Samuel Boyd of Catchpole Square: A Mystery

by B. L. Farjeon

Again he had to consider his course of action, and he was not long undecided. He would be silent. It was not Reginald he was championing, it was Florence. Until he saw and spoke with her he would do all that lay in his power to divert suspicion from the man she loved. Animated by this resolve, and with a dogged disregard of consequences, he folded the incriminating document and put it in his pocket. He made no attempt to justify himself; at all hazards he was determined to protect Florence, and, right or wrong, he would do what he had determined to do. The knowledge he had gained he would keep locked in his breast. Let others make the discovery of the murder. He would not move a step towards it.

All this time he had not given a thought to his own safety, to the peril in which he would be placed if his presence in the house of death became known. It was easy enough to devise a train of argument which would cast such suspicion upon himself as to cause most people to believe that he was the guilty man. Having no wish to court this danger he determined to leave the house as quickly as possible, and to postpone further reflection till the morning.

A last look into the death-chamber, a swift glance at the awful form lying there, a hurried examination of the papers to see if there were any other incriminating documents among them--which to his relief there were not--a pause before the wax figure of the Chinaman and a weird fancy that it also had met its death at the hand of a murderer, the careful gathering together of all the articles he had brought with him into the house, and he was ready to go.

He had a thought of leaving the house by the front door, but there was greater risk in that than in going back the way he had come; so he scrambled out of the window at the back, finding it much more difficult to scramble out than to scramble in, and was once more in the yard. He listened for sounds of voices or footsteps in the thoroughfare on the other side of the dead wall, and, hearing none, flung his grapnel up. It caught at the first throw, and climbing the rope he cautiously peeped over the wall to see if any wayfarers were about. No person was in sight. Detaching the grapnel he hung by his hands and dropped to the ground, thinking how foolish he had been in the first instance not to have adopted this means of reaching the inner ground. Tying the rope round his waist, and buttoning his coat over that and the large bottle, half the water in which he had drank during his investigations, he proceeded in the direction of his lodgings, nibbling a biscuit as he walked along.

The faint light of early morn was in the sky. A new day was dawning, to bring joy to some, despair to some, to raise this toiler up, to dash this toiler down. No warning of these issues in the peaceful grey light of morn. Majestic nature rolls its allotted course heedless of the fret of life. The yellow gas in the street lamps had a ghastly glare; at the end of a street a cat with green eyes gleaming like evil jewels stood in the middle of the road, and scampered off at his approach. A wretched man who seemed to start out of the ground cried, "Hi!" and flung a stone after it, and then, with folded arms and head sunk low on his breast, slinked off with a scowl, as though he had struck at the world for its treatment of him; two or three blear-eyed human night-birds, shivering in the grey light which, in its promise of a fair day, brought no solace to them, slouched close to the walls and houses, and cast lowering glances upon Dick as he passed; a forlorn woman, who had better have been in her grave, said, "Good morning, my dear," in a voice so false and hollow in its horrible gaiety that he shuddered as he heard it, and hurried on. But he turned and threw the degraded creature a sixpence. In his state of mind all forms of misery appealed strongly to him.

He reached Paradise Row in safety, and got into the house without disturbing his landlady. Locking the door of his room, he threw off his clothes and went to bed, deeming it wiser to seek three or four hours' rest in a natural way than to sleep with his clothes on. He was wearied and exhausted, but so excited that sleep did not come readily to him. Drowsily courting it he found himself dwelling upon the last words in the document he had stolen--there was no mincing the matter; he had stolen it: "Notation 2647." What could be the meaning of those words? Notation 2647--notation 2647. He repeated it dozens of times, and dreamt that the wax figure of the Chinaman was pursuing him over mountain and field, through fire and water, shouting after him, "Notation 2647!" Youth and a healthy physique, however, triumphed over these disordered fancies, and after awhile he sank into a dreamless sleep, and arose, refreshed and full of vigour, at half past eight. He heard the snoring of Constable Pond, and the soft footsteps of Mrs. Pond outside his door. He stepped into the passage, and it was like the breath of spring to his senses to meet her smiling face.

"Good morning, sir," she said. "I hope you slept well."

"Capitally," he replied. "The bed is very comfortable. Did I disturb you at all last night?" He waited in anxiety for her answer.

"Oh, no, sir. I'm asleep the minute I put my head on the pillow. Pond says I should be a blessing to burglars. Can I get you anything for breakfast?"

"Nothing, thank you," he said. "I take my meals out."