LITMIR.BIZ

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I was so silent, and, hard though it was to keep from doing so, I let nothing out.

      The truth was, Sir Gilbert Carstairs had fascinated me, not only with his grand offer, but with his pleasant, off-hand, companionable manners. He had put me at my ease at once; he had spoken so frankly and with such evident sincerity about his doings on that eventful night, that I accepted every word he said. And—in the little that I had thought of it—I was very ready to accept his theory as to how those two men had come by their deaths—and it was one that was certainly feasible, and worth following up. Some years before, I remembered, something of the same sort had gone on, and had resulted in an affray between salmon-poachers and river-watchers—why should it not have cropped up again? The more I thought of it, the more I felt Sir Gilbert's suggestion to have reason in it. And in that case all the mystery would be knocked clean out of these affairs—the murder of Phillips, the death of Crone, might prove to be the outcome of some vulgar encounter between them and desperadoes who had subsequently scuttled to safety and were doubtless quaking near at hand, in fear of their misdeeds coming to light; what appeared to be a perfect tangle might be the simplest matter in the world. So I judged—and next morning there came news that seemed to indicate that matters were going to be explained on the lines which Sir Gilbert had suggested.

      Chisholm brought that news to our office, just after Mr. Lindsey had come in. He told it to both of us; and from his manner of telling it, we both saw—I, perhaps, not so clearly as Mr. Lindsey—that the police were already at their favourite trick of going for what seemed to them the obvious line of pursuit.

      "I'm thinking we've got on the right clue at last, as regards the murder of yon man Phillips," announced Chisholm, with an air of satisfaction. "And if it is the right clue, as it seems to be, Mr. Lindsey, there'll be no great mystery in the matter, after all. Just a plain case of murder for the sake of robbery—that's it!"

      "What's your clue?" asked Mr. Lindsey quietly.

      "Well," answered Chisholm, with a sort of sly wink, "you'll understand, Mr. Lindsey, that we haven't been doing nothing these last few days, since yon inquest on Phillips, you know. As a matter of fact, we've been making inquiries wherever there seemed a chance of finding anything out. And we've found something out—through one of the banks yonder at Peebles."

      He looked at us as if to see if we were impressed; seeing, at any rate, that we were deeply interested, he went on.

      "It appears—I'll tell you the story in order, as it were," he said—"it appears that about eight months ago the agent of the British Linen Bank at Peebles got a letter from one John Phillips, written from a place called Colon, in Panama—that's Central America, as you'll be aware—enclosing a draft for three thousand pounds on the International Banking Corporation of New York. The letter instructed the Peebles agent to collect this sum and to place it in his bank to the writer's credit. Furthermore, it stated that the money was to be there until Phillips came home to Scotland, in a few months' time from the date of writing. This, of course, was all done in due course—there was the three thousand pounds in Phillips's name. There was a bit of correspondence between him at Colon and the bank at Peebles—then, at last, he wrote that he was leaving Panama for Scotland, and would call on the bank soon after his arrival. And on the morning of the day on which he was murdered, Phillips did call at the bank and established his identity, and so on, and he then drew out five hundred pounds of his money—two hundred pounds in gold, and the rest in small notes; and, Mr. Lindsey, he carried that sum away with him in a little handbag that he had with him."

      Mr. Lindsey, who had been listening with great attention, nodded.

      "Aye!" he said. "Carried five hundred pounds away with him. Go on, then."

      "Now," continued Chisholm, evidently very well satisfied with himself for the way he was marshalling his facts, "we—that is, to put it plainly, I myself—have been making more searching inquiries about Cornhill and Coldstream. There's two of the men at Cornhill station will swear that when Phillips got out of the train there, that evening of the murder, he was carrying a little handbag such as the bank cashier remembers—a small, new, brown leather bag. They're certain of it—the ticket-collector remembers him putting it under his arm while he searched his pocket for his ticket. And what's more, the landlord of the inn across the bridge there at Coldstream he remembers the bag, clearly enough, and that Phillips never had his hand off it while he was in his house. And of course, Mr. Lindsey, the probability is that in that bag was the money—just as he had drawn it out of the bank."

      "You've more to tell," remarked Mr. Lindsey.

      "Just so," replied Chisholm. "And there's two items. First of all—we've found that bag! Empty, you may be sure. In the woods near that old ruin on Till side. Thrown away under a lot of stuff—dead stuff, you'll understand, where it might have lain till Doomsday if I hadn't had a most particular search made. But—that's not all. The second item is here—the railway folk at Cornhill are unanimous in declaring that by that same train which brought Phillips there, two men, strangers, that looked like tourist gentlemen, came as well, whose tickets were from—where d'ye think, then, Mr. Lindsey?"

      "Peebles, of course," answered Mr. Lindsey.

      "And you've guessed right!" exclaimed Chisholm, triumphantly; "Peebles it was—and now, how do you think this affair looks? There's so many tourists on Tweedside this time of the year that nobody paid any great attention that night to these men, nor where they went. But what could be plainer, d'ye think?—of course, those two had tracked Phillips from the bank, and they followed him till they had him in yon place where he was found, and they murdered him—to rob him!"

Chapter XV. Five Hundred a Year

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      It was very evident that Chisholm was in a state of gleeful assurance about his theory, and I don't think he was very well pleased when Mr. Lindsey, instead of enthusiastically acclaiming it as a promising one, began to ask him questions.

      "You found a pretty considerable sum on Phillips as it was when you searched his body, didn't you?" he asked.

      "Aye—a good lot!" assented Chisholm. "But it was in a pocket-book in an inner pocket of his coat, and in his purse."

      "If it was robbery, why didn't they take everything?" inquired Mr. Lindsey.

      "Aye, I knew you'd ask that," replied Chisholm. "But the thing is that they were interrupted. The bag they could carry off—but it's probable that they heard Mr. Moneylaws here coming down the lane before they could search the man's pockets."

      "Umph!" said Mr. Lindsey. "And how do you account for two men getting away from the neighbourhood without attracting attention?"

      "Easy enough," declared Chisholm. "As I said just now, there's numbers of strangers comes about Tweedside at this time of the year, and who'd think anything of seeing them? What was easier than for these two to separate, to keep close during the rest of the night, and to get away by train from some wayside station or other next morning? They could manage it easily—and we're making inquiries at all the stations in the district on both sides the Tweed, with that idea."

      "Well—you'll have a lot of people to follow up, then," remarked Mr. Lindsey drily. "If you're going to follow every tourist that got on a train next morning between Berwick and Wooler, and Berwick and Kelso, and Berwick and Burnmouth, and Berwick and Blyth, you'll have your work set, I'm thinking!"

      "All the same," said Chisholm doggedly, "that's how it's been. And the bank at Peebles has the numbers of the notes that Phillips carried off in his little bag—and I'll trace those fellows yet, Mr. Lindsey."

      "Good luck to you, sergeant!" answered Mr. Lindsey. He turned to me when Chisholm had gone. "That's the police all over, Hugh," he remarked. "And you might talk till you were black in the face to yon man, and he'd stick to his story."

      "You don't believe it, then?" I asked him, somewhat surprised.

      "He may be right," he replied. "I'm not saying. Let him attend to his business—and now we'll be seeing to ours."

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