The Third R. Austin Freeman Megapack. R. Austin Freeman

It was entered by an arched gateway graced by two ancient cannon set up as posts and guarded by a Hausa sentry in a blue serge uniform and a scarlet fez. Towards the gateway Osmond and Betty directed their steps, and as they approached, the sentry sprang smartly to attention and presented arms; whereupon Betty marched in with impressive dignity and two tiny fingers raised to the peak of her helmet.

      “This seems to be the way up,” she said, turning towards a mouldering wooden staircase, as a supercilious-looking pelican waddled towards them and a fish-eagle on a perch in a corner uttered a loud yell. “What a queer place it is! It looks like a menagerie. I wonder if there is anyone at home.”

      She tripped up the stairs, followed by Osmond and watched suspiciously by an assemblage of storks, coots, rails, and other birds which were strolling about at large in the quadrangle, and came out on an open space at the top of a corner bastion. Just as they reached this spot a man came hurrying out of a shabby building which occupied one side of the square; and at the first glance Osmond recognized him as the officer who had come to Adaffia to execute the warrant on the day when he had buried poor Larkom. The recognition was mutual, for as soon as he had saluted Betty, the officer turned to him and held out his hand.

      “Larkom, by Jove!” said he.

      “My name is Cook,” Osmond corrected.

      “Oh,” said the other; “glad you set me right, because I have been going to send you a note. You remember me—Cockeram. I came down to Adaffia, you know, about that poor chap, Osmond.”

      “I remember. You said you had been going to write to me.”

      “Yes. I was going to send you something that I thought would interest you. I may as well give it to you now.” He began to rummage in his pockets and eventually brought forth a bulging letter-case, the very miscellaneous contents of which he proceeded to sort out. “It’s about poor Osmond,” he continued, disjointedly, and still turning over a litter of papers. “I felt that you would like to see it. Poor chap! It was such awfully rough luck.”

      “What was?” asked Osmond.

      “Why, you remember,” replied Cockeram, suspending his search to look up, “that I had a warrant to arrest him. It seemed that he was wanted for some sort of jewel robbery and there had been a regular hue-and-cry after him. Then he managed to slip away to sea and had just contrived to get into hiding at Adaffia when the fever got him. Frightful hard lines!”

      “Why hard lines?” demanded Osmond.

      “Why? Because he was innocent.”

      “Innocent!” exclaimed Osmond, staring at the officer in amazement.

      “Yes, innocent. Had nothing whatever to do with the robbery. No one can make out why on earth he scooted.”

      As Cockeram made his astounding statement, Betty turned deathly pale. “Is it quite certain that he was innocent?” she asked in a low, eager tone.

      “Perfectly,” he replied, turning an astonished blue eye on the white-faced girl and then hastily averting it. “Where is that confounded paper—newspaper cutting? I cut it out to send to Lark—Cook. There is no doubt whatever. It seems that they employed a criminal lawyer chap—a certain Dr. Thorndyke—to work up the case against Osmond. So this lawyer fellow got to work. And the upshot of it was that he proved conclusively that Osmond couldn’t possibly be the guilty party.”

      “How did he prove that?” Osmond demanded.

      “In the simplest and most satisfactory way possible,” replied Cockeram. “He followed up the tracks until he had spotted the actual robber and held all the clues in his hand. Then he gave the police the tip; and they swooped down on my nabs—caught him fairly on the hop with all the stolen property in his possession. There isn’t the shadow of a doubt about it.”

      “What was the name of the man who stole the gems?” Osmond asked anxiously.

      “I don’t remember,” Cockeram replied. “What interested me was the name of the man who didn’t steal them.”

      Betty, still white-faced and trembling, stood gazing rather wildly at Osmond. For his face bore a very singular expression—an expression that made her feel sick at heart. He did not look relieved or joyful. Surprised he certainly was. But it was not joyous surprise. Rather was it suggestive of alarm and dismay. And meanwhile Cockeram continued to turn over the accumulations in his letter-case. Suddenly he drew forth a crumpled and much-worn envelope from which he triumphantly extracted a long newspaper cutting.

      “Ah!” he exclaimed, as he handed it to Osmond, “here we are. You will find full particulars in this. You needn’t send it back to me. I have done with it. And now I must hook off to the court-house. You will take possession of the mess-room, Miss Burleigh, won’t you? and order whatever you want. Of course, Mr. Cook is my guest.” With a formal salute he turned, ran down the rickety stairs and out at the gate, pursued closely as far as the wicket by the pelican.

      But Betty’s whole attention was focussed on Osmond; and as he fastened hungrily on the newspaper cutting, she took his arm and drew him gently through a ramshackle lattice porch into the shabby little white washed mess-room, where she stood watching with mingled hope and terror the strange, enigmatical expression on his face as he devoured the printed lines.

      Suddenly—in the twinkling of an eye—That expression changed. Anxiety, even consternation, gave place to the wildest astonishment; his jaw fell, and the hand which held the newspaper cutting dropped to his side. And then he laughed aloud; a weird, sardonic laugh that made poor Betty’s flesh creep.

      “What is it, Jim, dear?” she asked nervously.

      He looked in her face and laughed again.

      “My name,” said he, “is not Jim. It is John. John Osmond.”

      “Very well, John,” she replied, meekly. “But why did you laugh?”

      He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked down at her with a smile.

      “Betty, darling,” said he, “do I understand that you are willing to marry me?”

      “Willing indeed!” she exclaimed. “I am going to marry you.”

      “Then, my darling,” said he, “you are going to marry a fool.”

      BOOK II

      The Investigator

      CHAPTER XII

      The Indictment

      Mr. Joseph Penfield sat behind his writing-table in a posture of calm attention, allowing his keen grey eyes to travel back and forth from the silver snuff box which lay on the note-pad before him to the two visitors who confronted him from their respective chairs. One of these, an elderly hard-faced man, square of jaw and truculent of eye, was delivering some sort of statement, while the other, a considerably younger man, listened critically, with his eyes cast down, but stealing, from time to time, a quick, furtive glance either at the speaker or at Mr. Penfield. He was evidently following the statement closely; and to an observer there might have appeared in his concentrated attention something more than mere interest; something inscrutable, with, perhaps, the faintest suggestion of irony.

      As the speaker came, somewhat abruptly, to an end, Mr. Penfield opened his snuff-box and took a pinch delicately between finger and thumb.

      “It is not quite clear to me, Mr. Woodstock,” said he, “why you are consulting me in this matter. You are an experienced practitioner, and the issue is a fairly simple one. What is there against your dealing with the case according to your own judgment?”

      “A good deal,” Mr. Woodstock replied. “In the first place, I am one of the interested parties—the principal one, in fact. In the second, I practise in a country town, whereas you are here in the very heart of the legal world; and in the third, I have no experience whatever of criminal practice; I am a conveyancer pure and simple.”

      “But,” objected Mr. Penfield, “this is not a matter of criminal practice.