Crum placed the musty sheets of lettering on the table before him, solemnly took off his spectacles and wiped them, and then stared across quietly at me without a word, as if he would let this astonishing balderdash sink deeply into my all too shallow soul. There was a silence in the office, unbroken save by the buzzing of the blue-bottles at the windows and the distant roar of the Strand, filtered by intervening acres of brickwork. For my part I found no words to express my emotions. For really it came upon me as a shock to think what crack-brained enthusiasts our fathers were. Here was a sound, apparently intelligent, old British seaman, who had knocked about the world more than a little, worrying himself to set curses on the heads of his unborn descendants if they should fail to be just such fools as himself. He meets a half-dozen of forlorn savages in mid-ocean, by purely circumstantial evidence connects them with another band of niggers of whom he has only got word by hearsay, and proceeds to spend ten years of his life in tracking the latter to a lair which probably never existed. And not satisfied, as I say, with this astounding waste of time and energy, but he expects ten other fools to do the same. I stared, therefore, at the good Crum with these unvoiced musings extremely vivid in my brain, the while I thanked God softly below my breath for civilization and common sense.
It was the lawyer who broke the silence before it got strained.
“I may say, my lord,” he remarked, “that we have compared this writing with the signature of your ancestor’s marriage record in Sellwood church. It is identical, and there seems to be no doubt that it is authentic. I would remind you that it is beyond question that he spent many years in what was called ‘The Indies’ at that date—the Southern Seas of America, in point of fact—where he left the reputation of a valiant sailor—I’m afraid I must say buccaneer. But you must remember that times were different,” he added hastily, feeling that as a supporter of the law he must not seem to favour equivocal methods.
“That I believe is entirely true,” I conceded. “Tradition has it that he was one of the most energetic old pirates of his day. But may I ask how you propose to explain his document getting to Lisbon into the shop of the local rubbish dealer, or whatever he may have been? Why did it not come home to those for whom it was intended? My unfortunate forefathers for twelve generations have had these curses hanging over them, and have lived in comfortable ignorance.”
“I don’t think there is much difficulty in finding explanation,” he replied deliberately. “You know that Sir John did perish out there, and to this day no news has been heard of his ultimate fate. My own suspicions are that Da Suhares—by the way, the people from whom your uncle purchased these documents bore the name of Soares—very possibly brought him treacherously to his death to possess the wealth that they had reaped in company. It is a very possible solution of the mystery, and we are not likely at this time of day to find a better one. But I must say, my lord, that to my mind the authenticity of the document is absolutely determined, and I have had experience of similar matters, I may say, for over half-a-century.”
“It’s plausible enough,” said I, shifting my ground, “but not good enough in my discretion to send a man fussing over to Yucatan for further explanations. Supposing the thing is absolutely correct, both in itself and in its deductions, what good is to be made of it at this time of day? Surely my uncle did not expect to find this unknown race after they have been lost three centuries or more? At any rate I shouldn’t have thought it of him. He showed no signs of brain softening ten years ago—or twelve, was it?—when I last interviewed him.”
He leant his elbows on the table, and drew the tips of his fingers together in a judicial attitude before he made answer in his intolerably cautious accent. Then he delivered himself of his opinions weightily.
“I think you are forgetting the other scroll—the one in symbol which was purchased with the one now before you. Recollect that if this could be interpreted, the mystery in all probability was one no longer. Your uncle was a man of leisure, fond of travel, and with the collecting mania. I am bound to say that under these circumstances I can understand his attitude. He knew that in Central America was the one man who could translate—if anybody could—this extremely recondite document. He also knew that in any case at his journey’s end he would find a vast field of interest in the lately discovered monuments of Yucatan. I must say that considering these things I should have been surprised if he had not gone. If you think of the astounding possibilities opened up to him in discovery if he did find a meaning to this scroll, and remember the enthusiastic nature of his temperament on matters of this kind, no room for wonder is left—at any rate not to my mind.”
I was fairly dumfounded. To think that a little cut-and-dried old solicitor could absolutely find, not only excuses for this absurd conduct, but a positive encouragement, was more than I could have believed possible. I gaped upon him.
“My dear Mr. Crum,” said I pityingly, “we are not in the sixteenth century. I can conceive a rampant adventurer like Sir Walter Raleigh, let us say—a man with the heart of a lion and the brains of a four-year-old child—setting out on some such wild-goose chase, but that a British peer, of good health and wealth, nigh threescore years of age——”