Samuel Boyd of Catchpole Square: A Mystery

by B. L. Farjeon

[DICK MAKES A DISCOVERY.]

His familiarity with the regulations and movements of the police hailing from the Bishop Street Police Station was of assistance to him. He knew that one end of Constable Applebee's beat was close to Catchpole Square, and his design was to watch for that officer's approach, and to remain hidden till he turned in the opposite direction. This would ensure him freedom of action for some fifteen or twenty minutes, time sufficient to enable him to mount the wall. He experienced little difficulty in the execution of this design. Constable Applebee sauntered to the end of his beat, lingered a moment or two, and then began to retrace his steps. Dick now prepared for action. "I really think," he mused, "that I should shine as a burglar."

There were few persons in the streets, and none in the thoroughfare on which the dead wall abutted. The first step to be taken was to ascertain if any person was in the house. He turned, therefore, into Catchpole Square, and looked up at the windows. There was no light in them, and from the position in which he stood he could discern no signs of life within. No long neglected cemetery could have presented a more desolate appearance. He knocked at the door, and his summons, many times repeated, met with no response. Dick did all this in a leisurely manner, being prepared with an answer in case an explanation was demanded. So absolutely imperative was it that he should be convinced that the house was uninhabited before he forced an entrance that he kept in the Square fully a quarter of an hour, at the expiration of which he passed through Deadman's Court, and was once more in front of the dead wall. Stealing to each end of the thoroughfare to see that no person was in view, he unwound the rope from his body, and fixed upon the spot to fling the grapnel. The first throw was unsuccessful; and the second; but at the third the grapnel caught, and Dick pulled at it hard in order to be sure that it was fast. Then, moistening the palms of his hands, and muttering, "Now, then, old Jack and the beanstalk," he commenced to climb.

It was not an easy task, partly in consequence of his inexperience at this kind of work, and partly because of the bulging of the large bottle of water under his waistcoat. But Dick was not to be beaten; not only were all the latent forces of his mind in full play, but all the latent forces of his body, and though his hands were chafed in the execution of the task, and the perspiration streamed down his face, he reached the top of the wall in safety, and with the bottle unbroken.

"Bravo, Dick," he gasped, pausing to recover his breath. "Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, I hope Humpty Dumpty won't have a bad fall. Take care of yourself, Dick, for my sake."

Drawing up the rope he reversed the grapnel, fixed it tight, let the rope drop on the inner side of the wall, and slid nimbly down.

He looked around. There were windows at the back, most of them masked with inside shutters, as they had been for years. To each of the six houses there was a back yard, and each yard was separated from its neighbour on either side by a wall as nigh as high as that which enclosed them all in the rear. Thus Dick found himself shut out from the world, as it were, with little likelihood of his movements being detected from any of the houses except the one he intended to break into--and that was as still and lifeless as death itself.

"Now, my lad," he said, "just to put life into you, for this desert of Sahara is enough to give any man the blue devils, I'll treat you to a drink. Is it agreed to? Passed unanimously."

Then came the difficult task of unhooking the grapnel, for it would never do to leave it on the wall. He made several futile attempts to loosen and bring it down, and had he not discovered in a corner a forked pole which at some remote period had probably been used as a clothes' prop, there would have been nothing for it but to leave it there and run the risk of discovery. With the aid of the pole, however, he succeeded in unhooking it, so suddenly that it fell to the ground with a crash and nearly gave him a crack on the head.

Gathering up the rope and slinging it over his arm, Dick searched for a means of effecting an entrance into the house. From the evidences of decay all around he judged that no use had been made of the back of the premises for a considerable time past; during his service with Samuel Boyd he had had no acquaintance of the rooms which looked out upon the yard, his duties confining him to the office in which the secretarial work was done. Above a door, which he tried in vain to open, was a small window which seemed less secure than the others; and when he reached up to it (standing on a rickety bench against the wall), this proved to be the case; but though the frame rattled when he shook it he saw no means of getting out of the difficulty except by breaking a pane of glass. Half measures would not serve now, and he adopted this bold expedient, pausing to listen, when the shattered glass fell upon the floor within, whether the crash had raised an alarm. There was no indication of it.