“She’s staying at the Hotel Victoria, in the name of Mrs. Seymour. I’ve left Craven there, and he’s subsidised one of the chambermaids as well, so I don’t think she’ll slip through our fingers.”
“Where does she come from?”
“I don’t know for certain yet. She’s registered as from Paris. I’ve arranged that one of my young women shall go to the hotel as a chambermaid to-morrow, on the chance of an opportunity of going through the lady’s belongings.”
Three days later Yardley again came round to see Tempest, but only to report an ignominious failure. It was evident that Mrs. Seymour had become aware that she was being watched and had made her plans accordingly.
Asking for a hansom to be called one morning, she had ostentatiously given instructions to the hall porter that she was expecting a visitor at noon, and, if she herself had not returned, the visitor was to be asked to wait. She then gave the cabby directions to go to Paquin’s showrooms in Doder Street, and had driven away. Craven had been inclined to follow; but feeling certain Mrs. Seymour would return, he decided that more was to be gained by overhauling her boxes, and he at once sought his confederate, who was figuring in the hotel as a chambermaid. Together they had thoroughly and systematically searched Mrs. Seymour’s room. Not a scrap of writing did they find—not the faintest clue of any sort from which they could start to establish the identity of Mrs. Seymour. Finally, they had relinquished the search in disgust, and Craven had set himself to await the lady’s return. She never did return; and when Craven reported, Yardley saw at once that the whole thing had been a ruse. The cabby, when found and questioned, told them that when they reached Trafalgar Square, his fare had told him to drive to Euston. He had done so, and the lady had entered the station. The most diligent inquiry failed to produce any person who had seen and recognised or had noticed the lady at the station. None of the booking-clerks recognised her from the description which was given. Her luggage, which remained at the hotel unclaimed, contained nothing of any sufficient value for it to be in the least likely it would ever be claimed, if Yardley were correct in his surmise that Mrs. Seymour had by some means become aware that she herself was under surveillance, and had deliberately elected to withdraw herself from observation.
The court for Crown cases reserved having decided—much to the disgust of the police—that the privilege of a solicitor prevented the execution of the search warrant and the overhauling of the papers of the firm, the trial of Arthur Baxter could no longer be delayed, and took its place in the judge’s list at the ensuing sessions of the Central Criminal Court. At the first reference by the prosecution to the secret trust, Tempest successfully objected. As he pointed out, Baxter had only been advantaged by the action of the Crown, which had, with full knowledge of the consequence, itself precipitated the circumstances, which vested the money in the hands of the surviving partners. That result Baxter could neither have produced nor anticipated; but for the moment assuming he could have produced it, then the three partners were equally concerned, and must be equally guilty; but the Crown had only indicated one, though, on an indictment of the three for conspiracy, a conviction would have been more easy to procure. Finally, he said that if his lordship admitted any reference to the secret trust on the ground of motive, then he should at once call the other surviving partners to prove that no one of the three had ever even suggested the division of the trust money, even after the court had formally declared it to be the absolute property of the partners; but that they had voluntarily reconstituted the trust, or rather had themselves constituted a trust for purposes which they declined to divulge, but which advantaged themselves personally no more than had the original will. In the end the judge upheld the objection. The trial was thus narrowed down to the fact that the partners possessed keys, and could have obtained access; that Baxter had been overheard to have had a difference with Sir John, when the latter had called at his chambers the night preceding the murder; and, what was most damning, that a revolver, with its marks of identification erased, together with bullets similar to the one which had caused the death of Sir John Rellingham, had been found at Mr. Baxter’s chambers secreted in a seldom used suit-case.
The case at best was a weak one; and doubtless relying upon the fact that Arthur Baxter would go into the witness-box and might convict himself under cross-examination, the ruling out of the question of the secret trust seriously handicapped the prosecution. Tempest had frankly told Baxter he didn’t believe the explanation of the quarrel which the solicitor had vouchsafed him, but Baxter declined to give any other. For that reason the barrister was surprised that only one or two formal questions relating to the quarrel were put to Bailey, the factotum of Arthur Baxter, and one of the witnesses called for the prosecution. Consequently Tempest asked Baxter no questions on the point when he put him in the witness-box. But the matter was raised and pressed in his cross-examination. Question after question he cleverly fenced with; but at last, driven into a corner, he gave a full explanation: “I have tried to keep faith with Sir John,” he said; “but you won’t let me. The point was simply this: Sir John called at my chambers, and asked me if I would marry his daughter. Neither I nor my partners at that time had the smallest idea that Sir John had ever been married except to his late wife, whom we all knew, or had ever had a daughter; and when I was talking to him, I didn’t know whether his daughter were illegitimate or legitimate. He showed me her portrait. She was a very beautiful girl; but all I felt inclined to promise was that I was quite willing to meet her, with the idea of marriage, if we mutually liked each other, and providing all knowledge was kept from her until after marriage that she had been the subject of discussion and arrangement between us. I wanted to win the affection of the girl on my own merits, or else I would be no party to such a marriage.”
“But, Mr. Baxter,” had been counsel’s reply, “you say Sir John was asking a favour of you, or requesting you to fall in with a proposal of his? How do you account for the fact that it was Sir John who said, ‘No, Arthur; don’t say any more. It’s quite final. I will not’? You admit, I suppose, that he did say that?”
“Oh, yes, he said it.”
“Well, then, how do you reconcile that with your story?”