The Greatest Works of J. S. Fletcher (64+ Titles in One Illustrated Edition). J. S. Fletcher
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made an effort to calm himself. He was furiously angry—angry with Bryce, angry with Mitchington, angry with the cloud of foolishness and stupidity that seemed to be gathering.
“Why should I—supposing that I do know something, which I don’t admit—why should I allow myself to be coerced and frightened by these fools?” he asked. “No man can prevent suspicion falling on him—it’s my bad luck in this instance. Why should I rush to the police-station and say, ‘Here—I’ll blurt out all I know—everything!’ Why?”
“Wouldn’t that be better than knowing that people are saying things?” she asked.
“As to that,” replied Ransford, “you can’t prevent people saying things—especially in a town like this. If it hadn’t been for the unfortunate fact that Braden came to the surgery door, nothing would have been said. But what of that?—I have known hundreds of men in my time—aye, and forgotten them! No!—I am not going to fall a victim to this device—it all springs out of curiosity. As to this last affair—it’s all nonsense!”
“But—if the man was really poisoned?” suggested Mary.
“Let the police find the poisoner!” said Ransford, with a grim smile. “That’s their job.”
Mary said nothing for a moment, and Ransford moved restlessly about the room.
“I don’t trust that fellow Bryce,” he said suddenly. “He’s up to something. I don’t forget what he said when I bundled him out that morning.”
“What?” she asked.
“That he would be a bad enemy,” answered Ransford. “He’s posing now as a friend—but a man’s never to be so much suspected as when he comes doing what you may call unnecessary acts of friendship. I’d rather that anybody was mixed up in my affairs—your affairs—than Pemberton Bryce!”
“So would I!” she said. “But—”
She paused there a moment and then looked appealingly at Ransford.
“I do wish you’d tell me—what you promised to tell me,” she said. “You know what I mean—about me and Dick. Somehow—I don’t quite know how or why—I’ve an uneasy feeling that Bryce knows something, and that he’s mixing it all up with—this! Why not tell me—please!”
Ransford, who was still marching about the room, came to a halt, and leaning his hands on the table between them, looked earnestly at her.
“Don’t ask that—now!” he said. “I can’t—yet. The fact is, I’m waiting for something—some particulars. As soon as I get them, I’ll speak to you—and to Dick. In the meantime—don’t ask me again—and don’t be afraid. And as to this affair, leave it to me—and if you meet Bryce again, refuse to discuss any thing with him. Look here!—there’s only one reason why he professes friendliness and a desire to save me annoyance. He thinks he can ingratiate himself with—you!”
“Mistaken!” murmured Mary, shaking her head. “I don’t trust him. And—less than ever because of yesterday. Would an honest man have done what he did? Let that police inspector talk freely, as he did, with people concealed behind a curtain? And—he laughed about it! I hated myself for being there—yet could we help it?”
“I’m not going to hate myself on Pemberton Bryce’s account,” said Ransford. “Let him play his game—that he has one, I’m certain.”
Bryce had gone away to continue his game—or another line of it. The Collishaw matter had not made him forget the Richard Jenkins tomb, and now, after leaving Ransford’s house, he crossed the Close to Paradise with the object of doing a little more investigation. But at the archway of the ancient enclosure he met old Simpson Harker, pottering about in his usual apparently aimless fashion. Harker smiled at sight of Bryce.
“Ah, I was wanting to have a word with you, doctor!” he said. “Something important. Have you got a minute or two to spare, sir? Come round to my little place, then—we shall be quiet there.”
Bryce had any amount of time to spare for an interesting person like Harker, and he followed the old man to his house—a tiny place set in a nest of similar old-world buildings behind the Close. Harker led him into a little parlour, comfortable and snug, wherein were several shelves of books of a curiously legal and professional-looking aspect, some old pictures, and a cabinet of odds and ends, stowed away in of dark corner. The old man motioned him to an easy chair, and going over to a cupboard, produced a decanter of whisky and a box of cigars.
“We can have a peaceful and comfortable talk here, doctor,” he remarked, as he sat down near Bryce, after fetching glasses and soda-water. “I live all alone, like a hermit—my bit of work’s done by a woman who only looks in of a morning. So we’re all by ourselves. Light your cigar!—same as that I gave you at Barthorpe. Um—well, now,” he continued, as Bryce settled down to listen. “There’s a question I want to put to you—strictly between ourselves—strictest of confidence, you know. It was you who was called to Braden by Varner, and you were left alone with Braden’s body?”
“Well?” admitted Bryce, suddenly growing suspicious. “What of it?”
Harker edged his chair a little closer to his guest’s, and leaned towards him.
“What,” he asked in a whisper, “what have you done with that scrap of paper that you took out of Braden’s purse?”
Chapter XIV. From the Past
If any remarkably keen and able observer of the odd characteristics of humanity had been present in Harker’s little parlour at that moment, watching him and his visitor, he would have been struck by what happened when the old man put this sudden and point-blank question to the young one. For Harker put the question, though in a whisper, in no more than a casual, almost friendlily-confidential way, and Bryce never showed by the start of a finger or the flicker of an eyelash that he felt it to be what he really knew it to be—the most surprising and startling question he had ever had put to him. Instead, he looked his questioner calmly in the eyes, and put a question in his turn.
“Who are you, Mr. Harker?” asked Bryce quietly.
Harker laughed—almost gleefully.
“Yes, you’ve a right to ask that!” he said. “Of course!—glad you take it that way. You’ll do!”
“I’ll qualify it, then,” added Bryce. “It’s not who—it’s what are you!”
Harker waved his cigar at the book-shelves in front of which his visitor sat.
“Take a look at my collection of literature, doctor,” he said. “What d’ye think of it?”
Bryce turned and leisurely inspected one shelf after another.
“Seems to consist of little else but criminal cases and legal handbooks,” he remarked quietly. “I begin to suspect you, Mr. Harker. They say here in Wrychester that you’re a retired tradesman. I think you’re a retired policeman—of the detective branch.”
Harker laughed again.
“No Wrychester man has ever crossed my threshold since I came to settle down here,” he said. “You’re the first person I’ve ever asked in—with one notable exception. I’ve never even had Campany, the librarian, here. I’m a hermit.”
“But—you were a detective?” suggested Bryce.
“Aye, for a good five-and-twenty years!” replied Harker. “And pretty well known, too, sir. But—my question, doctor. All between ourselves!”
“I’ll ask you one, then,” said Bryce. “How do you know I took a scrap of paper from Braden’s purse?”
“Because I know that