The Borough Treasurer

Brereton waved the proffered document aside and got up from his chair.

"No, thank you, Mr. Pett," he said. "I've no desire to see Mr. Kitely's will. I quite accept all that you say about it. You, as a lawyer, know very well that whatever I asked Miss Pett this morning was asked in the interests of my client. No—you can put the will away as far as I'm concerned. You've assured me that Miss Pett is as yet in ignorance of its contents, and—I take your word. I think, however, that Miss Pett won't be exactly surprised."

"Oh, I daresay my aunt has a pretty good idea, Mr. Brereton," agreed Pett, who having offered the will to both Bent and the superintendent, only to meet with a polite refusal from each, now put it back in his bag. "We all of us have some little idea which quarter the wind's in, you know, sir, in these cases. Of course, Kitely, deceased, had no relatives, Mr. Brereton: in fact, so far as Miss Pett and self are aware, beyond ourselves, he'd no friends."

"I was going to ask you a somewhat pertinent question, Mr. Pett," said Brereton. "Quite an informal one, you know. Do you think he had any enemies?"

Pett put his long white fingers together and inclined his head to one side. His slit of a mouth opened slightly, and his queer teeth showed themselves in a sly grin.

"Just so!" he said. "Of course, I take your meaning, Mr. Brereton. Naturally, you'd think that a man of his profession would make enemies. No doubt there must be a good many persons who'd have been glad—had he still been alive—to have had their knives into him. Oh, yes! But—unfortunately, I don't know of 'em, sir."

"Never heard him speak of anybody who was likely to cherish revenge, eh?" asked Brereton.

"Never, sir! Kitely, deceased," remarked Pett, meditatively, "was not given to talking of his professional achievements. I happen to know that he was concerned in some important cases in his time—but he rarely, if ever, mentioned them to me. In fact, I may say, gentlemen," he continued in a palpable burst of confidence, "I may say, between ourselves, that I'd had the honour of Mr. K.'s acquaintance for some time before ever I knew what his line of business had been! Fact!"

"A close man, eh?" asked Brereton.

"One of the very closest," replied Pett. "Yes, you may say that, sir."

"Not likely to let things out, I suppose?" continued Brereton.

"Not he! He was a regular old steel trap, Kitely was—shut tight!" said Pett.

"And—I suppose you've no theory, no idea of your own about his murder?" asked Brereton, who was watching the little man closely. "Have you formed any ideas or theories?"

Pett half-closed his eyes as he turned them on his questioner.

"Too early!" he replied, with a shake of his head. "Much too early. I shall—in due course. Meantime, there's another little commission I have to discharge, and I may as well do it at once. There are two or three trifling bequests in this will, gentlemen—one of 'em's to you, Mr. Bent. It wasn't in the original will—that was made before Kitely came to these parts. It's in a codicil—made when I came down here a few weeks ago, on the only visit I ever paid to the old gentleman. He desired, in case of his death, to leave you something—said you'd been very friendly to him."

"Very good of him, I'm sure," said Bent with a glance of surprise. "I'm rather astonished to hear of it, though."

"Oh, it's nothing much," remarked Pett, with a laugh as he drew from the brief bag what looked like an old quarto account book, fastened by a brass clasp. "It's a scrap-book that the old man kept—a sort of album in which he pasted up all sorts of odds and ends. He thought you'd find 'em interesting. And knowing of this bequest, sir, I thought I'd bring the book down. You might just give me a formal receipt for its delivery, Mr. Bent."

Bent took his curious legacy and led Mr. Pett away to a writing-desk to dictate a former of receipt. And as they turned away, the superintendent signed to Brereton to step into a corner of the room with him.

"You know what you said about that electric torch notion this afternoon, sir?" he whispered. "Well, after you left me, I just made an inquiry—absolutely secret, you know—myself. I went to Rellit, the ironmonger—I knew that if such things had ever come into the town, it 'ud be through him, for he's the only man that's at all up-to-date. And—I heard more than I expected to hear!"

"What?" asked Brereton.

"I think there may be something in what you said," answered the superintendent. "But, listen here—Rellit says he'd swear a solemn oath that nobody but himself ever sold an electric torch in Highmarket. And he's only sold to three persons—to the Vicar's son; to Mr. Mallalieu; and to Jack Harborough!"

CHAPTER XII

PARENTAL ANXIETY

For a moment Brereton and the superintendent looked at each other in silence. Then Bent got up from his desk at the other side of the room, and he and the little solicitor came towards them.

"Keep that to yourself, then," muttered Brereton. "We'll talk of it later. It may be of importance."

"Well, there's this much to bear in mind," whispered the superintendent, drawing back a little with an eye on the others. "Nothing of that sort was found on your client! And he'd been out all night. That's worth considering—from his standpoint, Mr. Brereton."

Brereton nodded his assent and turned away with another warning glance. And presently Pett and the superintendent went off, and Bent dropped into his easy chair with a laugh.

"Queer sort of unexpected legacy!" he said. "I wonder if the old man really thought I should be interested in his scrap-book?"

"There may be a great deal that's interesting in it," remarked Brereton, with a glance at the book, which Bent had laid aside on top of a book-case. "Take care of it. Well, what did you think of Mr. Christopher Pett?"

"Cool hand, I should say," answered Bent. "But—what did you think of him?"

"Oh, I've met Mr. Christopher Pett's sort before," said Brereton, drily. "The Dodson & Fogg type of legal practitioner is by no means extinct. I should much like to know a good deal more about his various dealings with Kitely. We shall see and hear more about them, however—later on. For the present there are—other matters."

He changed the subject then—to something utterly apart from the murder and its mystery. For the one topic which filled his own mind was also the very one which he could not discuss with Bent. Had Cotherstone, had Mallalieu anything to do with Kitely's death? That question was beginning to engross all his attention: he thought more about it than about his schemes for a successful defence of Harborough, well knowing that his best way of proving Harborough's innocence lay in establishing another man's guilt.

"One would give a good deal," he said to himself, as he went to bed that night, "if one could get a moment's look into Cotherstone's mind—or into Mallalieu's either! For I'll swear that these two know something—possibly congratulating themselves that it will never be known to anybody else!"

If Brereton could have looked into the minds of either of the partners at this particular juncture he would have found much opportunity for thought and reflection, of a curious nature. For both were keeping a double watch—on the course of events on one hand; on each other, on the other hand. They watched the police-court proceedings against Harborough and saw, with infinite relief, that nothing transpired which seemed inimical to themselves. They watched the proceedings at the inquest held on Kitely; they, too, yielded nothing that could attract attention in the way they dreaded. When several days had gone by and the police investigations seemed to have settled down into a concentrated purpose against the suspected man, both Mallalieu and Cotherstone believed themselves safe from discovery—their joint secret appeared to be well buried with the old detective. But the secret was keenly and vividly alive in their own hearts, and when Mallalieu faced the truth he knew that he suspected Cotherstone, and when Cotherstone put things squarely to himself he knew that he suspected Mallalieu. And the two men got to eyeing each other furtively, and to addressing each other curtly, and when they happened to be alone there was a heavy atmosphere of mutual dislike and suspicion between them.

It was a strange psychological fact that though these men had been partners for a period covering the most important part of their lives, they had next to nothing in common. They were excellent partners in business matters; Mallalieu knew Cotherstone, and Cotherstone knew Mallalieu in all things relating to the making of money. But in taste, temperament, character, understanding, they were as far apart as the poles. This aloofness when tested further by the recent discomposing events manifested itself in a disinclination to confidence. Mallalieu, whatever he thought, knew very well that he would never say what he thought to Cotherstone; Cotherstone knew precisely the same thing with regard to Mallalieu. But this silence bred irritation, and as the days went by the irritation became more than Cotherstone could bear. He was a highly-strung, nervous man, quick to feel and to appreciate, and the averted looks and monosyllabic remarks and replies of a man into whose company he could not avoid being thrown began to sting him to something like madness. And one day, left alone in the office with Mallalieu when Stoner the clerk had gone to get his dinner, the irritation became unbearable, and he turned on his partner in a sudden white heat of ungovernable and impotent anger.

"Hang you!" he hissed between his set teeth. "I believe you think I did that job! And if you do, blast you, why don't you say so, and be done with it?"

Mallalieu, who was standing on the hearth, warming his broad back at the fire, thrust his hands deeply into his pockets and looked half-sneeringly at his partner out of his screwed-up eyes.

"I should advise you to keep yourself cool," he said with affected quietness. "There's more than me'll think a good deal if you chance to let yourself out like that."

"You do think it!" reiterated Cotherstone passionately. "Damn it, d'ye think I haven't noticed it? Always looking at me as if—as if–"

"Now then, keep yourself calm," interrupted Mallalieu. "I can look at you or at any other, in any way I like, can't I? There's no need to distress yourself—I shan't give aught away. If you took it in your head to settle matters—as they were settled—well, I shan't say a word. That is unless—you understand?"

"Understand what?" screamed Cotherstone.

"Unless I'm obliged to," answered Mallalieu. "I should have to make it clear that I'd naught to do with that particular matter, d'ye see? Every man for himself's a sound principle. But—I see no need. I don't believe there'll be any need. And it doesn't matter the value of that pen that's shaking so in your hand to me if an innocent man suffers—if he's innocent o' that, he's guilty o' something else. You're safe with me."

Cotherstone flung the pen on the floor and stamped on it. And Mallalieu laughed cynically and walked slowly across to the door.

"You're a fool, Cotherstone," he said. "Go on a bit more like that, and you'll let it all out to somebody 'at 'll not keep secrets as I can. Cool yourself, man, cool yourself!"

"Hang you!" shouted Cotherstone. "Mind I don't let something out about you! Where were you that night, I should like to know? Or, rather, I do know! You're no safer than I am! And if I told what I do know–"

Mallalieu, with his hand on the latch, turned and looked his partner in the face—without furtiveness, for once.

"And if you told aught that you do, or fancy you know," he said quietly, "there'd be ruin in your home, you soft fool! I thought you wanted things kept quiet for your lass's sake? Pshaw!—you're taking leave o' your senses!"

He walked out at that, and Cotherstone, shaking with anger, relapsed into a chair and cursed his fate. And after a time he recovered himself and began to think, and his thoughts turned instinctively to Lettie.

Mallalieu was right—of course, he was right! Anything that he, Cotherstone, could say or do in the way of bringing up the things that must be suppressed would ruin Lettie's chances. So, at any rate, it seemed to him. For Cotherstone's mind was essentially a worldly one, and it was beyond him to believe that an ambitious young man like Windle Bent would care to ally himself with the daughter of an ex-convict. Bent would have the best of excuses for breaking off all relations with the Cotherstone family if the unpleasant truth came out. No!—whatever else he did, he must keep his secret safe until Bent and Lettie were safely married. That once accomplished, Cotherstone cared little about the future: Bent could not go back on his wife. And so Cotherstone endeavoured to calm himself, so that he could scheme and plot, and before night came he paid a visit to his doctor, and when he went home that evening, he had his plans laid.

Bent was with Lettie when Cotherstone got home, and Cotherstone presently got the two of them into a little snuggery which he kept sacred to himself as a rule. He sat down in his easy chair, and signed to them to sit near him.

"I'm glad I found you together," he said. "There's something I want to say. There's no call for you to be frightened, Lettie—but what I've got to say is serious. And I'll put it straight—Bent'll understand. Now, you'd arranged to get married next spring—six months hence. I want you to change your minds, and to let it be as soon as you can."

He looked with a certain eager wistfulness at Lettie, expecting to see her start with surprise. But fond as he was of her, Cotherstone had so far failed to grasp the later developments of his daughter's character. Lettie Cotherstone was not the sort of young woman who allows herself to be surprised by anything. She was remarkably level-headed, cool of thought, well able to take care of herself in every way, and fully alive to the possibilities of her union with the rising young manufacturer. And instead of showing any astonishment, she quietly asked her father what he meant.

"I'll tell you," answered Cotherstone, greatly relieved to find that both seemed inclined to talk matters quietly over. "It's this—I've not been feeling as well as I ought to feel, lately. The fact is, Bent, I've done too much in my time. A man can work too hard, you know—and it tells on him in the end. So the doctor says, anyhow."

"The doctor!" exclaimed Lettie. "You haven't been to him?"

"Seen him this afternoon," replied Cotherstone. "Don't alarm yourself. But that's what he says—naught wrong, all sound, but—it's time I rested. Rest and change—complete change. And I've made up my mind—I'm going to retire from business. Why not? I'm a well-to-do man—better off than most folks 'ud think. I shall tell Mallalieu tomorrow. Yes—I'm resolved on it. And that done, I shall go and travel for a year or two—I've always wanted to go round the world. I'll go—that for a start, anyway. And the sooner the better, says the doctor. And–" here he looked searchingly at his listeners—"I'd like to see you settled before I go. What?"

Lettie's calm and judicial character came out in the first words she spoke. She had listened carefully to Cotherstone; now she turned to Bent.

"Windle," she said, as quietly as if she were asking the most casual of questions, "wouldn't it upset all your arrangements for next year? You see, father," she went on, turning to Cotherstone, "Windle had arranged everything. He was going to have the whole of the spring and summer away from business; we were going on the Continent for six months. And that would have to be entirely altered and–"

"We could alter it," interrupted Bent. He was watching Cotherstone closely, and fancying that he saw a strained and eager look in his face, he decided that Cotherstone was keeping something back, and had not told them the full truth about his health.

"It's all a matter of arrangement. I could arrange to go away during the winter, Lettie."

"But I don't want to travel in winter," objected Lettie. "Besides—I've made all my arrangements about my gowns and things."

"That can be arranged, too," said Bent. "The dressmaker can work overtime."

"That'll mean that everything will be hurried—and spoiled," replied Lettie. "Besides, I've arranged everything with my bridesmaids. They can't be expected to–"

"We can do without bridesmaids," replied Bent, laying his hand on Lettie's arm. "If your father really feels that he's got to have the rest and the change he spoke of, and wants us to be married first, why, then–"

"But there's nothing to prevent you having a rest and a change now, father," said Lettie. "Why not? I don't like my arrangements to be altered—I had planned everything out so carefully. When we did fix on next spring, Windle, I had only just time as it was!"

"Pooh!" said Bent. "We could get married the day after tomorrow if we wanted! Bridesmaids—gowns—all that sort of tomfoolery, what does it matter?"

"It isn't tomfoolery," retorted Lettie. "If I am to be married I should like to be married properly."

She got up, with a heightened colour and a little toss of her head, and left the room, and the two men looked at each other.

"Talk to her, my lad," said Cotherstone at last. "Of course, girls think such a lot of—of all the accompaniments, eh?"

"Yes, yes—it'll be all right," replied Bent. He tapped Cotherstone's arm and gave him a searching look. "You're not keeping anything back—about your health, are you?" he asked.

Cotherstone glanced at the door and sank his voice to a whisper.

"It's my heart!" he answered. "Over-strained—much over-strained, the doctor says. Rest and change—imperative! But—not a word to Lettie, Bent. Talk her round—get it arranged. I shall feel safer—you understand?"

Bent was full of good nature, and though he understood to the full—it was a natural thing, this anxiety of a father for his only child. He promised to talk seriously to Lettie at once about an early wedding. And that night he told Brereton of what had happened, and asked him if he knew how special licences can be got, and Brereton informed him of all he knew on that point—and kept silence about one which to him was becoming deeply and seriously important.

CHAPTER XIII

THE ANONYMOUS LETTER

Within a week of that night Brereton was able to sum things up, to take stock, to put clearly before himself the position of affairs as they related to his mysterious client. They had by that time come to a clear issue: a straight course lay ahead with its ultimate stages veiled in obscurity. Harborough had again been brought up before the Highmarket magistrates, had stubbornly refused to give any definite information about his exact doings on the night of Kitely's murder, and had been duly committed for trial on the capital charge. On the same day the coroner, after holding an inquest extending over two sittings, had similarly committed him. There was now nothing to do but to wait until the case came on at Norcaster Assizes. Fortunately, the assizes were fixed for the middle of the ensuing month: Brereton accordingly had three weeks wherein to prepare his defence—or (which would be an eminently satisfactory equivalent) to definitely fix the guilt on some other person.

Christopher Pett, as legal adviser to the murdered man, had felt it his duty to remain in Highmarket until the police proceedings and the coroner's inquest were over. He had made himself conspicuous at both police-court and coroner's court, putting himself forward wherever he could, asking questions wherever opportunity offered. Brereton's dislike of him increased the more he saw of him; he specially resented Pett's familiarity. But Pett was one of those persons who know how to combine familiarity with politeness and even servility; to watch or hear him talk to any one whom he button-holed was to gain a notion of his veneration for them. He might have been worshipping Brereton when he buttoned-holed the young barrister after Harborough had been finally committed to take his trial.

"Ah, he's a lucky man, that, Mr. Brereton!" observed Pett, collaring Brereton in a corridor outside the crowded court. "Very fortunate man indeed, sir, to have you take so much interest in him. Fancy you—with all your opportunities in town, Mr. Brereton!—stopping down here, just to defend that fellow out of—what shall we call it?—pure and simple Quixotism! Quixotism!—I believe that's the correct term, Mr. Brereton. Oh, yes—for the man's as good as done for. Not a cat's chance! He'll swing, sir, will your client!"

"Your simile is not a good one, Mr. Pett," retorted Brereton. "Cats are said to have nine lives."

"Cat, rat, mouse, dog—no chance whatever, sir," said Pett, cheerfully. "I know what a country jury'll say. If I were a betting man, Mr. Brereton—which I ain't, being a regular church attendant—I'd lay you ten to one the jury'll never leave the box, sir!"

"No—I don't think they will—when the right man is put in the dock, Mr. Pett," replied Brereton.

Pett drew back and looked the young barrister in the face with an expression that was half quizzical and half serious.

"You don't mean to say that you really believe this fellow to be innocent, Mr. Brereton?" he exclaimed. "You!—with your knowledge of criminal proceedings! Oh, come now, Mr. Brereton—it's very kind of you, very Quixotic, as I call it, but–"

"You shall see," said Brereton and turned off. He had no mind to be more than civil to Pett, and he frowned when Pett, in his eagerness, laid a detaining hand on his gown. "I'm not going to discuss it, Mr. Pett," he added, a little warmly. "I've my own view of the case."

"But, but, Mr. Brereton—a moment!" urged Pett. "Just between ourselves as—well, not as lawyers but as—as one gentleman to another. Do you think it possible it was some other person? Do you now, really?"

"Didn't your estimable female relative, as you call her, say that I suggested she might be the guilty person?" demanded Brereton, maliciously. "Come, now, Mr. Pett! You don't know all that I know!"

Pett fell back, staring doubtfully at Brereton's curled lip, and wondering whether to take him seriously or not. And Brereton laughed and went off—to reflect, five minutes later, that this was no laughing matter for Harborough and his daughter, and to plunge again into the maze of thought out of which it was so difficult to drag anything that seemed likely to be helpful.

He interviewed Harborough again before he was taken back to Norcaster, and again he pressed him to speak, and again Harborough gave him a point-blank refusal.

"Not unless it comes to the very worst, sir," he said firmly, "and only then if I see there's no other way—and even then it would only be for my daughter's sake. But it won't come to that! There's three weeks yet—good—and if somebody can't find out the truth in three weeks–"

"Man alive!" exclaimed Brereton. "Your own common-sense ought to tell you that in cases like this three years isn't enough to get at the truth! What can I do in three weeks?"

"There's not only you, sir," replied Harborough. "There's the police—there's the detectives—there's–"

"The police and the detectives are all doing their best to fasten the crime on you!" retorted Brereton. "Of course they are! That's their way. When they've safely got one man, do you think they're going to look for another? If you won't tell me what you were doing, and where you were that night, well, I'll have to find out for myself."

Harborough gave his counsel a peculiar look which Brereton could not understand.

"Oh, well!" he said. "If you found it out–"

He broke off at that, and would say no more, and Brereton presently left him and walked thoughtfully homeward, reflecting on the prisoner's last words.

"He admits there is something to be found out," he mused. "And by that very admission he implies that it could be found out. Now—how? Egad!—I'd give something for even the least notion!"

Bent's parlour-maid, opening the door to Brereton, turned to a locked drawer in the old-fashioned clothes-press which stood in Bent's hall, and took from it a registered letter.

"For you, sir," she said, handing it to Brereton. "Came by the noon post, sir. The housekeeper signed for it."

Brereton took the letter into the smoking-room and looked at it with a sudden surmise that it might have something to do with the matter which was uppermost in his thoughts. He had had no expectation of any registered letter, no idea of anything that could cause any correspondent of his to send him any communication by registered post. There was no possibility of recognizing the handwriting of the sender, for there was no handwriting to recognize: the address was typewritten. And the postmark was London.