Fenchurch Street Mystery Page 2

pink petals still clung obtrusively amidst the deep black.

  "She would not look at the prisoner, and turned her head resolutely towards the

  magistrate. I fancy she had been fond of that vagabond husband of hers: an

  enormous wedding-ring encircled her finger, and that, too, was swathed in black.

  She firmly believed that Kershaw's murderer sat there in the dock, and she

  literally flaunted her grief before him.

  "I was indescribably sorry for her. As for M�ller, he was just fat, oily,

  pompous, conscious of his own importance as a witness; big fat fingers, covered

  with brass rings, gripped the two incriminating letters, which he had

  identified. They were his passports, as it were, to a delightful land of

  importance and notoriety. Sir Arthur Inglewood, I think, disappointed him by

  stating that he had no questions to ask of him. M�ller had been brimful of

  answers, ready with the most perfect indictment, the most elaborate accusations

  against the bloated millionaire who had decoyed his dear friend Kershaw, and

  murdered him in Heaven knows what an out-of-the-way corner of the East End.

  "After this, however, the excitement grew apace. M�ller had been dismissed, and

  had retired from the court altogether, leading away Mrs. Kershaw, who had

  completely broken down.

  "Constable D 21 was giving evidence as to the arrest in the meanwhile. The

  prisoner, he said, had seemed completely taken by surprise, not understanding

  the cause or history of the accusation against him; however, when put in full

  possession of the facts, and realizing, no doubt, the absolute futility of any

  resistance, he had quietly enough followed the constable into the cab. No one at

  the fashionable and crowded Hotel Cecil had even suspected that anything unusual

  had occurred.

  "Then a gigantic sigh of expectancy came from every one of the spectators. The '

  fun ' was about to begin. James Buckland, a porter at Fenchurch Street railway

  station, had just sworn to tell all the truth, etc. After all, it did not amount

  to much. He said that at six o'clock in the afternoon of December the 10th, in

  the midst of one of the densest fogs he ever remembers, the 6.5 from Tilbury

  steamed into the station, being just about an hour late. He was on the arrival

  platform, and was hailed by a passenger in a first-class carriage. He could see

  very little of him beyond an enormous black fur coat and a travelling cap of fur

  also.

  "The passenger had a quantity of luggage, all marked F. S., and he directed

  James Buckland to place it all upon a four-wheel cab, with the exception of a

  small hand-bag, which he carried himself. Having seen that all his luggage was

  safely bestowed, the stranger in the fur coat paid the porter, and, telling the

  cabman to wait until he returned, he walked away in the direction of the

  waiting-rooms, still carrying his small hand-bag.

  "'I stayed for a bit,' added James Buckland, ' talking to the driver about the

  fog and that; then I went about my business, seein' that the local from Southend

  'ad been signalled.'

  "The prosecution insisted most strongly upon the hour when the stranger in the

  fur coat, having seen to his luggage, walked away towards the waiting-rooms. The

  porter was emphatic. 'It was not a minute later than 6.15,' he averred.

  "Sir Arthur Inglewood still had no questions to ask, and the driver of the cab

  was called.

  "He corroborated the evidence of James Buckland as to the hour when the

  gentleman in the fur coat had engaged him, and having filled his cab in and out

  with luggage, had told him to wait. And cabby did wait. He waited in the dense

  fog�until he was tired, until he seriously thought of depositing all the luggage

  in the lost property office, and of looking out for another fare�waited until at

  last, at a quarter before nine, whom should he see walking hurriedly towards his

  cab but the gentleman in the fur coat and cap, who got in quickly and told the

  driver to take him at once to the Hotel Cecil. This, cabby declared, had

  occurred at a quarter before nine. Still Sir Arthur Inglewood made no comment,

  and Mr. Francis Smethurst, in the crowded, stuffy court, had calmly dropped to

  sleep.

  "The next witness, Constable Thomas Taylor, had noticed a shabbily dressed

  individual, with shaggy hair and beard, loafing about the station and

  waiting-rooms in the afternoon of December the 10th. He seemed to be watching

  the arrival platform of the Tilbury and Southend trains.

  "Two separate and independent witnesses, cleverly unearthed by the police, had

  seen this same shabbily dressed individual stroll into the first-class

  waiting-room at about 6.15 on Wednesday, December the 10th, and go straight up

  to a gentleman in a heavy fur coat and cap, who had also just come into the

  room. The two talked together for a while; no one heard what they said, but

  presently they walked off together. No one seemed to know in which direction.

  "Francis Smethurst was rousing himself from his apathy; he whispered to his

  lawyer, who nodded with a bland smile of encouragement. The employ�s the Hotel

  Cecil gave evidence as to the arrival of Mr. Smethurst at about 9.30 p.m. on

  Wednesday, December the 10th, in a cab, with a quantity of luggage; and this

  closed the case for the prosecution.

  "Everybody in that court already saw Smethurst mounting the gallows. It was

  uninterested curiosity which caused the elegant audience to wait and hear what

  Sir Arthur Inglewood had to say. He, of course, is the most fashionable man in

  the law at the present moment. His lolling attitudes, his drawling speech, are

  quite the rage, and imitated by the gilded youth of society.

  " Even at this moment, when the Siberian millionaire s neck literally and

  metaphorically hung in the balance, an expectant titter went round the fair

  spectators as Sir Arthur stretched out his long loose limbs and lounged across

  the table. He waited to make his effect�Sir Arthur is a born actor�and there is

  no doubt that he made it, when in his slowest, most drawly tones he said quietly

  "'With regard to this alleged murder of one William Kershaw, on Wednesday,

  December the 10th, between 6.15 and 8.45 p.m., your Honour, I now propose to

  call two witnesses, who saw this same William Kershaw alive on Tuesday

  afternoon, December the 16th, that is to say, six days after the supposed

  murder.'

  "It was as if a bombshell had exploded in the court. Even his Honour was aghast,

  and I am sure the lady next to me only recovered from the shock of the surprise

  in order to wonder whether she need put off her dinner party after all.

  "As for me," added the man in the corner, with that strange mixture of

  nervousness and self-complacency which had set Miss Polly Burton wondering,

  "well, you see, I had made up my mind long ago where the hitch lay in this

  particular case, and I was not so surprised as some of the others.

  "Perhaps you remember the wonderful development of the case, which so completely

  mystified the police�and in fact everybody except myself. Torriani and a waiter

  at his hotel in the Commercial Road both deposed that at about 3.30 p.m
. on

  December the 10th a shabbily dressed individual lolled into the coffee-room and

  ordered some tea. He was pleasant enough and talkative, told the waiter that his

  name was William Kershaw, that very soon all London would be talking about him,

  as he was about, through an unexpected stroke of good fortune, to become a very

  rich man, and so on, and so on, nonsense without end.

  "When he had finished his tea he lolled out again, but no sooner had he

  disappeared down a turning of the road than the waiter discovered an old

  umbrella, left behind accidentally by the shabby, talkative individual. As is

  the custom in his highly respectable restaurant, Signor Torriani put the

  umbrella carefully away in his office, on the chance of his customer calling to

  claim it when he had discovered his loss. And sure enough nearly a week later,

  on Tuesday, the 16th, at about 1 p.m., the same shabbily dressed individual

  called and asked for his umbrella. He had some lunch, and chatted once again to

  the waiter. Signor Torriani and the waiter gave a description of William

  Kershaw, which coincided exactly with that given by Mrs. Kershaw of her husband.

  "Oddly enough he seemed to be a very absent-minded sort of person, for on this

  second occasion, no sooner had he left than the waiter found a pocket-book in

  the coffee-room, underneath the table. It contained sundry letters and bills,

  all addressed to William Kershaw. This pocket-book was produced, and Karl

  M�ller, who had returned to the court, easily identified it as having belonged

  to his dear and lamented friend 'Villiam.'

  "This was the first blow to the case against the accused. It was a pretty stiff

  one, you will admit. Already it had begun to collapse like a house of cards.

  Still, there was the assignation, and the undisputed meeting between Smethurst

  and Kershaw, and those two and a half hours of a foggy evening to satisfactorily

  account for." The man in the corner made a long pause, keeping the girl on

  tenterhooks. He had fidgeted with his bit of string till there WSnot an inch of

  it free from the most complicated and elaborate knots.

  "I assure you," he resumed at last, "that at that very moment the whole mystery

  was, to me, as clear as daylight. I only marvelled how his Honour could waste

  his time and mine by putting what he thought were searching questions to the

  accused relating to his past. Francis Smethurst, who had quite shaken off his

  somnolence, spoke with a curious nasal twang, and with an almost imperceptible

  soup�n of foreign accent. He calmly denied Kershaw s version of his past;

  declared that he had never been called Barker, and had certainly never been

  mixed up in any murder case thirty years ago.

  "'But you knew this man Kershaw,' persisted his Honour, 'since you wrote to him?

  '

  "'Pardon me, your Honour,' said the accused quietly, 'I have never, to my

  knowledge, seen this man Kershaw, and I can swear that I never wrote to him.'

  "'Never wrote to him?' retorted his Honour warningly. 'That is a strange

  assertion to make when I have two of your letters to him in my hands at the

  present moment.

  "'I never wrote those letters, your Honour,' persisted the accused quietly,

  'they are not in my handwriting.'

  "'Which we can easily prove,' came in Sir Arthur Inglewood's drawly tones, as he

  handed up a packet to his Honour; 'here are a number of letters written by my

  client since he has landed in this country, and some of which were written under

  my very eyes.'

  "As Sir Arthur Inglewood had said, this could be easily proved, and the

  prisoner, at his Honour's request, scribbled a few lines, together with his

  signature, several times upon a sheet of note-paper. It was easy to read upon

  the magistrate's astounded countenance, that there was not the slightest

  similarity in the two handwritings.

  "A fresh mystery had cropped up. Who, then, had made the assignation with

  William Kershaw at Fenchurch Street railway station? The prisoner gave a fairly

  satisfactory account of the employment of his time since his landing in England.

  "'I came over on the Tsarskoe Selo,' he said, 'a yacht belonging to a friend of

  mine. When we arrived at the mouth of the Thames there was such a dense fog that

  it was twenty-four hours before it was thought safe for me to land. My friend,

  who is a Russian, would not land at all; he was regularly frightened at this

  land of fogs. He was going on to Madeira immediately.

  "'I actually landed on Tuesday, the 10th, and took a train at once for town. I

  did see to my luggage and a cab, as the porter and driver told your Honour; then

  I tried to find my way to a refreshment-room, where I could get a glass of wine.

  I drifted into the waiting-room, and there I was accosted by a shabbily dressed

  individual, who began telling me a piteous tale. Who he was I do not know. He

  said he was an old soldier who had served his country faithfully, and then been

  left to starve. He, begged of me to accompany him to his lodgings, where I could

  see his wife and starving children, and verify the truth and piteousness of his

  tale.

  "'Well, your Honour,' added the prisoner with noble frankness, 'it was my first

  day in the old country. I had come back after thirty years with my pockets full

  of gold, and this was the first sad tale I had heard; but I am a business man,

  and did not want to be exactly "done" in the eye. I followed my man through the

  fog, out into the streets. He walked silently by my side for a time. I had not a

  notion where I was.

  "'Suddenly I turned to him with some question, and realized in a moment that my

  gentleman had given me the slip. Finding, probably, that I would not part with

  my money till I had seen the starving wife and children, he left me to my fate,

  and went in search of more willing bait.

  "'The place where I found myself was dismal and deserted. I could see no trace

  of cab or omnibus. I retraced my steps and tried to find my way back to the

  station, only to find myself in worse and more deserted neighbourhoods. I became

  hopelessly lost and fogged. I don't wonder that two and a half hours elapsed

  while I thus wandered on in the dark and deserted streets; my sole astonishment

  is that I ever found the station at all that night, or rather close to it a

  policeman, who showed me the way.'

  "'But how do you account for Kershaw knowing all your movements?' still

  persisted his Honour, 'and his knowing the exact date of your arrival in

  England? How do you account for these two letters, in fact? '

  "'I cannot account for it or them, your Honour,' replied the prisoner quietly.

  'I have proved to you, have I not, that I never wrote those letters, and that

  the man�er�Karshaw is his name?�was not murdered by me?'

  "'Can you tell me of anyone here or abroad who might have heard of your

  movements, and of the date of your arrival?'

  "'My late employ�s at Vladivostok, of course, knew of my departure, but none of

  them could have written these letters, since none of them know a word of

  English.'

  "'Then you can throw no light upon these mysterious
letters? You cannot help the

  police in any way towards the clearing up of this strange affair?'

  "'The affair is as mysterious to me as to your Honour, and to the police of this

  country.'

  "Francis Smethurst was discharged, of course; there was no semblance of evidence

  against him sufficient to commit him for trial. The two overwhelming points of

  his defence which had completely routed the prosecution were, firstly, the proof

  that he had never written the letters making the assignation, and secondly, the

  fact that the man supposed to have been murdered on the 10th was seen to be

  alive and well on the 16th. But then, who in the world was the mysterious

  individual who had apprised Kershaw of the movements of Smethurst, the

  millionaire?"

  CHAPTER III. HIS DEDUCTION

  THE man in the corner cocked his funny thin head on one side and looked at

  Polly; then he took up his beloved bit of string and deliberately untied every

  knot he had made in it. When it was quite smooth he laid it out upon the table.

  "I will take you, if you like, point by point along the line of reasoning which

  I followed myself, and which will inevitably lead you, as it led me, to the only

  possible solution of the mystery.

  "First take this point," he said with nervous restlessness, once more taking up

  his bit of string, and forming with each point raised a series of knots which

  would have shamed a navigating instructor, "obviously it was impossible for

  Kershaw not to have been acquainted with Smethurst, since he was fully apprised

  of the latter's arrival in England by two letters. Now it was clear to me from

  the first that no one could have written those two letters except Smethurst. You

  will argue that those letters were proved not to have been written by the man in

  the dock. Exactly. Remember, Kershaw was a careless man�he had lost both

  envelopes. To him they were insignificant. Now it was never disproved that those

  letters were written by Smethurst."

  "But�" suggested Polly.

  "Wait a minute," he interrupted, while knot number two appeared upon the scene,

  "it was proved that six days after the murder, William Kershaw was alive, and

  visited the Torriani Hotel, where already he was known, and where he

  conveniently left a pocket-book behind, so that there should be no mistake as to

  his identity; but it was never questioned where Mr. Francis Smethurst, the

  millionaire, happened to spend that very same afternoon."

  "Surely, you don't mean��?" gasped the girl.

  "One moment, please," he added triumphantly. "How did it come about that the

  landlord of the Torriani Hotel was brought into court at all? How did Sir Arthur

  Inglewood, or rather his client, know that William Kershaw had on those two

  memorable occasions visited the hotel, and that its landlord could bring such

  convincing evidence forward that would for ever exonerate the millionaire from

  the imputation of murder?"

  "Surely," I argued, "the usual means, the police��" "The police had kept the

  whole affair very dark until the arrest at the Hotel Cecil. They did not put

  into the papers the usual: ' If anyone happens to know of the whereabouts, etc.

  etc.' Had the landlord of that hotel heard of the disappearance of Kershaw

  through the usual channels, he would have put himself in communication with the

  police. Sir Arthur Inglewood produced him. How did Sir Arthur Inglewood come on

  his track?"

  "Surely, you don't mean��?"

  "Point number four," he resumed imperturbably, "Mrs. Kershaw was never requested

  to produce a specimen of her husband's handwriting. Why? Because the police,

  clever as you say they are, never started on the right tack. They believed

  William Kershaw to have been murdered; they looked for William Kershaw.

  "On December the 31st, what was presumed to be the body of William Kershaw was

  found by two lightermen: I have shown you a photograph of the place where it was