Trent's Last Case (23 page)

Marlowe looked at Trent, who nodded as who should say that his point was met.

'As for Southampton,' pursued Marlowe, 'you know what I did when I got there, I have no doubt. I had decided to take Manderson's story about the mysterious Harris and act it out on my own lines. It was a carefully prepared lie, better than anything I could improvise. I even went so far as to get through a trunk call to the hotel at Southampton from the library before starting, and ask if Harris was there. I expected, he wasn't.'

'Was that why you telephoned?' Trent enquired quickly.

'The reason for telephoning was to get myself into an attitude in which Martin couldn't see my face or anything but the jacket and hat, yet which was a natural and familiar attitude. But while I was about it, it was obviously better to make a genuine call. If I had simply pretended to be telephoning, the people at the exchange could have told at once that there hadn't been a call from White Gables that night.'

'One of the first things I did was to make that enquiry,' said Trent. 'That telephone call, and the wire you sent from Southampton to the dead man to say Harris hadn't turned up, and you were returning—I particularly appreciated both those.'

A constrained smile lighted Marlowe's face for a moment. 'I don't know that there's anything more to tell. I returned to Marlstone, and faced your friend the detective with such nerve as I had left. The worst was when I heard you had been put on the case—no, that wasn't the worst. The worst was when I saw you walk out of the shrubbery the next day, coming away from the shed where I had laid the body. For one ghastly moment I thought you were going to give me in charge on the spot. Now I've told you everything, you don't look so terrible.'

He closed his eyes, and there was a short silence. Then Trent got suddenly to his feet.

'Cross-examination?' enquired Marlowe, looking at him gravely.

'Not at all,' said Trent, stretching his long limbs. 'Only stiffness of the legs. I don't want to ask any questions. I believe what you have told us. I don't believe it simply because I always liked your face, or because it saves awkwardness, which are the most usual reasons for believing a person, but because my vanity will have it that no man could lie to me steadily for an hour without my perceiving it. Your story is an extraordinary one; but Manderson was an extraordinary man, and so are you. You acted like a lunatic in doing what you did; but I quite agree with you that if you had acted like a sane man you wouldn't have had the hundredth part of a dog's chance with a judge and jury. One thing is beyond dispute on any reading of the affair: you are a man of courage.'

The color rushed into Marlowe's face, and he hesitated for words. Before he could speak Mr. Cupples arose with a dry cough.

'For my part,' he said, 'I never supposed you guilty for a moment.' Marlowe turned to him in grateful amazement, Trent with an incredulous stare. 'But,' pursued Mr. Cupples, holding up his hand, 'there is one question which I should like to put.'

Marlowe bowed, saying nothing.

'Suppose,' said Mr. Cupples, 'that some one else had been suspected of the crime and put upon trial. What would you have done?'

'I think my duty was clear. I should have gone with my story to the lawyers for the defense, and put myself in their hands.'

Trent laughed aloud. Now that the thing was over, his spirits were rapidly becoming ungovernable. 'I can see their faces!' he said. 'As a matter of fact, though, nobody else was ever in danger. There wasn't a shred of evidence against any one. I looked up Murch at the Yard this morning, and he told me he had come round to Bunner's view, that it was a case of revenge on the part of some American black-hand gang. So there's the end of the Manderson case. Holy, suffering Moses! What an ass a man can make of himself when he thinks he's being preternaturally clever!' He seized the bulky envelope from the table and stuffed it into the heart of the fire. 'There's for you, old friend! For want of you the world's course will not fail. But look here! It's getting late—nearly seven, and Cupples and I have an appointment at half-past. We must go. Mr. Marlowe, goodbye.' He looked into the other's eyes. 'I am a man who has worked hard to put a rope round your neck. Considering the circumstances, I don't know whether you will blame me. Will you shake hands?'

CHAPTER XVI

The Last Straw

'What was that you said about our having an appointment at half-past seven?' asked Mr. Cupples as the two came out of the great gateway of the pile of flats. 'Have we such an appointment?'

'Certainly we have,' replied Trent. 'You are dining with me. Only one thing can properly celebrate this occasion, and that is a dinner for which I pay. No, no! I asked you first. I have got right down to the bottom of a case that must be unique—a case that has troubled even my mind for over a year—and if that isn't a good reason for standing a dinner, I don't know what is. Cupples, we will not go to my club. This is to be a festival, and to be seen in a London club in a state of pleasurable emotion is more than enough to shatter any man's career. Besides that, the dinner there is always the same, or, at least, they always make it taste the same, I know not how. The eternal dinner at my club hath bored millions of members like me, and shall bore; but tonight let the feast be spread in vain, so far as we are concerned. We will not go where the satraps throng the hall. We will go to Sheppard's.'

'Who is Sheppard?' asked Mr. Cupples mildly, as they proceeded up Victoria Street. His companion went with an unnatural lightness, and a policeman, observing his face, smiled indulgently at a look of happiness which he could only attribute to alcohol.

'Who is Sheppard?' echoed Trent with bitter emphasis. 'That question, if you will pardon me for saying so, Cupples, is thoroughly characteristic of the spirit of aimless enquiry prevailing in this restless day. I suggest our dining at Sheppard's, and instantly you fold your arms and demand, in a frenzy of intellectual pride, to know who Sheppard is before you will cross the threshold of Sheppard's. I am not going to pander to the vices of the modern mind. Sheppard's is a place where one can dine. I do not know Sheppard. It never occurred to me that Sheppard existed. Probably he is a myth of totemistic origin. All I know is that you can get a bit of saddle of mutton at Sheppard's that has made many an American visitor curse the day that Christopher Columbus was born . .. . Taxi!'

A cab rolled smoothly to the curb, and the driver received his instructions with a majestic nod.

'Another reason I have for suggesting Sheppard's,' continued Trent, feverishly lighting a cigarette, 'is that I am going to be married to the most wonderful woman in the world. I trust the connection of ideas is clear.'

'You are going to marry Mabel!' cried Mr. Cupples. 'My dear friend, what good news this is! Shake hands, Trent; this is glorious! I congratulate you both from the bottom of my heart. And may I say—I don't want to interrupt your flow of high spirits, which is very natural indeed, and I remember being just the same in similar circumstances long ago—but may I say how earnestly I have hoped for this? Mabel has seen so much unhappiness, yet she is surely a woman formed in the great purpose of humanity to be the best influence in the life of a good man. But I did not know her mind as regarded yourself. Your mind I have known for some time,' Mr. Cupples went on, with a twinkle in his eye that would have done credit to the worldliest of creatures. 'I saw it at once when you were both dining at my house, and you sat listening to Professor Peppmuller and looking at her. Some of us older fellows have our wits about us still, my dear boy.'

'Mabel says she knew it before that,' replied Trent, with a slightly crestfallen air. 'And I thought I was acting the part of a person who was not mad about her to the life. Well, I never was any good at dissembling. I shouldn't wonder if even old Peppmuller noticed something through his double convex lenses. But however crazy I may have been as an undeclared suitor,' he went on with a return to vivacity, 'I am going to be much worse now. As for your congratulations, thank you a thousand times, because I know you mean them. You are the sort of uncomfortable brute who would pull a face three feet long if you thought we were making a mistake. By the way, I can't help being an ass tonight; I'm obliged to go on blithering. You must try to bear it. Perhaps it would be easier if I sang you a song—one of your old favorites. What was that song you used always to be singing? Like this, wasn't it?' He accompanied the following stave with a dexterous clog-step on the floor of the cab:

'There was an old nigger, and he had a wooden leg. He had no tobacco, no tobacco could he beg. Another old nigger was as cunning as a fox, And he always had tobacco in his old tobacco-box.'

'Now for the chorus!'

'Yes, he always had tobacco in his old tobacco-box.'

'But you're not singing. I thought you would be making the welkin ring.'

'I never sang that song in my life,' protested Mr. Cupples. 'I never heard it before.'

'Are you sure?' enquired Trent doubtfully. 'Well, I suppose I must take your word for it. It is a beautiful song, anyhow: not the whole warbling grove in concert heard can beat it. Somehow it seems to express my feelings at the present moment as nothing else could; it rises unbidden to the lips. Out of the fullness of the heart the mouth speaketh, as the Bishop of Bath and Wells said when listening to a speech of Mr. Balfour's.'

'When was that?' asked Mr. Cupples.

'On the occasion,' replied Trent, 'of the introduction of the Compulsory Notification of Diseases of Poultry Bill, which ill-fated measure you of course remember. Hullo!' he broke off, as the cab rushed down a side street and swung round a corner into a broad and populous thoroughfare, 'we're there already'. The cab drew up.

'Here we are,' said Trent, as he paid the man, and led Mr. Cupples into a long, paneled room set with many tables and filled with a hum of talk. 'This is the house of fulfillment of craving, this is the bower with the roses around it. I see there are three bookmakers eating pork at my favorite table. We will have that one in the opposite corner.'

He conferred earnestly with a waiter, while Mr. Cupples, in a pleasant meditation, warmed himself before the great fire. 'The wine here,' Trent resumed, as they seated themselves, 'is almost certainly made out of grapes. What shall we drink?'

Mr. Cupples came out of his reverie. 'I think,' he said, 'I will have milk and soda water.'

'Speak lower!' urged Trent. 'The head-waiter has a weak heart, and might hear you. Milk and soda water! Cupples, you may think you have a strong constitution, and I don't say you have not, but I warn you that this habit of mixing drinks has been the death of many a robuster man than you. Be wise in time. Fill high the bowl with Samian wine, leave soda to the Turkish hordes. Here comes our food.' He gave another order to the waiter, who ranged the dishes before them and darted away. Trent was, it seemed, a respected customer. 'I have sent,' he said, 'for wine that I know, and I hope you will try it. If you have taken a vow, then in the name of all the teetotal saints drink water, which stands at your elbow, but don't seek a cheap notoriety by demanding milk and soda.'

'I have never taken any pledge,' said Mr. Cupples, examining his mutton with a favorable eye. 'I simply don't care about wine. I bought a bottle once and drank it to see what it was like, and it made me ill. But very likely it was bad wine. I will taste some of yours, as it is your dinner, and I do assure you, my dear Trent, I should like to do something unusual to show how strongly I feel on the present occasion. I have not been so delighted for many years. To think,' he reflected aloud as the waiter filled his glass, 'of the Manderson mystery disposed of, the innocent exculpated, and your own and Mabel's happiness crowned—all coming upon me together! I drink to you, my dear friend.' And Mr. Cupples took a very small sip of the wine.

'You have a great nature,' said Trent, much moved. 'Your outward semblance doth belie your soul's immensity. I should have expected as soon to see an elephant conducting at the opera as you drinking my health. Dear Cupples! May his beak retain ever that delicate rose-stain!—No, curse it all!' he broke out, surprising a shade of discomfort that flitted over his companion's face as he tasted the wine again. 'I have no business to meddle with your tastes. I apologize. You shall have what you want, even if it causes the head-waiter to perish in his pride.'

When Mr. Cupples had been supplied with his monastic drink, and the waiter had retired, Trent looked across the table with significance. 'In this babble of many conversations,' he said, 'we can speak as freely as if we were on a bare hillside. The waiter is whispering soft nothings into the ear of the young woman at the pay-desk. We are alone. What do you think of that interview of this afternoon?' He began to dine with an appetite.

Without pausing in the task of cutting his mutton into very small pieces Mr. Cupples replied: 'The most curious feature of it, in my judgment, was the irony of the situation. We both held the clue to that mad hatred of Manderson's which Marlowe found so mysterious. We knew of his jealous obsession; which knowledge we withheld, as was very proper, if only in consideration of Mabel's feelings. Marlowe will never know of what he was suspected by that person. Strange! Nearly all of us, I venture to think, move unconsciously among a network of opinions, often quite erroneous, which other people entertain about us. I remember, for instance, discovering quite by accident some years ago that a number of people of my acquaintance believed me to have been secretly received into the Church of Rome. This absurd fiction was based upon the fact, which in the eyes of many appeared conclusive, that I had expressed myself in talk as favoring the plan of a weekly abstinence from meat. Manderson's belief in regard to his secretary probably rested upon a much slighter ground. It was Mr. Bunner, I think you said, who told you of his rooted and apparently hereditary temper of suspicious jealousy . . . . With regard to Marlowe's story, it appeared to me entirely straightforward, and not, in its essential features, especially remarkable, once we have admitted, as we surely must, that in the case of Manderson we have to deal with a more or less disordered mind.'

Trent laughed loudly. 'I confess,' he said, 'that the affair struck me as a little unusual.'

'Only in the development of the details,' argued Mr. Cupples. 'What is there abnormal in the essential facts? A madman conceives a crazy suspicion; he hatches a cunning plot against his fancied injurer; it involves his own destruction. Put thus, what is there that any man with the least knowledge of the ways of lunatics would call remarkable? Turn now to Marlowe's proceedings. He finds himself in a perilous position from which, though he is innocent, telling the truth will not save him. Is that an unheard-of situation? He escapes by means of a bold and ingenious piece of deception. That seems to me a thing that might happen every day, and probably does so.' He attacked his now unrecognizable mutton.

'I should like to know,' said Trent, after an alimentary pause in the conversation, 'whether there is anything that ever happened on the face of the earth that you could not represent as quite ordinary and commonplace by such a line of argument as that.'

A gentle smile illuminated Mr. Cupples's face. 'You must not suspect me of empty paradox,' he said. 'My meaning will become clearer, perhaps, if I mention some things which do appear to me essentially remarkable. Let me see . . . . Well, I would call the life history of the liver-fluke, which we owe to the researches of Poulton, an essentially remarkable thing.'

'I am unable to argue the point,' replied Trent. 'Fair science may have smiled upon the liver-fluke's humble birth, but I never even heard it mentioned.'

'It is not, perhaps, an appetizing subject,' said Mr. Cupples thoughtfully, 'and I will not pursue it. All I mean is, my dear Trent, that there are really remarkable things going on all round us if we will only see them; and we do our perceptions no credit in regarding as remarkable only those affairs which are surrounded with an accumulation of sensational detail.'

Trent applauded heartily with his knife-handle on the table, as Mr. Cupples ceased and refreshed himself with milk and soda water. 'I have not heard you go on like this for years,' he said. 'I believe you must be almost as much above yourself as I am. It is a bad case of the unrest which men miscall delight. But much as I enjoy it, I am not going to sit still and hear the Manderson affair dismissed as commonplace. You may say what you like, but the idea of impersonating Manderson in those circumstances was an extraordinarily ingenious idea.'

'Ingenious—certainly!' replied Mr. Cupples. 'Extraordinarily so—no! In those circumstances (your own words) it was really not strange that it should occur to a clever man. It lay almost on the surface of the situation. Marlowe was famous for his imitation of Manderson's voice; he had a talent for acting; he had a chess-player's mind; he knew the ways of the establishment intimately. I grant you that the idea was brilliantly carried out; but everything favored it. As for the essential idea, I do not place it, as regards ingenuity, in the same class with, for example, the idea of utilizing the force of recoil in a discharged firearm to actuate the mechanism of ejecting and reloading. I do, however, admit, as I did at the outset, that in respect of details the case had unusual features. It developed a high degree of complexity.'

'Did it really strike you in that way?' enquired Trent with desperate sarcasm.

'The affair became complicated,' went on Mr. Cupples unmoved, 'because after Marlowe's suspicions were awakened, a second subtle mind came in to interfere with the plans of the first. That sort of duel often happens in business and politics, but less frequently, I imagine, in the world of crime.'

'I should say never,' Trent replied; 'and the reason is, that even the cleverest criminals seldom run to strategic subtlety. When they do, they don't get caught, since clever policemen have if possible less strategic subtlety than the ordinary clever criminal. But that rather deep quality seems very rarely to go with the criminal make-up. Look at Crippen. He was a very clever criminal as they go. He solved the central problem of every clandestine murder, the disposal of the body, with extreme neatness. But how far did he see through the game? The criminal and the policeman are often swift and bold tacticians, but neither of them is good for more than a quite simple plan. After all, it's a rare faculty in any walk of life.'