PETER TAKES THE HELM
As the detectives travelled through night-hidden Kent and presently boarded the packet for Boulogne, Mark Brendon told his story with every detail for the benefit of Mr. Ganns. Before doing so he reread his own notes and was able to set each incident of the case very clearly and copiously before the older man. Peter never once interrupted him, and, at the conclusion of the narrative, complimented Mark on the recital.
"The moving picture is bright but not comprehensive," he said, returning to a former analogy. "In fact I'm beginning to see already that, no matter what we get at the end of the reel, there are still a few preliminary scenes that should come in at the beginning."
"I've begun at the beginning, Mr. Ganns."
But Peter shook his head.
"Half the battle is to know the beginning of a case. I'll almost go so far as to say that, given the real beginning, the end should be assured. You've not begun at the beginning of the Redmayne tangle, Mark. If you had, the clue to this labyrinth might be in your hands to-day. The more I hear and the more I think, the more firmly am I convinced that the truth we are out to find can only be discovered by a deal of hard digging in past times. There is a lot of spade work demanded and you, or I, may have to return to England to do it—unless we can get the information without the labour. But I've no reason to count on any luck of that sort."
"I should like to know the nature of the ground I failed to cover," said Brendon; but Peter was not disposed to enlighten him at present.
"Needn't bother yet," he said. "Now talk about yourself and give the case a rest."
They chatted until the dawn, by which time their train had reached Paris, and an hour or two later they were on their way to Italy.
Mr. Ganns had determined to cross the Lakes and arrive unexpectedly at Menaggio. He had now turned his mind once more to the problem before him and spoke but little. He sat with his notebook open and made an occasional entry as he pursued his thoughts. Mark read newspapers and presently handed a page to Mr. Ganns.
"What you said about acrostics interested me," he began. "Here's one and I've been trying to guess it for an hour. No doubt it ought to be easy; but I expect there's a catch. Wonder if it will puzzle you."
Peter smiled and dropped his notebook.
"Acrostics are a habit of mind," he said. "You grow to think acrostically and be up to all the tricks of the trade. You soon get wise to the way that people think who make them; and then you'll find they all think alike and all try to hoodwink you along the same lines. If you tempt me on to acrostics, you'll soon wish you had not."
Mark pointed to the puzzle.
"Try that," he said. "I can't make head or tail of it; yet I dare say you'll thrash it out if you've got the acrostic mind."
Mr. Ganns cast his eye over the puzzle. It ran thus:
When to the North you go,
The folk shall greet you so.
. . . . . . . . .
1. Upright and light and Source of Light
2. And Source of Light, reversed, are plain.
3. A term of scorn comes into sight
And Source of Light, reversed again.
The American regarded the problem for a minute in silence, then smiled and handed the paper back to Brendon.
"Quite neat, in its little conventional way," he said. "It's on the regular English pattern. Our acrostics are a trifle smarter, but all run into one form. The great acrostic writer isn't born. If acrostics were as big a thing as chess, then we should have masters who would produce masterpieces."
"But this one—d'you see it?"
"Milk for babes, Mark."
Mr. Ganns turned to his notebook, wrote swiftly into it, tore out the page, and handed the solution to his companion.
Brendon read:
G O D
Omega Alph A
D O G
"If you know Knut Hamsun's stories, then you guess it instantly. If not, you might possibly be bothered," he said, while Brendon stared.
"There are two ways with acrostics," continued Peter, full of animation, "the first is to make lights so difficult that they turn your hair grey till you've got them, the second—just traps—perhaps three perfectly sound answers to the same light, but the second just a shade sounder than the first, and the third a shade sounder than either of the others."
"Who makes acrostics like that?"
"Nobody. Life's too short; but if I devoted a year to a perfect acrostic, you bet your life it would take my fellow creatures a year to guess it. The same with cryptography, which we've both run up against, no doubt, in course of business. Cyphers are mostly crude; but I've often thought what a right down beauty it might be possible to make, given a little pains. The detective story writers make very good ones sometimes; but then the smart man, who wipes everybody's eyes, always gets 'em—by pulling down just the right book from the villain's library. My cryptograph won't depend on books."
Peter chattered on; then he suddenly stopped and turned to his notes again.
He looked up presently.
"The hard thing before us is this," he said, "to get into touch with Robert Redmayne, or his ghost. There are two sorts of ghost, Mark; the real thing—in which you don't believe and concerning which I hold a watching brief; and the manufactured article. Now the manufactured article can be quite as useful to the bulls as the crooks."
"You believe in ghosts!"
"I didn't say so. But I keep an open mind. I've heard some funny things from men whose word could be relied upon."
"If this is a ghost, that's a way out, of course; but in that case why are you frightened for Albert Redmayne's life?"
"I don't say he's a ghost and of course I don't think he's a ghost; but—"
He broke off and changed the subject.
"What I'm doing is to compare your verbal statement with Mr. Redmayne's written communication," he said, patting his book. "My old friend goes back a long way farther than you would, because he knows a lot more than you did. It's all here. I've got a regard for my eyes, so I had it typed. You'd better read it, however. You'll find the story of Robert Redmayne from childhood and the story of the girl, his niece, and of her dead father. Mrs. Doria's father was a rough customer—scorpions to Robert's whips apparently—a man a bit out of the common; yet he never came to open clash with the law. You never thought of Robert's dead brother, Henry, did you! But you'd be surprised how we can get at character and explain contradictions by studying the different members of a family."
"I shall like to read the report."
"It's valuable to us, because written without prejudice. That's where it beats your very lucid account, Mark. There was something running through your story, like a thread of silk in cotton, that you won't find here. It challenged me from the jump, my boy, and I'm inclined to think that in that thread of silk I shall just find the reason of your failure, before I've wound it up."
"I don't understand you, Ganns."
"You wouldn't—not yet. But we'll change the metaphor. We'll say there was a red herring drawn across the trail, and that you took the bait and, having started right enough, presently forsook the right scent for the wrong."
"Puzzle—to find the red herring," said Mark.
Mr. Ganns smiled.
"I think I've found it," he replied. "But on the other hand, perhaps I haven't. In twenty-four hours I shall know. I hope I'm right—for your sake. If I am, then you are discharged without a stain on your character; if I'm not, then the case is black against you."
Brendon made no reply. Neither his conscience nor his wit threw any light on the point. Then Peter, turning to his notes, touched on a minor incident and showed the other that it admitted of a doubt.
"D'you remember the night you left 'Crow's Nest' after your first visit? On the way back to Dartmouth you suddenly saw Robert Redmayne standing by a gate; and when the moonlight revealed you to him, he leaped away and disappeared into the trees. Why?"
"He knew me."
"How?"
"We had met at Princetown and we had spoken together for some minutes by the pool in Foggintor Quarry, where I was fishing."
"That's right. But he didn't know who you were then. Even if he'd remembered meeting you six months before in the dusk at Foggintor, why should he think you were a man who was hunting him?"
Mark reflected.
"That's true," he said. "Probably he'd have bolted from anybody that night, not wishing to be seen."
"I only raise the question. Of course it is easily explained on a general assumption that Redmayne knew every man's hand was against him. He would naturally, in his hunted state, fly the near approach of a man."
"Probably he didn't remember me."
"Probably; but there are possibilities about the action. He might have been warned against you."
"There was nobody to warn him. He had not yet seen his niece, nor spoken with her. Who else could have warned him—except Bendigo Redmayne himself?"
Peter did not pursue the subject. He shut his book, yawned, took snuff, and declared himself ready for a meal. The long day passed and both men turned in early and slept till daybreak.
Before noon they had left Baveno on a steamer and were crossing the blue depths of Maggiore. Brendon had never seen the Italian lakes before and he fell silent in the presence of such beauty; nor did Mr. Ganns desire to talk. They sat together and watched the panorama unfold, the hills and gorges, the glory of the light over earth and water, the presence of man, his little homes upon the mountains, his little barques upon the lake.
At Luino they left the steamer and proceeded to Tresa. Beside the railroad, on this brief instalment of the journey, there stood lofty palisades of close wire netting hung with bells. Peter, who had travelled here twenty years earlier, explained that they were erected as a safeguard against the eternal smuggling between Switzerland and Italy.
"'Only man is vile' in fact," he concluded and woke a passing wave of bitterness in his companion's spirit.
"And our life is concerned with his vileness," Mark answered. "I hate myself sometimes and wish I was a grocer or a linen draper or even a soldier or sailor. It's degrading to let your life's work depend on the wickedness of your fellow creatures, Ganns. I hope a time is coming when our craft will be as obsolete as bows and arrows."
The elder laughed.
"What does Goethe say somewhere?" he asked. "That if man endures for a million years, he'll never lack obstacles to give him trouble, or the pressure of need to make him conquer them. Then there's Montaigne—you ought to read Montaigne—wisest of men. He'll tell you that human wisdom has never reached the perfection of conduct that itself prescribes; and could it arrive there, it would still dictate to itself others beyond. In a word, the world will never be short of crooks while human nature lasts, nor yet of men trained to lay them by the heels. Crime will continue, in some form or other, as long as men do; and as the criminal gets cleverer, so must we."
"I think better of human nature," answered Mark and his friend applauded him.
"Quite right, my boy—at your age," he said.
They wound over Lugano and came in evening light to its northern shore. Then once more they took train, climbed aloft, and fell at last to Menaggio on Como's brink.
"Now," said Peter, "I guess we'll leave our traps here and beat it to Villa Pianezzo right away. We'll scare the old boy a bit, but can tell him things all fell right and so we found that we could jog along a week before we thought to do so. Not a word that I think him to be in danger."
Within twenty minutes their one-horse vehicle had reached Mr. Redmayne's modest home and they found three persons just about to take an evening meal. Simultaneously there appeared Mr. Redmayne, his niece, and Giuseppe Doria; and while Albert, Italian fashion, embraced Mr. Ganns and planted a kiss upon his cheek, Jenny greeted Mark Brendon and he looked once more into her eyes.
There had come new experiences to her and they did not fail of the man's observation. She smiled indeed and flushed and proclaimed her wonder and admiration at the speed which had brought him across Europe to her uncle's succour; but even in her animation and excitement the new expression persisted. It set Mark's heart throbbing vigorously and told him that perchance he might yet be useful to her. For there hung a shadow of melancholy on Jenny's face her smiles could not dispel.
Doria held back a little while his wife welcomed her uncle's friend; then he came forward, declared his pleasure at meeting Mark again and his belief that time would soon reveal the truth and set a period to the sinister story of the wanderer.
Mr. Redmayne was overjoyed at seeing Ganns and quite forgot the object of his visit in the pleasure of receiving him.
"It has been my last and abiding ambition to introduce you to Virgilio Poggi, dear Peter, so that you, he and I may sit together, hear each other's voices and look into each other's eyes. And now this will happen. Thus the unhappy spirit who wanders upon the hills has unconsciously accomplished a beautiful thing."
Jenny and Assunta, had hastily prepared for the visitors and now all sat at supper and Brendon learned how rooms were already taken for him and Mr. Ganns at the Hotel Victoria.
"That's as may be," he declared to Doria's wife. "You will find, I think, that Mr. Ganns is going to stop here. He takes the lead in this affair. Indeed there was no great reason why I should have intruded again, where I have failed so often."
Jenny looked at him softly.
"I am very thankful you have come," she said—in a whisper for his ear alone.
"Then I am very thankful too," he replied.
After a cheerful meal Peter absolutely declined to cross Como and visit Signor Poggi on the instant.
"I've had enough of your lakes for one day, Albert," he announced, "and I want to talk business and get a rough, general idea of what more is known than Mark and I already know. Now what has happened since you wrote, Mrs. Doria?"
"Tell them, Giuseppe," directed Mr. Redmayne.
"Your gift—the gold box—take a pinch," said Peter holding out his snuff to the old bookworm; but the master of Villa Pianezzo refused and lighted a cigar.
"I will have smoke rather than dust, my precious Peter," he said.
"The man has been seen twice since you heard from my wife," began Doria. "Once I met him face to face on the hill, where I walked alone to reflect on my own affairs; and once—the night before last—he came here. Happily Mr. Redmayne's room overlooks the lake and the garden walls are high, so he could not reach it; but the bedroom of Mr. Redmayne's man, Ernesto, is upon the side that stands up to the road.
"Robert Redmayne came at two o'clock, flung pebbles at the window, wakened Ernesto, and demanded to be let in to see his brother. But the Italian had been warned exactly what to say and do if such a thing happened. He speaks English well and told the unfortunate man that he must appear by day. Ernesto then mentioned a certain place, a mile from here in a secluded valley—a little bridge that spans a stream—and directed Robert to await his brother at that spot on the following day at noon. This my Uncle Alberto had already planned in the event of his brother reappearing.
"Having heard this, the red man departed without more words and your friend, greatly courageous, kept the appointment that he had made, taking only me with him. We were there before midday and waited until after two o'clock. But nobody came to us and we saw neither man nor woman.
"For my own part I feel very certain that Robert Redmayne was hidden near at hand, and that he would have come out quickly enough had his brother been alone; but of course Uncle Alberto would not go alone, and we would not have allowed him to do so in any case."
Peter listened intently to these words.
"And what of your meeting with him?" he asked.
"That was clearly an accident on Robert Redmayne's part. I happened to be walking, deep in thought near the spot where my wife first saw him, and, rounding a corner, I suddenly confronted the man sitting on a rock by the path. He started at my footfall, looked up, clearly recognized me, hesitated, and then leaped into the bushes. I endeavoured to follow but he distanced me. He is harbouring aloft there and may be in touch with some charcoal burner above in the mountains. He was strong and agile and moved swiftly."
"How was he dressed?"
"Exactly as I saw him dressed at 'Crow's Nest' when Mr. Bendigo Redmayne disappeared."
"I should like to know his tailor," said Mr. Ganns. "That's a useful suit he wears."
Then he asked a question that seemed to bear but little on the subject.
"Plenty of smugglers in the mountains I suppose?"
"Plenty," answered Giuseppe, "and my heart is with them."
"They dodge the customs officers and get across the frontier by night sometimes I dare say?"
"If I stop here long enough, I shall be better in a position to know," replied the other cheerfully. "My heart, Signor Ganns, is with these boys. They are a brave and valiant people and their lives are very dangerous and thrilling and interesting. They are heroes and not villains at all. Our woman, Assunta, is the widow of a free trader. She has good friends among them."
"Now, Peter, tell us all that is in your mind," urged Mr. Redmayne as he poured out five little glasses of golden liqueur. "You hold that I go in some peril from this unhappy man?"
"I do think so, Albert. And as to my mind, it is not by any means made up. You say, 'Catch Robert Redmayne first and decide afterwards.' Yes; but I will tell you an interesting thing. We are not going to catch Robert Redmayne."
"You throw up the sponge, signor?" asked Giuseppe in astonishment.
"Surely you have caught everybody you ever tried to catch, Peter?" asked Albert.
"There is a reason why I shall not catch him," replied Ganns, sipping from his little Venetian glass.
"Can it be that you think him not a man at all but a ghost, Mr. Ganns?" asked Jenny, round-eyed.
"He has already suggested a ghost," said Mark, "but there are different sorts of ghosts, Mrs. Doria. I see that, too. There are ghosts of flesh and blood."
"If he is a ghost, he is a very solid one indeed," declared Doria.
"He is," admitted Peter. "And yet none the less a ghost in my opinion. Now let us generalize. It needn't be a sound maxim to seek the person who benefits by a crime—not always—for often enough the actual legatee of a murdered man may have had nothing whatever to do with his death. Albert, for example, will inherit Mr. Bendigo Redmayne's estate when leave to assume his death is granted by the law; and Mrs. Doria will inherit her late husband's estate in due course. But it isn't suggested that your wife killed her first husband, Signor Doria; and it isn't suggested that my friend here killed his brother.
"None the less, it's a safe question to ask what a suspected man gains by his crime. And, if we put that question, we find that Robert Redmayne gained nothing whatever by killing Michael Pendean—nothing, that is, but the satisfaction of a sudden, overpowering lust to do so. Pendean's murder made Redmayne a vagabond, deprived him of his income and resources, set every man's hand against him and left him a wanderer haunted by the gallows. Yet, while he evaded the law in a manner that can only be called miraculous, he made no attempt to avert suspicion from himself. On the contrary he courted suspicion, took his victim to Berry Head on a motor bicycle and did a thousand things which defiantly proclaim him a lunatic—but for one overmastering fact. A lunatic must have been caught: he was not.
"He vanishes from Paignton, to reappear at 'Crow's Nest'; he takes another life; he apparently commits another senseless murder on the person of his own brother and once more disappears, leaving not a clue. Now, in face of these absurdities, we have a right to brush aside the apparent facts and ask ourselves a very vital question. What is that question, Signor Doria?"
"It is one I have already asked myself," replied Giuseppe. "It is one I have asked my wife. It is a question, however, which I cannot answer, because I do not know enough. There is nobody in the world who knows enough—unless it be Robert Redmayne."
Ganns nodded and took snuff.
"Good," he said.
"But what is the question?" asked Albert Redmayne. "What is the question Giuseppe puts to himself and, you put to yourself, Peter? We who are not so clever do not see the question."
"The question, my friend, is this: Did Robert Redmayne murder Michael Pendean and Bendigo Redmayne? And you can ask yourself a still more vital question: Are these two men dead at all?"
Jenny shivered violently. She put out her hand instinctively and it clutched Mark Brendon's arm where he sat next to her. He looked at her and saw that her eyes were fixed with strange doubt and horror upon Doria; while the Italian himself showed a considerable amount of surprise at Peter's conclusion.
"Corpo di Bacco! Then—" he asked.
"Then we may be said to enlarge the scope of the inquiry a good deal," answered Mr. Ganns mildly. He turned to Jenny.
"This is calculated to flutter you, young lady, when you think of your second marriage," he said. "But we're not asserting anything; we're only just having a friendly chat. Facts are what we want; and if the fact is that Robert Redmayne didn't kill Michael Pendean, that doesn't mean for a moment that Mr. Pendean isn't dead. You must not let theories frighten you now, since you certainly did not allow them to do so in the past."
"More than ever it is necessary that my unhappy brother should be secured," declared Albert. "It is interesting to remember," he added, "that poor Bendigo first thought he had to do with a ghost when the arrival of his brother was reported to him. He was very superstitious, as sailors often are, and not until Jenny had seen and spoken with her uncle, did Bendigo believe that a living man wanted to see him."
"The fact that it was actually Robert Redmayne and no ghost is proved by that incident, Ganns," added Mark Brendon. "That the man who came to 'Crow's Nest' was in truth Robert Redmayne we can rest assured through Mrs. Doria, who knew her uncle exceedingly well. It only remains to prove with equal certainty that the wanderer here is Redmayne, and one can feel very little question that he is. It is of course marvellous that he escaped discovery and arrest; but it may not be as marvellous as it seems. Stranger things have happened. And who else could it be in any case?"
"That reminds me," replied Ganns. "There has been mention made of Mr. Bendigo's log. He kept a careful diary—so it was reported. I should like to have that book, Albert, for in your statement you tell me that you preserved it."
"I did and it is here," replied his friend. "That and dear Bendigo's 'Bible,' as I call it—a copy of 'Moby Dick'—I brought away. As yet I have not consulted the diary—it was too intimate and distressed me. But I was looking forward to doing so."
"The parcel containing both books is in a drawer in the library. I'll get them," said Jenny. She left the apartment where they sat overlooking the lake and returned immediately with a parcel wrapped in brown paper.
"Why do you need this, Peter?" asked Albert, and while he was satisfied with the reply, Brendon was not.
"It's always interesting to get a thing from every angle," answered Mr. Ganns. "Your brother may have something to tell us."
But whether Bendigo's diary might have proved valuable remained a matter of doubt, for when Jenny opened the parcel, it was not there. A blank book and the famous novel were all the parcel contained.
"But I packed it myself," said Mr. Redmayne. "The diary was bound exactly as this blank volume is bound, yet it is certain that I made no mistake, for I opened my brother's log and read a page or two before completing the parcel."
"He had bought a new diary only the last time he was in Dartmouth," said Doria. "I remember the incident. I asked him what he was going to put into the book, and he said that his log was just running out and he needed a new volume."
"You are sure that you did not mistake the old, full book for the new, empty one, Albert?" asked his friend.
"I cannot be positive, of course, but I feel no shadow of doubt in my own mind."
"Then the one has been substituted for the other by somebody else. That is a very interesting fact, if true."
"Impossible," declared Jenny. "There was nobody to do such a thing, Mr. Ganns. Who could have felt any interest in poor Uncle Bendigo's diary but ourselves?"
Mr. Ganns considered.
"The answer to that question might save us a very great deal of trouble," he said. "But there may be no answer. Your uncle may be mistaken. On the other hand I have never known him to be mistaken over any question involving a book."
He took up the empty volume and turned its pages; then Brendon declared they must be going.
"I'm afraid we're keeping Mr. Redmayne out of bed, Ganns," he hinted. "Our kits have already been sent to the hotel and as we've got a mile to walk, we'd better be moving. Are you never sleepy?"
He turned to Jenny.
"I don't believe he has closed his eyes since we left England, Mrs. Doria."
But Peter did not laugh: he appeared to be deep in thought. Suddenly he spoke and surprised them.
"I'm afraid you're going to find me the sort of friend that sticketh closer than a brother, Albert. In a word, somebody must go to the hotel and bring back my travelling grip, for I'm not going to lose sight of you again till we've got this thing straightened out."
Mr. Redmayne was delighted.
"How like you, Peter—how typical of your attitude! You shall not leave me, dear friend. You shall sleep in the apartment next my own. It contains many books, but there shall be my great couch moved from my own bedroom and set up there in half an hour. It is as comfortable as a bed."
He turned to his niece.
"Seek Assunta and Ernesto and set the apartment in order for Mr. Ganns, Jenny; and you, Giuseppe, will take Mr. Brendon to the Hotel Victoria and bring back Peter's luggage."
Jenny hastened to do her uncle's bidding, while Brendon made his farewell and promised to return at an early hour on the following morning.
"My plans for to-morrow," said Peter, "subject to Mark's approval, are these. I suggest that Signor Doria should take Brendon to the scene in the hills where Robert Redmayne appeared; while, by her leave, I have a talk with Mrs. Jenny here. I'm going to run her over a bit of the past and she must be brave and give me all her attention."
He started and listened, his ear cocked toward the lake.
"What's that shindy?" he asked. "Sounds like distant cannon."
Doria laughed.
"Only the summer thunder on the mountains, signor," he answered.