Dead Men's Money Page 7

  CHAPTER VII

  THE INQUEST ON JOHN PHILLIPS

  Several of the notabilities of the neighbourhood had ridden or driven tothe inn, attracted, of course, by curiosity, and the man with the maimedhand immediately joined them as they stood talking apart from the rest ofus. Now, I knew all such people of our parts well enough by sight, but Idid not know this man, who certainly belonged to their class, and Iturned to Mr. Lindsey, asking him who was this gentleman that had justridden up. He glanced at me with evident surprise at my question.

  "What?" said he. "You don't know him? That's the man there's been so muchtalk about lately--Sir Gilbert Carstairs of Hathercleugh House, the newsuccessor to the old baronetcy."

  I knew at once what he meant. Between Norham and Berwick, overlooking theTweed, and on the English side of the river, stood an ancient,picturesque, romantic old place, half-mansion, half-castle, set in itsown grounds, and shut off from the rest of the world by high walls andgroves of pine and fir, which had belonged for many a generation to theold family of Carstairs. Its last proprietor, Sir Alexander Carstairs,sixth baronet, had been a good deal of a recluse, and I never rememberseeing him but once, when I caught sight of him driving in the town--avery, very old man who looked like what he really was, a hermit. He hadbeen a widower for many long years, and though he had three children, itwas little company that he seemed to have ever got out of them, for hiselder son, Mr. Michael Carstairs, had long since gone away to foreignparts, and had died there; his younger son, Mr. Gilbert, was, it wasunderstood, a doctor in London, and never came near the old place; andhis one daughter, Mrs. Ralston, though she lived within ten miles of herfather, was not on good terms with him. It was said that the oldgentleman was queer and eccentric, and hard to please or manage; howeverthat may be, it is certain that he lived a lonely life till he was wellover eighty years of age. And he had died suddenly, not so very longbefore James Gilverthwaite came to lodge with us; and Mr. Michael beingdead, unmarried, and therefore without family, the title and estate hadpassed to Mr. Gilbert, who had recently come down to Hathercleugh Houseand taken possession, bringing with him--though he himself was getting onin years, being certainly over fifty--a beautiful young wife whom, theysaid, he had recently married, and was, according to various accountswhich had crept out, a very wealthy woman in her own right.

  So here was Sir Gilbert Carstairs, seventh baronet, before me, chattingaway to some of the other gentlemen of the neighbourhood, and there wasnot a doubt in my mind that he was the man whom I had seen on the roadthe night of the murder. I was close enough to him now to look moreparticularly at his hand, and I saw that the two first fingers hadcompletely disappeared, and that the rest of it was no more than a claw.It was not likely there could be two men in our neighbourhood thusdisfigured. Moreover, the general build of the man, the tweed suit ofgrey that he was wearing, the attitude in which he stood, all convincedme that this was the person I had seen at the cross-roads, holding hiselectric torch to the face of his map. And I made up my mind there andthen to say nothing in my evidence about that meeting, for I had noreason to connect such a great gentleman as Sir Gilbert Carstairs withthe murder, and it seemed to me that his presence at those cross-roadswas easily enough explained. He was a big, athletic man and was likelyfond of a walk, and had been taking one that evening, and, not as yetbeing over-familiar with the neighbourhood--having lived so long awayfrom it,--had got somewhat out of his way in returning home. No, I wouldsay nothing. I had been brought up to have a firm belief in the oldproverb which tells you that the least said is soonest mended. We wereall packed pretty tightly in the big room of the inn when the coroneropened his inquiry. And at the very onset of the proceedings he made aremark which was expected by all of us that knew how these things aredone and are likely to go. We could not do much that day; there wouldhave to be an adjournment, after taking what he might call the surfaceevidence. He understood, he remarked, with a significant glance at thepolice officials and at one or two solicitors that were there, that therewas some extraordinary mystery at the back of this matter, and that agood many things would have to be brought to light before the jury couldget even an idea as to who it was that had killed the man whose body hadbeen found, and as to the reason for his murder. And all they could dothat day, he went on, was to hear such evidence--not much--as had alreadybeen collected, and then to adjourn.

  Mr. Lindsey had said to me as we drove along to the inn that I shouldfind myself the principal witness, and that Gilverthwaite would come intothe matter more prominently than anybody fancied. And this, of course,was soon made evident. What there was to tell of the dead man, up to thattime, was little. There was the medical evidence that he had been stabbedto death by a blow from a very formidable knife or dagger, which had beendriven into his heart from behind. There was the evidence which Chisholmand I had collected in Peebles and at Cornhill station, and at the innacross the Coldstream Bridge. There was the telegram which had been sentby Mr. Gavin Smeaton--whoever he might be--from Dundee. And that wasabout all, and it came to this: that here was a man who, in registeringat a Peebles hotel, called himself John Phillips and wrote down that hecame from Glasgow, where, up to that moment, the police had failed totrace anything relating to such a person; and this man had travelled toCornhill station from Peebles, been seen in an adjacent inn, had thendisappeared, and had been found, about two hours later, murdered in alonely place.

  "And the question comes to this," observed the coroner, "what was thisman doing at that place, and who was he likely to meet there? We havesome evidence on that point, and," he added, with one shrewd glance atthe legal folk in front of him and another at the jurymen at his side,"I think you'll find, gentlemen of the jury, that it's just enough towhet your appetite for more."

  They had kept my evidence to the last, and if there had been a good dealof suppressed excitement in the crowded room while Chisholm and thedoctor and the landlord of the inn on the other side of Coldstream Bridgegave their testimonies, there was much more when I got up to tell mytale, and to answer any questions that anybody liked to put to me. Mine,of course, was a straight enough story, told in a few sentences, and Idid not see what great amount of questioning could arise out of it. Butwhether it was that he fancied I was keeping something back, or that hewanted, even at that initial stage of the proceedings, to make matters asplain as possible, a solicitor that was representing the county policebegan to ask me questions.

  "There was no one else with you in the room when this man Gilverthwaitegave you his orders?" he asked.

  "No one," I answered.

  "And you've told me everything that he said to you?"

  "As near as I can recollect it, every word."

  "He didn't describe the man you were to meet?"

  "He didn't--in any way."

  "Nor tell you his name?"

  "Nor tell me his name."

  "So that you'd no idea whatever as to who it was that you were to meet,nor for what purpose he was coming to meet Gilverthwaite, ifGilverthwaite had been able to meet him?"

  "I'd no idea," said I. "I knew nothing but that I was to meet a man andgive him a message."

  He seemed to consider matters a little, keeping silence, and then he wentoff on another tack.

  "What do you know of the movements of this man Gilverthwaite while he waslodging with your mother?" he asked.

  "Next to nothing," I replied.

  "But how much?" he inquired. "You'd know something."

  "Of my own knowledge, next to nothing," I repeated. "I've seen him in thestreets, and on the pier, and taking his walks on the walls and over theBorder Bridge; and I've heard him say that he'd been out in the country.And that's all."

  "Was he always alone?" he asked.

  "I never saw him with anybody, never heard of his talking to anybody, norof his going to see a soul in the place," I answered; "and first andlast, he never brought any one into our house, nor had anybody asked atthe door for him."

  "And with the exception of that registered
letter we've heard of, henever had a letter delivered to him all the time he lodged withyou?" he said.

  "Not one," said I. "From first to last, not one."

  He was silent again for a time, and all the folk staring at him and me;and for the life of me I could not think what other questions he couldget out of his brain to throw at me. But he found one, and put it with asharp cast of his eye.

  "Now, did this man ever give you, while he was in your house, any reasonat all for his coming to Berwick?" he asked.

  "Yes," I answered; "he did that when he came asking for lodgings. He saidhe had folk of his own buried in the neighbourhood, and he was minded totake a look at their graves and at the old places where they'd lived."

  "Giving you, in fact, an impression that he was either a native ofthese parts, or had lived here at some time, or had kindred thathad?" he asked.

  "Just that," I replied.

  "Did he tell you the names of such folk, or where they were buried, oranything of that sort?" he suggested.

  "No--never," said I. "He never mentioned the matter again."

  "And you don't know that he ever went to any particular place to look atany particular grave or house?" he inquired.

  "No," I replied; "but we knew that he took his walks into the country onboth sides Tweed."

  He hesitated a bit, looked at me and back at his papers, and then, with aglance at the coroner, sat down. And the coroner, nodding at him as ifthere was some understanding between them, turned to the jury.

  "It may seem without the scope of this inquiry, gentlemen," he said,"but the presence of this man Gilverthwaite in the neighbourhood hasevidently so much to do with the death of the other man, whom we know asJohn Phillips, that we must not neglect any pertinent evidence. There isa gentleman present that can tell us something. Call the ReverendSeptimus Ridley."