Collected works of j s f.., p.672
Collected Works of J S Fletcher, page 672
All the folk who lived in No. 85 had gone to bed by that time, and the landlady, knowing that there was no late-comer to arrive, had locked and bolted her front door. It took Jennison a minute or two to turn the key and draw the two bolts, and all the time something was pulsing and throbbing in his brain, and saying over and over and over again, You’ll find the man dead! You’ll find the man dead! And when at last he had got clear of the house, and had rushed along the street to where the man lay, quiet enough, in the gutter, and had bent down and laid a hand on him, he knew that the man was dead — dead, Jennison informed himself, in non-original fashion, as a doornail.
Jennison was puzzled. He knew that a man can be all alive one minute and all dead the next. He had read — being inquisitive about such things — many newspaper reports of executions, and had gloated morbidly over the fact that from the moment of quitting the condemned cell to that in which death took place on the adjacent scaffold only thirty-five seconds had elapsed; he understood, too, that in electrocutions, the actual passage from life to death was even quicker — far quicker. But those things weren’t close at hand — this had been. Three, or at most, five minutes previously he had seen this man marching jauntily, bravely along, swinging his stick — now he lay there at Jennison’s feet as dead as — again he caught at a hackneyed phrase — as dead as Queen Anne. And Queen Anne, reflected Jennison, thinking queerly, had been dead — oh, no end of time! Dead! — but she wasn’t any deader than this chap!
There had been no noise, and so no windows went up in Cartwright Gardens. And just then no one came along, in either direction; Jennison was alone with the man who lay there so quietly. He bent down again and looked more closely at him. As far as he could judge, in the light of the street lamp and the glow of the moon, this was a man of about thirty-five years of age, a good-looking, even handsome man, a man, evidently, of some position and means, for he was well-dressed in a smartly-cut suit of dark blue serge, and had good linen, and a gold watch chain across his vest. His hat had fallen from him when he fell, and lay a yard or two away. Jennison picked it up and looked abstractedly into the lining. There, without feeling that he saw, he read the name and address of a Liverpool hatter, and turning the hat about in his hands noticed that it was quite new — perhaps its wearer had just come from Liverpool? But anyway, there he lay, statuesquely still . . . dead.
“Must ha’ been a fit!” mused Jennison, unable to run to great heights of speculation or theory. “A fit! — sudden. People do fall down and die in fits — die quick, too. So I’ve heard. It couldn’t be anything but a fit. And what am I to do next?”
As if in immediate answer to this question, the sound of a heavy, regular step came to Jennison’s ears. He knew that sound — a policeman was coming; he was coming into Cartwright Gardens from Marchmont Street. He came every midnight, almost to the minute, as Jennison, who often sat up late, tediously wooing the Muse, knew well. Presently he appeared, and Jennison hurried to meet him, and arrived at the point of contact breathless. The policeman halted, staring, but impassive.
“Oh, I say!” began Jennison lamely. “I — the fact is, there’s a dead man lying up there, nearly opposite our house. I — I think I saw him die. From my window, you know.”
The policeman quickened. He might have been a war-horse, sniffing the battle, or a fox-hound, catching a whiff of scent. His eyes opened wider, and he looked along the pavement, following Jennison’s ink-stained forefinger.
“Oh!” he exclaimed. “Just so! And —— —”
At that moment he caught sight of the dark heap lying in the gutter, and he relapsed into official silence and strode off, Jennison ambling at his side.
“Yes!” said Jennison jerkily. “I — I saw him! I was looking out of the window — my window — No. 85 I live — third floor. He came along, walking quickly, swinging his stick — I’ve an idea he was whistling or humming a tune. Then — suddenly stopped! Tore at his throat — extraordinary motions! And then he fell! and rolled into the gutter. And when I got down to him he was dead; oh, quite dead. What do you think it could have been?”
But all the policeman vouchsafed to say was in the form of a question, — put staccato fashion.
“When was this?”
“Just now, two or three minutes since,” replied Jennison. He heaved a deep sigh — a sigh of speculative surprise. “Lord!” he muttered. “It doesn’t seem — it isn’t — more than five or six minutes when I first saw him!”
“Doesn’t take long to die?” observed the policeman sententiously. “Thing is — here or elsewhere, I reckon! — cause of death.” Then having a bright notion, he added, “P’raps you’re mistaken, may be unconscious?”
But they were close to the fallen man now, and the policeman, after a hasty examination, looked up at Jennison and nodded.
“You’re right,” he said. “Dead enough! And — nobody with him, eh? No attack on him?”
“Attack?” exclaimed Jennison wonderingly. “Of course not! There wasn’t a soul about.”
The policeman began to fumble for his whistle.
“Then it must ha’ been a fit,” he said. “And there’s fits and fits! However. . . .” He raised his whistle to his lips and blew. The silence seemed greater than ever when the sound had died away. Jennison stood, still staring at the inanimate thing in the gutter: the policeman fidgeted, shifting his weight from one foot to another. Suddenly he spoke, nodding at the dead man.
“You don’t know him?”
Jennison started and looked up sharply.
“I?” he exclaimed. “Good Lord, no! Don’t know him from — anybody!”
“What I meant was,” said the policeman slowly, “what I meant was — you saying as how you lived — where? No. 85? — and it being latish, and him here, I thought maybe you’d know him, say, by sight — dweller hereabouts, eh?”
“Never seen him in my life before!” declared Jennison. Then he caught sight of the dead man’s hat, which he had carefully placed aside. “That hat,” he continued, pointing to it. “I picked it up. Liverpool, it says in it — maker’s or seller’s name, you know. P’raps he’s a Liverpool man. You’d think so, wouldn’t you? — Liverpool being in the hat?”
“Oh, well, his clothing’ll be examined,” remarked the policeman easily. “There’ll be something on him, likely or not. Papers — cards — such like. He’ll be taken to the mortuary — as soon as we can get the ambulance. Doctor’ll have to see him, too. Then — —”
He broke off as men came round the near corners. Jennison wondered that so many came so quickly. One — two — three — four — five policemen; a sergeant amongst them. He had to tell his tale to the sergeant; he told it in detail while others went for an ambulance. And when that came the sergeant asked Jennison to go with them: the police station and the mortuary, he said, were close together, and Jennison, as the only eye-witness, had better tell his story to the inspector. Jennison was nothing loath; here, at last, was an adventure, a mystery.
But it had drab, dismal settings, he thought, presently. The mortuary was a cold, repellent place, and it looked all the colder and more repellent, somehow, when they had laid the dead man there. A police surgeon came and examined what they had fetched him to see: he was one of those men, thought Jennison, out of whom you’re not going to extract speech if they don’t want to speak; he did his job in a silence which none of those standing by cared or dared to break. But when he had done it he turned, looking round.
“Where’s the man who saw him fall?” he asked sharply.
Jennison, who had remained hidden by the big forms around him, was shoved forward; the police surgeon sized him up in a quick glance.
“Well?” he said.
Jennison had to tell the tale again; this was the third time. The medical man listened in as grim a silence as he had kept before. But again his lips opened.
“Lifted his hands to his throat, you say?” he asked. “Suddenly?”
“All of a sudden!” answered Jennison. “One second he was walking along, ordinarily, the next, up went his hands, clutching, snatching, tearing at his throat! Like this — only worse!”
“Scream? Cry out?” asked the doctor.
“No — o” said Jennison. “Not what you’d call by either name. Made a bit of a moan — in his throat — as he went down.”
“Face first?”
“Face first it was — fell right on his face, I think. Then,” concluded Jennison, “then — well, he just rolled over into the gutter! And — lay still.”
He looked round as he said the last word, and became aware that two other men had come into the room and were listening intently. One was a tall, soldierly-looking man in an inspector’s uniform; the other was a quiet-looking, but sharp-eyed young man in civilian clothes. The surgeon turned to them, too, and after some muttered conversation about an inquest, went away. Jennison gathered that there would be a lot more to be heard about this affair — a lot more! And then, as nobody told him to go, or, indeed, took any particular notice of him, he stood by while the quiet-looking young man, whom presently he discovered to be a detective, and who answered to the name of Womersley, examined the dead man’s clothing, going through pocket after pocket, and laying out the various contents. There was nothing very remarkable. Money was there, in some quantity; a good watch and chain; a pocket-book, in which were clippings from American papers, all relating to trade matters, a cigar case; a silver matchbox; a pocket-knife. But there were no letters, nothing to give any clue to the man’s identity, until Womersley drew from a waistcoat pocket a crumpled visiting card with which, after a glance at it, he turned to the inspector.
“That’s the only thing there is that’s any use to us — now,” he said. “See? Thomas Bradmore, 157a Hunter Street. Is it — his? Or has it been given to him?”
“Close by, anyway,” remarked the inspector. “Better go round there at once.”
The detective moved off towards the door, without further words. And Jennison quietly slipped after him. It was his adventure — and he was going on with it.
CHAPTER II. THE MAN WHO CAME BACK
NOBODY OFFERED ANY objection to Jennison’s departure. He had already given his name and address to the sergeant, and since his last statement to the police surgeon, nobody had taken any notice of him. He felt, somehow, that he was unimportant, a very minor pawn in the game: he slunk, rather than marched, out of the door and the building. All the same, once outside, he made up to the detective.
“May I go with you?” he asked, half afraid of his temerity. “I — I’d like to, if you don’t mind.”
Womersley, who seemed somewhat abstracted, half paused and stared at his interrogator — wonderingly. In the light of the neighbouring lamp, he sized up Jennison and smiled.
“Oh!” he said. “You’re the chap that saw, aren’t you? Just so!”
“I saw!” assented Jennison. “Everything!”
“Why do you want to go with me?” demanded Womersley. “Eh?”
“Because I did see,” answered Jennison. “Now I want to hear.”
Womersley laughed. The laugh was half satirical, but the other half was wholly indulgent, and he nodded his head and turned along the pavement.
“Well, I don’t know why you shouldn’t,” he said. “And, as it happens, I’m not quite sure where this Hunter Street is. I’m new to this quarter of the town — I only came here, on special business, yesterday. Now up crops this!”
“I know where Hunter Street is,” remarked Jennison, eager to be of use. “Two minutes’ walk — as a matter of fact, it’s close to Cartwright Gardens. I’ll take you straight there.” Then, when they had crossed the road and walked on a little, he said timidly, “I suppose you’re a detective, aren’t you?”
“That’s it!” answered Womersley. “Detective-Sergeant, Criminal Investigation Department, Scotland Yard — now you’ve got it!”
“It must be very interesting work,” suggested Jennison.
“Sometimes!” said Womersley, with another laugh. “And sometimes — t’other thing. Dull!”
“I should have thought it could never have been that!” remarked Jennison.
“Dare say!” replied Womersley. “Fact, though! Horribly dull — at times. Prosaic!”
Jennison ruminated over this. He had a conception of detectives — formed entirely from his own imagination; he also had an idea of what a detective ought to look like. And Womersley wasn’t a bit like it — he was quite an ordinary young man in appearance; Jennison saw thousands and thousands of his type every day in the City. But there being no doubt that Womersley was a genuine detective, he proceeded to cultivate him.
“What now,” asked Jennison, in the accents of a disciple who finds himself admitted to the presence of a known master, “what, now, would you say is the particular gift or faculty that a detective ought to possess?”
Womersley laughed again. Then he threw two words over his shoulder.
“Common sense!” he said.
“Nothing beyond?” asked Jennison, in surprise.
“If you like,” laughed Womersley, “still more common sense — and still more common sense after that. I’m not defining common sense, you know. But — common sense all the time! — that’s the ticket. This Hunter Street? Well, the number’s 157a.”
The house was close by, and it was all in darkness. But there was a bell and a knocker at the front door, and repeated recourse to each prefaced the throwing up of a window-sash on the second floor and the protrusion of a head. A man’s voice sounded above them.
“What is it? — who’s there?”
“Is this Mr. Bradmore’s?” inquired Womersley. “Mr. Thomas Bradmore?”
“I’m Mr. Bradmore,” replied the man. “What do you want?”
Womersley glanced up and down the deserted street. Then he looked up.
“Sorry to rouse you, Mr. Bradmore,” he answered. “A man died very suddenly in Cartwright Gardens about an hour ago. We found your card on him. Can you come down and tell me if you know anything of him?”
The voice spoke one word.
“Wait!”
The window snapped with a click, and Womersley turned to Jennison.
“That settles that,” he murmured. “The dead man isn’t Bradmore. Next thing is — does Bradmore know who he is?”
Before Jennison had had time to speculate on the chances for and against this, the door opened, and Bradmore himself appeared, clad in an old dressing-gown and holding a lamp above his head. He was a tall, middle-aged man, somewhat worn and melancholy of aspect, whose dark, straggling hair and beard were already shot with gray, and who looked, somehow, as if he had known trouble and anxiety. He made a steady inspection of both men before speaking; Jennison he passed over quickly; at Womersley he looked longer.
“Police?” he asked.
“Scotland Yard man, Mr. Bradmore,” replied Womersley. He drew out the crumpled card which he had found on the dead man, and thrust it into the rays of the lamp. “That’s the card I spoke of, Mr. Bradmore. Yours, isn’t it?”
Bradmore nodded, and motioned his visitors to enter. He closed the door after them, and, leading them into a room on the right hand side of the passage, set his lamp on a centre table, pointed the two men to chairs, and himself took one facing the detective. And he immediately put a direct question to Womersley.
“What like was this man?”
“Good-looking, fresh-coloured man, Mr. Bradmore,” replied Womersley, promptly. “About thirty-five years old, I should say. Well dressed — dark blue serge suit. Plenty of money in his pockets. But no papers — at least, none giving any name or address, except, of course, your card. That was in the right-hand waistcoat pocket.”
“And you say he died suddenly in Cartwright Gardens?” asked Bradmore. “Of — what?”
Womersley shook his head and pointed to Jennison, who was listening with all his ears.
“That’s a question for the doctor, Mr. Bradmore,” he answered. “This young man saw all there was to be seen. He saw the man come along the street, apparently in the best of health and spirits, suddenly throw up his hands and clutch at his throat, and then fall to the ground and die — at once!”
Bradmore gave Jennison a glance. But it was no more than a glance. His attention went back to the detective.
“What exact time was this?” he asked.
“According to our friend here,” answered Womersley, again indicating Jennison, “just about a quarter to twelve. But — do you know who the man is, Mr. Bradmore? That’s the important thing just now.”
Bradmore nodded, slowly.
“Yes!” he answered. “It’ll be Alfred Jakyn — Alfred Jakyn!”
“Yes?” said Womersley. “And — who is Alfred Jakyn? Was, of course, I should say. Who was he, exactly?”
Bradmore began to stroke his beard, looking reflectively at his questioner.
“Do you know Holborn — I mean, do you know it well?” he asked.
“No,” replied Womersley, “I don’t; my work, as a rule, is at the other end of the town.”
“I thought not,” said Bradmore, “or you’d have known the name of Jakyn. If you go along Holborn to-morrow morning, you’ll see, at the corner of Counsel’s Passage, a chemist’s shop — well known — with the name Daniel Jakyn over it. As a matter of fact, Daniel Jakyn’s dead, and I’m his successor: I took over the business, of which I’d been manager for several years, when he died, last spring. And Alfred Jakyn was his son — only son. Only child, in fact.”
