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"But – "

"I haven't finished yet," said Quarles, interrupting me. "Obviously one man couldn't remove all that gold and get it away from the city that night. The robber, with the duplicate keys he had in his possession, could go to that strong-room when he liked; all he had to do was to take the precaution that he was not seen. A very few visits sufficed, no doubt; but on each occasion he brought away some spoil with him, which he concealed, I imagine, somewhere in the bank, where he could easily get at it. The robbery extended over a period of time, that is my point, and whether dummy bags were substituted for those taken, or a bag was gradually emptied, does not matter."

"But, my dear professor, your ingenious theory overlooks the fact that, if it were true, there would be no use for the final catastrophe – for attacking the porter and blowing up the strong-room."

"Ah! that brings me to the mental attitude of the thief. I think we shall find that an inspection of those strong-rooms was imminent, and the thief was anxious, first, to make a last addition to his store, and, secondly, to suggest the work of a gang, and so minimize all risk to himself. Besides – "

The professor paused. There was a knock at the door, and the servant brought in a telegram. Quarles opened it and read it.

"Besides, one has to consider the mental twist a man may have," he went on. "We shall probably find in this case that at the back of the robbery was an awful dread of the future, of the helplessness and poverty that might come into it, an abnormal morbidness which so constantly drives men to strange actions."

"But how could Ewing manage to conceal himself in the bank, or get into it even? Everybody knew him, everybody probably knew of his dismissal."

"How about the window in the roof?" said Quarles, handing me the telegram, and I read: "Left early this afternoon; returned home."

"That refers to the general manager, Mr. Wickstead," said Quarles. "Probably he does not intend to remain at home, but we may catch him there. I have a man watching him. I thought my statement that we had traced Ewing would frighten him. He is the thief, Wigan. He is also the friend Ewing spoke about to Ursula Yerbury. Don't you see the cleverness? He helped Ewing out of the country, after frightening him by saying that a prosecution had been decided upon; sent him somewhere where he was not likely to hear of the robbery, and tried to throw dust in our eyes by expressing pity for him and a belief in his innocence."

"If you are right, what a villain!" I exclaimed.

"An abnormal dread of the future, Wigan; I think we shall find that is at the bottom of it, and we shall probably find also that the whole of the spoil is intact. The law, of course, cannot enter into these curious mental attitudes. Come! I think we shall provide a sensation for the world of finance."

The arrest of Mr. Wickstead when he was on the point of bolting, and his subsequent confession, certainly made a sensation; and, as Quarles had surmised, the whole of the money and the jewels were found concealed in Mr. Wickstead's house.

The manner of the robbery was much as Quarles had imagined it, and there is little doubt that Wickstead was in an abnormal mental condition. But he was not mad, and was sentenced to a long term of imprisonment.

It was a sad case altogether, the only bright spot in it being the marriage of Ursula Yerbury to the man she had trusted, in spite of his lapse from the path of rectitude.

CHAPTER XIII
THE WILL OF THE ECCENTRIC MR. FRISBY

I have said that, owing to Quarles's dislike of publicity, I was constantly receiving praise which I did not merit; but in the curious affair of Mr. Frisby's will, although I received substantial benefits, the professor was obliged to put up with the eulogy. The case was never in my hands professionally; indeed, strictly speaking, there was no case for the police to deal with. All I really did was to use my position to clear away difficulties and give Quarles a clear field for his investigations. He declared that he went into the thing for the sake of the reward which was offered, but it was undoubtedly the intricacy of the problem which attracted him.

I will tell Mr. Frisby's history as a connected narrative at once; but, of course, the theory was not complete when Quarles decided to attempt the solution of the difficulty. We got the outline from newspaper paragraphs and comments; but some of the details, such as the tenor of Mr. Frisby's letter to his nephew, were only filled in after we had taken up the case seriously.

James Frisby, a native of Boston, in Lincolnshire, was apparently a very ordinary young man indeed. He was a clerk in the office of a solicitor in the town, named Giles, and in his leisure hours was inclined to consort with the most undesirable companions, and to be a too frequent visitor to the public-house bars. Without his doing anything very outrageous, the position of black sheep of his family was assigned to him, and a too puritanical spirit, perhaps, had judged him to be well on the downward path, when a girl named Edith Turner, the daughter of a small but prosperous farmer at Spilsby, came into his circle. According to all accounts, she was the sort of girl any man might fall in love with; exactly what she saw in James Frisby was not so apparent. However, there was undoubtedly mutual affection; but the girl's family strongly objected to the friendship, and the girl herself was not to be persuaded to act in opposition to her father's wishes. Frisby pleaded, made all sorts of promises for the future, and, when these proved of no avail, he threw up his situation and went to Australia.

There was evidently more in him than people gave him credit for. Some twenty-five years afterward he returned to Boston an exceedingly wealthy man, and an eccentric one. He immediately entered into negotiations to purchase the Towers, a large house some three miles out of Boston on the Spilsby Road. It had stood empty a long time, and he spent an immense amount of money upon alterations and in furnishing it, giving no information to anyone concerning himself or his intentions.

Twenty-five years had brought many changes. The old town nestling, and dozing a little perhaps, under the great church with its high tower, a landmark far across the fen country and out to sea, was much the same; but a new generation of people lived in it. Frisby's friends had gone, were dead or scattered about the world, and he had only one relation living, a nephew, the son of an elder sister. Frisby Morton was in business in London, was married and doing fairly well, and had so lost touch with his native place that he heard nothing about his uncle's return until James Frisby had settled at the Towers.

Five or six years after Frisby had left Boston, Edith Turner had become Edith Oglethorpe, the wife of a farmer. There was nothing to show that she had grieved very much for her first lover, no suggestion that she had not been a happy wife and mother. Both she and her husband were dead when Frisby returned, and their later years had been clouded with misfortune. Bad harvests and ill-luck had eaten up their savings, and they had been able to do very little for their only son. They appear to have had many ambitions for him, all of which remained unfulfilled.

James Frisby found the lad, then between seventeen and eighteen, in a grocer's shop in Wide Bargate, one of the main thoroughfares of the town, and at once proposed to adopt him. It was natural that Frisby should be interested in the son of the woman he had loved; it was natural, too, that the boy should jump at the prospect which opened out to him, but it was curious how quickly these two came to love each other. For Frisby probably there was in the son something of what he had loved in the mother; and the lad, no doubt, saw in the man all those good and lovable qualities which Frisby took no trouble to exhibit to the world.

A tutor came to the Towers; in due course young Oglethorpe went to Cambridge, and came home to be the constant companion of his adopted father. Such a life would have been bad for most young men, but Edward Oglethorpe appeared to be an exception to the rule. He had everybody's good word, not because of his wealthy position, but for his own sake. That he would come into all Frisby's money no one doubted.

There are few who are not attracted by wealth, and it was only natural that Frisby Morton should take an early opportunity of making himself known to his uncle. He was his only kith and kin; he might reasonably hope to reap some advantage from his wealthy relative. Whether he approached his uncle in too open a manner, or whether James Frisby had something against his sister or brother-in-law, some injury which he had nursed all these years and had not forgiven, was not known. The one thing certain was that Frisby disliked his nephew and took some trouble to make his adopted son dislike him too. Morton persistently paid flying visits to the Towers, getting small welcome, and on one occasion there was a quarrel, entirely of his uncle's making, Morton declared. That there was some truth in this seemed probable, for shortly afterward James Frisby wrote to him. It may be he considered the letter a sort of apology. He said frankly that he did not like him, and that he didn't want to have anything more to do with him.

"It isn't your fault, and it isn't mine. It just happens," he wrote. "Still, I do realize that you are my nephew, I do understand that you have some reason for thinking that you have a claim upon me. That I am a rich man is my attraction for you. I know it; you need not scruple to admit it. My money will all go to my adopted son, Edward Oglethorpe; but, as I have said, you are my nephew, and the enclosed check recognizes the relationship, and pays for it. Please understand that it is all you will ever get."

The ungracious tone of the letter lost some of its sting by reason of the largeness of the check, which was for ten thousand pounds. Morton's credit was none too strong, so it suited his purpose to make no secret of the gift. To one or two persons in Boston he showed Mr. Frisby's letter, which suggested that he realized the finality of the transaction, and seemed content to drop his uncle's acquaintance. Whether he really gave up all hope of further advantage was another matter.

James Frisby's death, which occurred about ten years after his return to England, caused a sensation not only in Lincolnshire, but throughout the country. When he was taken ill it was not thought that anything serious was the matter with him, but a stroke followed, and the doctor pronounced his condition to be grave. Oglethorpe immediately telegraphed to Morton. Apparently he had not troubled either to like or dislike him, and thought it only right that the nephew should know of his uncle's condition. That Morton had received ten thousand pounds he was aware, but he knew nothing of the letter which accompanied the gift, or he might have hesitated to send for him. Morton came to the Towers and stayed there. His uncle had lost all power of speech, hardly seemed to recognize those about him, yet it was evident that something troubled him. They thought it was the light in the room. They darkened it, and, that having no effect, they increased it, but failed to satisfy the old man, who worked his hands backward and forward as if he were wringing them at the inability of those by his bedside to comprehend him. In this manner James Frisby passed out of life.

The first note of sensation came quickly. No will could be found, and it was soon rumored that no will had been made. Mr. Giles, the chief solicitor in Boston, son of the Giles in whose office Mr. Frisby had started life, had no will in his possession, nor had any other solicitor in the town; and the advertisements which appeared in the London and provincial papers failed to produce any solicitor who had. Diligent search in the house was without result. Not only was there no will, but there was not even a scrap of paper of any kind to indicate what the old man's wishes were. Mr. Giles, with an eye to business in the future, made himself agreeable to Frisby Morton, who, if no will were forthcoming, would come into the property as next of kin. The general opinion was that no will had been made, but a servant at the Towers declared that he and another servant had witnessed their master's signature to some document soon after Edward Oglethorpe had come there to live. The other witness had recently left the Towers, but was easily found in Lincoln. That they had witnessed the signature to a will neither of them could affirm; their master had not said what the document was, but they had supposed it was his will. They both agreed as to what the paper was like. Moreover, the man who had taken another situation in Lincoln gave an item of information which added to the sensation. Some little time after he had witnessed the signature, he chanced to meet Mr. Frisby Morton in Boston, and in the course of conversation had mentioned what he had done. He could not say that Mr. Morton was particularly interested, but he asked several questions about Mr. Frisby and young Mr. Oglethorpe. Gossip in a provincial town, especially when it concerns an affair which everyone is talking about, is apt to become a serious matter. It did in this case. It only required someone to say that Morton had been told of a will for someone else to suggest that he might know where the will was at the present moment. This gossip found its way into Mr. Giles's office, and the solicitor gave immediate advice to his client. Frisby Morton was furious. Rumors of libel actions were in the air, not one but many, and Morton declared that the foul insinuation could only have come from one source, and expressed his conviction that Oglethorpe was responsible for it. Oglethorpe, in his turn, was indignant at being considered capable of such a thing, and put himself into the hands of Messrs. Lacey, a London firm of solicitors. It was by their advice that a reward of a thousand pounds was offered to anyone who should find the will, or should give such information as would lead to its discovery.

It was the publication of this reward which attracted Quarles's attention.

"A thousand pounds, Wigan," he remarked. "Shall we go for it?"

I laughed; I thought he was joking.

"You are not busy, are you; you could give the time?" he queried.

"It is hardly in my line, is it?"

"Money is in everybody's line," he returned. "A thousand divided by three is three hundred and thirty-three pounds six shillings and eight pence. Zena shall go with us. Let's get Bradshaw."

Two days later we were in Boston, comfortably housed at an old-fashioned hostelry called the Heron. Before leaving London I had got the outline of the case, and a few hours in Boston enabled me to fill in the details of the story as I have set it down here.

We had a small sitting-room at the Heron, as crammed full of furniture as the room in Chelsea was empty.

"Who could really think in a room like this?" said Quarles.

"I don't know whether it's the fault of the room," I answered, "but I have no ideas at all about this affair."

Zena laughed.

"Oh! there are plenty of ideas to be had; the most obvious is that Mr. Frisby never made a will. That would be my verdict but for one fact: we have an eccentric to deal with."

Quarles looked at her fixedly.

"The man who could send ten thousand pounds to his nephew in the way he did would hardly be likely to leave any chance open of his ever getting a penny more," Zena said. "If he hadn't made a will before, I think he would have sat down and made it the moment after drawing that check."

"The room doesn't affect her, Wigan," said the professor. "There's something in the argument, but I shall have to get a lonely walk before I can see anything clearly. An eccentric; yes, I think that is a point to bear in mind."

Quarles had his walk before breakfast next day, and afterward he and I called upon Mr. Giles. The solicitor was evidently not pleased to see us. Since the reward had been offered by Edward Oglethorpe he looked upon us as antagonists; but as the professor argued, in his most suave manner, the finding of the will, if it existed, must be a satisfaction to everybody, and might save immense trouble in the future. Possibly Mr. Giles did not perceive the cynicism in this argument.

"There is no will," he said with conviction.

"Do you imagine the servants' statement to be a fabrication, then?"

"No, but a man wants his signature witnessed to other documents besides a will. The fact that servants witnessed this document, whatever it was, suggests a careless and haphazard way of doing business, a tendency to leave things to the last moment. I believe Mr. Frisby was that kind of man, and he would be quite likely to put off making his will until it was too late."

"It is possible," said Quarles.

"Probable, sir, almost a certainty. If there is a will I shall be more surprised than I have been at anything in my professional career."

"Naturally, your conviction greatly impresses me," said Quarles.

"Why, sir, his manner on his deathbed confirms my view," the solicitor went on. "He was speechless, practically unconscious, yet undoubtedly troubled about something. He had left his will too late, sir; that was the trouble, depend upon it."

"Your client – I think you act for Mr. Morton – will profit by the omission. I suppose there is no doubt whatever that, if a will were found, he would not be mentioned in it. He had already received his money, I understand."

"I have grave doubts on the subject," Giles answered. "If Mr. Frisby had ever sat down to make a will, I am inclined to think he would have repented of the way in which he had treated his nephew. Personally, if a will exists, I should not be surprised to find my client residuary legatee."

"Our friend Giles has missed his vocation, Wigan," said Quarles, as he walked back to the Heron, where he had ordered a carriage to drive us over to the Towers; "he should have turned his hand to writing romances instead of writing obscure English in legal documents."

"I have no doubt he will do exceedingly well if no will is found," I answered.

"No doubt. A mean man, Wigan, one who cannot help resenting the success of others. He does not forget that James Frisby was once a clerk in his father's office."

"Still, it seems to me there is a great deal of force in what he says," I remarked.

"It would interest me more to know what he really thinks," Quarles returned.

The Towers, exteriorly, was a barrack of a place, deriving its name from two square excrescences at either end of its long façade. Within it was a treasure house. Furniture, pictures, china, silver, books, all were good. The taste displayed was cosmopolitan, even bizarre. Not in a single room was there any attempt at uniformity, nor any fixed plan of decoration. Jacobean furniture, Georgian, examples of Sheraton, Heppelwhite, and other English worthies in the art, rubbed shoulders with the work of the master makers of Italy and France, and were crowded together with marvelous specimens from the East, from India and Japan. The paintings were of many schools; the china, as a private collection, would be hard to beat; much of the silver was unique, and rare books shared shelf room with the modern productions of the printers' and binders' arts.

"An eccentric, Wigan," said Quarles, glancing rapidly around him. "Zena was right in emphasizing that fact. We must bear it in mind."

Before leaving town I had taken the precaution of seeing Messrs. Lacey, the solicitors, and in consequence Edward Oglethorpe was prepared for our visit and welcomed it. His appearance went to confirm the reports we had heard of him. He was an upstanding, straightforward young Englishman of the best type, one with whom it seemed impossible to associate any kind of meanness.

The professor came to the point at once.

"May I take it, Mr. Oglethorpe, you have no reason to suspect that Frisby Morton has had anything to do with the disappearance of this will?"

"The idea never suggested itself to me until he accused me of making such a statement, then – "

"Quite naturally a doubt was raised in your mind," said Quarles. "Did it ever occur to you that Mr. Frisby had treated his nephew badly?"

"No; I knew he did not care for him, but I also knew he had given him ten thousand pounds. Only since his death have I known of the letter he sent with that check. I was, therefore, not aware that he intended to leave him out of his will."

"You feel confident there was a will?"

"Mr. Frisby told me I was his heir, and I took it for granted there was a will. I never saw, I do not think he actually told me he had made it. As it is, of course, I naturally have doubts whether it ever was made."

Quarles nodded.

"I cannot explain what my adopted father was to me," Oglethorpe went on, "nor how keenly I feel his death. The question of his wealth never troubled me. I was too happy and contented with him to give a thought to what my future would be without him. You can understand how hateful this business, this quarreling about his money, is to me."

"I can, I can," said Quarles, with ready sympathy, and with a few dexterous questions he set Oglethorpe talking about the dead man. Never surely has a man had his virtues treated more lovingly or his faults so little remembered. To illustrate some reminiscence of his adopted father, Oglethorpe led us from room to room to show us some cabinet or picture. It seemed to me, as I looked round, that there were a thousand places where a will might be securely hidden, and my sympathy went out to this young fellow who stood to lose what there could be no doubt he was intended to possess.

We came presently to the old man's sanctum. Quarles had not asked to see it. He had followed Oglethorpe, content to listen to him, and only asking a short question at intervals. He seemed to grow keener in this room.

"Was he here a great deal?" the professor asked, looking round.

"He did all his business here, and if he wanted to talk to me seriously we came in here. He always put down the check for my college expenses on this table with, 'There, my dear boy, don't spend it foolishly and don't get into debt' – always the same words. I can hear them now. It is a comfort to me to remember that I gave him no anxiety on that score."

"Of course this room has been searched very thoroughly?"

"The whole house has been searched from garret to cellar, but you are at liberty to look where you please."

"It would be superfluous labor, no doubt," Quarles answered. "Tell me, Mr. Oglethorpe, during this search were there any surprises? It seems certain that if a will exists it must be in an altogether unexpected place. Now were things generally found in unexpected places? For example, there is a safe in that corner, I see; did you by any chance find a pair of old slippers securely locked up in it?"

"There was nothing so eccentric as that," said Oglethorpe, "but certainly we did come across unexpected things. Some old pipes were locked in a cabinet in the drawing-room. We found a mass of worthless papers in that safe, while some valuable documents were under some old clothes at the bottom of a drawer in his bedroom. In that chest by the window, which a burglar would find difficult to pick, he had locked some fragments of a worthless china vase, and in this table drawer, which has no lock at all, he kept the few letters he had received from my mother. He looked upon them as one of the greatest treasures he possessed, yet anyone might have opened the drawer and read the letters. Yes, the dear old man was a little eccentric in that way."

"Kept his old clothes, useless papers, broken fragments. He did not like throwing things away."

"That is true."

"I suppose this room is much as he left it," said Quarles, picking up the waste-paper basket and turning over the papers in it.

"Yes; practically nothing has been moved or altered in the whole house. I had everything put back exactly where it was found. You notice that even the paper basket has not been emptied."

"May I open one or two drawers?" asked Quarles.

"You may search wherever you like," said Oglethorpe.

For a few minutes Quarles wandered round the room, opening a drawer here, a cabinet there, and apparently looking at the contents in a casual manner.

"I should like to see the room where Mr. Frisby died, if I may," he said presently.

We went upstairs, and with a slow glance round it, Quarles seemed to take in every item it contained and every corner that was in it. Here, too, he opened several drawers.

"He died in the evening, I understand," said the professor.

"Just before midnight," Oglethorpe returned.

"He was unconscious, wasn't he?"

"He could not speak, but I do not think he was altogether unconscious. I believe he knew me."

"It has been suggested that he appeared to have something on his mind," said Quarles.

"I think it was the light that troubled him, but whether he wanted more or less in the room we could not determine. We tried both without being able to satisfy him."

"Reviewing the circumstances of those last few hours, was there anything which might point to the cause of this trouble?"

"I do not think so," Oglethorpe answered. "He moved his hands continuously, but not in the least as if he were anxious to write. Such an idea did not occur to any of us. It was only afterward that we wondered whether he was troubled about his will."

"Who first started that idea?"

"I think it was Morton, but I am not sure."

"How did Mr. Frisby move his hands?"

"Like this, very slowly and feebly."

Oglethorpe held his hands before him an inch or two apart, the knuckles uppermost. The left hand he tilted slowly forward and downward; the right upward and backward.

"You are quite sure that those were the exact movements?" said Quarles after watching him closely.

"Quite sure."

"They were the same the whole time? He did not vary them?"

"Not once."

Quarles turned and walked out of the room, and we followed him. He paused to examine a bronze figure standing on a pedestal on the landing.

"Do you intend to begin your search at once?" Oglethorpe asked.

The professor did not answer.

"You can do so when you like," Oglethorpe went on.

"No," said Quarles with a start. He was not really examining the bronze, he was lost in thought. "No, not at once. I must think it out first. To-morrow, perhaps. I cannot say for certain."

It was by no means a hopeful answer, and I wondered if Quarles had already made some discovery which entirely destroyed his theory. His questions and his insistency on certain points told me that he had some theory.

We had kept our carriage waiting.

"I'm going to walk, Wigan," said the professor. "I must be alone. That road looks pretty flat and uninteresting; I shall go that way. It's impossible to think in that room at the Heron. I may be some hours. By the way, you might try and find out if Frisby Morton is in Boston. I might want to see him."

I drove back to the Heron, and in the afternoon I made inquiries about Morton. I found that a rumor had already been circulated in the town that a great detective had come to the Towers, and there was some excitement as to the reason of his visit. Mr. Giles must surely have mentioned our call, I thought. I also heard that Frisby Morton had left for London by the mid-day train, and I wondered if there was any significance in the fact of his departure coinciding with Quarles's arrival.

The professor did not return to the Heron until late. He was tired and hungry, and would neither talk nor listen to me until he had made a square meal.

"I found a splendid spot to think in, Wigan," he said, when the three of us were in our sitting-room. "A disused gravel-pit. I shared it with a frog for a time, but he worried me so I took him by the leg and threw him out. I looked for him afterward with the intention of throwing him in again. I could not find him, but as I was turning away, would you believe it, he hopped in again of his own accord."

I was not in the mood for an Æsop fable, and with some impatience I told him the results of my inquiries that afternoon.

"Gone, has he? Business called him to town, I presume?"

"Perhaps his solicitor wanted him to be out of reach of questions," I suggested.

"Our friend Giles is quite capable of it," Quarles returned. "He has not impressed me; but to return to my frog. There were quite a number of places near that gravel-pit which would have suited him equally well; but no, he would get back to the pit. I cannot say he gave me an idea, but he helped to confirm one. The mind, be it frog's or man's, is certain to be biased by circumstances and environment. If you watched a frog through a period of time, apart from his actions necessary to life and well-being, you would find him doing certain other things, doing them to-day because he did them yesterday. He acquires a habit. Men do the same. The more curious these actions are, the more eccentric the individual becomes. You remember Zena warned us that we had to do with an eccentric in this affair, and therefore was inclined to believe in the existence of a will."

Zena nodded.

"She based her belief on one point. When Mr. Frisby gave his nephew such a large sum of money, disliking him as he did, he would take special care that he should never touch another penny. A strong argument. Besides, there was the testimony of the two servants who had witnessed their master's signature to some document. On the other side was the outstanding fact that no will was forthcoming. Men do not put off making their wills until too late. A man like Mr. Frisby, it might reasonably be argued, when making his will, would go to a solicitor. He had a very large fortune to dispose of; he wished to benefit a person who had no legal claim on him; he was particularly anxious that his nephew should not get anything more. His early years in a lawyer's office would have shown him something of the pitfalls which await the amateur in legal matters. Further, there was the obvious distress of the dying man which might mean that he had neglected to make a will. On the whole, perhaps, the weight of evidence was against the existence of a will."