The Heath Hover Mystery Read online

assented the inspector briskly, relieved that he wasnow going to get his own innings, and also all his professional keennessto the fore over the prospect of being put in charge of a veryout-of-the-way case. "And now, with Mr Mervyn's permission, I willtake his statement as to the whole of last night's occurrence."

  "You shall have it to the full," was the answer. "But first of all hadyou not better go through the poor chap's clothes--they are hanging upin the kitchen where I put them to dry, those he has on now are mine,which I rigged him out with as a change. Needless to say I haven'ttouched a thing of his, pending your arrival. You may find some clue toidentification there."

  "We'll do so at once," said the police officer, and they adjournedforthwith to the kitchen.

  The clothes were hanging where they had been placed the night before,and were now quite dry. But mystery seemed likely to be piled onmystery. Except some sovereigns and silver change amounting tosomething over five pounds in all, the pockets were absolutely empty.Not a scrap of paper, no card-case or pocket-book, not even a purse.Besides the money, an old Waterbury watch, attached to a leather guard,made up the entire contents.

  Furthermore the clothes themselves afforded no clue. The buttons wereplain horn ones, and bore the name of no tailor, nor was there any shopmark upon any article of hosiery; and now the police inspector warmed tohis work, for he could see that all such indications had been carefullyand deliberately removed. But by whom, and with what object? That washis business to find out.

  "Now Mr Mervyn, if you please. I should like your statement."

  "Certainly. Let's go back into the other room and I'll get you somefoolscap to take it down on. It'll ease your notebook--eh, inspector?"

  Mervyn told his story, plainly and concisely, as we know it--notomitting any detail. Any detail? Yes. He omitted just one--thefinding of the metal disk. But at that part of the narrative whichrelated to the apparition--or hallucination--of the opening door, bothhis auditors looked up keenly. For they were acquainted with the weirdlegends which popular belief hung around Heath Hover.

  "As sure as I sit here," went on the narrator, "that manifestation--delusion, if you like--was the means of saving the man's life, for if Ihadn't seen it I should have finished dropping off to sleep in my chair,and had I done so, why he might have shouted till doomsday without myhearing him. However, it didn't seem much good, as things turned out."

  The inspector laid down his stylo.

  "Now, Mr Mervyn, if you will be so good. We will examine that door,and what lies beyond it."

  "Certainly," and Mervyn, unlocking a drawer in his writing tableproduced a long, brown, heavy key.

  "See," he went on, "it was under this pile of papers. I always keep itthere. Yet that door opened of itself, just as I have described. I'dswear to that as positively as I could swear to anything in my life."

  "You have strong nerves, Mr Mervyn," said the inspector, a thoughtdrily, perhaps, as he took the key which the other tendered to him.

  The lock, though a trifle stiff, turned without difficulty. A black gapyawned in front, and a close yet chilly, fungus-laden air greeted theirfaces.

  "Hold hard now till I get some candles," went on Mervyn. In a momentthese were obtained and lighted, each carrying one. "I'd better lead,"he appended, perhaps anticipating the thought that flitted through themind of the police officer. It would be so easy otherwise to springback, and locking the pair securely in that vault, thus obtain forhimself a start of several hours. Such things had happened.

  A good bit of a shiver ran through the trio as they descended into thedank mustiness of the vault. The walls glistened with moisture, so didthe stone floor. But there was no break in the solid masonry, save forone hole, barely four inches across, which admitted air from the outsidebut no light. The inspector made a minute and exhaustive examination ofboth walls and flooring, but there was no sign of either having beendisturbed, perhaps for centuries.

  "My belief is that this place was nothing more than a common or homelywine cellar," said Mervyn, as having found nothing whatever to rewardtheir investigation they took their way up the stone steps again. "Thefact of the existence of a disused empty vault like this under a houseis enough to give rise to all sorts of weird beliefs centring round it.But yet--that door business of last night--well, if that was an opticaldelusion I'll never believe in my own eyesight again. And now," as theyregained the outer day, "before we start to look at the hole in the ice,how about a little something stimulating after your drive. Eh?"

  The doctor was agreeable, in fact quite willing, but the cautious policeofficer declined. Mervyn, seeing through this thought too, got out anew bottle with the seal intact, and drew the cork. Likewise he placedan unbroken syphon on the table, perhaps rather ostentatiously. Whilethus engaged, the pony-cart rumbled up, bringing the returning Joe.

  He, too, now the inspector desired to question. Possibly becausedisregarding his master's parting injunction, the old rustic had beenimbibing some Dutch courage in the shape of a couple of "goes" of squareHollands on the way back at the _Dog and Partridge_, the same number ofmiles distant upon the road, he was able to answer these questions in astraight and fairly lucid manner, though he would more than oncerevert--as his mind misgave him--to his stock declaration! "I didn'tsee no strange gemmun 'ere last night. You'll mind I said so, Mus'Mervyn. I didn't see he."

  "Nobody said you did, Joe," reassured the inspector. "You only saw himthis morning, after he was dead."

  "That's Gawd's truth, I reckon, Mr Nashby, zur," was the ferventrejoinder.

  "One thing more, if you'll excuse me, Mr Mervyn," said Nashby. "I'lljust examine this room a little."

  He looked on the floor, under the couch, in cupboards, and drawers; notomitting the old vases of quaint ware that stood on the mantelpiece.The owner, watching with outward indifference, had his own thoughts. Sohad the inspector. Whoever had been the cause of this unknownstranger's death, it had been no one entering the house from outside,determined the latter.

  Then they adjourned to view the scene of the rescue. Along the paththrough the wood Mervyn pointed out the footprints--half obliterated bysubsequent snow--left by himself and the rescued stranger, likewisethose quite fresh, made by himself and old Joe that morning on theirrespective and independent progresses to the spot. Of these Nashby tookcareful measurements.

  "There you are," went on Mervyn, as they arrived at the place. "You'llsee the hole is newly frozen over, but the ladder's just where I leftit. The water's over twenty feet deep there, but what the deuce startedthe poor chap on the ice at all is what bangs me. Seems to me we're upagainst a very tall thing in mysteries."

  "I shouldn't wonder if we were, Mr Mervyn," rejoined the inspector,again rather drily.

  "Couldn't we trace his footmarks back?" suggested the doctor. "It wouldshow the direction he had come from, and then we could make enquiries.Eh, Nashby?"

  "The very thing I was going to do," answered the latter.

  But the plan, though good, was difficult of execution. The footmarkswere almost obliterated by the more recent snowfall, in places quite so.And they led from nowhere direct. They zigzagged and twisted, asthough their perpetrator were wandering at random and round and round,then lost themselves altogether in a sort of small ravine. But the veryincoherency of their course suggested a reason for the stranger plunginginto the peril he had done. Clearly he had got lost in the thick woodsand had welcomed this long, broad stretch of open, and apparently strongice, as a way out.

  "Now I would suggest an adjournment for lunch," said Mervyn. "We cantake up the trail afterwards where we left it."

  "That's not half a bad idea," assented the doctor heartily. "Thanksvery much, Mr Mervyn. I'd been about a bit before I started for here,and after a drive through this invigorating air, it seems a long whileago since breakfast time."

  Inspector Nashby raised no objection. A stalwart police officer, eventhough on an interesting case, and prospectively a case for advan
cement,is not proof against the pangs of deferred appetite on a crisp, keen,frosty day. But even while discussing good cheer in an impromptu way inMervyn's kitchen--for they left the living-room in silent possession ofthe dead--Nashby kept his eyes about him and his perceptions at fullcock. For Nashby had his theories already forming. The doctor as yethad formed none.

  While thus engaged, they missed the fact that the sun-bright day hadoverclouded. They were awakened to it, however, by the discovery thatit had begun to snow again. More than begun indeed, for the snow wascoming down, not merely in flakes, but almost in slabs. A little moreof it