The Female Detective (10 page)

“And then, as I heard the ring at the hall-door, and as
she
knew it was the doctor returned, she raised her right hand, looked wildly at me, and said—‘I command—in the name of God.'

“She never spoke aloud again. She only whispered messages to her husband, and taking the doctor's head between her hands, whispered something to him which made the poor gentleman tremble.

“Then she died as the servants came trooping into the house from the school treat.

“I knew how wrong I had been long before the next day. But when I looked at her still face, my dear, I could not disobey her; and I felt more unable to oppose her last wishes when our housekeeper, Mrs. Dumarty, whispered to me that she looked in her sleep as though
she
had done her duty.

“I know how wicked it all was, but as the years have rolled on I hoped I had done all for the best. My brother, when he came home at the end of those two days, found a deep consolation in the little child—and I could not tell him he was weeping over a stranger.

“I fell very ill myself, my dear, after the burial, and they thought it was grief which had overpowered me. But I am afraid it was more my conscience than my sorrow, though I am sure I loved my sister very dearly.

“As the years have gone on I have thought I had done all for the best. Sir Nathaniel has received a large income yearly from me; for I came into a good property very soon after Mrs. Shedleigh's death. And I have made my will in his favour, so that he could never have been poor through my action—whereas had he inherited the estates he would soon have wasted them, for he is quite a prodigal.

“Now you know all. You tell me, my poor woman, you wish to save me. How can you?”

Long before the good lady asked me that woful question, I had hung my head in sorrow and regret.

Don't suppose we detectives have no soft places in our hearts because we are obliged to steel them against the daily wickedness we have to encounter. It is not long since that one Tom White, a detective of the R Division, was shocked by seeing a young thief, whom he was pursuing, fall dead at his feet. Tom White never was the thing after that; so he must have had some soft place in his heart, poor fellow.

I confess I was sorry I had shown Sir Nathaniel the cards he now held.

Could I save her?

I was determined to do my best.

“Well?” she said, a little wearily, and coming to me, she put her hand lightly on my shoulder.

I confess I never felt a hand rest so heavily upon me, though her touch was as delicate as that of the lady she must have always been.

“I am very sorry—” I said.

“There is no need,” she replied.

“And very much ashamed—”

“Why, my dear?
You
have done your duty, whatever I may have omitted.”

“I would rather be you,” I said.

I confess these replies of mine were sentimental for a detective. Still, as they were uttered, I repeat them.

And lo! as I spoke, there came a sudden, fierce, imperious peal upon the great gate-bell.

As I glanced at the great clock, and read “a quarter to four,” I felt certain the visitor was Sir Nathaniel Shirley.

He did not even send a card up; only his name, with the statement that he must see either Mr. or Miss Shedleigh.

The man added that he had replied his master was out in the grounds, but that his lady was in the house.

Positively Sir Nathaniel felt himself already so much master that he had not waited for permission to come upstairs.

“Good day, Catherine,” said the baronet, entering; “I heard you were in, and so I did not wait for the man coming down again.”

The coward! he was afraid she would gain the more advantage the longer the time before he saw her.

As he spoke, he glanced at me as though I stood his enemy. He had held out his hand to me, taken what I offered without remark (like my friend the ringtailed at the gardens), and now he was ready to snarl because he supposed I had nothing more to give.

When the man had left the room, he turned to me and said the following words, in as sweet a tone as he would have used for inquiring after my health.

“I thought I should find you here, you baggage!”

“Sir!” said I, and I think I was justified in the exclamation.

“Now, you don't get from me a rap,” he said, still in a sweet voice, but with one of the ugliest countenances ever I remember to have remarked.

It is certain he was a miserable tyrant—infinitely more dangerous to his friends (if he had any) than to his enemies.

“And what have you got to say?” he asked, turning to Miss Shedleigh.

“What have you?” she asked, and her voice was as surprisingly steady as her manner was collected.

“You know what I have come for.”

“Yes,” she said, quite gently.

“So I have found you out at last?” he said.

It was clear he had passed
me
over in the matter as though I had never known of it.

Here I looked at him—perhaps a little keenly—and then it was that I noticed the blackness I had marked on the previous night round his mouth was still more observable as he stood confronting his niece's sister-in-law, and with as ugly a look of victory upon his face as a man could wear.

“One moment!” here I interposed with.

“Well?” he said, speaking sweetly, but looking at me as though I was one of the worst kind of dogs.

“I'm not wanted here. I will leave the room.”

“You will do no such thing!” said he, brave I presume because he had but to do with a couple of women.

“Indeed!” said I, “take care. You know I'm a police-officer; impede me in the execution of my duty at your peril. I say I am not wanted here, and I think fit to leave the room.”

As I moved towards him another change in his face became apparent. Whether it was that he turned more generally pallid, and so he looked darker about the mouth—or whether the blackness around his lips did increase, it is certain that a change occurred.

He stood in my way till I came near him, and then he fell back almost as though I had touched him.

I left the room, but before I did so, I said to Miss Shedleigh—“I shall be outside. If you call to me I shall hear you. Don't be afraid of this gentleman.”

Then I left the room.

What was said I never learnt.

The need of my attendance was brought about by a scream on the part of the lady, whereupon I thought fit to run into the room, where I found—

But before I reach that last scene but one in this narrative I should make the reader acquainted with some observations I made.

Upon reaching the corridor beyond the room in which the war was to be fought out, I found myself near a window which, with the ordinary eyes of a detective, I knew must be in a plane with the windows of the room I had just left, simply because the view from it was such as I had noticed, without much intention of doing so (for observation of all before him becomes a habit with the detective), from those openings.

The whole of these windows looked over the sweep before the house, which was enclosed by a wall in front, and two heavy solid wooden gates. In each gate, however, was a wicket, one of which was open, and through it I saw the faces of two men who were peering from the cab, the top of which only I could see beyond the wall and gates.

Faintly as I saw their faces, and under such disadvantages, I recognised one of them as that of a policeman known to me.

Beyond any question the other individual was also an officer.

So, he had shown no sign of mercy. He had not sought to compromise with the Shedleighs, by having an interview with them. Cruel as he was, he had brought down two policemen with him, and it struck me at once that it was the time necessary for the procuring of these officers which accounted for the half hour's grace he had shown before he arrived. To arrest Miss Shedleigh at an earlier hour than that at which now he was proceeding to accomplish that act, he must have got up early in the morning—a piece of severity which, doubtless, he could not force upon himself, though it was to lead the earlier to the exhibition of his cruelty.

I had been watching the faces through the open window—for it was the end of July, fine weather—and the gate-wicket, and without being seen myself, for about two minutes, when I heard the officer I knew say—

“There he is—he's coming.”

It was not much above a whisper, but the breeze set my way, and my ears are uncommonly fine and sharp; indeed, I believe it is admitted that we women detectives are enabled to educate our five senses to a higher pitch than are our male competitors.

Clearly, the officers could see across the gardens, and round by the house over the grounds, whilst I was only to make observations in an opposite direction.

But in a moment I heard a clear light voice singing lowly and sweetly. I recognised it in a moment for that of the master of the house.

There was no sound but the rustle of the light wind (twittering the leaves and rippling patches of wheat) to interfere with his voice, and indeed it seemed to me as though the murmur made with his voice a sweet chorus.

He came round by the house, the volume of his voice increasing as he did so, and then he passed away on the other side, his voice dying away till the note of the wind was louder than his hymn.

The policemen followed him with their sight as far as they could, and if you have seen a cat lose a mouse you can comprehend the style of look upon the officers' faces as their charge went round the corner of his own house.

I suppose this episode had taken up about two minutes of time.

But this is only guesswork.

Suddenly a quick, sharp, shrill scream.

Then—silence.

As I heard the officers leaping from the cab and cranching over the gravel, I ran forward and broke in rather than opened the door.

There lay Sir Nathaniel on his face.

Two or three yards away from him knelt Miss Shedleigh, her hands as tightly clasped as they could be, and pressed against the wall.

I may say at once—he was dead.

Afterwards, when the lady could speak calmly, she told me she had been certain it was death as he fell. She knew the family disease had grasped him—that fell heart disease which had killed his brother, which had helped in a measure to destroy his niece, Mrs. Shedleigh.

She declared she saw upon his face as he fell that expression which she had seen in death upon the countenance of her sister-in-law, and of that lady's father, at whose bedside she had been at the time of his death.

The policemen, I need not say, were in the house almost before I entered the room, into which they got quite as soon as the servants.

But before they had reached their client's dead side I had found a line of conduct to take.

The baronet was deceased. Very well—then all things were as they were before I told him of what was, perhaps, his good fortune, though he died over it; for, from what I heard, I doubt if he would have expired in his own bed but in a government one, had he been at liberty much longer to carry on his very bad life.

This question only stood in my way—

Had he told the police the exact state of affairs?

I guessed he had refrained from doing so. I felt sure he was a man who would say no more than was needed. It could not have been necessary to report at the station the history I had given him.

The course I took will perhaps be most quickly understood by a report of the words I used.

You may guess that the officer of the two who knew me was considerably taken aback by finding me in the room when he entered it.

“Blackman,” said I, when the doctor had been, when he had pronounced his opinion (which did not take long), and when there was breathing time for the household once more—“Blackman, what on earth were you here for?”

“
He
brought us.”

The emphasis on “
he
” plainly proved it was the dead man which was meant.

“What did he say?”

“Why, that he wanted to give his brother and his sister-in-law into custody for robbing him.”

“Yes—he was mad,” said I.

Blackman turned all manner of colours.

“Lord!” said he, turning at last quite red, “and to think that though I thought him such a queer customer, and the job such a queer job—to think as
I
didn't see that. Of course, G. (I am called G. by the force),
you
is here on that business?”

“Precisely,” said I.

“Of course—
I
see it all.”

“Of course you do,” said I.

And it is astonishing how my explanation was accepted by all concerned in the inquest, and even by the general public.

[I have not much hesitation in telling this tale, however, for now, by certain events, no one has been wronged by the substituted child, for she has played
her
part out in the play of this world.]

Sir Nathaniel's pocket-book, however, gave me a fright, for it contained the addresses of Flemps the cabman, and Mr. Geffins the medical student. However, Miss Shedleigh was out of the way when the cabman gave his evidence, she having been a witness at the opening inquiry (together with myself), and the cabman offering his evidence at the adjourned examination. Flemps's evidence was not full. He had to look at the deceased gentleman for identification, and his evidence ran to this effect—“Which if ever I sord the gent afore, take my badge away and give me three months.”

I was out of the way when this evidence was adduced, nor did I show myself when the following witness, Mr. Geffins, deposed that he had never seen the “subject before in life.”

Sir Nathaniel's medical adviser was called, and I have no doubt this gentleman, of great note—for Sir Nathaniel would have everything of the best of its kind, from his medical adviser to his blacking—I have no doubt that this gentleman considerably tended to close the inquiry quickly. He deposed, with some degree of pain evidently, a condition which gave his statement more weight, that the deceased gentleman had been suffering for some time from disease of the heart—a family complaint; that this disease had been much accelerated in its progress by the loose mode of life in which the baronet had lived, and that he had warned him only a few previous days to avoid any great excitement, as it might be dangerous. “I added,” said the witness, “that if Sir Nathaniel kept himself quiet he might live into a green old age—a result of which there was a possibility, but little probability.”