The Cask. Freeman Wills Crofts

He measured the distance between them and found it was fifteen inches. Ladders, he knew, are about twelve.

      Opening the gate he went to the outside of the wall. A grass plot ran alongside it here and the Inspector, stooping down, searched for corresponding marks. He was not disappointed. Two much deeper depressions showed where the ends of the ladder-like apparatus had sunk into the softer ground. These were not narrow like those in the yard, but rectangular and of heavier stuff, three inches by two, he estimated. He looked at the plaster on the wall above, but it was not till he examined it through his lens that he was satisfied it bore two faint scratches, corresponding in position to the muddy marks on the opposite side.

      A further thought struck him. Scooping up a little soil from the grass, he went again into the yard and compared with his lens the soil and the dry mud of the marks on the plaster. As he had anticipated, they were identical.

      He could now dimly reconstruct what had happened. Some one had placed a peculiar kind of ladder against the outside of the wall and presumably crossed it and opened the gate. The ladder had then been carried round and placed against the inside of the wall, but, probably by accident, opposite end up. The outside plaster was therefore clean but scraped, while that on the inside bore traces of the soil from the ends that had stood on the grass. In going out after barring the gate, he imagined the thief had pulled the ladder after him with a cord and passed it over the wall.

      The Inspector returned to the grass and made a further search. Here he found confirmation of his theory in a single impression of one of the legs of the ladder some two feet six out from the wall. That, he decided, had been caused by the climber throwing down the ladder when leaving the yard. He also found three footmarks, but, unfortunately, they were so blurred as to be valueless.

      He took out his notebook and made a sketch with accurate dimensions showing what he had learnt of the ladder—its length, width, and the shape of the legs at each end. Then bringing out the steps Felix had used to hang the chain blocks, he got on the wall. He examined the cement coping carefully, but without finding any further traces.

      The yard being paved, no wheel or foot marks were visible, but Burnley spent quite a long time crossing and recrossing it, examining every foot of ground in the hope of finding some object that had been dropped. Once before, in just such another case, he had had the luck to discover a trouser button concealed under some leaves, a find which had led to penal servitude for two men. On this occasion he was disappointed, his search being entirely unsuccessful.

      He went out on the drive. Here were plenty of marks, but try as he would he could make nothing of them. The surface was covered thickly with fine gravel and only showed vague disturbances with no clear outlines. He began methodically to search the drive as he had done the yard. Every foot was examined in turn, Burnley gradually working down towards the gate. After he left the immediate neighbourhood of the house the gravel became much thinner, but the surface below was hard and bore no marks. He continued perseveringly until he got near the gate, and then he had some luck.

      In the lawn between the house and the road some work was in progress. It seemed to Burnley that a tennis or croquet ground was being made. From the corner of this ground a recently filled in cut ran across the drive and out to the hedge adjoining the lane. Evidently a drain had just been laid.

      Where this drain passed under the drive the newly filled ground had slightly sunk. The hollow had been made up in the middle with gravel, but it happened that a small space on the lane side which had not gone down much was almost uncovered, the clay showing through. On this space were two clearly defined footmarks, pointing in the direction of the house.

      I have said two, but that is not strictly correct. One, that of a workman’s right boot with heavy hobnails, was complete in every detail, the clay holding the impression like plaster of Paris. The other, some distance in front and to the left and apparently the next step forward, was on the edge of the clay patch and showed the heel only, the sole having borne on the hard.

      Inspector Burnley’s eyes brightened. Never had he seen better impressions. Here was something tangible at last. He bent down to examine them more closely, then suddenly sprang to his feet with a gesture of annoyance.

      ‘Fool that I am,’ he growled, ‘that’s only Watty bringing up the cask.’

      All the same he made a careful sketch of the marks, showing the distance between them and the size of the clay patch. Watty, he felt sure, would be easy to find through the carting establishment, when he could ascertain if the footsteps were his. If it should chance they were not, he had probably found a useful clue to the thief. For the convenience of the reader I reproduce the sketch.

      Burnley turned to go on, but his habit of thinking things out reasserted itself, and he stood gazing at the marks and slowly pondering. He was puzzled that the steps were so close together. He took out his rule and re-measured the distance between them. Nineteen inches from heel to heel. That was surely very close. A man of Watty’s size would normally take a step of at least thirty inches, and carters were generally long-stepping men. If he had put it at thirty-two or thirty-three inches he would probably be nearer the thing. Why, then, this short step?

      He looked and pondered. Then suddenly a new excitement came into his eyes and he bent swiftly down again.

      ‘Jove!’ he murmured. ‘Jove! I nearly missed that! It makes it more like Watty and, if so, it is conclusive! Absolutely conclusive!’ His cheek was flushed and his eyes shone.

      ‘That probably settles that hash,’ said the evidently delighted Inspector. He, nevertheless, continued his methodical search down the remainder of the drive and out on to the road, but without further result.

      He looked at his watch. It was seven o’clock.

      ‘Two more points and I’m through,’ he said to himself in a satisfied tone.

      He turned into the lane and walked slowly down it, scrutinising the roadway as he had done the drive. Three separate times he stopped to examine and measure footmarks, the third occasion being close by the little gate in the hedge.

      ‘Number one point done. Now for number two,’ he muttered, and returning to the entrance gate stood for a moment looking up and down the road. Choosing the direction of London he walked for a quarter of a mile examining the gateways at either side, particularly those that led into fields. Apparently he did not find what he was in search of, for he retraced his steps to where a cross road led off to the left and continued his investigations along it. No better luck rewarding him, he tried a second cross road with the same result. There being no other cross roads, he returned to the lane and set out again, this time with his back to London. At the third gateway, one leading into a field on the left-hand side of the road, he stopped.

      It was an ordinary iron farm gate set in the rather high and thick hedge that bounded the road. The field was in grass and bore the usual building ground notice. Immediately inside the gate was a patch of low and swampy looking ground, and it was a number of fresh wheel marks crossing this patch that had caught the Inspector’s attention.

      The gate was not padlocked, and Burnley slipped the bolt back and entered the field. He examined the wheel marks with great care. They turned sharply at right angles on passing through the gate and led for a short distance along the side of the fence, stopping beside a tree which grew in the hedge. The hoof marks of a horse and the prints of a man’s hobnailed boots leading over the same ground also came in for a close scrutiny.

      It was a contented looking Burnley that turned out of the field and walked back to St Malo. He was well satisfied with his night’s work. He had firstly succeeded in getting a lot of information out of Felix, and had further turned the latter into a friend anxious to help in the clearing up of the mystery. And though an unexpected check had arisen in the disappearance of the cask, he felt that with the information he had gained in the last three hours it would not be long before he had his hands on it again.

      As he approached the door Felix hailed him.

      ‘I saw you coming up,’ he said. ‘What luck?’