose," murmured the Home Secretary,
+wonderingly.</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly. And so she saw it. And what should you think was the condition
+of Arthur Constant when the door yielded to my violent exertions and
+flew open?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, was he not dead?" gasped the Home Secretary, his heart fluttering
+violently.</p>
+
+<p>"Dead? A young, healthy fellow like that! When the door flew open Arthur
+Constant was sleeping the sleep of the just. It was a deep, a very deep
+sleep, of course, else the blows at his door would long since have
+awakened him. But all the while Mrs. Drabdump's fancy was picturing her
+lodger cold and stark the poor young fellow was lying in bed in a nice
+warm sleep."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean to say you found Arthur Constant alive?"</p>
+
+<p>"As you were last night."</p>
+
+<p>The minister was silent, striving confusedly to take in the situation.
+Outside the crowd was cheering again. It was probably to pass the time.</p>
+
+<p>"Then, when was he murdered?"</p>
+
+<p>"Immediately afterward."</p>
+
+<p>"By whom?"</p>
+
+<p>"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 of
+exhaustion. It must have been either by Mrs. Drabdump or by myself."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean to say that Mrs. Drabdump&mdash;&mdash;!"</p>
+
+<p>"Poor dear Mrs. Drabdump, you don't deserve this of your Home Secretary!
+The idea of that good lady!"</p>
+
+<p>"It was you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Calm yourself, my dear Home Secretary. There is nothing to be alarmed
+at. It was a solitary experiment, and I intend it to remain so." The
+noise without grew louder. "Three cheers for Grodman! Hip, hip, hip,
+hooray," fell faintly on their ears.</p>
+
+<p>But the Minister, pallid and deeply moved, touched the bell. The Home
+Secretary's home secretary appeared. He looked at the great man's
+agitated face with suppressed surprise.</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you for calling in your amanuensis," said Grodman. "I intended to
+ask you to lend me his services. I suppose he can write shorthand."</p>
+
+<p>The minister nodded, speechless.</p>
+
+<p>"That is well. I intend this statement to form the basis of an appendix
+to the twenty-fifth edition&mdash;sort of silver wedding&mdash;of my book,
+'Criminals I Have Caught,' Mr. Denzil Cantercot, who, by the will I have
+made to-day, is appointed my literary executor, will have the task of
+working it up with literary and dramatic touches after the model of the
+other chapters of my book. I have every confidence he will be able to do
+me as much justice, from a literary point of view, as you, sir, no doubt
+will from a legal. I feel certain he will succeed in catching the style
+of the other chapters to perfection."</p>
+
+<p>"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 his
+statement in shorthand."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, sir," said Grodman, heartily. "Ready, Mr. Templeton? Here
+goes. My career till I left the Scotland-Yard Detective Department is
+known to all the world. Is that too fast for you, Mr. Templeton? A
+little? Well, I'll go slower; but pull me up if I forget to keep the
+brake on. When I retired, I discovered that I was a bachelor. But it was
+too 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 was
+published I had nothing more to do but think. I had plenty of money, and
+it was safely invested; there was no call for speculation. The future
+was 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 my
+ancient exploits; I re-read my book. And as I thought and thought, away
+from the excitement of the actual hunt, and seeing the facts in a truer
+perspective, so it grew daily clearer to me that criminals were more
+fools than rogues. Every crime I had traced, however cleverly
+perpetrated, was from the point of view of penetrability a weak failure.
+Traces and trails were left on all sides&mdash;ragged edges, rough-hewn
+corners; in short, the job was botched, artistic completeness
+unattained. To the vulgar, my feats might seem marvelous&mdash;the average
+man is mystified to grasp how you detect the letter 'e' in a simple
+cryptogram&mdash;to myself they were as commonplace as the crimes they
+unveiled. To me now, with my lifelong study of the science of evidence,
+it seemed possible to commit not merely one, but a thousand crimes that
+should be absolutely undiscoverable. And yet criminals would go on
+sinning, and giving themselves away, in the same old grooves&mdash;no
+originality, no dash, no individual insight, no fresh conception! One
+would imagine there were an Academy of crime with forty thousand
+armchairs. And gradually, as I pondered and brooded over the thought,
+there came upon me the desire to commit a crime that should baffle
+detection. I could invent hundreds of such crimes, and please myself by
+imagining them done; but would they really work out in practice?
+Evidently the sole performer of my experiment must be myself; the
+subject&mdash;whom or what? Accident should determine. I itched to commence
+with murder&mdash;to tackle the stiffest problems first, and I burned to
+startle and baffle the world&mdash;especially the world of which I had ceased
+to 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 sported
+with my pet theories, and fitted them mentally on everyone I met. Every
+friend or acquaintance I sat and gossiped with, I was plotting how to
+murder without leaving a clue. There is not one of my friends or
+acquaintances I have not done away with in thought. There is no public
+man&mdash;have no fear, my dear Home Secretary&mdash;I have not planned to
+assassinate secretly, mysteriously, unintelligibly, undiscoverably. Ah,
+how I could give the stock criminals points&mdash;with their second-hand
+motives, their conventional conceptions, their commonplace details,
+their lack of artistic feeling and restraint.</p>
+
+<p>"The late Arthur Constant came to live nearly opposite me. I cultivated
+his acquaintance&mdash;he was a lovable young fellow, an excellent subject
+for experiment. I do not know when I have ever taken to a man more. From
+the moment I first set eyes on him, there was a peculiar sympathy
+between us. We were drawn to each other. I felt instinctively he would
+be the man. I loved to hear him speak enthusiastically of the
+Brotherhood of Man&mdash;I, who knew the brotherhood of man was to the ape,
+the serpent, and the tiger&mdash;and he seemed to find a pleasure in stealing
+a moment's chat with me from his engrossing self-appointed duties. It is
+a pity humanity should have been robbed of so valuable a life. But it
+had to be. At a quarter to ten on the night of December 3d he came to
+me. Naturally I said nothing about this visit at the inquest or the
+trial. His object was to consult me mysteriously about some girl. He
+said he had privately lent her money&mdash;which she was to repay at her
+convenience. What the money was for he did not know, except that it was
+somehow connected with an act of abnegation in which he had vaguely
+encouraged her. The girl had since disappeared, and he was in distress
+about her. He would not tell me who it was&mdash;of course now, sir, you know
+as well as I it was Jessie Dymond&mdash;but asked for advice as to how to set
+about finding her. He mentioned that Mortlake was leaving for Devonport
+by the first train on the next day. Of old I should have connected these
+two facts and sought the thread; now, as he spoke, all my thoughts were
+dyed red. He was suffering perceptibly from toothache, and in answer to
+my sympathetic inquiries told me it had been allowing him very little
+sleep. Everything combined to invite the trial of one of my favorite
+theories. I spoke to him in a fatherly way, and when I had tendered some
+vague advice about the girl, and made him promise to secure a night's
+rest (before he faced the arduous tram-men's meeting in the morning) by
+taking a sleeping-draught, I gave him some sulfonal in a phial. It is a
+new drug, which produces protracted sleep without disturbing the
+digestion, and which I use myself. He promised faithfully to take the
+draught; and I also exhorted him earnestly to bolt and bar and lock
+himself in so as to stop up every chink or aperture by which the cold
+air of the winter's night might creep into the room. I remonstrated with
+him on the careless manner he treated his body, and he laughed in his
+good-humored, gentle way, and promised to obey me in all things. And he
+did. That Mrs. Drabdump, failing to rouse him, would cry 'Murder!' I
+took for certain. She is built that way. As even Sir Charles
+Brown-Harland remarked, she habitually takes her prepossessions for
+facts, her inferences for observations. She forecasts the future in
+gray. 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 on
+almost any woman under similar conditions. The only uncertain link in
+the chain was: Would Mrs. Drabdump rush across to get me to break open
+the door? Women always rush for a man. I was well-nigh the nearest, and
+certainly the most authoritative man in the street, and I took it for
+granted she would."</p>
+
+<p>"But suppose she hadn't?" the Home Secretary could not help asking.</p>
+
+<p>"Then the murder wouldn't have happened, that's all. In due course
+Arthur Constant would have awoke, or somebody else breaking open the
+door would have found him sleeping; no harm done, nobody any the wiser.
+I could hardly sleep myself that night. The thought of the extraordinary
+crime I was about to commit&mdash;a burning curiosity to know whether Wimp
+would detect the <i>modus operandi</i>&mdash;the prospect of sharing the feelings
+of murderers with whom I had been in contact all my life without being
+in touch with the terrible joys of their inner life&mdash;the fear lest I
+should be too fast asleep to hear Mrs. Drabdump's knock&mdash;these things
+agitated me and disturbed my rest. I lay tossing on my bed, planning
+every detail of poor Constant's end. The hours dragged slowly and
+wretchedly on toward the misty dawn. I was racked with suspense. Was I
+to be disappointed after all? At last the welcome sound came&mdash;the
+rat-tat-tat of murder. The echoes of that knock are yet in my ear. 'Come
+over and kill him!' I put my night-capped head out of the window and
+told her to wait for me. I dressed hurriedly, took my razor, and went
+across to 11 Glover Street. As I broke open the door of the bedroom in
+which Arthur Constant lay sleeping, his head resting on his hands, I
+cried, 'My God!' as if I saw some awful vision. A mist as of blood
+swam before Mrs. Drabdump's eyes. She cowered back, for an instant
+(I divined rather than saw the action) she shut off the dreaded
+sight with her hands. In that instant I had made my cut&mdash;precisely,
+scientifically&mdash;made so deep a cut and drew out the weapon so sharply
+that there was scarce a drop of blood on it; then there came from the
+throat a jet of blood which Mrs. Drabdump, conscious only of the horrid
+gash, saw but vaguely. I covered up the face quickly with a handkerchief
+to hide any convulsive distortion. But as the medical evidence (in this
+detail accurate) testified, death was instantaneous. I pocketed the
+razor and the empty sulfonal phial. With a woman like Mrs. Drabdump to
+watch me, I could do anything I pleased. I got her to draw my attention
+to the fact that both the windows were fastened. Some fool, by the by,
+thought there was a discrepancy in the evidence because the police found
+only one window fastened, forgetting that, in my innocence, I took care
+not to fasten the window I had opened to call for aid. Naturally I did
+not call for aid before a considerable time had elapsed. There was Mrs.
+Drabdump to quiet, and the excuse of making notes&mdash;as an old hand. My
+object was to gain time. I wanted the body to be fairly cold and stiff
+before being discovered, though there was not much danger here; for, as
+you saw by the medical evidence, there is no telling the time of death
+to an hour or two. The frank way in which I said the death was very
+recent disarmed all suspicion, and even Dr. Robinson was unconsciously
+worked upon, in adjudging the time of death, by the knowledge (query
+here, Mr. Templeton) that it had preceded my advent on the scene.</p>
+
+<p>"Before leaving Mrs. Drabdump there is just one point I should like to
+say a word about. You have listened so patiently, sir, to my lectures on
+the science of sciences that you will not refuse to hear the last. A
+good deal of importance has been attached to Mrs. Drabdump's
+oversleeping herself by half an hour. It happens that this (like the
+innocent fog which has also been made responsible for much) is a purely
+accidental and irrelevant circumstance. In all works on inductive logic
+it is thoroughly recognized that only some of the circumstances of a
+phenomenon are of its essence and causally interconnected; there is
+always a certain proportion of heterogeneous accompaniments which have
+no intimate relation whatever with the phenomenon. Yet so crude is as
+yet the comprehension of the science of evidence, that every feature of
+the phenomenon under investigation is made equally important, and sought
+to be linked with the chain of evidence. To attempt to explain
+everything is always the mark of the tyro. The fog and Mrs. Drabdump's
+oversleeping herself were mere accidents. There are always these
+irrelevant accompaniments, and the true scientist allows for this
+element of (so to speak) chemically unrelated detail. Even I never
+counted on the unfortunate series of accidental phenomena which have led
+to 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 few
+minutes earlier on the night of December 3d, so that she didn't know of
+Constant's visit, was a relevant accident. In fact, just as the art of
+the artist or the editor consists largely in knowing what to leave out,
+so does the art of the scientific detector of crime consist in knowing
+what details to ignore. In short, to explain everything is to explain
+too much. And too much is worse than too little. To return to my
+experiment. My success exceeded my wildest dreams. None had an inkling
+of the truth. The insolubility of the Big Bow Mystery teased the acutest
+minds in Europe and the civilized world. That a man could have been
+murdered in a thoroughly inaccessible room savored of the ages of magic.
+The redoubtable Wimp, who had been blazoned as my successor, fell back
+on the theory of suicide. The mystery would have slept till my death,
+but&mdash;I fear&mdash;for my own ingenuity. I tried to stand outside myself, and
+to look at the crime with the eyes of another, or of my old self. I
+found the work of art so perfect as to leave only one sublimely simple
+solution. The very terms of the problem were so inconceivable that, had
+I not been the murderer, I should have suspected myself, in conjunction
+of course with Mrs. Drabdump. The first persons to enter the room would
+have seemed to me guilty. I wrote at once (in a disguised hand and over
+the 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 who
+entered the room together. To dash a half-truth in the world's eyes is
+the surest way of blinding it altogether. This letter of mine I
+contradicted myself (in my own name) the next day, and in the course of
+the long letter which I was tempted to write I adduced fresh evidence
+against 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 enjoyed
+the hunt more. Unfortunately, Wimp, set on the chase again by my own
+letter, by dint of persistent blundering, blundered into a track
+which&mdash;by a devilish tissue of coincidences I had neither foreseen nor
+dreamt of&mdash;seemed to the world the true. Mortlake was arrested and
+condemned. Wimp had apparently crowned his reputation. This was too
+much. I had taken all this trouble merely to put a feather in Wimp's
+cap, whereas I had expected to shake his reputation by it. It was bad
+enough that an innocent man should suffer; but that Wimp should achieve
+a reputation he did not deserve, and overshadow all his predecessors by
+dint of a colossal mistake, this seemed to me intolerable. I have moved
+heaven 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 world
+searched for the missing girl; I have petitioned and agitated. In vain.
+I have failed. Now I play my last card. As the overweening Wimp could
+not be allowed to go down to posterity as the solver of this terrible
+mystery, I decided that the condemned man might just as well profit by
+his exposure. That is the reason I make the exposure to-night, before it
+is too late to save Mortlake."</p>
+
+<p>"So that is the reason?" said the Home Secretary with a suspicion of
+mockery in his tones.</p>
+
+<p>"The sole reason."</p>
+
+<p>Even as he spoke a deeper roar than ever penetrated the study. The crowd
+had again started cheering. Impatient as the watchers were, they felt
+that no news was good news. The longer the interview accorded by the
+Home Secretary to the chairman of the Defense Committee, the greater the
+hope his obduracy was melting. The idol of the people would be saved,
+and "Grodman" and "Tom Mortlake" were mingled in the exultant plaudits.</p>
+
+<p>"Templeton," said the Minister, "have you got down every word of Mr.
+Grodman's confession?"</p>
+
+<p>"Every word, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"Then bring in the cable you received just as Mr. Grodman entered the
+house."</p>
+
+<p>Templeton went back into the outer room and brought back the cablegram
+that had been lying on the Minister's writing-table when Grodman came
+in. The Home Secretary silently handed it to his visitor. It was from
+the Chief of Police of Melbourne, announcing that Jessie Dymond had just
+arrived in that city in a sailing vessel, ignorant of all that had
+occurred, and had been immediately dispatched back to England, having
+made a statement entirely corroborating the theory of the defense.</p>
+
+<p>"Pending further inquiries into this," said the Home Secretary, not
+without appreciation of the grim humor of the situation as he glanced at
+Grodman's ashen cheeks, "I have reprieved the prisoner. Mr. Templeton
+was about to dispatch the messenger to the governor of Newgate as you
+entered this room. Mr. Wimp's card-castle would have tumbled to pieces
+without your assistance. Your still undiscoverable crime would have
+shaken his reputation as you intended."</p>
+
+<p>A sudden explosion shook the room and blent with the cheers of the
+populace. Grodman had shot himself&mdash;very scientifically&mdash;in the heart.
+He fell at the Home Secretary's feet, stone dead.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a name="illus4" id="illus4"></a>
+<img src="images/illus4.jpg" alt=""/>
+</div>
+
+<h3>He fell at the Home Secretary's feet, stone dead.</h3>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+
+<p>Some of the workingmen who had been standing waiting by the shafts of
+the hansom helped to bear the stretcher.</p>
+
+
+<h3>THE END.</h3>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="The_Antique_Library_of_Standard_and_Popular_12mos" id="The_Antique_Library_of_Standard_and_Popular_12mos"></a>The Antique Library of Standard and Popular 12mos.</h2>
+
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">ABBE CONSTANTIN.     Halevy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ABBOT.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ADAM BEDE.    Eliot.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">AESOP'S FABLES.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ALHAMBRA.     Irving.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ALICE.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">AN AMERICAN GIRL IN LONDON.     Duncan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ANDERSEN'S FAIRY TALES.     Andersen.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN.     Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ANTIQUARY.     Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ARABIAN NIGHTS' ENTERTAINMENTS.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ARDATH.      Corelli.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">AULD LANG SYNE.      Russell.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BARON MUNCHAUSEN.      Raspe.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BARRACK ROOM BALLADS AND OTHER VERSE.     Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BEHIND A MASK.      Daudet.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BETROTHED.     Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BETWEEN TWO OPINIONS.     Loti.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BEYOND THE CITY.     Doyle.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BIG BOW MYSTERY.     Zangwill.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BLACK BEAUTY.      Sewell.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BLACK DWARF.     Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BLACK TULIP.     Dumas.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BONDMAN.      Caine.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR.     Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">BRYANT'S POEMS.      Bryant.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CALLED BACK.      Conway.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CAST UP BY THE SEA.     Baker.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CAXTONS, THE      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CHANGE OF AIR.      Hope.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CHILDREN OF THE ABBEY.      Roche.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CHOUANS.     Balzac.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CLEOPATRA.      Haggard.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CLOISTER WENDHUSEN.      Heimburg.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">COUNT ROBERT OF PARIS.     Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">COWPER'S POEMS.      Cowper.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">CRIQUETTE.      Halevy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DANESBURY HOUSE.     Wood.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DANIRA.       Werner.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DARK DAYS.      Conway.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DAVID COPPERFIELD.      Dickens.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DEEMSTER.      Caine.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DEERSLAYER.       Cooper.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DEPARTMENTAL DITTIES.      Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DESCENT OF MAN.      Darwin.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DESPERATE REMEDIES.      Hardy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DEVEREUX.       Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DIANA OF THE CROSSWAYS.      Meredith.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DOCTOR RAMEAU.     Ohnet.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DOMBEY &amp; SON.     Dickens.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DONOVAN.       Lyall.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">DOROTHY'S DOUBLE.     Henty.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">EAST LYNNE.      Wood.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ELSIE.      Heimburg.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ERNEST MALTRAVERS.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">EUGENE ARAM.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">EVOLUTION OF DODD.      Smith.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">FAIR MAID OF PERTH.     Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD.     Hardy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">FIRST VIOLIN.       Fothergill.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">FLOWER GIRL OF PARIS.     Schobert.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">FLOWER OF FRANCE.       Ryan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">FORTUNES OF NIGEL.    Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">FROMONT, Jr. AND RISLER, Sr.      Daudet.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GLADIATORS.      Whyte-Melville.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GRAY AND THE BLUE.     Roe.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GREAT KEINPLATZ EXPERIMENT.       Doyle.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GREEN MOUNTAIN BOYS.     Thompson.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GRIMM'S FAIRY TALES.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GRIMM'S HOUSEHOLD TALES.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GULLIVER'S TRAVELS.       Swift.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">GUY MANNERING.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HANDY ANDY.      Lover.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HANS OF ICELAND.      Hugo.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HAROLD.       Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HEART OF MIDLOTHIAN.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HEIR OF LINNE.       Buchanan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HEIR OF REDCLYFFE.       Yonge.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HORTENSE.        Heimburg.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.      Hawthorne.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HOUSE OF THE WOLF.      Weyman.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HOUSE PARTY.       Ouida.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME.      Hugo.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">HYPATIA.       Kingsley.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">IN ALL SHADES.       Allen.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">IN LOVE'S DOMAINS.       Ryan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">INTO MOROCCO.       Loti.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">IRONMASTER.       Ohnet.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">IRON PIRATE.      Pemberton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO MEND.       Reade.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">IVANHOE.       Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">JANE EYRE.       Bronte.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">JOHN HALIFAX, GENTLEMAN.        Mulock.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">JOSEPH BALSAMO.        Dumas.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">KARMA.       Sinnett.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">KENELM CHILLINGLY.        Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">KENILWORTH.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">KIDNAPPED.      Stevenson.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">KINGS IN EXILE.     Daudet.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">LAST DAYS OF POMPEII.       Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">LAST OF THE MOHICANS.       Cooper.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">LIGHT OF ASIA.       Arnold.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">LIGHT THAT FAILED.       Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">LORNA DOONE.       Blackmore.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">LUCILE.       Meredith.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">LUCRETIA.       Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MAN OF MARK.       Hope.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MAROONED.        Russell.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MARRIAGE AT SEA.        Russell.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MARTIN HEWITT.        Morrison.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MASTER  OF BALLANTRAE.      Stevenson.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MASTER OF THE MINE.      Buchanan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MAYOR  OF  CASTERBRIDGE.      Hardy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MEMOIRS OF A PHYSICIAN.      Dumas.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MERZE.      Ryan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MICAH CLARKE.      Doyle.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MICHAEL'S CRAG.      Allen.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MIDDLEMARCH.      Eliot.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MILL ON THE FLOSS.      Eliot.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MINE OWN PEOPLE AND IN BLACK AND WHITE.      Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MONASTERY, THE      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MRS. ANNIE GREEN.      Read.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">MY LADY NICOTINE.      Barrie.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">NEWCOMES.      Thackeray.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">NICHOLAS NICKLEBY.      Dickens.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">NORTH AGAINST SOUTH.      Verne.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">OLD MORTALITY.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ONE OF THE FORTY.      Daudet.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ON THE HEIGHTS.      Auerbach.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ORIGIN OF SPECIES.      Darwin.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">OUR MUTUAL FRIEND.      Dickens.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PAGAN OF THE ALLEGHANIES.      Ryan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PATHFINDER.      Cooper.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PAUL CLIFFORD.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PELHAM.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PERE GORIOT.      Balzac.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PHANTOM RICKSHAW.      Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PICKWICK PAPERS.      Dickens.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PILGRIMS OF THE RHINE.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PILGRIM'S PROGRESS.      Bunyan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PIONEERS.      Cooper.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PIRATE.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS.      Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PRAIRIE.      Cooper.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PRETTY MICHAL.      Jokai.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">PRINCE OF THE HOUSE OF DAVID.      Ingraham.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">QUENTIN DURWARD.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">RED GAUNTLET.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">REPROACH OF ANNESLEY.      Grey.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">RETURN OF THE NATIVE.      Hardy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">RIENZI.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ROBINSON CRUSOE.      Defoe.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ROB ROY.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ROMANCE OF TWO WORLDS.      Corelli.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ROMOLA.      Eliot.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ST. RONAN'S WELL.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SARCHEDON.      Whyte-Melville.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SCARLET LETTER.      Hawthorne.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SCOTT'S POEMS.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SCOTTISH CHIEFS.      Porter.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SEA WOLVES.      Pemberton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SHADOW OF A CRIME.      Caine.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SHE FELL IN LOVE WITH HER HUSBAND.      Werner.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SIGN OF THE FOUR.      Doyle.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SILENCE OF DEAN MAITLAND.      Grey.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SKETCH BOOK.      Irving.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SOLDIERS THREE.      Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SON OF HAGAR.      Caine.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SONG OF HIAWATHA.       Longfellow.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SQUAW ELOUISE.      Ryan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">STORY OF AN AFRICAN FARM.      Schreiner.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">STRANGE STORY.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">STRONGER THAN DEATH.      Gautier.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">STUDY IN SCARLET.      Doyle.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">STUDY OF GENIUS.      Royse.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SURGEON'S DAUGHTER.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON.      Wyss.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TALE OF TWO CITIES.      Dickens.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TALES FROM SHAKESPEARE.      Lamb.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TALISMAN.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">THADDEUS OF WARSAW.      Porter.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">THELMA.      Corelli.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">THREE MEN IN A BOAT.      Jerome.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TOILERS OF THE SEA.      Hugo.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TOLD IN THE HILLS.      Ryan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TOM BROWN AT OXFORD.      Hughes.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TOM BROWN'S SCHOOL DAYS.      Hughes.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">TREASURE ISLAND.      Stevenson.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">UNCLE TOM'S CABIN.      Stowe.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">UNDER THE DEODARS AND STORY OF THE GADSBYS.      Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">UNDER TWO FLAGS.      Ouida.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">UP TERRAPIN RIVER.      Read.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">VANITY FAIR.      Thackeray.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">VICAR OF WAKEFIELD.      Goldsmith.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WAVERLY.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WEE WILLIE WINKIE.      Kipling.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WESTWARD HO.      Kingsley.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WE TWO.      Lyall.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WHAT'S BRED IN THE BONE.      Allen.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WHITE COMPANY.      Doyle.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WOODLANDERS.      Hardy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">WOODSTOCK.      Scott.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">ZANONI.      Lytton.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Big Bow Mystery, by I. Zangwill
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Big Bow Mystery
+
+Author: I. Zangwill
+
+Release Date: February 23, 2009 [EBook #28164]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BIG BOW MYSTERY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                          The Big Bow Mystery
+
+                            By I. Zangwill
+
+
+Chicago and New York
+Rand, 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 to
+review it without prejudice. A new book just hot from the brain is
+naturally apt to appear faulty to its begetter, but an old book has got
+into the proper perspective and may be praised by him without fear or
+favor. "The Big Bow Mystery" seems to me an excellent murder story, as
+murder stories go, for, while as sensational as the most of them, it
+contains more humor and character creation than the best. Indeed, the
+humor is too abundant. Mysteries should be sedate and sober. There
+should be a pervasive atmosphere of horror and awe such as Poe manages
+to create. Humor is out of tone; it would be more artistic to preserve a
+somber note throughout. But I was a realist in those days, and in real
+life mysteries occur to real persons with their individual humors, and
+mysterious circumstances are apt to be complicated by comic. The
+indispensable condition of a good mystery is that it should be able and
+unable to be solved by the reader, and that the writer's solution should
+satisfy. Many a mystery runs on breathlessly enough till the denouement
+is reached, only to leave the reader with the sense of having been
+robbed of his breath under false pretenses. And not only must the
+solution be adequate, but all its data must be given in the body of the
+story. The author must not suddenly spring a new person or a new
+circumstance upon his reader at the end. Thus, if a friend were to ask
+me to guess who dined with him yesterday, it would be fatuous if he had
+in mind somebody of whom he knew I had never heard. The only person who
+has ever solved "The Big Bow Mystery" is myself. This is not paradox but
+plain fact. For long before the book was written, I said to myself one
+night that no mystery-monger had ever murdered a man in a room to which
+there was no possible access. The puzzle was scarcely propounded ere the
+solution 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 him
+with a more original piece of fiction. I might have refused, but there
+was murder in my soul, and here was the opportunity. I went to work
+seriously, though the _Morning Post_ subsequently said the skit was too
+labored, and I succeeded at least in exciting my readers, so many of
+whom sent in unsolicited testimonials in the shape of solutions during
+the run of the story that, when it ended, the editor asked me to say
+something by way of acknowledgement. Thereupon I wrote a letter to the
+paper, thanking the would-be solvers for their kindly attempts to help
+me out of the mess into which I had got the plot. I did not like to
+wound their feelings by saying straight out that they had failed, one
+and all, to hit on the real murderer, just like real police, so I tried
+to 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 is
+obvious that the mystery-story is just the one species of story that can
+not be told impromptu or altered at the last moment, seeing that it
+demands the most careful piecing together and the most elaborate
+dove-tailing. Nevertheless, if you cast your joke upon the waters, you
+shall find it no joke after many days. This is what I read in the
+_Lyttelton Times_, New Zealand: "The chain of circumstantial evidence
+seems fairly irrefragable. From all accounts, Mr. Zangwill himself was
+puzzled, after carefully forging every link, how to break it. The method
+ultimately adopted I consider more ingenious than convincing." After
+that I made up my mind never to joke again, but this good intention now
+helps to pave the beaten path.
+
+    I. ZANGWILL.
+    LONDON, September, 1895.
+
+
+
+
+NOTE.
+
+
+The Mystery which the author will always associate with this story is
+how he got through the task of writing it. It was written in a
+fortnight--day by day--to meet a sudden demand from the "Star," which
+made "a new departure" with it.
+
+The said fortnight was further disturbed by an extraordinary combined
+attack of other troubles and tasks. This is no excuse for the
+shortcomings of the book, as it was always open to the writer to revise
+or 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 on
+the 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 a
+frigid gray mist. There are mornings when King Fog masses his molecules
+of carbon in serried squadrons in the city, while he scatters them
+tenuously in the suburbs; so that your morning train may bear you from
+twilight to darkness. But to-day the enemy's maneuvering was more
+monotonous. From Bow even unto Hammersmith there draggled a dull,
+wretched vapor, like the wraith of an impecunious suicide come into a
+fortune immediately after the fatal deed. The barometers and
+thermometers had sympathetically shared its depression, and their
+spirits (when they had any) were low. The cold cut like a many-bladed
+knife.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump, of 11 Glover Street, Bow, was one of the few persons in
+London whom fog did not depress. She went about her work quite as
+cheerlessly as usual. She had been among the earliest to be aware of the
+enemy's advent, picking out the strands of fog from the coils of
+darkness the moment she rolled up her bedroom blind and unveiled the
+somber picture of the winter morning. She knew that the fog had come to
+stay for the day at least, and that the gas bill for the quarter was
+going to beat the record in high-jumping. She also knew that this was
+because 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 him
+a proportion of the actual account for the whole house. The
+meteorologists might have saved the credit of their science if they had
+reckoned with Mrs. Drabdump's next gas bill when they predicted the
+weather and made "Snow" the favorite, and said that "Fog" would be
+nowhere. Fog was everywhere, yet Mrs. Drabdump took no credit to herself
+for her prescience. Mrs. Drabdump indeed took no credit for anything,
+paying her way along doggedly, and struggling through life like a
+wearied swimmer trying to touch the horizon. That things always went as
+badly as she had foreseen did not exhilarate her in the least.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump was a widow. Widows are not born, but made, else you might
+have fancied Mrs. Drabdump had always been a widow. Nature had given her
+that tall, spare form, and that pale, thin-lipped, elongated, hard-eyed
+visage, and that painfully precise hair, which are always associated
+with widowhood in low life. It is only in higher circles that women can
+lose their husbands and yet remain bewitching. The late Mr. Drabdump had
+scratched the base of his thumb with a rusty nail, and Mrs. Drabdump's
+foreboding that he would die of lockjaw had not prevented her wrestling
+day and night with the shadow of Death, as she had wrestled with it
+vainly twice before, when Katie died of diphtheria and little Johnny of
+scarlet fever. Perhaps it is from overwork among the poor that Death has
+been reduced to a shadow.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump was lighting the kitchen fire. She did it very
+scientifically, as knowing the contrariety of coal and the anxiety of
+flaming sticks to end in smoke unless rigidly kept up to the mark.
+Science was a success as usual; and Mrs. Drabdump rose from her knees
+content, like a Parsee priestess who had duly paid her morning devotions
+to 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 to
+fifteen minutes to seven. Mrs. Drabdump's devotion to the kitchen fire
+invariably terminated at fifteen minutes past six. What was the matter
+with the clock?
+
+Mrs. Drabdump had an immediate vision of Snoppet, the neighboring
+horologist, keeping the clock in hand for weeks and then returning it
+only superficially repaired and secretly injured more vitally "for the
+good of the trade." The evil vision vanished as quickly as it came,
+exorcised by the deep boom of St. Dunstan's bells chiming the
+three-quarters. In its place a great horror surged. Instinct had failed;
+Mrs. Drabdump had risen at half-past six instead of six. Now she
+understood why she had been feeling so dazed and strange and sleepy. She
+had overslept herself.
+
+Chagrined and puzzled, she hastily set the kettle over the crackling
+coal, discovering a second later that she had overslept herself because
+Mr. Constant wished to be woke three-quarters of an hour earlier than
+usual, and to have his breakfast at seven, having to speak at an early
+meeting of discontented tram-men. She ran at once, candle in hand, to
+his bedroom. It was upstairs. All "upstairs" was Arthur Constant's
+domain, 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 at
+once." The usual slumbrous "All right" was not forthcoming; but, as she
+herself had varied her morning salute, her ear was less expectant of the
+echo. She went downstairs, with no foreboding save that the kettle would
+come off second best in the race between its boiling and her lodger's
+dressing.
+
+For she knew there was no fear of Arthur Constant's lying deaf to the
+call of duty--temporarily represented by Mrs. Drabdump. He was a light
+sleeper, and the tram conductors' bells were probably ringing in his
+ears, summoning him to the meeting. Why Arthur Constant, B.
+A.--white-handed and white-shirted, and gentleman to the very purse of
+him--should concern himself with tram-men, when fortune had confined his
+necessary relations with drivers to cabmen at the least, Mrs. Drabdump
+could not quite make out. He probably aspired to represent Bow in
+Parliament; but then it would surely have been wiser to lodge with a
+landlady who possessed a vote by having a husband alive. Nor was there
+much practical wisdom in his wish to black his own boots (an occupation
+in which he shone but little), and to live in every way like a Bow
+working man. Bow working men were not so lavish in their patronage of
+water, whether existing in drinking glasses, morning tubs, or laundress'
+establishments. Nor did they eat the delicacies with which Mrs. Drabdump
+supplied him, with the assurance that they were the artisan's appanage.
+She could not bear to see him eat things unbefitting his station. Arthur
+Constant opened his mouth and ate what his landlady gave him, not first
+deliberately shutting his eyes according to the formula, the rather
+pluming himself on keeping them very wide open. But it is difficult for
+saints to see through their own halos; and in practice an aureola about
+the head is often indistinguishable from a mist. The tea to be scalded
+in Mr. Constant's pot, when that cantankerous kettle should boil, was
+not 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 the
+fog-thickened darkness of a winter night! Well, she hoped his journey
+would be duly rewarded, that his perks would be heavy, and that he would
+make as good a thing out of the "traveling expenses" as rival labor
+leaders roundly accused him of to other people's faces. She did not
+grudge him his gains, nor was it her business if, as they alleged, in
+introducing Mr. Constant to her vacant rooms, his idea was not merely to
+benefit his landlady. He had done her an uncommon good turn, queer as
+was the lodger thus introduced. His own apostleship to the sons of toil
+gave Mrs. Drabdump no twinges of perplexity. Tom Mortlake had been a
+compositor; and apostleship was obviously a profession better paid and
+of a higher social status. Tom Mortlake--the hero of a hundred
+strikes--set up in print on a poster, was unmistakably superior to Tom
+Mortlake setting up other men's names at a case. Still, the work was not
+all beer and skittles, and Mrs. Drabdump felt that Tom's latest job was
+not enviable. She shook his door as she passed it on her way to the
+kitchen, but there was no response. The street door was only a few feet
+off down the passage, and a glance at it dispelled the last hope that
+Tom had abandoned the journey. The door was unbolted and unchained, and
+the only security was the latch-key lock. Mrs. Drabdump felt a whit
+uneasy, though, to give her her due, she never suffered as much as most
+housewives do from criminals who never come. Not quite opposite, but
+still only a few doors off, on the other side of the street, lived the
+celebrated ex-detective, Grodman, and, illogically enough, his presence
+in the street gave Mrs. Drabdump a curious sense of security, as of a
+believer living under the shadow of the fane. That any human being of
+ill-odor should consciously come within a mile of the scent of so famous
+a sleuth-hound seemed to her highly improbable. Grodman had retired
+(with a competence) and was only a sleeping dog now; still, even
+criminals 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 Mortlake
+had been thoughtful enough to slip the loop that held back the bolt of
+the big lock. She allowed herself another throb of sympathy for the
+labor leader whirling on his dreary way toward Devonport Dockyard. Not
+that he had told her anything of his journey beyond the town; but she
+knew Devonport had a Dockyard because Jessie Dymond--Tom's
+sweetheart--once mentioned that her aunt lived near there, and it lay on
+the surface that Tom had gone to help the dockers, who were imitating
+their London brethren. Mrs. Drabdump did not need to be told things to
+be aware of them. She went back to prepare Mr. Constant's superfine tea,
+vaguely wondering why people were so discontented nowadays. But when she
+brought up the tea and the toast and the eggs to Mr. Constant's
+sitting-room (which adjoined his bedroom, though without communicating
+with it), Mr. Constant was not sitting in it. She lit the gas, and laid
+the cloth; then she returned to the landing and beat at the bedroom door
+with an imperative palm. Silence alone answered her. She called him by
+name and told him the hour, but hers was the only voice she heard, and
+it sounded strangely to her in the shadows of the staircase. Then,
+muttering, "Poor gentleman, he had the toothache last night; and p'r'aps
+he's only just got a wink o' sleep. Pity to disturb him for the sake of
+them grizzling conductors. I'll let him sleep his usual time," she bore
+the 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 a
+telegram came soon after. Mrs. Drabdump rattled his door, shouted, and
+at 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. She
+went downstairs again and turned the handle of Mortlake's room, and went
+in without knowing why. The coverlet of the bed showed that the occupant
+had only lain down in his clothes, as if fearing to miss the early
+train. She had not for a moment expected to find him in the room; yet
+somehow the consciousness that she was alone in the house with the
+sleeping Constant seemed to flash for the first time upon her, and the
+clammy 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 in
+the gray mist, blinking bleary eyes at either end, where the street
+lamps smoldered on. No one was visible for the moment, though smoke was
+rising from many of the chimneys to greet its sister mist. At the house
+of the detective across the way the blinds were still down and the
+shutters up. Yet the familiar, prosaic aspect of the street calmed her.
+The bleak air set her coughing; she slammed the door to, and returned to
+the kitchen to make fresh tea for Constant, who could only be in a deep
+sleep. But the canister trembled in her grasp. She did not know whether
+she dropped it or threw it down, but there was nothing in the hand that
+battered again a moment later at the bedroom door. No sound within
+answered the clamor without. She rained blow upon blow in a sort of
+spasm of frenzy, scarce remembering that her object was merely to wake
+her lodger, and almost staving in the lower panels with her kicks. Then
+she turned the handle and tried to open the door, but it was locked. The
+resistance recalled her to herself--she had a moment of shocked decency
+at the thought that she had been about to enter Constant's bedroom. Then
+the terror came over her afresh. She felt that she was alone in the
+house with a corpse. She sank to the floor, cowering; with difficulty
+stifling a desire to scream. Then she rose with a jerk and raced down
+the stairs without looking behind her, and threw open the door and ran
+out into the street, only pulling up with her hand violently agitating
+Grodman's door-knocker. In a moment the first floor window was
+raised--the little house was of the same pattern as her own--and
+Grodman's full, fleshy face loomed through the fog in sleepy irritation
+from under a nightcap. Despite its scowl the ex-detective's face dawned
+upon her like the sun upon an occupant of the haunted chamber.
+
+"What in the devil's the matter?" he growled. Grodman was not an early
+bird, now that he had no worms to catch. He could afford to despise
+proverbs now, for the house in which he lived was his, and he lived in
+it because several other houses in the street were also his, and it is
+well for the landlord to be about his own estate in Bow, where poachers
+often shoot the moon. Perhaps the desire to enjoy his greatness among
+his early cronies counted for something, too, for he had been born and
+bred at Bow, receiving when a youth his first engagement from the local
+police quarters, whence he drew a few shillings a week as an amateur
+detective in his leisure hours.
+
+Grodman was still a bachelor. In the celestial matrimonial bureau a
+partner might have been selected for him, but he had never been able to
+discover her. It was his one failure as a detective. He was a
+self-sufficing person, who preferred a gas stove to a domestic; but in
+deference to Glover Street opinion he admitted a female factotum between
+ten a. m. and ten p. m., and, equally in deference to Glover Street
+opinion, excluded her between ten p. m. and ten a. m.
+
+"I want you to come across at once," Mrs. Drabdump gasped. "Something
+has happened to Mr. Constant."
+
+"What! Not bludgeoned by the police at the meeting this morning, I
+hope?"
+
+"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 does
+not answer."
+
+Grodman's face lit up with relief.
+
+"You silly woman! Is that all? I shall have a cold in my head. Bitter
+weather. He's dog-tired after yesterday--processions, three speeches,
+kindergarten, lecture on 'the moon,' article on co-operation. That's his
+style." 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. Wait
+for me. Down in five minutes." Grodman did not take this Cassandra of
+the kitchen too seriously. Probably he knew his woman. His small,
+bead-like eyes glittered with an almost amused smile as he withdrew them
+from Mrs. Drabdump's ken, and shut down the sash with a bang. The poor
+woman ran back across the road and through her door, which she would not
+close behind her. It seemed to shut her in with the dead. She waited in
+the passage. After an age--seven minutes by any honest clock--Grodman
+made his appearance, looking as dressed as usual, but with unkempt hair
+and with disconsolate side-whisker. He was not quite used to that
+side-whisker yet, for it had only recently come within the margin of
+cultivation. In active service Grodman had been clean-shaven, like all
+members of the profession--for surely your detective is the most
+versatile of actors. Mrs. Drabdump closed the street door quietly, and
+pointed to the stairs, fear operating like a polite desire to give him
+precedence. 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 no
+other sound or movement. His face grew more serious. He waited, then
+knocked, 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 the
+upper panels, but the door seemed bolted as well as locked. He stood
+still, his face set and rigid, for he liked and esteemed the man.
+
+"Ay, knock your loudest," whispered the pale-faced woman. "You'll not
+wake him now."
+
+The gray mist had followed them through the street door, and hovered
+about 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, and
+holding her hands before her as if to ward off the dreadful vision.
+Without another word, Grodman applied his shoulder to the door, and made
+a violent muscular effort. He had been an athlete in his time, and the
+sap 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 bent
+upward, the large upper bolt tore off its iron staple; the door flew
+back 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 "Horrible
+Suicide in Bow," and "The Star" poster added, for the satisfaction of
+those too poor to purchase: "A Philanthropist Cuts His Throat."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+But the newspapers were premature. Scotland Yard refused to prejudge the
+case despite the penny-a-liners. Several arrests were made, so that the
+later editions were compelled to soften "Suicide" into "Mystery." The
+people arrested were a nondescript collection of tramps. Most of them
+had committed other offenses for which the police had not arrested them.
+One bewildered-looking gentleman gave himself up (as if he were a
+riddle), but the police would have none of him, and restored him
+forthwith to his friends and keepers. The number of candidates for each
+new opening in Newgate is astonishing.
+
+The full significance of this tragedy of a noble young life cut short
+had hardly time to filter into the public mind, when a fresh sensation
+absorbed it. Tom Mortlake had been arrested the same day at Liverpool on
+suspicion of being concerned in the death of his fellow-lodger. The news
+fell like a bombshell upon a land in which Tom Mortlake's name was a
+household word. That the gifted artisan orator, who had never shrunk
+upon occasion from launching red rhetoric at Society, should actually
+have shed blood seemed too startling, especially as the blood shed was
+not blue, but the property of a lovable young middle-class idealist, who
+had now literally given his life to the Cause. But this supplementary
+sensation did not grow to a head, and everybody (save a few labor
+leaders) was relieved to hear that Tom had been released almost
+immediately, being merely subpoenaed to appear at the inquest. In an
+interview which he accorded to the representative of a Liverpool paper
+the same afternoon, he stated that he put his arrest down entirely to
+the enmity and rancor entertained toward him by the police throughout
+the country. He had come to Liverpool to trace the movements of a friend
+about whom he was very uneasy, and he was making anxious inquiries at
+the docks to discover at what times steamers left for America, when the
+detectives stationed there in accordance with instructions from
+headquarters had arrested him as a suspicious-looking character.
+"Though," said Tom, "they must very well have known my phiz, as I have
+been sketched and caricatured all over the shop. When I told them who I
+was they had the decency to let me go. They thought they'd scored off me
+enough, I reckon. Yes, it certainly is a strange coincidence that I
+might 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 had
+just come from the 'scene of the crime,' and actually lived in the
+house, they would probably have--let me alone." He laughed
+sarcastically. "They are a queer lot of muddle-heads are the police.
+Their motto is, 'First catch your man, then cook the evidence.' If
+you're on the spot you're guilty because you're there, and if you're
+elsewhere you're guilty because you have gone away. Oh, I know them! If
+they 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 five
+this morning."
+
+"If they clapped you in quod," the interviewer reported himself as
+facetiously 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 excuse
+me. I am so upset about my friend. I'm afraid he has left England, and I
+have 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 were
+billed to preside at a great meeting of clerks at St. James' Hall
+between 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 was
+going to wire, and then the news of poor Constant's end drove it out of
+my 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 the
+public knowledge of his movements on the morning of the Mystery. The
+cabman who drove him to Euston had written indignantly to the papers to
+say that he had picked up his celebrated fare at Bow Railway Station at
+about half-past four a. m., and the arrest was a deliberate insult to
+democracy, and he offered to make an affidavit to that effect, leaving
+it dubious to which effect. But Scotland Yard betrayed no itch for the
+affidavit in question, and No. 2,138 subsided again into the obscurity
+of his rank. Mortlake--whose face was very pale below the black mane
+brushed back from his fine forehead--gave his evidence in low,
+sympathetic tones. He had known the deceased for over a year, coming
+constantly across him in their common political and social work, and had
+found the furnished rooms for him in Glover Street at his own request,
+they just being to let when Constant resolved to leave his rooms at
+Oxford House in Bethnal Green and to share the actual life of the
+people. The locality suited the deceased, as being near the People's
+Palace. He respected and admired the deceased, whose genuine goodness
+had won all hearts. The deceased was an untiring worker; never grumbled,
+was always in fair spirits, regarded his life and wealth as a sacred
+trust to be used for the benefit of humanity. He had last seen him at a
+quarter past nine p. m. on the day preceding his death. He (witness) had
+received a letter by the last post which made him uneasy about a friend.
+Deceased was evidently suffering from toothache, and was fixing a piece
+of cotton-wool in a hollow tooth, but he did not complain. Deceased
+seemed rather upset by the news he brought, and they both discussed it
+rather excitedly.
+
+By a Juryman: Did the news concern him?
+
+Mortlake: Only impersonally. He knew my friend, and was keenly
+sympathetic 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. If
+you, sir, think it relevant or essential, I will state what the trouble
+was.
+
+Coroner: Was the toothache very violent?
+
+Mortlake: I cannot tell. I think not, though he told me it had disturbed
+his 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 I
+returned, and told my landlady I should be leaving by an early train
+for--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, I
+even slipped the bolt of the big lock, which was usually tied back. It
+was impossible for any one to get in even with a latch-key.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump's evidence (which, of course, preceded his) was more
+important, and occupied a considerable time, unduly eked out by
+Drabdumpian padding. Thus she not only deposed that Mr. Constant had the
+toothache, but that it was going to last about a week; in tragic-comic
+indifference to the radical cure that had been effected. Her account of
+the last hours of the deceased tallied with Mortlake's, only that she
+feared Mortlake was quarreling with him over something in the letter
+that came by the nine o'clock post. Deceased had left the house a little
+after Mortlake, but had returned before him, and had gone straight to
+his bedroom. She had not actually seen him come in, having been in the
+kitchen, but she heard his latch-key, followed by his light step up the
+stairs.
+
+A Juryman: How do you know it was not somebody else? (Sensation, of
+which the juryman tries to look unconscious.)
+
+Witness: He called down to me over the banisters, and says in his
+sweetish 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 seventeen
+years, my lud, and have always gave satisfaction; and Mr. Mortlake, he
+wouldn't ha' recommended me otherwise, though I wish to Heaven the poor
+gentleman had never----
+
+Coroner: Yes, yes, of course. You tried to rouse him?
+
+But it was some time before Mrs. Drabdump was sufficiently calm to
+explain that though she had overslept herself, and though it would have
+been all the same anyhow, she had come up to time. Bit by bit the tragic
+story was forced from her lips--a tragedy that even her telling could
+not make tawdry. She told with superfluous detail how--when Mr. Grodman
+broke in the door--she saw her unhappy gentleman lodger lying on his
+back in bed, stone dead, with a gaping red wound in his throat; how her
+stronger-minded companion calmed her a little by spreading a
+handkerchief over the distorted face; how they then looked vainly about
+and under the bed for any instrument by which the deed could have been
+done, the veteran detective carefully making a rapid inventory of the
+contents of the room, and taking notes of the precise position and
+condition of the body before anything was disturbed by the arrival of
+gapers or bunglers; how she had pointed out to him that both the windows
+were firmly bolted to keep out the cold night air; how, having noted
+this down with a puzzled, pitying shake of the head, he had opened the
+window 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 ask
+them to send on an inspector and a surgeon. How they both remained in
+the room till the police arrived, Grodman pondering deeply the while and
+making notes every now and again, as fresh points occurred to him, and
+asking her questions about the poor, weak-headed young man. Pressed as
+to what she meant by calling the deceased "weak-headed," she replied
+that some of her neighbors wrote him begging letters, though, Heaven
+knew, they were better off than herself, who had to scrape her fingers
+to the bone for every penny she earned. Under further pressure from Mr.
+Talbot, who was watching the inquiry on behalf of Arthur Constant's
+family, Mrs. Drabdump admitted that the deceased had behaved like a
+human being, nor was there anything externally eccentric or queer in his
+conduct. He was always cheerful and pleasant spoken, though certainly
+soft--God rest his soul. No; he never shaved, but wore all the hair that
+Heaven had given him.
+
+By a Juryman: She thought deceased was in the habit of locking his door
+when 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 slid
+upward, and was at the top of the door. When she first let lodgings, her
+reasons for which she seemed anxious to publish, there had only been a
+bolt, but a suspicious lodger, she would not call him a gentleman, had
+complained that he could not fasten his door behind him, and so she had
+been put to the expense of having a lock made. The complaining lodger
+went off soon after without paying his rent. (Laughter.) She had always
+known 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 told
+him to be careful. I told him I lost a purse with 3s. 2d. myself on
+Jubilee Day.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump resumed her seat, weeping vaguely.
+
+The Coroner: Gentlemen, we shall have an opportunity of viewing the room
+shortly.
+
+The story of the discovery of the body was retold, though more
+scientifically, by Mr. George Grodman, whose unexpected resurgence into
+the realm of his early exploits excited as keen a curiosity as the
+reappearance "for this occasion only" of a retired prima donna. His
+book, "Criminals I Have Caught," passed from the twenty-third to the
+twenty-fourth edition merely on the strength of it. Mr. Grodman stated
+that the body was still warm when he found it. He thought that death was
+quite recent. The door he had had to burst was bolted as well as locked.
+He confirmed Mrs. Drabdump's statement about the windows; the chimney
+was very narrow. The cut looked as if done by a razor. There was no
+instrument lying about the room. He had known the deceased about a
+month. He seemed a very earnest, simple-minded young fellow who spoke a
+great deal about the brotherhood of man. (The hardened old man-hunter's
+voice was not free from a tremor as he spoke jerkily of the dead man's
+enthusiasms.) He should have thought the deceased the last man in the
+world to commit suicide.
+
+Mr. Denzil Cantercot was next called. He was a poet. (Laughter.) He was
+on his way to Mr. Grodman's house to tell him he had been unable to do
+some writing for him because he was suffering from writer's cramp, when
+Mr. Grodman called to him from the window of No. 11 and asked him to run
+for the police. No, he did not run; he was a philosopher. (Laughter.) He
+returned with them to the door, but did not go up. He had no stomach for
+crude sensations. (Laughter.) The gray fog was sufficiently unbeautiful
+for him for one morning. (Laughter.)
+
+Inspector Howlett said: About 9:45 on the morning of Tuesday, 4th
+December, from information received, he went with Sergeant Runnymede and
+Dr. Robinson to 11 Glover Street, Bow, and there found the dead body of
+a young man, lying on his back with his throat cut. The door of the room
+had been smashed in, and the lock and the bolt evidently forced. The
+room was tidy. There were no marks of blood on the floor. A purse full
+of gold was on the dressing-table beside a big book. A hip-bath with
+cold water stood beside the bed, over which was a hanging bookcase.
+There was a large wardrobe against the wall next to the door. The
+chimney was very narrow. There were two windows, one bolted. It was
+about 18 feet to the pavement. There was no way of climbing up. No one
+could possibly have got out of the room, and then bolted the doors and
+windows behind him; and he had searched all parts of the room in which
+anyone might have been concealed. He had been unable to find any
+instrument in the room, in spite of exhaustive search, there being not
+even a penknife in the pockets of the clothes of the deceased, which lay
+on a chair. The house and the back yard, and the adjacent pavement, had
+also been fruitlessly searched.
+
+Sergeant Runnymede made an identical statement, saving only that he had
+gone with Dr. Robinson and Inspector Howlett.
+
+Dr. Robinson, divisional surgeon, said: The deceased was lying on his
+back, with his throat cut. The body was not yet cold, the abdominal
+region being quite warm. Rigor mortis had set in in the lower jaw, neck
+and upper extremities. The muscles contracted when beaten. I inferred
+that life had been extinct some two or three hours, probably not longer,
+it might have been less. The bedclothes would keep the lower part warm
+for some time. The wound, which was a deep one, was 5-1/2 inches from
+right to left across the throat to a point under the left ear. The upper
+portion of the windpipe was severed, and likewise the jugular vein. The
+muscular coating of the carotid artery was divided. There was a slight
+cut, 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 the
+right hand. The wound could not have been self-inflicted. A sharp
+instrument had been used, such as a razor. The cut might have been made
+by a left-handed person. No doubt death was practically instantaneous. I
+saw no signs of a struggle about the body or the room. I noticed a purse
+on the dressing-table, lying next to Madame Blavatsky's big book on
+Theosophy. Sergeant Runnymede drew my attention to the fact that the
+door had evidently been locked and bolted from within.
+
+By a Juryman: I do not say the cuts could not have been made by a
+right-handed person. I can offer no suggestion as to how the inflicter
+of the wound got in or out. Extremely improbable that the cut was
+self-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 the
+morning of the 4th inst. Glover Street lay within his beat. He saw or
+heard nothing suspicious. The fog was never very dense, though nasty to
+the throat. He had passed through Glover Street about half-past four. He
+had not seen Mr. Mortlake or anybody else leave the house.
+
+The Court here adjourned, the Coroner and the jury repairing in a body
+to 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 had
+been released on suspicion that they were innocent; there was not a
+single case even for a magistrate. Clues, which at such seasons are
+gathered by the police like blackberries off the hedges, were scanty and
+unripe. Inferior specimens were offered them by bushels, but there was
+not a good one among the lot. The police could not even manufacture a
+clue.
+
+Arthur Constant's death was already the theme of every hearth, railway
+carriage and public house. The dead idealist had points of contact with
+so many spheres. The East End and West End alike were moved and excited,
+the Democratic Leagues and the Churches, the Doss-houses and the
+Universities. The pity of it! And then the impenetrable mystery of it!
+
+The evidence given in the concluding portion of the investigation was
+necessarily less sensational. There were no more witnesses to bring the
+scent of blood over the coroner's table; those who had yet to be heard
+were merely relatives and friends of the deceased, who spoke of him as
+he 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 about
+him 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 at
+home. His friends were a motley crew; friends of the same friend are not
+necessarily friends of one another. But their diversity only made the
+congruity of the tale they had to tell more striking. It was the tale of
+a man who had never made an enemy even by benefiting him, nor lost a
+friend even by refusing his favors; the tale of a man whose heart
+overflowed with peace and good will to all men all the year round; of a
+man to whom Christmas came not once, but three hundred and sixty-five
+times a year; it was the tale of a brilliant intellect, who gave up to
+mankind what was meant for himself, and worked as a laborer in the
+vineyard of humanity, never crying that the grapes were sour; of a man
+uniformly cheerful and of good courage, living in that forgetfulness of
+self which is the truest antidote to despair. And yet there was not
+quite wanting the note of pain to jar the harmony and make it human.
+Richard Elton, his chum from boyhood, and vicar of Somerton, in
+Midlandshire, handed to the coroner a letter from the deceased about ten
+days before his death, containing some passages which the coroner read
+aloud: "Do you know anything of Schopenhauer? I mean anything beyond the
+current misconceptions? I have been making his acquaintance lately. He
+is an agreeable rattle of a pessimist; his essay on 'The Misery of
+Mankind' is quite lively reading. At first his assimilation of
+Christianity and Pessimism (it occurs in his essay on 'Suicide') dazzled
+me as an audacious paradox. But there is truth in it. Verily, the whole
+creation groaneth and travaileth, and man is a degraded monster, and sin
+is over all. Ah, my friend, I have shed many of my illusions since I
+came to this seething hive of misery and wrongdoing. What shall one
+man's life--a million men's lives--avail against the corruption, the
+vulgarity and the squalor of civilization? Sometimes I feel like a
+farthing rush-light in the Hall of Eblis. Selfishness is so long and
+life so short. And the worst of it is that everybody is so beastly
+contented. The poor no more desire comfort than the rich culture. The
+woman to whom a penny school fee for her child represents an appreciable
+slice of her income is satisfied that the rich we shall always have with
+us.
+
+"The real crusted old Tories are the paupers in the Workhouse. The
+Radical working men are jealous of their own leaders, and the leaders of
+one another. Schopenhauer must have organized a labor party in his salad
+days. And yet one can't help feeling that he committed suicide as a
+philosopher by not committing it as a man. He claims kinship with
+Buddha, too; though Esoteric Buddhism at least seems spheres removed
+from the philosophy of 'The Will and the Idea'. What a wonderful woman
+Madame Blavatsky must be. I can't say I follow her, for she is up in the
+clouds nearly all the time, and I haven't as yet developed an astral
+body. Shall I send you on her book? It is fascinating.... I am becoming
+quite a fluent orator. One soon gets into the way of it. The horrible
+thing is that you catch yourself saying things to lead up to 'Cheers'
+instead of sticking to the plain realities of the business. Lucy is
+still doing the galleries in Italy. It used to pain me sometimes to
+think of my darling's happiness when I came across a flat-chested
+factory girl. Now I feel her happiness is as important as a factory
+girl's."
+
+Lucy, the witness explained, was Lucy Brent, the betrothed of the
+deceased. The poor girl had been telegraphed for, and had started for
+England. The witness stated that the outburst of despondency in this
+letter was almost a solitary one, most of the letters in his possession
+being bright, buoyant and hopeful. Even this letter ended with a
+humorous statement of the writer's manifold plans and projects for the
+new year. The deceased was a good Churchman.
+
+Coroner: Was there any private trouble in his own life to account for
+the temporary despondency?
+
+Witness: Not so far as I am aware. His financial position was
+exceptionally favorable.
+
+Coroner: There had been no quarrel with Miss Brent?
+
+Witness: I have the best authority for saying that no shadow of
+difference 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 by
+the Freethought Publication Society?
+
+Witness: I do not know who publishes his books.
+
+The Juryman (a small grocer and big raw-boned Scotchman, rejoicing in
+the name of Sandy Sanderson and the dignities of deaconry and membership
+of 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 thank
+Heaven for this small mercy)--who believes that life is not worth
+living.
+
+The Juryman: Were you not shocked to find the friend of a meenister
+reading such impure leeterature?
+
+Witness: The deceased read everything. Schopenhauer is the author of a
+system of philosophy, and not what you seem to imagine. Perhaps you
+would like to inspect the book? (Laughter.)
+
+The Juryman: I would na' touch it with a pitchfork. Such books should be
+burnt. And this Madame Blavatsky's book--what is that? Is that also
+pheelosophy?
+
+Witness: No. It is Theosophy. (Laughter.)
+
+Mr. Allen Smith, secretary of the Trammel's Union, stated that he had
+had an interview with the deceased on the day before his death, when he
+(the deceased) spoke hopefully of the prospects of the movement, and
+wrote him out a check for 10 guineas for his union. Deceased promised to
+speak at a meeting called for a quarter past seven a.m. the next day.
+
+Mr. Edward Wimp, of the Scotland Yard Detective Department, said that
+the letters and papers of the deceased threw no light upon the manner of
+his death, and they would be handed back to the family. His Department
+had 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 of
+Tuesday, the 4th inst., Mrs. Drabdump, a worthy, hard-working widow, who
+lets lodgings at 11 Grover Street, Bow, was unable to arouse the
+deceased, who occupied the entire upper floor of the house. Becoming
+alarmed, she went across to fetch Mr. George Grodman, a gentleman known
+to us all by reputation, and to whose clear and scientific evidence we
+are much indebted, and got him to batter in the door. They found the
+deceased lying back in bed with a deep wound in his throat. Life had
+only recently become extinct. There was no trace of any instrument by
+which the cut could have been effected; there was no trace of any person
+who could have effected the cut. No person could apparently have got in
+or out. The medical evidence goes to show that the deceased could not
+have inflicted the wound himself. And yet, gentlemen, there are, in the
+nature of things, two--and only two--alternative explanations of his
+death. Either the wound was inflicted by his own hand, or it was
+inflicted by another's. I shall take each of these possibilities
+separately. First, did the deceased commit suicide? The medical evidence
+says deceased was lying with his hands clasped behind his head. Now the
+wound was made from right to left, and terminated by a cut on the left
+thumb. If the deceased had made it he would have had to do it with his
+right hand, while his left hand remained under his head--a most peculiar
+and unnatural position to assume. Moreover, in making a cut with the
+right hand, one would naturally move the hand from left to right. It is
+unlikely that the deceased would move his right hand so awkwardly and
+unnaturally, unless, of course, his object was to baffle suspicion.
+Another point is that on this hypothesis, the deceased would have had to
+replace his right hand beneath his head. But Dr. Robinson believes that
+death was instantaneous. If so, deceased could have had no time to pose
+so neatly. It is just possible the cut was made with the left hand, but
+then the deceased was right-handed. The absence of any signs of a
+possible weapon undoubtedly goes to corroborate the medical evidence.
+The police have made an exhaustive search in all places where the razor
+or other weapon or instrument might by any possibility have been
+concealed, including the bedclothes, the mattress, the pillow, and the
+street into which it might have been dropped. But all theories involving
+the willful concealment of the fatal instrument have to reckon with the
+fact or probability that death was instantaneous, also with the fact
+that there was no blood about the floor. Finally, the instrument used
+was in all likelihood a razor, and the deceased did not shave, and was
+never known to be in possession of any such instrument. If, then, we
+were to confine ourselves to the medical and police evidence, there
+would, I think, be little hesitation in dismissing the idea of suicide.
+Nevertheless, it is well to forget the physical aspect of the case for a
+moment and to apply our minds to an unprejudiced inquiry into the mental
+aspect of it. Was there any reason why the deceased should wish to take
+his own life? He was young, wealthy and popular, loving and loved; life
+stretched 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 had
+ambition, an illustrious public career was within reach. He was an
+orator of no mean power, a brilliant and industrious man. His outlook
+was always on the future--he was always sketching out ways in which he
+could be useful to his fellow-men. His purse and his time were ever at
+the command of whosoever could show fair claim upon them. If such a man
+were likely to end his own life, the science of human nature would be at
+an end. Still, some of the shadows of the picture have been presented to
+us. The man had his moments of despondency--as which of us has not? But
+they seem to have been few and passing. Anyhow, he was cheerful enough
+on the day before his death. He was suffering, too, from toothache. But
+it does not seem to have been violent, nor did he complain. Possibly, of
+course, the pain became very acute in the night. Nor must we forget that
+he may have overworked himself, and got his nerves into a morbid state.
+He worked very hard, never rising later than half-past seven, and doing
+far more than the professional 'labor leader.' He taught and wrote as
+well as spoke and organized. But on the other hand all witnesses agree
+that he was looking forward eagerly to the meeting of tram-men on the
+morning of the 4th inst. His whole heart was in the movement. Is it
+likely that this was the night he would choose for quitting the scene of
+his usefulness? Is it likely that if he had chosen it, he would not have
+left 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 is
+it likely he would have concealed the instrument? The only positive sign
+of intention is the bolting of his door in addition to the usual locking
+of it, but one cannot lay much stress on that. Regarding the mental
+aspects alone, the balance is largely against suicide; looking at the
+physical aspects, suicide is well nigh impossible. Putting the two
+together, the case against suicide is all but mathematically complete.
+The answer, then, to our first question, Did the deceased commit
+suicide? is, that he did not."
+
+The coroner paused, and everybody drew a long breath. The lucid
+exposition had been followed with admiration. If the coroner had stopped
+now, 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 of
+homicide? In order to answer that question in the affirmative it is
+essential that we should be able to form some conception of the _modus
+operandi_. It is all very well for Dr. Robinson to say the cut was made
+by another hand; but in the absence of any theory as to how the cut
+could possibly have been made by that other hand, we should be driven
+back to the theory of self-infliction, however improbable it may seem to
+medical gentlemen. Now, what are the facts? When Mrs. Drabdump and Mr.
+Grodman found the body it was yet warm, and Mr. Grodman, a witness
+fortunately qualified by special experience, states that death had been
+quite recent. This tallies closely enough with the view of Dr. Robinson,
+who, examining the body about an hour later, put the time of death at
+two or three hours before, say seven o'clock. Mrs. Drabdump had
+attempted to wake the deceased at a quarter to seven, which would put
+back the act to a little earlier. As I understand from Dr. Robinson,
+that it is impossible to fix the time very precisely, death may have
+very well taken place several hours before Mrs. Drabdump's first attempt
+to wake deceased. Of course, it may have taken place between the first
+and second calls, as he may merely have been sound asleep at first; it
+may also not impossibly have taken place considerably earlier than the
+first call, for all the physical data seem to prove. Nevertheless, on
+the whole, I think we shall be least likely to err if we assume the time
+of 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 know
+exactly how it is constructed. On the ground floor a front room tenanted
+by Mr. Mortlake, with two windows giving on the street, both securely
+bolted; 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 be
+sure all the various doors and windows have not yet been unfastened;
+while the season of the year is a guarantee that nothing had been left
+open. The front door through which Mr. Mortlake has gone out before
+half-past four, is guarded by the latch-key lock and the big lock. On
+the upper floor are two rooms--a front room used by deceased for a
+bedroom, and a back room which he used as a sitting-room. The back room
+has been left open, with the key inside, but the window is fastened. The
+door of the front room is not only locked, but bolted. We have seen the
+splintered mortise and the staple of the upper bolt violently forced
+from the woodwork and resting on the pin. The windows are bolted, the
+fasteners being firmly fixed in the catches. The chimney is too narrow
+to admit of the passage of even a child. This room, in fact, is as
+firmly barred in as if besieged. It has no communication with any other
+part of the house. It is as absolutely self-centered and isolated as if
+it were a fort in the sea or a log-hut in the forest. Even if any
+strange person is in the house, nay, in the very sitting-room of the
+deceased, he cannot get into the bedroom, for the house is one built for
+the poor, with no communication between the different rooms, so that
+separate families, if need be, may inhabit each. Now, however, let us
+grant that some person has achieved the miracle of getting into the
+front room, first floor, 18 feet from the ground. At half-past six, or
+thereabouts, he cuts the throat of the sleeping occupant. How is he then
+to 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 yet
+leave the doors and windows locked and bolted from within? This is a
+degree of miracle at which my credulity must draw the line. No, the room
+had been closed all night--there is scarce a trace of fog in it. No one
+could get in or out. Finally, murders do not take place without motive.
+Robbery and revenge are the only conceivable motives. The deceased had
+not an enemy in the world; his money and valuables were left untouched.
+Everything was in order. There were no signs of a struggle. The answer
+then to our second inquiry--was the deceased killed by another
+person?--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 the
+deceased did not commit suicide. It seems equally clear that the
+deceased was not murdered. There is nothing for it, therefore,
+gentlemen, but to return a verdict tantamount to an acknowledgment of
+our incompetence to come to any adequately grounded conviction whatever
+as to the means or the manner by which the deceased met his death. It is
+the most inexplicable mystery in all my experience." (Sensation.)
+
+The Foreman (after a colloquy with Mr. Sandy Sanderson): "We are not
+agreed, sir. One of the jurors insists on a verdict of "Death from
+visitation by the act of God.""
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+But Sandy Sanderson's burning solicitude to fix the crime flickered out
+in the face of opposition, and in the end he bowed his head to the
+inevitable "open verdict." Then the floodgates of inkland were opened,
+and the deluge pattered for nine days on the deaf coffin where the poor
+idealist moldered. The tongues of the Press were loosened, and the
+leader writers reveled in recapitulating the circumstances of "The Big
+Bow Mystery," though they could contribute nothing but adjectives to the
+solution. The papers teemed with letters--it was a kind of Indian summer
+of the silly season. But the editors could not keep them out, nor cared
+to. The mystery was the one topic of conversation everywhere--it was on
+the carpet and the bare boards alike, in the kitchen and the
+drawing-room. It was discussed with science or stupidity, with aspirates
+or without. It came up for breakfast with the rolls, and was swept off
+the supper table with the last crumbs.
+
+No. 11 Glover Street, Bow, remained for days a shrine of pilgrimage. The
+once sleepy little street buzzed from morning till night. From all parts
+of the town people came to stare up at the bedroom window and wonder
+with a foolish look of horror. The pavement was often blocked for hours
+together, and itinerant vendors of refreshment made it a new market
+center, while vocalists hastened thither to sing the delectable ditty of
+the deed without having any voice in the matter. It was a pity the
+Government did not erect a toll-gate at either end of the street. But
+Chancellors of the Exchequer rarely avail themselves of the more obvious
+expedients for paying off the National debt.
+
+Finally, familiarity bred contempt, and the wits grew facetious at the
+expense of the Mystery. Jokes on the subject appeared even in the comic
+papers.
+
+To the proverb, "You must not say Boo to a goose," one added, "or else
+she will explain you the Mystery." The name of the gentleman who asked
+whether the Bow Mystery was not 'arrowing shall not be divulged. There
+was more point in "Dagonet's" remark that, if he had been one of the
+unhappy jurymen, he should have been driven to "suicide." A professional
+paradox-monger pointed triumphantly to the somewhat similar situation in
+"the murder in the Rue Morgue," and said that Nature had been
+plagiarizing again--like the monkey she was--and he recommended Poe's
+publishers to apply for an injunction. More seriously, Poe's solution
+was re-suggested by "Constant Reader" as an original idea. He thought
+that a small organ-grinder's monkey might have got down the chimney with
+its master's razor, and, after attempting to shave the occupant of the
+bed, have returned the way it came. This idea created considerable
+sensation, but a correspondent with a long train of letters draggling
+after his name pointed out that a monkey small enough to get down so
+narrow 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 keenly
+about the power of monkeys' muscles that it was almost taken for granted
+that 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 blood
+had been discovered on the floor, or on the nightshirt, or the
+counterpane. The "Lancet's" leader on the Mystery was awaited with
+interest. It said: "We cannot join in the praises that have been
+showered upon the coroner's summing up. It shows again the evils
+resulting from having coroners who are not medical men. He seems to have
+appreciated but inadequately the significance of the medical evidence.
+He should certainly have directed the jury to return a verdict of murder
+on that. What was it to do with him that he could see no way by which
+the wound could have been inflicted by an outside agency? It was for the
+police to find how that was done. Enough that it was impossible for the
+unhappy young man to have inflicted such a wound and then have strength
+and will power enough to hide the instrument and to remove perfectly
+every trace of his having left the bed for the purpose." It is
+impossible to enumerate all the theories propounded by the amateur
+detectives, while Scotland Yard religiously held its tongue. Ultimately
+the interest on the subject became confined to a few papers which had
+received the best letters. Those papers that couldn't get interesting
+letters stopped the correspondence and sneered at the "sensationalism"
+of those that could. Among the mass of fantasy there were not a few
+notable solutions, which failed brilliantly, like rockets posing as
+fixed stars. One was that in the obscurity of the fog the murderer had
+ascended to the window of the bedroom by means of a ladder from the
+pavement. He had then with a diamond cut one of the panes away, and
+effected an entry through the aperture. On leaving he fixed in the pane
+of glass again (or another which he had brought with him), and thus the
+room remained with its bolts and locks untouched. On its being pointed
+out that the panes were too small, a third correspondent showed that
+that didn't matter, as it was only necessary to insert the hand and undo
+the fastening, when the entire window could be opened, the process being
+reversed by the murderer on leaving. This pretty edifice of glass was
+smashed by a glazier, who wrote to say that a pane could hardly be fixed
+in from only one side of a window frame, that it would fall out when
+touched, and that in any case the wet putty could not have escaped
+detection. A door panel sliced out and replaced was also put forward,
+and as many trap-doors and secret passages were ascribed to No. 11
+Glover Street as if it were a medieval castle. Another of these clever
+theories was that the murderer was in the room the whole time the police
+were there--hidden in the wardrobe. Or he had got behind the door when
+Grodman broke it open, so that he was not noticed in the excitement of
+the discovery, and escaped with his weapon at the moment when Grodman
+and Mrs. Drabdump were examining the window fastenings.
+
+Scientific explanations also were to hand to explain how the assassin
+locked and bolted the door behind him. Powerful magnets outside the door
+had been used to turn the key and push the bolt within. Murderers armed
+with magnets loomed on the popular imagination like a new microbe. There
+was only one defect in this ingenious theory--the thing could not be
+done. A physiologist recalled the conjurers who swallowed swords--by an
+anatomical peculiarity of the throat--and said that the deceased might
+have swallowed the weapon after cutting his own throat. This was too
+much for the public to swallow. As for the idea that the suicide had
+been effected with a penknife or its blade, or a bit of steel, which had
+got 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 accorded
+to the idea that the cut had been made with a candlestick (or other
+harmless article) constructed like a sword-stick. Theories of this sort
+caused a humorist to explain that the deceased had hidden the razor in
+his hollow tooth! Some kind friend of Messrs. Maskelyne and Cook
+suggested 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 most
+brilliant of these flashes of false fire was the facetious, yet probably
+half-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 it
+drew the following interesting communication from the great detective
+himself:
+
+     "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 the
+paper, 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 committee
+of 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, and
+imparting an air of distinction and an agreeable aroma to the close
+leathery atmosphere. Crowl cobbled away, talking to his tenant without
+raising his eyes. He was a small, big-headed, sallow, sad-eyed man, with
+a 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 he
+removed it and sat in his shirt sleeves. Crowl was a thinker, or thought
+he was--which seems to involve original thinking anyway. His hair was
+thinning rapidly at the top, as if his brain was struggling to get as
+near as possible to the realities of things. He prided himself on having
+no fads. Few men are without some foible or hobby; Crowl felt almost
+lonely at times in his superiority. He was a Vegetarian, a Secularist, a
+Blue 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 a
+fad. "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 stood
+on Mile-end Waste, which was opposite his shop--and held forth to the
+crowd on the evils of kings, priests and mutton chops, the "plain man"
+turned up at intervals like the "theme" of a symphonic movement. "I am
+only a plain man and I want to know." It was a phrase that sabered the
+spider-webs of logical refinement, and held them up scornfully on the
+point. When Crowl went for a little recreation in Victoria Park on
+Sunday afternoons, it was with this phrase that he invariably routed the
+supernaturalists. Crowl knew his Bible better than most ministers, and
+always carried a minutely-printed copy in his pocket, dogs-eared to mark
+contradictions in the text. The second chapter of Jeremiah says one
+thing; the first chapter of Corinthians says another. Two contradictory
+statements may both be true, but "I am only a plain man, and I want to
+know." Crowl spent a large part of his time in setting "the word against
+the word." Cock-fighting affords its votaries no acuter pleasure than
+Crowl derived from setting two texts by the ears. Crowl had a
+metaphysical genius which sent his Sunday morning disciples frantic with
+admiration, and struck the enemy dumb with dismay. He had discovered,
+for instance, that the Deity could not move, owing to already filling
+all space. He was also the first to invent, for the confusion of the
+clerical, the crucial case of a saint dying at the Antipodes
+contemporaneously with another in London. Both went skyward to heaven,
+yet the two traveled in directly opposite directions. In all eternity
+they would never meet. Which, then, got to heaven? Or was there no such
+place? "I am only a plain man, and I want to know." Preserve us our open
+spaces; they exist to testify to the incurable interest of humanity in
+the Unknown and the Misunderstood. Even 'Arry is capable of five
+minutes' 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 hopelessly
+wrong on all subjects under the sun. In only one point did Peter Crowl
+agree with Denzil Cantercot--he admired Denzil Cantercot secretly. When
+he asked him for the True--which was about twice a day on the
+average--he didn't really expect to get it from him. He knew that Denzil
+was a poet.
+
+"The Beautiful," he went on, "is a thing that only appeals to men like
+you. The True is for all men. The majority have the first claim. Till
+then you poets must stand aside. The True and the Useful--that's what we
+want. The Good of Society is the only test of things. Everything stands
+or falls by the Good of Society."
+
+"The Good of Society!" echoed Denzil, scornfully. "What's the Good of
+Society? The Individual is before all. The mass must be sacrificed to
+the 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 a
+blank."
+
+"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 Denzil
+Cantercot bitterly. "Many of us start by following the butterfly through
+the 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 on
+you."
+
+Denzil's wild eyes flashed angrily. He shook his long hair. Life was
+very serious to him. He never wrote comic verse intentionally.
+
+There are three reasons why men of genius have long hair. One is, that
+they forget it is growing. The second is, that they like it. The third
+is, that it comes cheaper; they wear it long for the same reason that
+they wear their hats long.
+
+Owing to this peculiarity of genius, you may get quite a reputation for
+lack of twopence. The economic reason did not apply to Denzil, who could
+always 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 over
+barbers and conspire to promote their interests? Denzil would have told
+you it was not to serve the barbers, but to gratify the crowd's
+instinctive resentment of originality. In his palmy days Denzil had been
+an editor, but he no more thought of turning his scissors against
+himself than of swallowing his paste. The efficacy of hair has changed
+since the days of Samson, otherwise Denzil would have been a Hercules
+instead of a long, thin, nervous man, looking too brittle and delicate
+to be used even for a pipe-cleaner. The narrow oval of his face sloped
+to a pointed, untrimmed beard. His linen was reproachable, his dingy
+boots were down at heel, and his cocked hat was drab with dust. Such are
+the effects of a love for the Beautiful.
+
+Peter Crowl was impressed with Denzil's condemnation of flippancy, and
+he hastened to turn off the joke.
+
+"I'm quite serious," he said. "Butterflies are no good to nothing or
+nobody; 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 elaborate
+courtesy. Mrs. Crowl grunted and looked at her husband with a note of
+interrogation 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, and
+helplessly shook his head in a horizontal direction. It was wonderful
+how Mrs. Crowl towered over Mr. Crowl, even when he stood up in his
+shoes. 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 a
+question of provin' to a lot of chuckleheads that Jollygee and Genesis,
+or some other dead and gone Scripture folk that don't consarn no mortal
+soul, used to contradict each other, your tongue 'ud run thirteen to the
+dozen. 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 a
+lamppost. Here's a man stayin' with you for weeks and weeks--eatin' and
+drinkin' 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 weeks
+come and gone, and not a blessed 'aypenny have I----"
+
+"My dear Mrs. Crowl," said Denzil, removing his cigarette from his mouth
+with 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 bill
+you would have had the money long ago. How do you expect me to think of
+these details?"
+
+"We ain't so grand down here. People pays their way--they don't get no
+bills," 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 to
+know," Mrs. Crowl resumed. "And there ain't a woman in the Mile End Road
+as 'ud a-done it cheaper, with bread at fourpence threefarden a quartern
+and landlords clamorin' for rent every Monday morning almost afore the
+sun's up and folks draggin' and slidderin' on till their shoes is only
+fit to throw after brides, and Christmas comin' and seven-pence a week
+for 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. Peter
+felt that, having brought nine children into the world, it was only fair
+he should pay a penny a week for each of those old enough to bear
+educating. His better half argued that, having so many children, they
+ought in reason to be exempted. Only people who had few children could
+spare the penny. But the one point on which the cobbler-skeptic of the
+Mile End Road got his way was this of the fees. It was a question of
+conscience, and Mrs. Crowl had never made application for their
+remission, though she often slapped her children in vexation instead.
+They were used to slapping, and when nobody else slapped them they
+slapped one another. They were bright, ill-mannered brats, who pestered
+their parents and worried their teachers, and were happy as the Road was
+long.
+
+"Bother the school fees!" Peter retorted, vexed. "Mr. Cantercot's not
+responsible for your children."
+
+"I should hope not, indeed, Mr. Crowl," Mrs. Crowl said sternly. "I'm
+ashamed of you." And with that she flounced out of the shop into the
+back parlor.
+
+"It's all right," Peter called after her soothingly. "The money'll be
+all right, mother."
+
+In lower circles it is customary to call your wife your mother; in
+somewhat superior circles it is the fashion to speak of her as "the
+wife" as you speak of "the Stock Exchange," or "the Thames," without
+claiming any peculiar property. Instinctively men are ashamed of being
+moral and domesticated.
+
+Denzil puffed his cigarette, unembarrassed. Peter bent attentively over
+his work, making nervous stabs with his awl. There was a long silence.
+An organ-grinder played a waltz outside, unregarded; and, failing to
+annoy anybody, moved on. Denzil lit another cigarette. The dirty-faced
+clock 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 visible
+incarnation of Authority."
+
+"What! do you call Queen Victoria visible?"
+
+"Peter, do you want to drive me from the house? Leave frivolousness to
+women, whose minds are only large enough for domestic difficulties.
+Republics are low. Plato mercifully kept the poets out of his. Republics
+are not congenial soil for poetry."
+
+"What nonsense! If England dropped its fad of Monarchy and became a
+Republic 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 a
+button-hook about poets, present company always excepted. I'm only a
+plain man, and I want to know where's the sense of givin' any one person
+authority 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 to
+give you flying angels and to carry you aloft, like a banner,
+huzzahing."
+
+"Ah, that's because he's head and shoulders above 'em already," said
+Crowl, with a flash in his sad gray eyes. "Still, it don't prove that
+I'd talk any different. And I think you're quite wrong about his being
+spoiled. Tom's a fine fellow--a man every inch of him, and that's a good
+many. I don't deny he has his weaknesses, and there was a time when he
+stood in this very shop and denounced that poor dead Constant. 'Crowl,'
+said he, 'that man'll do mischief. I don't like these kid-glove
+philanthropists mixing themselves up in practical labor disputes they
+don't understand.'"
+
+Denzil whistled involuntarily. It was a piece of news.
+
+"I daresay," continued Crowl, "he's a bit jealous of anybody's
+interference with his influence. But in this case the jealousy did wear
+off, you see, for the poor fellow and he got quite pals, as everybody
+knows. Tom's not the man to hug a prejudice. However, all that don't
+prove nothing against Republics. Look at the Czar and the Jews. I'm only
+a plain man, but I wouldn't live in Russia not for--not for all the
+leather in it! An Englishman, taxed as he is to keep up his Fad of
+Monarchy, is at least king in his own castle, whoever bosses it at
+Windsor. Excuse me a minute, the missus is callin'."
+
+"Excuse _me_ a minute. I'm going, and I want to say before I go--I feel
+it is only right you should know at once--that after what has passed
+to-day I can never be on the same footing here as in the--shall I say
+pleasant?--days of yore."
+
+"Oh, no, Cantercot. Don't say that; don't say that!" pleaded the little
+cobbler.
+
+"Well, shall I say unpleasant, then?"
+
+"No, no, Cantercot. Don't misunderstand me. Mother has been very much
+put to it lately to rub along. You see she has such a growing family. It
+grows--daily. But never mind her. You pay whenever you've got the
+money."
+
+Denzil shook his head. "It cannot be. You know when I came here first I
+rented your top room and boarded myself. Then I learnt to know you. We
+talked together. Of the Beautiful. And the Useful. I found you had no
+soul. But you were honest, and I liked you. I went so far as to take my
+meals with your family. I made myself at home in your back parlor. But
+the 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 be
+pieced together--nevermore." He shook his hair sadly and shambled out of
+the shop. Crowl would have gone after him, but Mrs. Crowl was still
+calling, and ladies must have the precedence in all polite societies.
+
+Cantercot went straight--or as straight as his loose gait permitted--to
+46 Glover Street, and knocked at the door. Grodman's factotum opened it.
+She was a pock-marked person, with a brickdust complexion and a
+coquettish 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, suddenly
+appearing in his slippers. "Come in. What the devil have you been doing
+with 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 from
+Drink--and Me."
+
+"I don't know which is worse," said Denzil, irritated. "You both steal
+away my brains."
+
+"Indeed?" said Grodman, with an amused smile. "Well, it's only petty
+pilfering, 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 I
+Have Caught.'"
+
+"'Criminals _I_ Have Caught,'" corrected Grodman. "My dear Denzil, how
+often am I to point out that I went through the experiences that make
+the backbone of my book, not you? In each case I cooked the criminal's
+goose. Any journalist could have supplied the dressing."
+
+"The contrary. The journeymen of journalism would have left the truth
+naked. You yourself could have done that--for there is no man to beat
+you at cold, lucid, scientific statement. But I idealized the bare facts
+and lifted them into the realm of poetry and literature. The
+twenty-fourth edition of the book attests my success."
+
+"Rot! The twenty-fourth edition was all owing to the murder! Did you do
+that?"
+
+"You take one up so sharply, Mr. Grodman," said Denzil, changing his
+tone.
+
+"No--I've retired," laughed Grodman.
+
+Denzil did not reprove the ex-detective's flippancy. He even laughed a
+little.
+
+"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 to
+write that letter to the 'Pell Mell Press' myself. You might have earned
+a crown."
+
+"I've had writer's cramp, and couldn't do your last job. I was coming to
+tell 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 get
+up 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 it
+on?"
+
+"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 something
+for 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 in
+his 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. Grodman
+overheard their whispers, and laughed silently. His hearing was acute.
+Jane had first introduced Denzil to his acquaintance about two years
+ago, when he spoke of getting an amanuensis, and the poet had been doing
+odd 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 to
+conceal, 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 his
+place at the Crowl dinner-table.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+Mrs. Crowl surveyed Denzil Cantercot so stonily and cut him his beef so
+savagely that he said grace when the dinner was over. Peter fed his
+metaphysical genius on tomatoes. He was tolerant enough to allow his
+family to follow their Fads; but no savory smells ever tempted him to be
+false to his vegetable loves. Besides, meat might have reminded him too
+much of his work. There is nothing like leather, but Bow beefsteaks
+occasionally come very near it.
+
+After dinner Denzil usually indulged in poetic reverie. But to-day he
+did not take his nap. He went out at once to "raise the wind." But there
+was a dead calm everywhere. In vain he asked for an advance at the
+office of the "Mile End Mirror," to which he contributed scathing
+leaderettes about vestrymen. In vain he trudged to the city and offered
+to write the "Ham and Eggs Gazette" an essay on the modern methods of
+bacon-curing. Denzil knew a great deal about the breeding and
+slaughtering of pigs, smoke-lofts and drying processes, having for years
+dictated 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 trade
+papers since boyhood. But there is great competition on these papers. So
+many men of literary gifts know all about the intricate technicalities
+of manufactures and markets, and are eager to set the trade right.
+Grodman perhaps hardly allowed sufficiently for the step backward that
+Denzil made when he devoted his whole time for months to "Criminals I
+Have Caught." It was as damaging as a debauch. For when your rivals are
+pushing forward, to stand still is to go back.
+
+In despair Denzil shambled toilsomely to Bethnal Green. He paused before
+the window of a little tobacconist's shop, wherein was displayed a
+placard announcing
+
+     "PLOTS FOR SALE."
+
+The announcement went on to state that a large stock of plots was to be
+obtained on the premises--embracing sensational plots, humorous plots,
+love plots, religious plots, and poetic plots; also complete
+manuscripts, original novels, poems and tales. Apply within.
+
+It was a very dirty-looking shop, with begrimed bricks and blackened
+woodwork. The window contained some musty old books, an assortment of
+pipes and tobacco, and a large number of the vilest daubs unhung,
+painted in oil on Academy boards, and unframed. These were intended for
+landscapes, as you could tell from the titles. The most expensive was
+"Chingford Church," and it was marked 1s. 9d. The others ran from 6d. to
+1s. 3d., and were mostly representations of Scotch scenery--a loch with
+mountains in the background, with solid reflections in the water and a
+tree in the foreground. Sometimes the tree would be in the background.
+Then the loch would be in the foreground. Sky and water were intensely
+blue in all. The name of the collection was "Original oil paintings done
+by hand." Dust lay thick upon everything, as if carefully shoveled on;
+and the proprietor looked as if he slept in his shop window at night
+without taking his clothes off. He was a gaunt man with a red nose, long
+but scanty black locks covered by a smoking cap, and a luxuriant black
+mustache. He smoked a long clay pipe, and had the air of a broken-down
+operatic villain.
+
+"Ah, good afternoon, Mr. Cantercot," he said, rubbing his hands, half
+from cold, half from usage; "what have you brought me?"
+
+"Nothing," said Denzil, "but if you will lend me a sovereign I'll do you
+a 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, and
+Denzil 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 dangerous
+hunted look. Money he must have. But the operatic villain was
+inflexible. No plot, no supper.
+
+Poor Denzil went out flaming. He knew not where to turn. Temporarily he
+turned 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 of
+the words suddenly flashed upon him again, they bore a new significance.
+He went in meekly, and borrowed fourpence of the operatic villain. Then
+he took the 'bus for Scotland Yard. There was a not ill-looking servant
+girl in the 'bus. The rhythm of the vehicle shaped itself into rhymes in
+his brain. He forgot all about his situation and his object. He had
+never really written an epic--except "Paradise Lost"--but he composed
+lyrics about wine and women and often wept to think how miserable he
+was. But nobody ever bought anything of him, except articles on
+bacon-curing or attacks on vestrymen. He was a strange, wild creature,
+and the wench felt quite pretty under his ardent gaze. It almost
+hypnotized her, though, and she looked down at her new French kid boots
+to escape it.
+
+At Scotland Yard Denzil asked for Edward Wimp. Edward Wimp was not on
+view. Like kings and editors, Detectives are difficult of
+approach--unless you are a criminal, when you cannot see anything of
+them at all. Denzil knew of Edward Wimp, principally because of
+Grodman's contempt for his successor. Wimp was a man of taste and
+culture. Grodman's interests were entirely concentrated on the problems
+of logic and evidence. Books about these formed his sole reading; for
+_belles lettres_ he cared not a straw. Wimp, with his flexible
+intellect, had a great contempt for Grodman and his slow, laborious,
+ponderous, almost Teutonic methods. Worse, he almost threatened to
+eclipse the radiant tradition of Grodman by some wonderfully ingenious
+bits of workmanship. Wimp was at his greatest in collecting
+circumstantial evidence; in putting two and two together to make five.
+He would collect together a number of dark and disconnected data and
+flash across them the electric light of some unifying hypothesis in a
+way which would have done credit to a Darwin or a Faraday. An intellect
+which might have served to unveil the secret workings of nature was
+subverted to the protection of a capitalistic civilization.
+
+By the assistance of a friendly policeman, whom the poet magnetized into
+the belief that his business was a matter of life and death, Denzil
+obtained the great detective's private address. It was near King's
+Cross. By a miracle Wimp was at home in the afternoon. He was writing
+when Denzil was ushered up three pairs of stairs into his presence, but
+he 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 himself
+as a gentleman.
+
+"That is my name," he murmured.
+
+"You were one of the witnesses at the inquest on the body of the late
+Arthur Constant. I have your evidence there." He pointed to a file. "Why
+have you come to give fresh evidence?"
+
+Again Denzil started, flushing in addition this time. "I want money," he
+said, almost involuntarily.
+
+"Sit down." Denzil sat. Wimp stood.
+
+Wimp was young and fresh-colored. He had a Roman nose, and was smartly
+dressed. He had beaten Grodman by discovering the wife Heaven meant for
+him. He had a bouncing boy, who stole jam out of the pantry without
+anyone being the wiser. Wimp did what work he could do at home in a
+secluded study at the top of the house. Outside his chamber of horrors
+he was the ordinary husband of commerce. He adored his wife, who thought
+poorly of his intellect, but highly of his heart. In domestic
+difficulties Wimp was helpless. He could not even tell whether the
+servant's "character" was forged or genuine. Probably he could not level
+himself to such petty problems. He was like the senior wrangler who has
+forgotten how to do quadratics, and has to solve equations of the second
+degree by the calculus.
+
+"How much money do you want?" he asked.
+
+"I do not make bargains," Denzil replied, his calm come back by this
+time. "I came to tender you a suggestion. It struck me that you might
+offer me a fiver for my trouble. Should you do so, I shall not refuse
+it."
+
+"You shall not refuse it--if you deserve it."
+
+"Good. I will come to the point at once. My suggestion concerns--Tom
+Mortlake."
+
+Denzil threw out the name as if it were a torpedo. Wimp did not move.
+
+"Tom Mortlake," went on Denzil, looking disappointed, "had a
+sweetheart." 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 before
+Mr. 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. So
+they tell me in Stepney Green, where she lodged and worked."
+
+"What was she?"
+
+"She was a dressmaker. She had a wonderful talent. Quite fashionable
+ladies got to know of it. One of her dresses was presented at Court. I
+think 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. When
+he was earning 36s. a week as a compositor they were saving up to buy a
+home. 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 of
+the Chapel told me all about 'Mortlake and his young woman.' Ye gods!
+How times are changed! Two years ago Mortlake had to struggle with my
+caligraphy--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 beauty
+and intellect foregather. A mere artisan! A manual laborer!" Denzil's
+eyes flashed angrily. He rose with excitement. "They say he always was a
+jabberer in the composing-room, and he has jabbered himself right out of
+it and into a pretty good thing. He didn't have much to say about the
+crimes of capital when he was set up to second the toast of 'Railton and
+Hockes' at the beanfeast."
+
+"Toast and butter, toast and butter," said Wimp genially. "I shouldn't
+blame a man for serving the two together, Mr. Cantercot."
+
+Denzil forced a laugh. "Yes; but consistency's my motto. I like to see
+the royal soul immaculate, unchanging, immovable by fortune. Anyhow,
+when better times came for Mortlake the engagement still dragged on. He
+did 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 of
+an evening. Sometimes there was no light in her room. That meant she was
+downstairs gossiping with the landlady."
+
+"She might have been out with Tom?"
+
+"No, sir; I knew Tom was on the platform somewhere or other. He was
+working 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 strong
+character. 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 real
+to me than the women who pester me for the price for apartments. Jessie
+Dymond, too, was of the race of heroines. Her eyes were clear blue, two
+wells with Truth at the bottom of each. When I looked into those eyes my
+own were dazzled. They were the only eyes I could never make dreamy." He
+waved his hand as if making a pass with it. "It was she who had the
+influence over me."
+
+"You knew her then?"
+
+"Oh, yes. I knew Tom from the old 'New Pork Herald' days, and when I
+first met him with Jessie hanging on his arm he was quite proud to
+introduce 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 Beautiful
+alone is deserving of our regard."
+
+"And when the Beautiful was not gossiping with her landlady, did she
+gossip 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. Whose
+was 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 you
+thoroughly."
+
+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 time
+you 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 in
+his social mission work. I knew she was one of the attendants at the big
+children's tea in the Great Assembly Hall early in November. He treated
+her quite like a lady. She was the only attendant who worked with her
+hands."
+
+"The others carried the cups on their feet, I suppose?"
+
+"No; how could that be? My meaning is that all the other attendants were
+real ladies, and Jessie was only an amateur, so to speak. There was no
+novelty for her in handing kids cups of tea. I daresay she had helped
+her landlady often enough at that--there's quite a bushel of brats below
+stairs. It's almost as bad as at friend Crowl's. Jessie was a real
+brick. But perhaps Tom didn't know her value. Perhaps he didn't like
+Constant to call on her, and it led to a quarrel. Anyhow, she's
+disappeared, like the snowfall on the river. There's not a trace. The
+landlady, who was such a friend of hers that Jessie used to make up her
+stuff into dresses for nothing, tells me that she's dreadfully annoyed
+at not having been left the slightest clue to her late tenant's
+whereabouts."
+
+"You have been making inquiries on your own account apparently."
+
+"Only of the landlady. Jessie never even gave her the week's notice, but
+paid her in lieu of it, and left immediately. The landlady told me I
+could have knocked her down with a feather. Unfortunately, I wasn't
+there to do it, for I should certainly have knocked her down for not
+keeping her eyes open better. She says if she had only had the least
+suspicion beforehand that the minx (she dared to call Jessie a minx) was
+going, she'd have known where, or her name would have been somebody
+else'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 have
+let out that she was going. But, no! not a word. She plumped down the
+money and walked out. The landlady ran upstairs. None of Jessie's things
+were there. She must have quietly sold them off, or transferred them to
+the new place. I never in my life met a girl who so thoroughly knew her
+own mind or had a mind so worth knowing. She always reminded me of the
+Maid 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 end
+of 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. Grodman
+wrote to the 'Pell Mell.' The more we know about Mr. Constant's life the
+more we shall know about the manner of his death. I thought my
+information 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 a
+vengeance.
+
+"Your style, my dear Mr. Cantercot. The unique noble style."
+
+"Yes, I was afraid it would betray me," said Denzil. "And since you
+know, I may tell you that Grodman's a mean curmudgeon. What does he want
+with all that money and those houses--a man with no sense of the
+Beautiful? He'd have taken my information, and given me more kicks than
+ha'pence for it, so to speak."
+
+"Yes, he is a shrewd man after all. I don't see anything valuable in
+your evidence against Mortlake."
+
+"No!" said Denzil in a disappointed tone, and fearing he was going to be
+robbed. "Not when Mortlake was already jealous of Mr. Constant, who was
+a sort of rival organizer, unpaid! A kind of blackleg doing the work
+cheaper--nay, for nothing."
+
+"Did Mortlake tell you he was jealous?" said Wimp, a shade of sarcastic
+contempt piercing through his tones.
+
+"Oh, yes! He said to me, 'That man will work mischief. I don't like your
+kid-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 for
+you."
+
+"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 manage
+on it after all." He took his hat and the sovereign.
+
+Outside the door he met a rather pretty servant just bringing in some
+tea to her master. He nearly upset her tray at sight of her. She seemed
+more amused at the _rencontre_ than he.
+
+"Good afternoon, dear," she said coquettishly. "You might let me have
+that sovereign. I do so want a new Sunday bonnet."
+
+Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the hall door viciously when
+he got to the bottom of the stairs. He seemed to be walking arm-in-arm
+with the long arm of coincidence. Wimp did not hear the duologue. He was
+already busy on his evening's report to headquarters. The next day
+Denzil had a body-guard wherever he went. It might have gratified his
+vanity had he known it. But to-night he was yet unattended, so no one
+noted that he went to 46 Glover Street, after the early Crowl supper. He
+could not help going. He wanted to get another sovereign. He also itched
+to taunt Grodman. Not succeeding in the former object, he felt the road
+open for the second.
+
+"Do you still hope to discover the Bow murderer?" he asked the old
+bloodhound.
+
+"I can lay my hand on him now," Grodman announced curtly.
+
+Denzil hitched his chair back involuntarily. He found conversation with
+detectives as lively as playing at skittles with bombshells. They got on
+his nerves terribly, these undemonstrative gentlemen with no sense of
+the 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's
+Cross Grodman was only a little surprised. The two men were always
+overwhelmingly cordial when they met, in order to disguise their mutual
+detestation. When people really like each other, they make no
+concealment of their mutual contempt. In his letter to Grodman, Wimp
+said that he thought it would be nicer for him to keep Christmas in
+company than in solitary state. There seems to be a general prejudice in
+favor of Christmas numbers, and Grodman yielded to it. Besides, he
+thought that a peep at the Wimp domestic interior would be as good as a
+pantomime. He quite enjoyed the fun that was coming, for he knew that
+Wimp had not invited him out of mere "peace and goodwill."
+
+There was only one other guest at the festive board. This was Wimp's
+wife's mother's mother, a lady of sweet seventy. Only a minority of
+mankind can obtain a grandmother-in-law by marrying, but Wimp was not
+unduly conceited. The old lady suffered from delusions. One of them was
+that she was a centenarian. She dressed for the part. It is
+extraordinary what pains ladies will take to conceal their age. Another
+of Wimp's grandmother-in-law's delusions was that Wimp had married to
+get her into the family. Not to frustrate his design, she always gave
+him her company on high-days and holidays. Wilfred Wimp--the little boy
+who stole the jam--was in great form at the Christmas dinner. The only
+drawback to his enjoyment was that its sweets needed no stealing. His
+mother presided over the platters, and thought how much cleverer Grodman
+was than her husband. When the pretty servant who waited on them was
+momentarily out of the room, Grodman had remarked that she seemed very
+inquisitive. This coincided with Mrs. Wimp's own convictions, though Mr.
+Wimp could never be brought to see anything unsatisfactory or suspicious
+about 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 Denzil
+Cantercot's name was mentioned. Grodman saw it and watched her, and
+fooled Wimp to the top of his bent. It was, of course, Wimp who
+introduced the poet's name, and he did it so casually that Grodman
+perceived at once that he wished to pump him. The idea that the rival
+bloodhound should come to him for confirmation of suspicions against his
+own pet jackal was too funny. It was almost as funny to Grodman that
+evidence of some sort should be obviously lying to hand in the bosom of
+Wimp's hand-maiden; so obviously that Wimp could not see it. Grodman
+enjoyed his Christmas dinner, secure that he had not found a successor
+after all. Wimp, for his part, contemptuously wondered at the way
+Grodman's thought hovered about Denzil without grazing the truth. A man
+constantly about him, too!
+
+"Denzil is a man of genius," said Grodman. "And as such comes under the
+heading of Suspicious Characters. He has written an Epic Poem and read
+it to me. It is morbid from start to finish. There is 'death' in the
+third line. I daresay you know he polished up my book." Grodman's
+artlessness was perfect.
+
+"No. You surprise me," Wimp replied. "I'm sure he couldn't have done
+much to it. Look at your letter in the 'Pell Mell.' Who wants more
+polish 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 was
+clever and cogent. After that quotation from the letter to the poor
+fellow's _fiancee_ 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 an
+indiscreet. Grodman would plume himself terribly. At this moment Wimp
+felt that Grodman had been right in remaining a bachelor. Grodman
+perceived the humor of the situation, and wore a curious, sub-mocking
+smile.
+
+"On the day I was born," said Wimp's grandmother-in-law, "over a hundred
+years ago, there was a babe murdered." Wimp found himself wishing it had
+been she. He was anxious to get back to Cantercot. "Don't let us talk
+shop on Christmas Day," he said, smiling at Grodman. "Besides, murder
+isn't a very appropriate subject."
+
+"No, it ain't," said Grodman. "How did we get on to it? Oh, yes--Denzil
+Cantercot. Ha! ha! ha! That's curious, for since Denzil wrote 'Criminals
+I have Caught,' his mind's running on nothing but murders. A poet's
+brain is easily turned."
+
+Wimp's eye glittered with excitement and contempt for Grodman's
+blindness. In Grodman's eye there danced an amused scorn of Wimp; to the
+outsider his amusement appeared at the expense of the poet.
+
+Having wrought his rival up to the highest pitch Grodman slyly and
+suddenly unstrung him.
+
+"How lucky for Denzil!" he said, still in the same naive, facetious
+Christmasy 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 overheard
+Grodman had set himself to find out the relation between his two
+employes. By casually referring to Denzil as "your husband" he so
+startled the poor woman that she did not attempt to deny the bond. Only
+once did he use the two words, but he was satisfied. As to the alibi he
+had not yet troubled her; but to take its existence for granted would
+upset and discomfort Wimp. For the moment that was triumph enough for
+Wimp's guest.
+
+"Par," said Wilfred Wimp, "what's a alleybi? A marble?"
+
+"No, my lad," said Grodman, "it means being somewhere else when you're
+supposed to be somewhere."
+
+"Ah, playing truant," said Wilfred self-consciously; his schoolmaster
+had 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 gods
+bidding him mistrust Grodman. Out of the mouths of little children
+issueth wisdom; sometimes even when they are not saying their lessons.
+
+"When I was in my cradle, a century ago," said Wimp's
+grandmother-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 expects
+it. 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's
+chronology. Once let him know that Bank Holiday is coming, and he writes
+to the company for more water. To-day his stock seemed low and he was
+dribbling it out; at times the wintry sun would shine in a feeble,
+diluted way, and though the holiday-makers would have preferred to take
+their sunshine neat, they swarmed forth in their myriads whenever there
+was a ray of hope. But it was only dodging the raindrops; up went the
+umbrellas again, and the streets became meadows of ambulating mushrooms.
+
+Denzil Cantercot sat in his fur overcoat at the open window, looking at
+the landscape in water colors. He smoked an after-dinner cigarette, and
+spoke of the Beautiful. Crowl was with him. They were in the first floor
+front, Crowl's bedroom, which, from its view of the Mile End Road, was
+livelier than the parlor with its outlook on the backyard. Mrs. Crowl
+was an anti-tobacconist as regards the best bedroom; but Peter did not
+like to put the poet or his cigarette out. He felt there was something
+in common between smoke and poetry, over and above their being both
+Fads. Besides, Mrs. Crowl was sulking in the kitchen. She had been
+arranging for an excursion with Peter and the children to Victoria Park.
+She had dreamed of the Crystal Palace, but Santa Claus had put no gifts
+in the cobbler's shoes. Now she could not risk spoiling the feather in
+her bonnet. The nine brats expressed their disappointment by slapping
+one another on the staircases. Peter felt that Mrs. Crowl connected him
+in some way with the rainfall, and was unhappy. Was it not enough that
+he had been deprived of the pleasure of pointing out to a superstitious
+majority 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 to
+the ragged sky and the dripping eaves. "Ugly old scarecrow!"
+
+"Ugly she seems to-day," admitted Denzil. "But what is Ugliness but a
+higher form of Beauty? You have to look deeper into it to see it; such
+vision is the priceless gift of the few. To me this wan desolation of
+sighing 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 he
+spoke 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 if
+Nature isn't a Fad. Hallo, there goes Mortlake! Lord, a minute of this
+will soak him to the skin."
+
+The labor leader was walking along with bowed head. He did not seem to
+mind the shower. It was some seconds before he even heard Crowl's
+invitation to him to take shelter. When he did hear it he shook his
+head.
+
+"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 in
+the world which now galled him more than the suspicion that he was
+stuck-up and wished to cut old friends. He picked his way through the
+nine brats who clung affectionately to his wet knees, dispersing them
+finally by a jet of coppers to scramble for. Peter met him on the stair
+and 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 will
+say what comes uppermost! But it ain't from the soul, Tom, it ain't from
+the soul," said Peter, punning feebly, and letting a mirthless smile
+play over his sallow features. "You know Mr. Cantercot, I suppose? The
+poet."
+
+"Oh, yes; how do you do, Tom? Seen the 'New Pork Herald' lately? Not
+bad, 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 you
+are 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 for
+plain men like me, with no gift but just enough brains to see into the
+realities of things--to understand that we've got no soul and no
+immortality, and all that--and too selfish to look after anybody's
+comfort but my own and mother's and the kid's. But men like you and
+Cantercot--it ain't right that you should be peggin' away at low
+material things. Not that I think Cantercot's gospel's any value to the
+masses. The Beautiful is all very well for folks who've got nothing else
+to 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 little
+enough, Heaven knows; though how a place can know anything, Heaven alone
+knows. You give us the Useful, Tom; that's what the world wants more
+than 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's
+a combination for you. She always reminds me of Grace Darling. How is
+she, 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 meant
+Miss Dymond."
+
+"You needn't be so interested in her," said Tom, surlily. "She don't
+appreciate it. Ah, the shower is over. I must be going."
+
+"No, stay a little longer, Tom," pleaded Peter. "I see a lot about you
+in the papers, but very little of your dear old phiz now. I can't spare
+the 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 next
+big performance is on the twenty-first of January, when that picture of
+poor Mr. Constant is to be unveiled at the Bow Break o' Day Club. They
+have written to Gladstone and other big pots to come down. I do hope the
+old man accepts. A non-political gathering like this is the only
+occasion we could both speak at, and I have never been on the same
+platform with Gladstone."
+
+He forgot his depression and ill-temper in the prospect, and spoke with
+more animation.
+
+"No, I should hope not, Tom," said Peter. "What with his Fads about the
+Bible being a Rock, and Monarchy being the right thing, he is a most
+dangerous man to lead the Radicals. He never lays his ax to the root of
+anything--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 into
+the "gentleman" was delightful. It was almost as good as a week's rent
+to her to give vent to her feelings. The controversial couple had moved
+away from the window when Tom entered, and had not noticed the immediate
+advent of another visitor who had spent his time profitably in listening
+to 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 was
+Wimp. Denzil was rather dubious as to the friendship, but he preferred
+to take Wimp diluted. "Mortlake's upstairs," he said. "Will you come up
+and 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 queer
+quartette. Wimp had hardly expected to find anybody at the house on
+Boxing Day, but he did not care to waste a day. Was not Grodman, too, on
+the track? How lucky it was that Denzil had made the first overtures, so
+that he could approach him without exciting suspicion.
+
+Mortlake scowled when he saw the detective. He objected to the
+police--on principle. But Crowl had no idea who the visitor was, even
+when told his name. He was rather pleased to meet one of Denzil's
+high-class friends, and welcomed him warmly. Probably he was some famous
+editor, which would account for his name stirring vague recollections.
+He summoned the eldest brat and sent him for beer (people would have
+their Fads), and not without trepidation called down to "Mother" for
+glasses. "Mother" observed at night (in the same apartment) that the
+beer 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," said
+the 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 the
+conversation; "mysterious affair that, Mr. Crowl."
+
+"No; it's the right thing," said Peter. "There ought to be some memorial
+of the man in the district where he worked and where he died, poor
+chap." The cobbler brushed away a tear.
+
+"Yes, it's only right," echoed Mortlake a whit eagerly. "He was a noble
+fellow, a true philanthropist. The only thoroughly unselfish worker I've
+ever 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 met
+his like. Ah, I wish there was a Heaven for him to go to!" He blew his
+nose 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 there
+the 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; at
+least, so Mrs. Drabdump said at the inquest."
+
+"That last conversation he had with you, Tom," said Denzil. "He didn't
+say 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," replied
+Tom, testily. "It may have been suicide. Men often get sick of
+life--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, looking
+even worse-tempered than when he came. Wimp went soon after, and Crowl
+and Denzil were left to their interminable argumentation concerning the
+Useful and the Beautiful.
+
+Wimp went west. He had several strings (or cords) to his bow, and he
+ultimately found himself at Kensal Green Cemetery. Being there, he went
+down the avenues of the dead to a grave to note down the exact date of a
+death. It was a day on which the dead seemed enviable. The dull, sodden
+sky, the dripping, leafless trees, the wet spongy soil, the reeking
+grass--everything combined to make one long to be in a warm, comfortable
+grave, away from the leaden ennui of life. Suddenly the detective's keen
+eye caught sight of a figure that made his heart throb with sudden
+excitement. It was that of a woman in a gray shawl and a brown bonnet
+standing before a railed-in grave. She had no umbrella. The rain plashed
+mournfully upon her, but left no trace on her soaking garments. Wimp
+crept up behind her, but she paid no heed to him. Her eyes were lowered
+to the grave, which seemed to be drawing them toward it by some strange
+morbid fascination. His eyes followed hers. The simple headstone bore
+the name: "Arthur Constant."
+
+Wimp tapped her suddenly on the shoulder.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump went deadly white. She turned round, staring at Wimp
+without any recognition.
+
+"You remember me, surely," he said. "I've been down once or twice to
+your place about that poor gentleman's papers." His eye indicated the
+grave.
+
+"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 rheumatics
+this twenty year."
+
+Mrs. Drabdump shrank from accepting Wimp's attentions, not so much
+perhaps because he was a man as because he was a gentleman. Mrs.
+Drabdump liked to see the fine folks keep their place, and not
+contaminate their skirts by contact with the lower castes. "It's set
+wet, it'll rain right into the new year," she announced. "And they say a
+bad beginnin' makes a worse endin'." Mrs. Drabdump was one of those
+persons who give you the idea that they just missed being born
+barometers.
+
+"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 acute
+surprise. "I always make a hexcursion on Bank Holiday."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+The New Year brought Mrs. Drabdump a new lodger. He was an old gentleman
+with 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 be
+haunted if the ghosts of those murdered in them had any
+self-respect--are supposed to fetch a lower rent in the market. The
+whole Irish problem might be solved if the spirits of "Mr. Balfour's
+victims" would only depreciate the value of property to a point
+consistent with the support of an agricultural population. But Mrs.
+Drabdump's new lodger paid so much for his rooms that he laid himself
+open to a suspicion of special interest in ghosts. Perhaps he was a
+member of the Psychical Society. The neighborhood imagined him another
+mad philanthropist, but as he did not appear to be doing any good to
+anybody it relented and conceded his sanity. Mortlake, who occasionally
+stumbled across him in the passage, did not trouble himself to think
+about him at all. He was too full of other troubles and cares. Though he
+worked harder than ever, the spirit seemed to have gone out of him.
+Sometimes he forgot himself in a fine rapture of eloquence--lashing
+himself up into a divine resentment of injustice or a passion of
+sympathy with the sufferings of his brethren--but mostly he plodded on
+in dull, mechanical fashion. He still made brief provincial tours,
+starring a day here and a day there, and everywhere his admirers
+remarked how jaded and overworked he looked. There was talk of starting
+a subscription to give him a holiday on the Continent--a luxury
+obviously unobtainable on the few pounds allowed him per week. The new
+lodger would doubtless have been pleased to subscribe, for he seemed
+quite to like occupying Mortlake's chamber the nights he was absent,
+though he was thoughtful enough not to disturb the hardworked landlady
+in the adjoining room by unseemly noise. Wimp was always a quiet man.
+
+Meantime the 21st of the month approached, and the East End was in
+excitement. Mr. Gladstone had consented to be present at the ceremony of
+unveiling the portrait of Arthur Constant, presented by an unknown donor
+to the Bow Break o' Day Club, and it was to be a great function. The
+whole affair was outside the lines of party politics, so that even
+Conservatives and Socialists considered themselves justified in
+pestering the committee for tickets. To say nothing of ladies. As the
+committee desired to be present themselves, nine-tenths of the
+applications for admission had to be refused, as is usual on these
+occasions. The committee agreed among themselves to exclude the fair sex
+altogether as the only way of disposing of their womankind who were
+making speeches as long as Mr. Gladstone's. Each committeeman told his
+sisters, female cousins and aunts that the other committeemen had
+insisted on divesting the function of all grace; and what could a man do
+when he was in a minority of one?
+
+Crowl, who was not a member of the Break o' Day Club, was particularly
+anxious to hear the great orator whom he despised; fortunately Mortlake
+remembered the cobbler's anxiety to hear himself, and on the eve of the
+ceremony sent him a ticket. Crowl was in the first flush of possession
+when Denzil Cantercot returned, after a sudden and unannounced absence
+of three days. His clothes were muddy and tattered, his cocked hat was
+deformed, 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 dry
+as the Sahara."
+
+Crowl ran inside and got the water, trying hard not to inform Mrs. Crowl
+of their lodger's return. "Mother" had expressed herself freely on the
+subject of the poet during his absence, and not in terms which would
+have 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 might
+be 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 felt
+no sense of victory. He had no desire to crow over his partner and to
+utter that "See! didn't I tell you so?" which is a greater consolation
+than religion in most of the misfortunes of life. Unfortunately, to get
+the water, Crowl had to go to the kitchen; and as he was usually such a
+temperate man, this desire for drink in the middle of the day attracted
+the attention of the lady in possession. Crowl had to explain the
+situation. Mrs. Crowl ran into the shop to improve it. Mr. Crowl
+followed 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 if
+it were brandy.
+
+"Madam," he said, smacking his lips, "I do care. I care intensely. Few
+things in life would grieve me more deeply than to hear that a child, a
+dear little child--the Beautiful in a nutshell--had suffered hunger. You
+wrong me." His voice was tremulous with the sense of injury. Tears stood
+in his eyes.
+
+"Wrong you? I've no wish to wrong you," said Mrs. Crowl. "I should like
+to hang you."
+
+"Don't talk of such ugly things," said Denzil, touching his throat
+nervously.
+
+"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 you
+mean?"
+
+But Mrs. Crowl was glaring too viciously at Mr. Crowl to reply. He
+understood the message as if it were printed. It ran: "You have broken
+one of my best glasses. You have annihilated threepence, or a week's
+school fees for half the family." Peter wished she would turn the
+lightning upon Denzil, a conductor down whom it would run innocuously.
+He stooped down and picked up the pieces as carefully as if they were
+cuttings from the Koh-i-noor. Thus the lightning passed harmlessly over
+his 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 with
+Peter all these years for nothing. "And if you haven't been murdered
+what have you been doing?"
+
+"My dear, my dear," put in Crowl, deprecatingly, looking up from his
+quadrupedal 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 to
+know?"
+
+Peter went on picking up the pieces of the Koh-i-noor.
+
+"I have no secrets from Mrs. Crowl" Denzil explained courteously. "I
+have been working day and night bringing out a new paper. Haven't had a
+wink 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 was
+overjoyed at the _rencontre_ and told him the idea I'd been brooding
+over 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 nights
+but 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 the
+Beautiful."
+
+"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 the
+fun of anonymity comes in? If I had any gifts, I should like to get the
+credit. It's a right and natural feeling, to my thinking."
+
+"Unnatural, Peter; unnatural. We're all born anonymous, and I'm for
+sticking close to Nature. Enough for me that I disseminate the
+Beautiful. Any letters come during my absence, Mrs. Crowl?"
+
+"No," she snapped. "But a gent named Grodman called. He said you hadn't
+been to see him for some time, and looked annoyed to hear you'd
+disappeared. How much have you let him in for?"
+
+"The man's in my debt," said Denzil, annoyed. "I wrote a book for him
+and he's taken all the credit for it, the rogue! My name doesn't appear
+even 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. Gladstone
+speaks. Awful demand for places."
+
+"Gladstone!" sneered Denzil. "Who wants to hear Gladstone? A man who's
+devoted 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 Fads
+of Religion and Monarchy. But, for all that, the man has his gifts, and
+I'm burnin' to hear him."
+
+"I wouldn't go out of my way an inch to hear him," said Denzil; and went
+up to his room, and when Mrs. Crowl sent him up a cup of nice strong tea
+at 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 Road
+swarmed, with noisy life, as though it were a Saturday night. The stars
+flared in the sky like the lights of celestial costermongers. Everybody
+was on the alert for the advent of Mr. Gladstone. He must surely come
+through the Road on his journey from the West Bow-wards. But nobody saw
+him or his carriage, except those about the Hall. Probably he went by
+tram most of the way. He would have caught cold in an open carriage, or
+bobbing his head out of the window of a closed.
+
+"If he had only been a German prince, or a cannibal king," said Crowl
+bitterly, as he plodded toward the Club, "we should have disguised Mile
+End in bunting and blue fire. But perhaps it's a compliment. He knows
+his London, and it's no use trying to hide the facts from him. They must
+have queer notions of cities, those monarchs. They must fancy everybody
+lives in a flutter of flags and walks about under triumphal arches, like
+as if I were to stitch shoes in my Sunday clothes." By a defiance of
+chronology Crowl had them on to-day, and they seemed to accentuate the
+simile.
+
+"And why shouldn't life be fuller of the Beautiful," said Denzil. The
+poet had brushed the reluctant mud off his garments to the extent it was
+willing to go, and had washed his face, but his eyes were still
+bloodshot from the cultivation of the Beautiful. Denzil was accompanying
+Crowl to the door of the Club out of good-fellowship. Denzil was himself
+accompanied by Grodman, though less obtrusively. Least obtrusively was
+he accompanied by his usual Scotland Yard shadows, Wimp's agents. There
+was a surging nondescript crowd about the Club, and the police, and the
+door-keeper, and the stewards could with difficulty keep out the tide of
+the ticketless, through which the current of the privileged had equal
+difficulty in permeating. The streets all around were thronged with
+people longing for a glimpse of Gladstone. Mortlake drove up in a hansom
+(his head a self-conscious pendulum of popularity, swaying and bowing to
+right 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. He
+had only found him by accident, for he was himself bound to the
+unveiling ceremony, to which he had been invited in view of his known
+devotion to the task of unveiling the Mystery. He spoke to one of the
+policemen about, who said, "Ay, ay, sir," and he was prepared to follow
+Denzil, if necessary, and to give up the pleasure of hearing Gladstone
+for an acuter thrill. The arrest must be delayed no longer.
+
+But Denzil seemed as if he were going in on the heels of Crowl. This
+would suit Grodman better. He could then have the two pleasures. But
+Denzil 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 the
+Fourth Estate were concentrated in that haughty monosyllable. Heaven
+itself is full of journalists who have overawed St. Peter. But the
+door-keeper was a veritable dragon.
+
+"What paper, sir?"
+
+"'New Pork Herald,'" said Denzil sharply. He did not relish his word
+being distrusted.
+
+"'New York Herald,'" said one of the bystanding stewards, scarce
+catching 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 not
+make his face quite impassive, and there was a suppressed intensity in
+the 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 their
+coming _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 going
+to be executed under very sensational circumstances. Everything would
+combine to turn the eyes of the country upon him--nay, of the world, for
+had not the Big Bow Mystery been discussed in every language under the
+sun? In these electric times the criminal achieves a cosmopolitan
+reputation. It is a privilege he shares with few other artists. This
+time Wimp would be one of them; and, he felt, deservedly so. If the
+criminal had been cunning to the point of genius in planning the murder,
+he had been acute to the point of divination in detecting it. Never
+before had he pieced together so broken a chain. He could not resist the
+unique opportunity of setting a sensational scheme in a sensational
+frame-work. The dramatic instinct was strong in him; he felt like a
+playwright who has constructed a strong melodramatic plot, and has the
+Drury Lane stage suddenly offered him to present it on. It would be
+folly to deny himself the luxury, though the presence of Mr. Gladstone
+and the nature of the ceremony should perhaps have given him pause. Yet,
+on the other hand, these were the very factors of the temptation. Wimp
+went in and took a seat behind Denzil. All the seats were numbered, so
+that everybody might have the satisfaction of occupying somebody else's.
+Denzil was in the special reserved places in the front row just by the
+central gangway; Crowl was squeezed into a corner behind a pillar near
+the back of the hall. Grodman had been honored with a seat on the
+platform, which was accessible by steps on the right and left, but he
+kept his eye on Denzil. The picture of the poor idealist hung on the
+wall behind Grodman's head, covered by its curtain of brown holland.
+There was a subdued buzz of excitement about the hall, which swelled
+into cheers every now and again as some gentleman known to fame or Bow
+took his place upon the platform. It was occupied by several local M.
+P.'s of varying politics, a number of other Parliamentary satellites of
+the great man, three or four labor leaders, a peer or two of
+philanthropic pretensions, a sprinkling of Toynbee and Oxford Hall men,
+the president and other honorary officials, some of the family and
+friends of the deceased, together with the inevitable percentage of
+persons who had no claim to be there save cheek. Gladstone was
+late--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 a
+political meeting. Gladstone came in just in time to acknowledge the
+compliment. The noise of the song, trolled out from iron lungs, had
+drowned the huzzahs heralding the old man's advent. The convivial chorus
+went to Mortlake's head, as if champagne had really preceded it. His
+eyes grew moist and dim. He saw himself swimming to the Millenium on
+waves of enthusiasm. Ah, how his brother-toilers should be rewarded for
+their trust in him!
+
+With his usual courtesy and consideration, Mr. Gladstone had refused to
+perform the actual unveiling of Arthur Constant's portrait. "That," he
+said in his postcard, "will fall most appropriately to Mr. Mortlake, a
+gentleman who has, I am given to understand, enjoyed the personal
+friendship of the late Mr. Constant, and has co-operated with him in
+various schemes for the organization of skilled and unskilled classes of
+labor, as well as for the diffusion of better ideals--ideals of
+self-culture and self-restraint--among the workingmen of Bow, who have
+been fortunate, so far as I can perceive, in the possession (if in one
+case unhappily only temporary possession) of two such men of undoubted
+ability and honesty to direct their divided counsels and to lead them
+along a road, which, though I cannot pledge myself to approve of it in
+all its turnings and windings, is yet not unfitted to bring them
+somewhat nearer to goals to which there are few of us but would extend
+some measure of hope that the working classes of this great Empire may
+in due course, yet with no unnecessary delay, be enabled to arrive."
+
+Mr. Gladstone's speech was an expansion of his postcard, punctuated by
+cheers. The only new thing in it was the graceful and touching way in
+which he revealed what had been a secret up till then--that the portrait
+had been painted and presented to the Bow Break o' Day Club, by Lucy
+Brent, who in the fulness of time would have been Arthur Constant's
+wife. It was a painting for which he had sat to her while alive, and she
+had stifled yet pampered her grief by working hard at it since his
+death. The fact added the last touch of pathos to the occasion. Crowl's
+face was hidden behind his red handkerchief; even the fire of excitement
+in Wimp's eye was quenched for a moment by a tear-drop, as he thought of
+Mrs. Wimp and Wilfred. As for Grodman, there was almost a lump in his
+throat. Denzil Cantercot was the only unmoved man in the room. He
+thought the episode quite too Beautiful, and was already weaving it into
+rhyme.
+
+At the conclusion of his speech Mr. Gladstone called upon Tom Mortlake
+to unveil the portrait. Tom rose, pale and excited. His hand faltered as
+he touched the cord. He seemed overcome with emotion. Was it the mention
+of Lucy Brent that had moved him to his depths?
+
+The brown holland fell away--the dead stood revealed as he had been in
+life. Every feature, painted by the hand of Love, was instinct with
+vitality: the fine, earnest face, the sad kindly eyes, the noble brow
+seeming still a-throb with the thought of Humanity. A thrill ran through
+the room--there was a low, undefinable murmur. O, the pathos and the
+tragedy of it! Every eye was fixed, misty with emotion, upon the dead
+man in the picture and the living man who stood, pale and agitated, and
+visibly unable to commence his speech, at the side of the canvas.
+Suddenly a hand was laid upon the labor leader's shoulder, and there
+rang through the hall in Wimp's clear, decisive tones the words: "Tom
+Mortlake, I arrest you for the murder of Arthur Constant!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+For a moment there was an acute, terrible silence. Mortlake's face was
+that of a corpse; the face of the dead man at his side was flushed with
+the hues of life. To the overstrung nerves of the onlookers, the
+brooding eyes of the picture seemed sad and stern with menace, and
+charged with the lightnings of doom.
+
+It was a horrible contrast. For Wimp, alone, the painted face had
+fuller, more tragical, meanings. The audience seemed turned to stone.
+They sat or stood--in every variety of attitude--frozen, rigid. Arthur
+Constant's picture dominated the scene, the only living thing in a hall
+of 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 police
+conspiracy."
+
+His words relaxed the tension. The stony figures were agitated. A dull,
+excited hubbub answered him. The little cobbler darted from behind his
+pillar, and leaped upon a bench. The cords of his brow were swollen with
+excitement. He seemed a giant overshadowing the hall.
+
+"Boys!" he roared, in his best Victoria Park voice, "listen to me. This
+charge is a foul and damnable lie."
+
+"Bravo!" "Hear, hear!" "Hooray!" "It is!" was roared back at him from
+all 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 want
+to 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 the
+platform, 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 the
+ceremony 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 whose
+ears is borne the ominous sibilance of the pit. He almost wished he had
+not followed the curtain-raiser with his own stronger drama.
+Unconsciously the police, scattered about the hall, drew together. The
+people on the platform knew not what to do. They had all risen and stood
+in a densely-packed mass. Even Mr. Gladstone's speech failed him in
+circumstances so novel. The groans died away; the cheers for Mortlake
+rose and swelled and fell and rose again. Sticks and umbrellas were
+banged and rattled, handkerchiefs were waved, the thunder deepened. The
+motley crowd still surging about the hall took up the cheers, and for
+hundreds of yards around people were going black in the face out of mere
+irresponsible enthusiasm. At last Tom waved his hand--the thunder
+dwindled, died. The prisoner was master of the situation.
+
+Grodman stood on the platform, grasping the back of his chair, a curious
+mocking Mephistophelian glitter about his eyes, his lips wreathed into a
+half smile. There was no hurry for him to get Denzil Cantercot arrested
+now. Wimp had made an egregious, a colossal blunder. In Grodman's heart
+there was a great glad calm as of a man who has strained his sinews to
+win in a famous match, and has heard the judge's word. He felt almost
+kindly to Denzil now.
+
+Tom Mortlake spoke. His face was set and stony. His tall figure was
+drawn up haughtily to its full height. He pushed the black mane back
+from his forehead with a characteristic gesture. The fevered audience
+hung upon his lips--the men at the back leaned eagerly forward--the
+reporters were breathless with fear lest they should miss a word. What
+would the great labor leader have to say at this supreme moment?
+
+"Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: It is to me a melancholy pleasure to have
+been honored with the task of unveiling to-night this portrait of a
+great benefactor to Bow and a true friend to the laboring classes.
+Except that he honored me with his friendship while living, and that the
+aspirations of my life have, in my small and restricted way, been
+identical with his, there is little reason why this honorable duty
+should have fallen upon me. Gentlemen, I trust that we shall all find an
+inspiring influence in the daily vision of the dead, who yet liveth in
+our hearts and in this noble work of art--wrought, as Mr. Gladstone has
+told us, by the hand of one who loved him." The speaker paused a moment,
+his low vibrant tones faltering into silence. "If we humble workingmen
+of Bow can never hope to exert individually a tithe of the beneficial
+influence wielded by Arthur Constant, it is yet possible for each of us
+to walk in the light he has kindled in our midst--a perpetual lamp of
+self-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 the
+Beautiful. Again there was a breathless hush. Mr. Gladstone's mobile
+face was working with excitement. No such extraordinary scene had
+occurred in the whole of his extraordinary experience. He seemed about
+to rise. The cheering subsided to a painful stillness. Wimp cut the
+situation by laying his hand again upon Tom's shoulder.
+
+"Come quietly with me," he said. The words were almost a whisper, but in
+the supreme silence they traveled to the ends of the hall.
+
+"Don't you go, Tom!" The trumpet tones were Peter's. The call thrilled
+an answering chord of defiance in every breast, and a low, ominous
+murmur 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 hurtling
+mass of men struggled confusedly from their seats. In a moment all was
+chaos. Tom did not move. Half-a-dozen men, headed by Peter, scaled the
+platform. Wimp was thrown to one side, and the invaders formed a ring
+round Tom's chair. The platform people scampered like mice from the
+center. Some huddled together in the corners, others slipped out at the
+rear. The committee congratulated themselves on having had the
+self-denial to exclude ladies. Mr. Gladstone's satellites hurried the
+old man off and into his carriage; though the fight promised to become
+Homeric. Grodman stood at the side of the platform secretly more amused
+than ever, concerning himself no more with Denzil Cantercot, who was
+already strengthening his nerves at the bar upstairs. The police about
+the hall blew their whistles, and policemen came rushing in from outside
+and the neighborhood. An Irish M. P. on the platform was waving his
+gingham like a shillalah in sheer excitement, forgetting his new-found
+respectability and dreaming himself back at Donnybrook Fair. Him a
+conscientious constable floored with a truncheon. But a shower of fists
+fell on the zealot's face, and he tottered back bleeding. Then the storm
+broke in all its fury. The upper air was black with staves, sticks, and
+umbrellas, mingled with the pallid hailstones of knobby fists. Yells and
+groans and hoots and battle-cries blent in grotesque chorus, like one of
+Dvorak's weird diabolical movements. Mortlake stood impassive, with arms
+folded, making no further effort, and the battle raged round him as the
+water swirls around some steadfast rock. A posse of police from the back
+fought their way steadily toward him, and charged up the heights of the
+platform steps, only to be sent tumbling backward, as their leader was
+hurled 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 been
+taken, after being well shaken. Then the miracle happened.
+
+As when of old a reputable goddess _ex machina_ saw her favorite hero in
+dire peril, straightway she drew down a cloud from the celestial stores
+of Jupiter and enveloped her fondling in kindly night, so that his
+adversary strove with the darkness, so did Crowl, the cunning cobbler,
+the much-daring, essay to insure his friend's safety. He turned off the
+gas at the meter.
+
+An Arctic night--unpreceded by twilight--fell, and there dawned the
+sabbath of the witches. The darkness could be felt--and it left blood
+and bruises behind it. When the lights were turned on again, Mortlake
+was gone. But several of the rioters were arrested, triumphantly.
+
+And through all, and over all, the face of the dead man who had sought
+to bring peace on earth, brooded.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese, with his head
+bandaged, while Denzil Cantercot told him the story of how he had
+rescued 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 battle
+till 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't
+quite sure he would."
+
+"Yes; but I wish some cowardly fool hadn't turned off the gas. I like
+men 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 be
+easier, 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 Peter
+thoughtfully. "But I didn't think of that at the time."
+
+He swallowed his water quickly and it went the wrong way and added to
+his confusion. It also began to dawn upon him that he might be called to
+account. Let it be said at once that he wasn't. He had taken too
+prominent a part.
+
+Meantime, Mrs. Wimp was bathing Mr. Wimp's eye, and rubbing him
+generally with arnica. Wimp's melodrama had been, indeed, a sight for
+the gods. Only, virtue was vanquished and vice triumphant. The villain
+had escaped, and without striking a blow.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+There was matter and to spare for the papers the next day. The striking
+ceremony--Mr. Gladstone's speech--the sensational arrest--these would of
+themselves have made excellent themes for reports and leaders. But the
+personality of the man arrested, and the Big Bow Mystery Battle--as it
+came to be called--gave additional piquancy to the paragraphs and the
+posters. The behavior of Mortlake put the last touch to the
+picturesqueness of the position. He left the hall when the lights went
+out, and walked unnoticed and unmolested through pleiads of policemen to
+the nearest police station, where the superintendent was almost too
+excited to take any notice of his demand to be arrested. But to do him
+justice, the official yielded as soon as he understood the situation. It
+seems inconceivable that he did not violate some red-tape regulation in
+so doing. To some this self-surrender was limpid proof of innocence; to
+others it was the damning token of despairing guilt.
+
+The morning papers were pleasant reading for Grodman, who chuckled as
+continuously over his morning egg, as if he had laid it. Jane was
+alarmed for the sanity of her saturnine master. As her husband would
+have said, Grodman's grins were not Beautiful. But he made no effort to
+suppress them. Not only had Wimp perpetrated a grotesque blunder, but
+the journalists to a man were down on his great sensation tableau,
+though their denunciations did not appear in the dramatic columns. The
+Liberal papers said that he had endangered Mr. Gladstone's life; the
+Conservative that he had unloosed the raging elements of Bow
+blackguardism, and set in motion forces which might have easily swelled
+to a riot, involving severe destruction of property. But "Tom Mortlake,"
+was, after all, the thought swamping every other. It was, in a sense, a
+triumph for the man.
+
+But Wimp's turn came when Mortlake, who reserved his defense, was
+brought up before a magistrate, and, by force of the new evidence, fully
+committed for trial on the charge of murdering Arthur Constant. Then
+men's thoughts centered again on the Mystery, and the solution of the
+inexplicable problem agitated mankind from China to Peru.
+
+In the middle of February, the great trial befell. It was another of the
+opportunities which the Chancellor of the Exchequer neglects. So
+stirring a drama might have easily cleared its expenses--despite the
+length of the cast, the salaries of the stars, and the rent of the
+house--in mere advance booking. For it was a drama which (by the rights
+of Magna Charta) could never be repeated; a drama which ladies of
+fashion would have given their earrings to witness, even with the
+central figure not a woman. And there was a woman in it anyhow, to judge
+by the little that had transpired at the magisterial examination, and
+the fact that the country was placarded with bills offering a reward for
+information concerning a Miss Jessie Dymond. Mortlake was defended by
+Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C., retained at the expense of the
+Mortlake Defense Fund (subscriptions to which came also from Australia
+and the Continent), and set on his mettle by the fact that he was the
+accepted 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 that
+the prisoner murdered his friend and fellow-lodger, Mr. Arthur Constant,
+in cold blood, and with the most careful premeditation; premeditation so
+studied, as to leave the circumstances of the death an impenetrable
+mystery for weeks to all the world, though fortunately without
+altogether baffling the almost superhuman ingenuity of Mr. Edward Wimp,
+of the Scotland Yard Detective Department. I propose to show that the
+motives of the prisoner were jealousy and revenge; jealousy not only of
+his friend's superior influence over the workingmen he himself aspired
+to lead, but the more commonplace animosity engendered by the disturbing
+element of a woman having relations to both. If, before my case is
+complete, it will be my painful duty to show that the murdered man was
+not the saint the world has agreed to paint him, I shall not shrink from
+unveiling the truer picture, in the interests of justice, which cannot
+say _nil nisi bonum_ even of the dead. I propose to show that the murder
+was committed by the prisoner shortly before half-past six on the
+morning of December 4th, and that the prisoner having, with the
+remarkable ingenuity which he has shown throughout, attempted to prepare
+an alibi by feigning to leave London by the first train to Liverpool,
+returned home, got in with his latch-key through the street-door, which
+he had left on the latch, unlocked his victim's bedroom with a key which
+he possessed, cut the sleeping man's throat, pocketed his razor, locked
+the door again, and gave it the appearance of being bolted, went
+downstairs, unslipped the bolt of the big lock, closed the door behind
+him, and got to Euston in time for the second train to Liverpool. The
+fog helped his proceedings throughout." Such was in sum the theory of
+the prosecution. The pale defiant figure in the dock winced perceptibly
+under parts of it.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump was the first witness called for the prosecution. She was
+quite used to legal inquisitiveness by this time, but did not appear in
+good 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's
+room, and I'm afraid he quarreled with him. He might have left his last
+hours peaceful." (Amusement.)
+
+"What happened then?"
+
+"Mr. Mortlake went out in a passion, and came in again in about an
+hour."
+
+"He told you he was going away to Liverpool very early the next
+morning."
+
+"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 always
+steadies my nerves."
+
+"Quite so. Where were you when the prisoner told you he was going to
+Devonport?"
+
+"Drinkin' my tea in the kitchen."
+
+"What should you say if prisoner dropped something in it to make you
+sleep 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 clever
+enough to try and poison me."
+
+The Judge: "The witness in her replies must confine herself to the
+evidence."
+
+Mr. Spigot, Q. C.: "I must submit to your lordship that it is a very
+logical answer, and exactly illustrates the interdependence of the
+probabilities. Now, Mrs. Drabdump, let us know what happened when you
+awoke at half-past six the next morning."
+
+Thereupon Mrs. Drabdump recapitulated the evidence (with new
+redundancies, but slight variations) given by her at the inquest. How
+she became alarmed--how she found the street-door locked by the big
+lock--how she roused Grodman, and got him to burst open the door--how
+they 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 am
+sure 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 I
+set 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 two
+rooms on the same floor?"
+
+"Yes, but he didn't pay as much."
+
+"And, while occupying this front bedroom, did not the prisoner once lose
+his key and have another made?"
+
+"He did; he was very careless."
+
+"Do you know what the prisoner and Mr. Constant spoke about on the night
+of 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 to
+you 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 a
+murder?"
+
+"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 not
+that 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 care
+for Miss Dymond?"
+
+"He didn't seem to think of her, my lud. When he got a letter in her
+handwriting among his heap he used to throw it aside till he'd torn open
+the 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 had
+ceased to care for Miss Dymond. Might not this have been in consequence
+of 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 you
+ever see anything--say when Miss Dymond came to your house--to make you
+suspect 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 the
+door." (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. Constant
+and the prisoner. He knew very little about Miss Dymond, having scarcely
+seen her. Prisoner had never spoken to him much about her. He should not
+think she was much in prisoner's thoughts. Naturally the prisoner had
+been depressed by the death of his friend. Besides, he was overworked.
+Witness thought highly of Mortlake's character. It was incredible that
+Constant had had improper relations of any kind with his friend's
+promised wife. Grodman's evidence made a very favorable impression on
+the jury; the prisoner looked his gratitude; and the prosecution felt
+sorry it had been necessary to call this witness.
+
+Inspector Howlett and Sergeant Runnymede had also to repeat their
+evidence. Dr. Robinson, police-surgeon, likewise retendered his evidence
+as to the nature of the wound, and the approximate hour of death. But
+this time he was much more severely examined. He would not bind himself
+down to state the time within an hour or two. He thought life had been
+extinct two or three hours when he arrived, so that the deed had been
+committed between seven and eight. Under gentle pressure from the
+prosecuting counsel, he admitted that it might possibly have been
+between six and seven. Cross-examined, he reiterated his impression in
+favor of the later hour.
+
+Supplementary evidence from medical experts proved as dubious and
+uncertain as if the court had confined itself to the original witness.
+It seemed to be generally agreed that the data for determining the time
+of death of anybody were too complex and variable to admit of very
+precise inference; _rigor mortis_ and other symptoms setting in within
+very wide limits and differing largely in different persons. All agreed
+that death from such a cut must have been practically instantaneous, and
+the theory of suicide was rejected by all. As a whole the medical
+evidence tended to fix the time of death, with a high degree of
+probability, between the hours of six and half-past eight. The efforts
+of the Prosecution were bent upon throwing back the time of death to as
+early as possible after about half-past five. The Defense spent all its
+strength upon pinning the experts to the conclusion that death could not
+have been earlier than seven. Evidently the Prosecution was going to
+fight hard for the hypothesis that Mortlake had committed the crime in
+the interval between the first and second trains for Liverpool; while
+the Defense was concentrating itself on an alibi, showing that the
+prisoner had traveled by the second train which left Euston Station at a
+quarter-past seven, so that there could have been no possible time for
+the passage between Bow and Euston. It was an exciting struggle. As yet
+the contending forces seemed equally matched. The evidence had gone as
+much for as against the prisoner. But everybody knew that worse lay
+behind.
+
+"Call Edward Wimp."
+
+The story Edward Wimp had to tell began tamely enough with
+thrice-threshed-out facts. But at last the new facts came.
+
+"In consequence of suspicions that had formed in your mind you took up
+your quarters, disguised, in the late Mr. Constant's rooms?"
+
+"I did; at the commencement of the year. My suspicions had gradually
+gathered against the occupants of No. 11, Glover Street, and I resolved
+to 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. I
+found the key of Mr. Constant's bedroom buried deeply in the side of
+prisoner's leather sofa. I found what I imagine to be the letter he
+received on December 3d, in the pages of a 'Bradshaw' lying under the
+same 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 wigs
+or without, were observed to be polishing their glasses. Mr. Wimp's
+examination was resumed.
+
+"After making these discoveries what did you do?"
+
+"I made inquiries about Miss Dymond, and found Mr. Constant had visited
+her once or twice in the evening. I imagined there would be some traces
+of a pecuniary connection. I was allowed by the family to inspect Mr.
+Constant's check-book, and found a paid check made out for L25 in the
+name of Miss Dymond. By inquiry at the Bank, I found it had been cashed
+on November 12th of last year. I then applied for a warrant against the
+prisoner."
+
+Cross-examined: "Do you suggest that the prisoner opened Mr. Constant's
+bedroom with the key you found?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+Brown-Harland, Q. C. (sarcastically): "And locked the door from within
+with 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 from
+the outside. Those who broke it open naturally imagined it had been
+locked from the inside when they found the key inside. The key would, on
+this theory, be on the floor as the outside locking could not have been
+effected if it had been in the lock. The first persons to enter the room
+would naturally believe it had been thrown down in the bursting of the
+door. Or it might have been left sticking very loosely inside the lock
+so as not to interfere with the turning of the outside key in which case
+it would also probably have been thrown to the ground."
+
+"Indeed. Very ingenious. And can you also explain how the prisoner could
+have bolted the door within from the outside?"
+
+"I can. (Renewed sensation.) There is only one way in which it was
+possible--and that was, of course, a mere conjurer's illusion. To cause
+a locked door to appear bolted in addition, it would only be necessary
+for the person on the inside of the door to wrest the staple containing
+the bolt from the woodwork. The bolt in Mr. Constant's bedroom worked
+perpendicularly. When the staple was torn off, it would simply remain at
+rest on the pin of the bolt instead of supporting it or keeping it
+fixed. A person bursting open the door and finding the staple resting on
+the 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 been
+done beforehand." (Applause in court, which was instantly checked by the
+ushers.) The counsel for the defense felt he had been entrapped in
+attempting to be sarcastic with the redoubtable detective. Grodman
+seemed green with envy. It was the one thing he had not thought of.
+
+Mrs. Drabdump, Grodman, Inspector Howlett, and Sergeant Runnymede were
+recalled and re-examined by the embarrassed Sir Charles Brown-Harland as
+to the exact condition of the lock and the bolt and the position of the
+key. It turned out as Wimp had suggested; so prepossessed were the
+witnesses with the conviction that the door was locked and bolted from
+the inside when it was burst open that they were a little hazy about the
+exact details. The damage had been repaired, so that it was all a
+question of precise past observation. The inspector and the sergeant
+testified that the key was in the lock when they saw it, though both the
+mortise and the bolt were broken. They were not prepared to say that
+Wimp's theory was impossible; they would even admit it was quite
+possible 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 her
+immediate engrossing interest in the horrible sight of the corpse.
+Grodman alone was positive that the key was in the door when he burst it
+open. No, he did not remember picking it up from the floor and putting
+it 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 panels
+of the door.
+
+By the Prosecution: "Don't you think, from the comparative ease with
+which the door yielded to your onslaught, that it is highly probable
+that the pin of the bolt was not in a firmly fixed staple, but in one
+already 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 was
+new and shoddy. But I have always been a strong man."
+
+"Very well, Mr. Grodman. I hope you will never appear at the
+music-halls." (Laughter.)
+
+Jessie Dymond's landlady was the next witness for the prosecution. She
+corroborated Wimp's statements as to Constant's occasional visits, and
+narrated how the girl had been enlisted by the dead philanthropist as a
+collaborator in some of his enterprises. But the most telling portion of
+her evidence was the story of how, late at night, on December 3d, the
+prisoner called upon her and inquired wildly about the whereabouts of
+his sweetheart. He said he had just received a mysterious letter from
+Miss Dymond saying she was gone. She (the landlady) replied that she
+could have told him that weeks ago, as her ungrateful lodger was gone
+now some three weeks without leaving a hint behind her. In answer to his
+most ungentlemanly raging and raving, she told him it served him right,
+as he should have looked after her better, and not kept away for so
+long. She reminded him that there were as good fish in the sea as ever
+came out, and a girl of Jessie's attractions need not pine away (as she
+had seemed to be pining away) for lack of appreciation. He then called
+her 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 check
+produced. He particularly remembered it, because he paid the money to a
+very pretty girl. She took the entire amount in gold. At this point the
+case was adjourned.
+
+Denzil Cantercot was the first witness called for the prosecution on the
+resumption of the trial. Pressed as to whether he had not told Mr. Wimp
+that he had overheard the prisoner denouncing Mr. Constant, he could not
+say. He had not actually heard the prisoner's denunciations; he might
+have given Mr. Wimp a false impression, but then Mr. Wimp was so
+prosaically literal. (Laughter.) Mr. Crowl had told him something of the
+kind. Cross-examined, he said Jessie Dymond was a rare spirit and she
+always reminded him of Joan of Arc.
+
+Mr. Crowl, being called, was extremely agitated. He refused to take the
+oath, and informed the court that the Bible was a Fad. He could not
+swear by anything so self-contradictory. He would affirm. He could not
+deny--though he looked like wishing to--that the prisoner had at first
+been rather mistrustful of Mr. Constant, but he was certain that the
+feeling had quickly worn off. Yes, he was a great friend of the
+prisoner, but he didn't see why that should invalidate his testimony,
+especially as he had not taken an oath. Certainly the prisoner seemed
+rather depressed when he saw him on Bank Holiday, but it was overwork on
+behalf of the people and for the demolition of the Fads.
+
+Several other familiars of the prisoner gave more or less reluctant
+testimony as to his sometime prejudice against the amateur rival labor
+leader. His expressions of dislike had been strong and bitter. The
+Prosecution also produced a poster announcing that the prisoner would
+preside at a great meeting of clerks on December 4th. He had not turned
+up at this meeting nor sent any explanation. Finally, there was the
+evidence of the detectives who originally arrested him at Liverpool
+Docks in view of his suspicious demeanor. This completed the case for
+the prosecution.
+
+Sir Charles Brown-Harland, Q. C., rose with a swagger and a rustle of
+his silk gown, and proceeded to set forth the theory of the defense. He
+said he did not purpose to call any witnesses. The hypothesis of the
+prosecution was so inherently childish and inconsequential, and so
+dependent upon a bundle of interdependent probabilities that it crumbled
+away at the merest touch. The prisoner's character was of unblemished
+integrity, his last public appearance had been made on the same platform
+with Mr. Gladstone, and his honesty and highmindedness had been vouched
+for by statesmen of the highest standing. His movements could be
+accounted for from hour to hour--and those with which the prosecution
+credited him rested on no tangible evidence whatever. He was also
+credited with superhuman ingenuity and diabolical cunning of which he
+had shown no previous symptom. Hypothesis was piled on hypothesis, as in
+the old Oriental legend, where the world rested on the elephant and the
+elephant on the tortoise. It might be worth while, however, to point out
+that it was at least quite likely that the death of Mr. Constant had not
+taken place before seven, and as the prisoner left Euston Station at
+7:15 a. m. for Liverpool, he could certainly not have got there from Bow
+in the time; also that it was hardly possible for the prisoner, who
+could prove being at Euston Station at 5:25 a. m., to travel backward
+and forward to Glover Street and commit the crime all within less than
+two hours. "The real facts," said Sir Charles impressively, "are most
+simple. The prisoner, partly from pressure of work, partly (he had no
+wish to conceal) from worldly ambition, had begun to neglect Miss
+Dymond, to whom he was engaged to be married. The man was but human, and
+his head was a little turned by his growing importance. Nevertheless, at
+heart he was still deeply attached to Miss Dymond. She, however, appears
+to have jumped to the conclusion that he had ceased to love her, that
+she was unworthy of him, unfitted by education to take her place side by
+side with him in the new spheres to which he was mounting--that, in
+short, she was a drag on his career. Being, by all accounts, a girl of
+remarkable force of character, she resolved to cut the Gordian knot by
+leaving London, and, fearing lest her affianced husband's
+conscientiousness 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 which
+drags an honored name in the mire--a theory so superfluous that I shall
+only allude to it. That Arthur Constant could have seduced, or had any
+improper relations with his friend's betrothed is a hypothesis to which
+the lives of both give the lie. Before leaving London--or England--Miss
+Dymond wrote to her aunt in Devonport--her only living relative in this
+country--asking her as a great favor to forward an addressed letter to
+the prisoner, a fortnight after receipt. The aunt obeyed implicitly.
+This was the letter which fell like a thunderbolt on the prisoner on the
+night of December 3d. All his old love returned--he was full of
+self-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 to
+rush up to his friend, Constant, to seek his advice. Perhaps Constant
+knew something of the affair. The prisoner knew the two were in not
+infrequent communication. It is possible--my lord and gentlemen of the
+jury, I do not wish to follow the methods of the prosecution and confuse
+theory with fact, so I say it is possible--that Mr. Constant had
+supplied her with the L25 to leave the country. He was like a brother to
+her, perhaps even acted imprudently in calling upon her, though neither
+dreamed of evil. It is possible that he may have encouraged her in her
+abnegation and in her altruistic aspirations, perhaps even without
+knowing their exact drift, for does he not speak in his very last letter
+of the fine female characters he was meeting, and the influence for good
+he had over individual human souls? Still, this we can now never know,
+unless the dead speak or the absent return. It is also not impossible
+that Miss Dymond was entrusted with the L25 for charitable purposes. But
+to come back to certainties. The prisoner consulted Mr. Constant about
+the letter. He then ran to Miss Dymond's lodgings in Stepney Green,
+knowing beforehand his trouble would be futile. The letter bore the
+postmark of Devonport. He knew the girl had an aunt there; possibly she
+might have gone to her. He could not telegraph, for he was ignorant of
+the address. He consulted his 'Bradshaw,' and resolved to leave by the
+5:30 a. m. from Paddington, and told his landlady so. He left the letter
+in the 'Bradshaw,' which ultimately got thrust among a pile of papers
+under the sofa, so that he had to get another. He was careless and
+disorderly, and the key found by Mr. Wimp in his sofa must have lain
+there for some years, having been lost there in the days when he
+occupied the bedroom afterward rented by Mr. Constant. Afraid to miss
+his train, he did not undress on that distressful night. Meantime the
+thought occurred to him that Jessie was too clever a girl to leave so
+easy a trail, and he jumped to the conclusion that she would be going to
+her married brother in America, and had gone to Devonport merely to bid
+her aunt farewell. He determined therefore to get to Liverpool, without
+wasting time at Devonport, to institute inquiries. Not suspecting the
+delay 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 went
+slowly in the fog, he missed the first train, and wandered about
+brooding disconsolately in the mist till the second. At Liverpool his
+suspicious, excited demeanor procured his momentary arrest. Since then
+the thought of the lost girl has haunted and broken him. That is the
+whole, the plain, and the sufficing story." The effective witnesses for
+the defense were, indeed, few. It is so hard to prove a negative. There
+was Jessie's aunt, who bore out the statement of the counsel for the
+defense. There were the porters who saw him leave Euston by the 7:15
+train for Liverpool, and arrive just too late for the 5:15; there was
+the 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 got
+a little confused; he was asked whether, if he really picked up the
+prisoner at Bow Railway Station at about 4:30, he ought not to have
+caught the first train at Euston. He said the fog made him drive rather
+slowly, but admitted the mist was transparent enough to warrant full
+speed. He also admitted being a strong trade unionist, Spigot, Q. C.,
+artfully extorting the admission as if it were of the utmost
+significance. Finally, there were numerous witnesses--of all sorts and
+conditions--to the prisoner's high character, as well as to Arthur
+Constant's blameless and moral life.
+
+In his closing speech on the third day of the trial, Sir Charles pointed
+out with great exhaustiveness and cogency the flimsiness of the case for
+the prosecution, the number of hypotheses it involved, and their mutual
+interdependence. Mrs. Drabdump was a witness whose evidence must be
+accepted with extreme caution. The jury must remember that she was
+unable to dissociate her observations from her inferences, and thought
+that the prisoner and Mr. Constant were quarreling merely because they
+were agitated. He dissected her evidence, and showed that it entirely
+bore out the story of the defense. He asked the jury to bear in mind
+that no positive evidence (whether of cabmen or others) had been given
+of the various and complicated movements attributed to the prisoner on
+the 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--he
+meant, of course, Miss Dymond--had not been produced. Even if she were
+dead, and her body were found, no countenance would be given to the
+theory of the prosecution, for the mere conviction that her lover had
+deserted her would be a sufficient explanation of her suicide. Beyond
+the ambiguous letter, no tittle of evidence of her dishonor--on which
+the bulk of the case against the prisoner rested--had been adduced. As
+for the motive of political jealousy that had been a mere passing cloud.
+The two men had become fast friends. As to the circumstances of the
+alleged crime, the medical evidence was on the whole in favor of the
+time of death being late; and the prisoner had left London at a quarter
+past seven. The drugging theory was absurd, and as for the too clever
+bolt and lock theories, Mr. Grodman, a trained scientific observer, had
+pooh-poohed them. He would solemnly exhort the jury to remember that if
+they condemned the prisoner they would not only send an innocent man to
+an ignominious death on the flimsiest circumstantial evidence, but they
+would deprive the workingmen of this country of one of their truest
+friends and their ablest leader.
+
+The conclusion of Sir Charles' vigorous speech was greeted with
+irrepressible applause.
+
+Mr. Spigot, Q. C., in closing the case for the prosecution, asked the
+jury to return a verdict against the prisoner for as malicious and
+premeditated a crime as ever disgraced the annals of any civilized
+country. His cleverness and education had only been utilized for the
+devil's ends, while his reputation had been used as a cloak. Everything
+pointed strongly to the prisoner's guilt. On receiving Miss Dymond's
+letter announcing her shame, and (probably) her intention to commit
+suicide, he had hastened upstairs to denounce Constant. He had then
+rushed to the girl's lodgings, and, finding his worst fears confirmed,
+planned at once his diabolically ingenious scheme of revenge. He told
+his landlady he was going to Devonport, so that if he bungled, the
+police would be put temporarily off his track. His real destination was
+Liverpool, for he intended to leave the country. Lest, however, his plan
+should break down here, too, he arranged an ingenious alibi by being
+driven to Euston for the 5:15 train to Liverpool. The cabman would not
+know he did not intend to go by it, but meant to return to 11, Glover
+Street, there to perpetrate this foul crime, interruption to which he
+had possibly barred by drugging his landlady. His presence at Liverpool
+(whither he really went by the second train) would corroborate the
+cabman's story. That night he had not undressed nor gone to bed; he had
+plotted out his devilish scheme till it was perfect; the fog came as an
+unexpected 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 the
+crime.
+
+Mr. Justice Crogie, summing up, began dead against the prisoner.
+Reviewing the evidence, he pointed out that plausible hypotheses neatly
+dove-tailed did not necessarily weaken one another, the fitting so well
+together 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 the
+case for the defense was from excluding hypothesis. The key, the letter,
+the reluctance to produce the letter, the heated interview with
+Constant, the misstatement about the prisoner's destination, the flight
+to Liverpool, the false tale about searching for a "him," the
+denunciations 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's
+presence at Euston at 5:25 a. m., there was no attempt to account for
+his movements between that and 7:15 a. m. It was as possible that he
+returned to Bow as that he lingered about Euston. There was nothing in
+the medical evidence to make his guilt impossible. Nor was there
+anything inherently impossible in Constant's yielding to the sudden
+temptation of a beautiful girl, nor in a working-girl deeming herself
+deserted, temporarily succumbing to the fascinations of a gentleman and
+regretting it bitterly afterward. What had become of the girl was a
+mystery. Hers might have been one of those nameless corpses which the
+tide swirls up on slimy river banks. The jury must remember, too, that
+the relation might not have actually passed into dishonor, it might have
+been just grave enough to smite the girl's conscience, and to induce her
+to behave as she had done. It was enough that her letter should have
+excited the jealousy of the prisoner. There was one other point which he
+would like to impress on the jury, and which the counsel for the
+prosecution had not sufficiently insisted upon. This was that the
+prisoner's guiltiness was the only plausible solution that had ever been
+advanced of the Bow Mystery. The medical evidence agreed that Mr.
+Constant did not die by his own hand. Someone must therefore have
+murdered him. The number of people who could have had any possible
+reason or opportunity to murder him was extremely small. The prisoner
+had both reason and opportunity. By what logicians called the method of
+exclusion, suspicion would attach to him on even slight evidence. The
+actual evidence was strong and plausible, and now that Mr. Wimp's
+ingenious theory had enabled them to understand how the door could have
+been apparently locked and bolted from within, the last difficulty and
+the last argument for suicide had been removed. The prisoner's guilt was
+as clear as circumstantial evidence could make it. If they let him go
+free, the Bow Mystery might henceforward be placed among the archives of
+unavenged assassinations. Having thus well-nigh hung the prisoner, the
+judge wound up by insisting on the high probability of the story for the
+defense, though that, too, was dependent in important details upon the
+prisoner's mere private statements to his counsel. The jury, being by
+this time sufficiently muddled by his impartiality, were dismissed, with
+the exhortation to allow due weight to every fact and probability in
+determining their righteous verdict.
+
+The minutes ran into hours, but the jury did not return. The shadows of
+night fell across the reeking, fevered court before they announced their
+verdict--
+
+"Guilty."
+
+The judge put on his black cap.
+
+The great reception arranged outside was a fiasco; the evening banquet
+was indefinitely postponed. Wimp had won; Grodman felt like a whipped
+cur.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+"So you were right," Denzil could not help saying as he greeted Grodman
+a week afterward. "I shall not live to tell the story of how you
+discovered the Bow murderer."
+
+"Sit down," growled Grodman; "perhaps you will after all." There was a
+dangerous gleam in his eyes. Denzil was sorry he had spoken.
+
+"I sent for you," Grodman said, "to tell you that on the night Wimp
+arrested 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 the
+confusion of the poetic. The greatest exponent of the Beautiful is only
+allowed the same number of wives as the greengrocer. I do not blame you
+for not being satisfied with Jane--she is a good servant but a bad
+mistress--but it was cruel to Kitty not to inform her that Jane had a
+prior right in you, and unjust to Jane not to let her know of the
+contract 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 of
+an arrest for bigamy. Neither loves me."
+
+"I should think they would come in very useful to you. You plant one in
+my house to tell my secrets to Wimp, and you plant one in Wimp's house
+to 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 for
+Kitty, I never had such a shock in my life as at finding her installed
+in 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 must
+do something for a living; you wouldn't do anything for hers. And so you
+couldn't go anywhere without meeting a wife! Ha! ha! ha! Serve you
+right, 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 my
+book, smoked my cigars, and pocketed my money. And yet, when you have an
+important piece of information bearing on a mystery about which I am
+thinking 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 I
+discovered your two marriages I determined to have you arrested
+for--your treachery. But when I found you had, as I thought, put Wimp on
+the wrong scent, when I felt sure that by arresting Mortlake he was
+going to make a greater ass of himself than even nature had been able to
+do, then I forgave you. I let you walk about the earth--and
+drink--freely. Now it is Wimp who crows--everybody pats him on the
+back--they call him the mystery man of the Scotland-Yard tribe. Poor Tom
+Mortlake will be hanged, and all through your telling Wimp about Jessie
+Dymond!"
+
+"It was you yourself," said Denzil sullenly. "Everybody was giving it
+up. But you said 'Let us find out all that Arthur Constant did in the
+last few months of his life.' Wimp couldn't miss stumbling on Jessie
+sooner or later. I'd have throttled Constant, if I had known he'd
+touched her," he wound up with irrelevant indignation.
+
+Grodman winced at the idea that he himself had worked _ad majorem
+gloriam_ of Wimp. And yet, had not Mrs. Wimp let out as much at the
+Christmas dinner?
+
+"What's past is past," he said gruffly. "But if Tom Mortlake hangs, you
+go to Portland."
+
+"How can I help Tom hanging?"
+
+"Help the agitation as much as you can. Write letters under all sorts of
+names to all the papers. Get everybody you know to sign the great
+petition. Find out where Jessie Dymond is--the girl who holds the proof
+of Tom Mortlake's innocence."
+
+"You really believe him innocent?"
+
+"Don't be satirical, Denzil. Haven't I taken the chair at all the
+meetings? 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 Constant
+than--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 had
+become the leader of the rescue party--suggestions, subscriptions came
+from all sides. The suggestions were burnt, the subscriptions
+acknowledged in the papers and used for hunting up the missing girl.
+Lucy Brent headed the list with a hundred pounds. It was a fine
+testimony to her faith in her dead lover's honor.
+
+The release of the Jury had unloosed "The Greater Jury," which always
+now sits upon the smaller. Every means was taken to nullify the value of
+the "palladium of British liberty." The foreman and the jurors were
+interviewed, the judge was judged, and by those who were no judges. The
+Home Secretary (who had done nothing beyond accepting office under the
+Crown) was vituperated, and sundry provincial persons wrote
+confidentially to the Queen. Arthur Constant's backsliding cheered many
+by convincing them that others were as bad as themselves; and well-to-do
+tradesmen saw in Mortlake's wickedness the pernicious effects of
+socialism. A dozen new theories were afloat. Constant had committed
+suicide 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 great
+point was--Jessie Dymond must be produced, dead or alive. The electric
+current scoured the civilized world in search of her. What wonder if the
+shrewder sort divined that the indomitable detective had fixed his last
+hope on the girl's guilt? If Jessie had wrongs why should she not have
+avenged 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 the
+horizon. The Home Secretary remained inflexible; the great petitions
+discharged their signatures at him in vain. He was a Conservative,
+sternly conscientious; and the mere insinuation that his obstinacy was
+due to the politics of the condemned only hardened him against the
+temptation of a cheap reputation for magnanimity. He would not even
+grant a respite, to increase the chances of the discovery of Jessie
+Dymond. In the last of the three weeks there was a final monster meeting
+of protest. Grodman again took the chair, and several distinguished
+faddists were present, as well as numerous respectable members of
+society. The Home Secretary acknowledged the receipt of their
+resolutions. The Trade Unions were divided in their allegiance; some
+whispered of faith and hope, others of financial defalcations. The
+former essayed to organize a procession and an indignation meeting on
+the Sunday preceding the Tuesday fixed for the execution, but it fell
+through on a rumor of confession. The Monday papers contained a last
+masterly letter from Grodman exposing the weakness of the evidence, but
+they knew nothing of a confession. The prisoner was mute and disdainful,
+professing little regard for a life empty of love and burdened with
+self-reproach. He refused to see clergymen. He was accorded an interview
+with Miss Brent in the presence of a jailer, and solemnly asseverated
+his respect for her dead lover's memory. Monday buzzed with rumors; the
+evening papers chronicled them hour by hour. A poignant anxiety was
+abroad. The girl would be found. Some miracle would happen. A reprieve
+would arrive. The sentence would be commuted. But the short day darkened
+into night even as Mortlake's short day was darkening. And the shadow of
+the 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 eyes
+were heavy with unshed tears. The dingy wintry road seemed one vast
+cemetery; the street lamps twinkled like corpse-lights. The confused
+sounds of the street-life reached his ear as from another world. He did
+not see the people who flitted to and fro amid the gathering shadows of
+the cold, dreary night. One ghastly vision flashed and faded and flashed
+upon the background of the duskiness.
+
+Denzil stood beside him, smoking in silence. A cold fear was at his
+heart. That terrible Grodman! As the hangman's cord was tightening round
+Mortlake, he felt the convict's chains tightening round himself. And yet
+there was one gleam of hope, feeble as the yellow flicker of the
+gas-lamp across the way. Grodman had obtained an interview with the
+condemned late that afternoon, and the parting had been painful, but the
+evening paper, that in its turn had obtained an interview with the
+ex-detective, announced on its placard:
+
+     "GRODMAN STILL CONFIDENT,"
+
+and the thousands who yet pinned their faith on this extraordinary man
+refused to extinguish the last sparks of hope. Denzil had bought the
+paper and scanned it eagerly, but there was nothing save the vague
+assurance that the indefatigable Grodman was still almost pathetically
+expectant of the miracle. Denzil did not share the expectation; he
+meditated flight.
+
+"Peter," he said at last, "I'm afraid it's all over."
+
+Crowl nodded, heart-broken. "All over!" he repeated, "and to think that
+he dies--and it is--all over!"
+
+He looked despairingly at the blank winter sky, where leaden clouds shut
+out 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 of
+leather! No compensation nowhere for being cut off innocent in the pride
+of youth and strength! A man who has always preached the Useful day and
+night, and toiled and suffered for his fellows. Where's the justice of
+it, where's the justice of it?" he demanded fiercely. Again his wet eyes
+wandered upward toward heaven, that heaven away from which the soul of a
+dead saint at the Antipodes was speeding into infinite space.
+
+"Well, where was the justice for Arthur Constant if he, too, was
+innocent?" said Denzil. "Really, Peter, I don't see why you should take
+it for granted that Tom is so dreadfully injured. Your horny-handed
+labor leaders are, after all, men of no aesthetic refinement, with no
+sense of the Beautiful; you cannot expect them to be exempt from the
+coarser forms of crime. Humanity must look to for other leaders--to the
+seers and the poets!"
+
+"Cantercot, if you say Tom's guilty I'll knock you down." The little
+cobbler 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 no
+grounds. The judge is an honest man, and with gifts I can't lay claim
+to. But I believe in Tom with all my heart. And if Tom is guilty I
+believe in the Cause of the People with all my heart all the same. The
+Fads are doomed to death, they may be reprieved, but they must die at
+last."
+
+He drew a deep sigh, and looked along the dreary Road. It was quite dark
+now, but by the light of the lamps and the gas in the shop windows the
+dull, 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 the
+little cobbler like an icy wind. He saw his own life, and a hundred
+million lives like his, swelling and breaking like bubbles on a dark
+ocean, unheeded, uncared for.
+
+A newsboy passed along, clamoring "The Bow murderer, preparations for
+the hexecution!"
+
+A terrible shudder shook the cobbler's frame. His eyes ranged
+sightlessly after the boy; the merciful tears filled them at last.
+
+"The Cause of the People," he murmured, brokenly, "I believe in the
+Cause 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, an
+ever-augmenting crowd was gathered, eager to catch the first whisper of
+a reprieve.
+
+The house was guarded by a cordon of police, for there was no
+inconsiderable danger of a popular riot. At times a section of the crowd
+groaned and hooted. Once a volley of stones was discharged at the
+windows. The news-boys were busy vending their special editions, and the
+reporters struggled through the crowd, clutching descriptive pencils,
+and ready to rush off to telegraph offices should anything "extra
+special" occur. Telegraph boys were coming up every now and again with
+threats, messages, petitions and exhortations from all parts of the
+country to the unfortunate Home Secretary, who was striving to keep his
+aching head cool as he went through the voluminous evidence for the last
+time and pondered over the more important letters which "The Greater
+Jury" had contributed to the obscuration of the problem. Grodman's
+letter in that morning's paper shook him most; under his scientific
+analysis the circumstantial chain seemed forged of painted cardboard.
+Then the poor man read the judge's summing up, and the chain became
+tempered steel. The noise of the crowd outside broke upon his ear in his
+study 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. There
+were many that loved the man who lay in the jaws of death, and a spirit
+of mad revolt surged in their breasts. And the sky was gray, and the
+bleak night deepened and the shadow of the gallows crept on.
+
+Suddenly a strange inarticulate murmur spread through the crowd, a vague
+whisper of no one knew what. Something had happened. Somebody was
+coming. A second later and one of the outskirts of the throng was
+agitated, and a convulsive cheer went up from it, and was taken up
+infectiously all along the street. The crowd parted--a hansom dashed
+through the center. "Grodman! Grodman!" shouted those who recognized the
+occupant. "Grodman! Hurrah!" Grodman was outwardly calm and pale, but
+his eyes glittered; he waved his hand encouragingly as the hansom dashed
+up to the door, cleaving the turbulent crowd as a canoe cleaves the
+waters. Grodman sprang out, the constables at the portal made way for
+him respectfully. He knocked imperatively, the door was opened
+cautiously; a boy rushed up and delivered a telegram; Grodman forced his
+way in, gave his name, and insisted on seeing the Home Secretary on a
+matter of life and death. Those near the door heard his words and
+cheered, and the crowd divined the good omen, and the air throbbed with
+cannonades of joyous sound. The cheers rang in Grodman's ears as the
+door slammed behind him. The reporters struggled to the front. An
+excited knot of working men pressed round the arrested hansom, they took
+the horse out. A dozen enthusiasts struggled for the honor of placing
+themselves between the shafts. And the crowd awaited Grodman.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+Grodman was ushered into the conscientious Minister's study. The doughty
+chief of the agitation was, perhaps, the one man who could not be
+denied. As he entered, the Home Secretary's face seemed lit up with
+relief. At a sign from his master, the amanuensis who had brought in the
+last 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 came
+under his own eyes.
+
+"You have a valid reason for troubling me, I suppose, Mr. Grodman?" said
+the 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 any
+attention 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 never
+been a criminal lawyer, like some of my predecessors. But I should
+hardly speak of it as a science; I look upon it as a question of
+common-sense."
+
+"Pardon me, sir. It is the most subtle and difficult of all the
+sciences. It is, indeed, rather the science of the sciences. What is the
+whole of Inductive Logic, as laid down, say, by Bacon and Mill, but an
+attempt to appraise the value of evidence, the said evidence being the
+trails left by the Creator, so to speak? The Creator has--I say it in
+all reverence--drawn a myriad red herrings across the track, but the
+true scientist refuses to be baffled by superficial appearances in
+detecting the secrets of Nature. The vulgar herd catches at the gross
+apparent fact, but the man of insight knows that what lies on the
+surface does lie."
+
+"Very interesting, Mr. Grodman, but really----"
+
+"Bear with me, sir. The science of evidence being thus so extremely
+subtle, and demanding the most acute and trained observation of facts,
+the most comprehensive understanding of human psychology, is naturally
+given over to professors who have not the remotest idea that 'things are
+not what they seem,' and that everything is other than it appears; to
+professors, most of whom, by their year-long devotion to the
+shop-counter or the desk, have acquired an intimate acquaintance with
+all 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 a
+witness. The retailing of evidence--the observation of the facts--is
+given over to people who go through their lives without eyes; the
+appreciation of evidence--the judging of these facts--is surrendered to
+people who may possibly be adepts in weighing out pounds of sugar. Apart
+from their sheer inability to fulfill either function--to observe, or to
+judge--their observation and their judgment alike are vitiated by all
+sorts of irrelevant prejudices."
+
+"You are attacking trial by jury."
+
+"Not necessarily. I am prepared to accept that scientifically, on the
+ground that, as there are, as a rule, only two alternatives, the balance
+of probability is slightly in favor of the true decision being come to.
+Then, in cases where experts like myself have got up the evidence, the
+jury 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 fresh
+concrete 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 but
+the truth'?"
+
+"Fifty?" said the Minister, humoring him a little.
+
+"Not five. I say nothing of lapses of memory, of inborn defects of
+observational power--though the suspiciously precise recollection of
+dates and events possessed by ordinary witnesses in important trials
+taking place years after the occurrences involved, is one of the most
+amazing things in the curiosities of modern jurisprudence. I defy you,
+sir, to tell me what you had for dinner last Monday, or what exactly you
+were saying and doing at five o'clock last Tuesday afternoon. Nobody
+whose life does not run in mechanical grooves can do anything of the
+sort; unless, of course, the facts have been very impressive. But this
+by the way. The great obstacle to veracious observation is the element
+of prepossession in all vision. Has it ever struck you, sir, that we
+never see anyone more than once, if that? The first time we meet a man
+we may possibly see him as he is; the second time our vision is colored
+and modified by the memory of the first. Do our friends appear to us as
+they appear to strangers? Do our rooms, our furniture, our pipes strike
+our eye as they would strike the eye of an outsider, looking on them for
+the first time? Can a mother see her babe's ugliness, or a lover his
+mistress' shortcomings, though they stare everybody else in the face?
+Can we see ourselves as others see us? No; habit, prepossession changes
+all. The mind is a large factor of every so-called external fact. The
+eye sees, sometimes, what it wishes to see, more often what it expects
+to see. You follow me, sir?"
+
+The Home Secretary nodded his head less impatiently. He was beginning to
+be interested. The hubbub from without broke faintly upon their ears.
+
+"To give you a definite example. Mr. Wimp says that when I burst open
+the door of Mr. Constant's room on the morning of December 4th, and saw
+that 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 I
+admit that this was so, only in things like this you do not seem to
+conclude, 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 burning
+stick, you do not believe in its continuous existence. It is the same
+when witnessing a legerdemain performance. Seeing is not always
+believing, despite the proverb; but believing is often seeing. It is not
+to the point that in that little matter of the door Wimp was as
+hopelessly and incurably wrong as he has been in everything all along.
+Though the door was securely bolted, I confess that I should have seen
+that I had broken the bolt in forcing the door, even if it had been
+broken beforehand. Never once since December 4th did this possibility
+occur to me, till Wimp with perverted ingenuity suggested it. If this is
+the case with a trained observer, one moreover fully conscious of this
+ineradicable tendency of the human mind, how must it be with an
+untrained observer?"
+
+"Come to the point, come to the point," said the Home Secretary, putting
+out his hand as if it itched to touch the bell on the writing-table.
+
+"Such as," went on Grodman imperturbably, "such as--Mrs. Drabdump. That
+worthy person is unable, by repeated violent knocking, to arouse her
+lodger who yet desires to be aroused; she becomes alarmed, she rushes
+across to get my assistance; I burst open the door--what do you think
+the 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 condition
+of Arthur Constant when the door yielded to my violent exertions and
+flew open?"
+
+"Why, was he not dead?" gasped the Home Secretary, his heart fluttering
+violently.
+
+"Dead? A young, healthy fellow like that! When the door flew open Arthur
+Constant was sleeping the sleep of the just. It was a deep, a very deep
+sleep, of course, else the blows at his door would long since have
+awakened him. But all the while Mrs. Drabdump's fancy was picturing her
+lodger cold and stark the poor young fellow was lying in bed in a nice
+warm 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 of
+exhaustion. 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 alarmed
+at. It was a solitary experiment, and I intend it to remain so." The
+noise 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 Home
+Secretary's home secretary appeared. He looked at the great man's
+agitated face with suppressed surprise.
+
+"Thank you for calling in your amanuensis," said Grodman. "I intended to
+ask 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 appendix
+to the twenty-fifth edition--sort of silver wedding--of my book,
+'Criminals I Have Caught,' Mr. Denzil Cantercot, who, by the will I have
+made to-day, is appointed my literary executor, will have the task of
+working it up with literary and dramatic touches after the model of the
+other chapters of my book. I have every confidence he will be able to do
+me as much justice, from a literary point of view, as you, sir, no doubt
+will from a legal. I feel certain he will succeed in catching the style
+of 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 his
+statement in shorthand."
+
+"Thank you, sir," said Grodman, heartily. "Ready, Mr. Templeton? Here
+goes. My career till I left the Scotland-Yard Detective Department is
+known to all the world. Is that too fast for you, Mr. Templeton? A
+little? Well, I'll go slower; but pull me up if I forget to keep the
+brake on. When I retired, I discovered that I was a bachelor. But it was
+too 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 was
+published I had nothing more to do but think. I had plenty of money, and
+it was safely invested; there was no call for speculation. The future
+was 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 my
+ancient exploits; I re-read my book. And as I thought and thought, away
+from the excitement of the actual hunt, and seeing the facts in a truer
+perspective, so it grew daily clearer to me that criminals were more
+fools than rogues. Every crime I had traced, however cleverly
+perpetrated, was from the point of view of penetrability a weak failure.
+Traces and trails were left on all sides--ragged edges, rough-hewn
+corners; in short, the job was botched, artistic completeness
+unattained. To the vulgar, my feats might seem marvelous--the average
+man is mystified to grasp how you detect the letter 'e' in a simple
+cryptogram--to myself they were as commonplace as the crimes they
+unveiled. To me now, with my lifelong study of the science of evidence,
+it seemed possible to commit not merely one, but a thousand crimes that
+should be absolutely undiscoverable. And yet criminals would go on
+sinning, and giving themselves away, in the same old grooves--no
+originality, no dash, no individual insight, no fresh conception! One
+would imagine there were an Academy of crime with forty thousand
+armchairs. And gradually, as I pondered and brooded over the thought,
+there came upon me the desire to commit a crime that should baffle
+detection. I could invent hundreds of such crimes, and please myself by
+imagining them done; but would they really work out in practice?
+Evidently the sole performer of my experiment must be myself; the
+subject--whom or what? Accident should determine. I itched to commence
+with murder--to tackle the stiffest problems first, and I burned to
+startle and baffle the world--especially the world of which I had ceased
+to 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 sported
+with my pet theories, and fitted them mentally on everyone I met. Every
+friend or acquaintance I sat and gossiped with, I was plotting how to
+murder without leaving a clue. There is not one of my friends or
+acquaintances I have not done away with in thought. There is no public
+man--have no fear, my dear Home Secretary--I have not planned to
+assassinate secretly, mysteriously, unintelligibly, undiscoverably. Ah,
+how I could give the stock criminals points--with their second-hand
+motives, their conventional conceptions, their commonplace details,
+their lack of artistic feeling and restraint.
+
+"The late Arthur Constant came to live nearly opposite me. I cultivated
+his acquaintance--he was a lovable young fellow, an excellent subject
+for experiment. I do not know when I have ever taken to a man more. From
+the moment I first set eyes on him, there was a peculiar sympathy
+between us. We were drawn to each other. I felt instinctively he would
+be the man. I loved to hear him speak enthusiastically of the
+Brotherhood 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 stealing
+a moment's chat with me from his engrossing self-appointed duties. It is
+a pity humanity should have been robbed of so valuable a life. But it
+had to be. At a quarter to ten on the night of December 3d he came to
+me. Naturally I said nothing about this visit at the inquest or the
+trial. His object was to consult me mysteriously about some girl. He
+said he had privately lent her money--which she was to repay at her
+convenience. What the money was for he did not know, except that it was
+somehow connected with an act of abnegation in which he had vaguely
+encouraged her. The girl had since disappeared, and he was in distress
+about her. He would not tell me who it was--of course now, sir, you know
+as well as I it was Jessie Dymond--but asked for advice as to how to set
+about finding her. He mentioned that Mortlake was leaving for Devonport
+by the first train on the next day. Of old I should have connected these
+two facts and sought the thread; now, as he spoke, all my thoughts were
+dyed red. He was suffering perceptibly from toothache, and in answer to
+my sympathetic inquiries told me it had been allowing him very little
+sleep. Everything combined to invite the trial of one of my favorite
+theories. I spoke to him in a fatherly way, and when I had tendered some
+vague advice about the girl, and made him promise to secure a night's
+rest (before he faced the arduous tram-men's meeting in the morning) by
+taking a sleeping-draught, I gave him some sulfonal in a phial. It is a
+new drug, which produces protracted sleep without disturbing the
+digestion, and which I use myself. He promised faithfully to take the
+draught; and I also exhorted him earnestly to bolt and bar and lock
+himself in so as to stop up every chink or aperture by which the cold
+air of the winter's night might creep into the room. I remonstrated with
+him on the careless manner he treated his body, and he laughed in his
+good-humored, gentle way, and promised to obey me in all things. And he
+did. That Mrs. Drabdump, failing to rouse him, would cry 'Murder!' I
+took for certain. She is built that way. As even Sir Charles
+Brown-Harland remarked, she habitually takes her prepossessions for
+facts, her inferences for observations. She forecasts the future in
+gray. 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 on
+almost any woman under similar conditions. The only uncertain link in
+the chain was: Would Mrs. Drabdump rush across to get me to break open
+the door? Women always rush for a man. I was well-nigh the nearest, and
+certainly the most authoritative man in the street, and I took it for
+granted 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 course
+Arthur Constant would have awoke, or somebody else breaking open the
+door would have found him sleeping; no harm done, nobody any the wiser.
+I could hardly sleep myself that night. The thought of the extraordinary
+crime I was about to commit--a burning curiosity to know whether Wimp
+would detect the _modus operandi_--the prospect of sharing the feelings
+of murderers with whom I had been in contact all my life without being
+in touch with the terrible joys of their inner life--the fear lest I
+should be too fast asleep to hear Mrs. Drabdump's knock--these things
+agitated me and disturbed my rest. I lay tossing on my bed, planning
+every detail of poor Constant's end. The hours dragged slowly and
+wretchedly on toward the misty dawn. I was racked with suspense. Was I
+to be disappointed after all? At last the welcome sound came--the
+rat-tat-tat of murder. The echoes of that knock are yet in my ear. 'Come
+over and kill him!' I put my night-capped head out of the window and
+told her to wait for me. I dressed hurriedly, took my razor, and went
+across to 11 Glover Street. As I broke open the door of the bedroom in
+which Arthur Constant lay sleeping, his head resting on his hands, I
+cried, 'My God!' as if I saw some awful vision. A mist as of blood
+swam before Mrs. Drabdump's eyes. She cowered back, for an instant
+(I divined rather than saw the action) she shut off the dreaded
+sight with her hands. In that instant I had made my cut--precisely,
+scientifically--made so deep a cut and drew out the weapon so sharply
+that there was scarce a drop of blood on it; then there came from the
+throat a jet of blood which Mrs. Drabdump, conscious only of the horrid
+gash, saw but vaguely. I covered up the face quickly with a handkerchief
+to hide any convulsive distortion. But as the medical evidence (in this
+detail accurate) testified, death was instantaneous. I pocketed the
+razor and the empty sulfonal phial. With a woman like Mrs. Drabdump to
+watch me, I could do anything I pleased. I got her to draw my attention
+to the fact that both the windows were fastened. Some fool, by the by,
+thought there was a discrepancy in the evidence because the police found
+only one window fastened, forgetting that, in my innocence, I took care
+not to fasten the window I had opened to call for aid. Naturally I did
+not 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. My
+object was to gain time. I wanted the body to be fairly cold and stiff
+before being discovered, though there was not much danger here; for, as
+you saw by the medical evidence, there is no telling the time of death
+to an hour or two. The frank way in which I said the death was very
+recent disarmed all suspicion, and even Dr. Robinson was unconsciously
+worked upon, in adjudging the time of death, by the knowledge (query
+here, Mr. Templeton) that it had preceded my advent on the scene.
+
+"Before leaving Mrs. Drabdump there is just one point I should like to
+say a word about. You have listened so patiently, sir, to my lectures on
+the science of sciences that you will not refuse to hear the last. A
+good deal of importance has been attached to Mrs. Drabdump's
+oversleeping herself by half an hour. It happens that this (like the
+innocent fog which has also been made responsible for much) is a purely
+accidental and irrelevant circumstance. In all works on inductive logic
+it is thoroughly recognized that only some of the circumstances of a
+phenomenon are of its essence and causally interconnected; there is
+always a certain proportion of heterogeneous accompaniments which have
+no intimate relation whatever with the phenomenon. Yet so crude is as
+yet the comprehension of the science of evidence, that every feature of
+the phenomenon under investigation is made equally important, and sought
+to be linked with the chain of evidence. To attempt to explain
+everything is always the mark of the tyro. The fog and Mrs. Drabdump's
+oversleeping herself were mere accidents. There are always these
+irrelevant accompaniments, and the true scientist allows for this
+element of (so to speak) chemically unrelated detail. Even I never
+counted on the unfortunate series of accidental phenomena which have led
+to 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 few
+minutes earlier on the night of December 3d, so that she didn't know of
+Constant's visit, was a relevant accident. In fact, just as the art of
+the artist or the editor consists largely in knowing what to leave out,
+so does the art of the scientific detector of crime consist in knowing
+what details to ignore. In short, to explain everything is to explain
+too much. And too much is worse than too little. To return to my
+experiment. My success exceeded my wildest dreams. None had an inkling
+of the truth. The insolubility of the Big Bow Mystery teased the acutest
+minds in Europe and the civilized world. That a man could have been
+murdered in a thoroughly inaccessible room savored of the ages of magic.
+The redoubtable Wimp, who had been blazoned as my successor, fell back
+on 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, and
+to look at the crime with the eyes of another, or of my old self. I
+found the work of art so perfect as to leave only one sublimely simple
+solution. The very terms of the problem were so inconceivable that, had
+I not been the murderer, I should have suspected myself, in conjunction
+of course with Mrs. Drabdump. The first persons to enter the room would
+have seemed to me guilty. I wrote at once (in a disguised hand and over
+the 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 who
+entered the room together. To dash a half-truth in the world's eyes is
+the surest way of blinding it altogether. This letter of mine I
+contradicted myself (in my own name) the next day, and in the course of
+the long letter which I was tempted to write I adduced fresh evidence
+against 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 enjoyed
+the hunt more. Unfortunately, Wimp, set on the chase again by my own
+letter, by dint of persistent blundering, blundered into a track
+which--by a devilish tissue of coincidences I had neither foreseen nor
+dreamt of--seemed to the world the true. Mortlake was arrested and
+condemned. Wimp had apparently crowned his reputation. This was too
+much. I had taken all this trouble merely to put a feather in Wimp's
+cap, whereas I had expected to shake his reputation by it. It was bad
+enough that an innocent man should suffer; but that Wimp should achieve
+a reputation he did not deserve, and overshadow all his predecessors by
+dint of a colossal mistake, this seemed to me intolerable. I have moved
+heaven 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 world
+searched for the missing girl; I have petitioned and agitated. In vain.
+I have failed. Now I play my last card. As the overweening Wimp could
+not be allowed to go down to posterity as the solver of this terrible
+mystery, I decided that the condemned man might just as well profit by
+his exposure. That is the reason I make the exposure to-night, before it
+is too late to save Mortlake."
+
+"So that is the reason?" said the Home Secretary with a suspicion of
+mockery in his tones.
+
+"The sole reason."
+
+Even as he spoke a deeper roar than ever penetrated the study. The crowd
+had again started cheering. Impatient as the watchers were, they felt
+that no news was good news. The longer the interview accorded by the
+Home Secretary to the chairman of the Defense Committee, the greater the
+hope 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 the
+house."
+
+Templeton went back into the outer room and brought back the cablegram
+that had been lying on the Minister's writing-table when Grodman came
+in. The Home Secretary silently handed it to his visitor. It was from
+the Chief of Police of Melbourne, announcing that Jessie Dymond had just
+arrived in that city in a sailing vessel, ignorant of all that had
+occurred, and had been immediately dispatched back to England, having
+made a statement entirely corroborating the theory of the defense.
+
+"Pending further inquiries into this," said the Home Secretary, not
+without appreciation of the grim humor of the situation as he glanced at
+Grodman's ashen cheeks, "I have reprieved the prisoner. Mr. Templeton
+was about to dispatch the messenger to the governor of Newgate as you
+entered this room. Mr. Wimp's card-castle would have tumbled to pieces
+without your assistance. Your still undiscoverable crime would have
+shaken his reputation as you intended."
+
+A sudden explosion shook the room and blent with the cheers of the
+populace. 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 of
+the hansom helped to bear the stretcher.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+The Antique Library of Standard and Popular 12mos.
+
+
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+    ABBOT. Scott.
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+
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