VIII
THE MYSTERY OF BRUDENELL COURT
"Did you ever make up your mind about that Brudenell Court affair?" the Old Man in the Corner said to me that day.
"No," I replied. "As far as I am concerned the death of Colonel Forburg has remained a complete mystery."
"You don't think," he insisted, "that Morley Thrall was guilty?"
"Well," I said, "I don't know what to think."
"Then don't do it," he rejoined, with a chuckle, "if you don't know what to think, then it's best not to think at all. At any rate wait until I have told you exactly what did happen—not as it was reported in the newspapers, but in the sequence in which the various incidents occurred.
"On Christmas Eve, last year, while the family were at dinner, there was a sudden commotion and cries of 'Stop, thief!' issuing from the back premises of Brudenell Court, the country seat of a certain Colonel Forburg. The butler ran in excitedly to say that Julia Mason, one of the maids, was drawing down the blinds in one of the first-floor rooms, when she saw a man fiddling with the shutters of the French window in the smoking-room downstairs. She at once gave the alarm, whereupon the man bolted across the garden in the direction of the five-acre field. The Colonel and his stepson, as well as two male guests who were dining with them, immediately jumped up and hurried out to help in the chase. It was a very dark night, people were running to and fro, and for a few moments there was a great deal of noise and confusion, through which two pistol-shots in close succession were distinctly heard.
"The ladies—amongst whom was Miss Monica Glenluce, the Colonel's stepdaughter—had remained in the dining-room, and the dinner was kept waiting, pending the return of the gentlemen. They straggled in one by one, all except the Colonel. The ladies eagerly asked for news; the gentlemen could not say much—the night was very dark and they had just waited about outside until some of the indoor men who had given chase came back with the news that the thief had been caught.
"This news was confirmed by young Glenluce, Miss Monica's brother, who was the last to return. He had actually witnessed the capture. The thief had bolted straight across the five-acre meadow, but doubled back before he reached the stables, turned sharply to the right through the kitchen garden, and then jumped over the boundary wall of the grounds into the lane beyond, where he fell straight into the arms of the local constable who happened to be passing by.
"Young Glenluce had great fun out of the chase; he had guessed the man's purpose, and instead of running after him across the meadow, he had gone round it, and had reached the boundary wall only a few seconds after the thief had scaled it. There was some talk about the gunshots that had been heard, and every one supposed that Colonel Forburg, who was a violent-tempered man, had snatched up a revolver before giving chase to the burglar, and had taken a potshot at him; it was fortunate that he had missed him.
"The incident would then have been closed and the interrupted dinner proceeded with, but for the fact that the host had not yet returned. Nothing was thought of this at first, for it was generally supposed that the Colonel had been kept talking by one of his men, or perhaps by the constable who had effected the capture; it was only when close on half an hour had gone by that Miss Monica became impatient. She got the butler to telephone both to the stables and the lodge, but the Colonel had not been seen at either place, either during or after the incident with the burglar; communication with the police station brought the same result; nothing had been seen or heard of the Colonel.
"Genuinely alarmed now, Miss Monica gave orders for the grounds to be searched; it was just possible that the Colonel had fallen whilst running, and was lying somewhere, helpless in the dark, perhaps unconscious.... Every one began recalling those pistol-shots and a vague sense of tragedy spread over the entire house. Monica blamed herself for not having thought of all this before.
"A search party went out at once; for a while stable-lanterns and electric-torches gleamed through the darkness and past the shrubberies. Then suddenly there were calls for help, the wandering lights centred in one spot, somewhere in the middle of the five-acre meadow near the big elm tree. Obviously there had been an accident. Monica ran to the front door, followed by all the guests. Through the darkness a group of men were seen slowly wending their way towards the house; one man was running ahead, it was the chauffeur. Young Glenluce, half guessing that something sinister had occurred, went forward to meet him.
"What had happened was indeed as tragic as it was mysterious; the search party had found the Colonel lying full-length in the meadow. His clothes were saturated with blood; he had been shot in the breast and was apparently dead. Close by a revolver had been picked up. It was impossible to keep the terrible news from Miss Monica. Her brother broke the news to her. She bore up with marvellous calm, and it was she who at once gave the necessary orders to have her stepfather's body taken upstairs and to fetch both the doctor and the police.
"In the meanwhile the guests had gone back into the house. They stood about in groups, awestruck and whispering. They did not care to finish their dinner, or to go up to their rooms, as in all probability they would be required when the police came to make enquiries. Monica and Gerald Glenluce had gone to sit in the smoking-room.
"It was the most horrible Christmas Eve any one in that house had ever experienced.”
"Murder committed from any other motive than that of robbery," the Old Man in the Corner went on after a moment's pause, "always excites the interest of the public. There is nearly always an element of mystery about it, and it invariably suggests possibilities of romance. In this case, of course, there was no question of robbery. After Colonel Forburg fell, shot, as it transpired, at close range and full in the breast, his clothes were left untouched; there was loose silver in his trousers pocket, a few treasury notes in his letter-case, and he was wearing a gold watch and chain and a fine pearl stud.
"The motive of the crime was therefore enmity or revenge, and here the police were at once confronted with a great difficulty. Not, mind you, the difficulty of finding a man who hated the Colonel sufficiently to kill him, but that of choosing among his many enemies one who was most likely to have committed such a terrible crime. He was the best-hated man in the county. Known as 'Remount Forburg,' he was generally supposed to have made his fortune in some shady transactions connected with the Remount Department of the War Office during the Boer War, more than twenty years ago.
"His first wife was said to have died of a broken heart, and he had no children of his own; some ten years ago he had married a widow with two young children. She had a considerable fortune of her own, and when she died she left it in trust for her children, but she directed that her husband should be the sole guardian of Monica and Gerald until they came of age; moreover, she left him the interest of the whole of the capital amount for so long as they were in his house and unmarried. After his death the money would revert unconditionally to them.
"Of course it was a foolish, one might say a criminal will, and one obviously made under the influence of her husband. One can only suppose that the poor woman had died without knowing anything of 'Remount Forburg's' character. Since her death his violent temper and insufferable arrogance had alienated from the children every friend they ever had. Only some chance acquaintances ever came anywhere near Brudenell Court now. Naturally every one said that the Colonel's behaviour was part of a scheme for keeping suitors away from his stepdaughter Monica, who was a very beautiful girl; as for Gerald Glenluce, Monica's younger brother, he had been sadly disfigured when he was a schoolboy through a fall against a sharp object that had broken his nose and somewhat mysteriously deprived him of the sight of one eye.
"Those who had suffered most from Colonel Forburg's violent tempers declared that the boy's face had been smashed in by a blow from a stick, and that the stick had been wielded by his stepfather. Be that as it may, Gerald Glenluce had remained, in consequence of this disfigurement, a shy, retiring, silent boy, who neither played games nor rode to hounds and had no idea how to handle a gun; but he was essentially the Colonel's favourite. Where Forburg was harsh and dictatorial with every one else, he would always unbend to Gerald, and was almost gentle and affectionate toward him. Perhaps an occasional twinge of remorse had something to do with this soft side of his disagreeable character.
"Certainly that softness did not extend to Monica. He made the girl's life almost unbearable with his violence which amounted almost to brutality. The girl hated him and openly said so. Her one desire was to get away from Brudenell Court by any possible means. But owing to her mother's foolish will she had no money of her own, and the few friends she had were not sufficiently rich, or sufficiently disinterested, to give her a home away from her stepfather, nor would the Colonel, for a matter of that, have given his consent to her living away from him.
"As for marriage, it was a difficult question. Young men fought shy of any family connection with 'Remount Forburg.' The latter's nickname was bad enough, but there were rumours of secrets more unavowable still in the past history of the Colonel. Certain it is that though Monica excited admiration wherever she went, and though one or two of her admirers did go to the length of openly courting her, the courtship never matured into an actual engagement. Something or other always occurred to cool off the ardour of the wooers. Suddenly they would either go on a big-game shooting expedition, or on a tour round the world, or merely find that country air did not suit them. There would perhaps be a scene of fond farewell, but Monica would always understand that the farewell was a definite one, and, as she was an intelligent as well as a fascinating girl, she put two and two together, and observed that these farewell scenes were invariably preceded by a long interview behind closed doors between her stepfather and her admirer of the moment.
"Small wonder then that she hated the Colonel. She hated him as much as she loved her brother. A great affection had, especially of late, developed between these two; it was a love born of an affinity of trouble and sense of injustice. On Gerald's part there was also an element of protection towards his beautiful sister; the fact that he was so avowedly the spoilt son of his irascible stepfather enabled him many a time to stand between Monica and the Colonel's unbridled temper.
"Latterly, however, some brightness and romance had been introduced into the drab existence of Monica Glenluce by the discreet courtship of her latest admirer, Mr. Morley Thrall. Mr. Thrall was a wealthy man, not too young and of independent position, who presumably did not care whether county society would cut him or no in consequence of his marriage with the stepdaughter of 'Remount Forburg.'
"Subsequent events showed that he had observed the greatest discretion while he was courting Monica. No one knew that there was an understanding between him and the girl, least of all the Colonel. Mr. Morley Thrall came, not too frequently, to Brudenell Court; while there he appeared to devote most of his attention to his host and to Gerald, and to take little if any notice of Monica. She had probably given him a hint of rocks ahead, and he had succeeded in avoiding the momentous interview with the Colonel which Monica had learned to look on with dread.
"Mr. Morley Thrall had been asked to stay at Brudenell Court for Christmas, the other guests being a Major Rawstone, with his wife and daughter, Rachel. They were all at dinner on that memorable Christmas Eve when the tragedy occurred, and all the men hurried out of the dining-room in the wake of their host when first the burglary alarm was given.
"Thus did matters stand at Brudenell Court when, directly after the holidays, Jim Peyton, a groom recently in the employ of Colonel Forburg, was brought before the magistrates charged with the murder of his former master. There was a pretty stiff case against him too. It seems that he had lately been dismissed by Colonel Forburg for drunkenness, and that before dismissing him the Colonel had given him a thrashing which apparently was well deserved, because while he was drunk he very nearly set fire to the stables, and an awful disaster was only averted by the timely arrival of the Colonel himself upon the scene.
"Be that as it may, the man went away swearing vengeance. Subsequently he took out a summons for assault against Colonel Forburg and only got one shilling damages. This had occurred a week before Christmas. There were several witnesses there who could swear to the threatening language used by Peyton on more than one occasion since then, and of course he had been caught in the very act of trying to break into the house through the French window of the smoking-room.
"On the other hand, the revolver with which 'Remount Forburg' had been shot, and which was found close to the body with two empty chambers, was identified as the Colonel's own property, one which he always kept, loaded, in a drawer of his desk in the smoking-room. And—this is the interesting point—the shutters of the smoking-room were found by the police inspector, who examined them subsequently, to be bolted on the inside, just as they had been left earlier in the evening by the footman whose business it was to see to the fastening of windows and shutters on the ground floor.
"This fact—the shutters being bolted on the inside—was confirmed by Miss Monica Glenluce, who had been the first to go into the smoking-room after the tragic event. Her brother joined her subsequently. Both of these witnesses said that the room looked absolutely undisturbed, the shutters were bolted, the drawer of the desk was closed: they had remained in the room until after the visit of the police inspector.
"After the positive evidence of these two witnesses, the police prosecution had of necessity to fall back on the far-fetched theory that Colonel Forburg himself, before he hurried out in order to join in the chase against the burglar, had run into the smoking-room and picked up his revolver, and that, having overtaken Peyton, he had threatened him; that Peyton had then jumped on him, wrenched the weapon out of his hand and shot him. It was a far-fetched theory certainly, and one which the defence quickly upset. Gerald Glenluce for one was distinctly under the impression that the Colonel ran from the dining-room straight out into the garden, and the young footman who was watching the fun from the front door, and saw the Colonel run out, was equally sure that he had not a revolver in his hand.
"Peyton got six months hard for attempted house-breaking, there really was no evidence against him to justify the more serious charge; but when the charge of murder was withdrawn, it left the mystery of 'Remount Forburg's' tragic end seemingly more impenetrable than before. Nevertheless the coroner and jury laboured conscientiously at the inquest. No stone was to be left unturned to bring the murder of 'Remount Forburg' to justice, and in this laudable effort the coroner had the able and unqualified assistance of Miss Glenluce. However bitter her feelings may have been in the past towards her stepfather while he lived, she seemed determined that his murderer should not go unpunished. Nay more, there appeared to be in all her actions during this terrible time a strange note of vindictiveness and animosity, as if the unknown man who had rid her of an arrogant and brutal tyrant had really done her a lasting injury.
"It was entirely through her energy and exertions that certain witnesses were induced to come forward and give what turned out to be highly sensational evidence. The police who were convinced that James Peyton was guilty had turned all their investigations in the direction of proving their theories; Miss Monica, on the other hand, had seemingly made up her mind that the murderer was to be sought for inside the house; it even appeared as if she had certain suspicions which she only desired to confirm. To this end she had questioned and cross-questioned every one who was in the house on that fatal night, well knowing how reluctant some people are to be mixed up in any way with police proceedings. But at last she had forced two persons to speak, and it was on the first day of the inquest that at last a glimmer of light was thrown upon the mysterious tragedy.
"After the medical evidence which went to establish beyond a doubt that Colonel Forburg died from a gunshot wound inflicted at close range, both balls having penetrated the heart, Miss Glenluce was called. Replying to the coroner, who had put certain questions to her with regard to the Colonel's state of mind just before the tragedy, she said that he appeared to have a premonition that something untoward was about to happen. When the butler ran into the dining-room saying that a burglar had been seen trying to break into the house, the Colonel had jumped up from the table at once.
"'I did the same,' Miss Monica went on, 'as I was genuinely alarmed; but my stepfather, in his peremptory way, ordered me to sit still. "I believe," he said to me, with a funny laugh, "that it's a put-up job. It's some friend of Thrall's giving him a hand." I could not, of course, understand what he meant by that, and I looked at Mr. Thrall for an explanation. I must add that Mr. Thrall had been extraordinarily moody all through dinner; he appeared flushed, and I noticed particularly that he never spoke either to my step-father, to my brother, or to me. However at the moment I failed to catch his eye, and the very next second he was out of the room, on the heels of Colonel Forburg.'
"This was remarkable evidence to say the least of it, but nevertheless it was confirmed by two witnesses who heard the Colonel make that strange remark: one was Rachel Rawstone, the young friend who was dining at Brudenell Court that Christmas Eve, and the other was Gerald Glenluce. Of course, by this time the public was getting very excited: they were like so many hounds heading for a scent, and the jury was beginning to show signs of that obstinate prejudice which culminated in a ridiculous verdict. But there was more to come. Thanks again to Miss Monica's insistence, the footman at Brudenell Court, a lad named Cambalt, had been induced to come forward with a story which he had evidently intended to keep hidden within his bosom, if possible. He gave his evidence with obvious reluctance and in a scarcely audible voice. It was generally noticed, however, that Miss Monica urged him frequently to speak up.
"Cambalt deposed that just before dinner on Christmas Eve, he had gone in to tidy the smoking-room before the gentlemen came down from dressing. As he opened the door he saw Mr. Morley Thrall standing in the middle of the room facing Colonel Forburg who was seated at his desk. Young Mr. Glenluce was standing near the mantelpiece with one foot on the fender, staring into the fire. Mr. Thrall, according to witness, was livid with rage.
"''E took a step forward like,' Cambalt went on, amidst breathless silence on the part of the public and jury alike, 'and 'e raised 'is fist. But the Colonel 'e just laughed, then 'e opened the drawer of the desk and took out a revolver and showed it to Mr. Thrall and says: "'Ere y'are, there's a revolver 'andy, any way." Then Mr. Thrall 'e swore like anything, and says: "You blackguard! You d—— scoundrel! You ought to be shot like the cur you are." I thought he would strike the Colonel, but young Mr. Glenluce 'e just stepped quickly in between the two gentlemen and 'e says: "Look 'ere, Thrall, I won't put up with this! You jess get out!" Then one of the gentlemen seed me, and Mr. Thrall 'e walked out of the room.'
"'And what happened after he had gone?' the coroner asked.
"'Oh!' the witness replied, 'the Colonel 'e threw the revolver back into the drawer and laughed sarcastic like. Then 'e 'eld out 'is 'and to Mr. Gerald, and says: "Thanks, my boy. You did 'elp me to get rid of that ruffian." After that,' Cambalt concluded, 'I got on with my work, and the gentlemen took no notice of me.'
"This witness was very much pressed with questions as to what happened later on when the burglary alarm was given and the gentlemen all hurried out of the house. Cambalt was in the hall at the time and he made straight for the front door to see some of the fun. He said that the Colonel was out first, and the other three gentlemen, Mr. Gerald, Mr. Rawstone and Mr. Morley Thrall went out after him; Mr. Thrall was the last to go outside; he ran across the garden in the direction of the five-acre field. Major Rawstone remained somewhere near the house, but it was a very dark night, and he, Cambalt, soon lost sight of the gentlemen. Presently, however, Mr. Thrall came back toward the house. It was a few minutes after the shots had been fired and witness heard Mr. Thrall say to Major Rawstone: 'I suppose it's that fool Forburg potting away at the burglar; hell get himself into trouble, if he doesn't look out.' Soon after that Mr. Gerald came running back with the news that the burglar had fallen into the arms of a passing constable and Cambalt then returned to his duties in the dining-room.
"As you see," the Old Man in the Corner went on glibly, "this witness's evidence was certainly sensational. The jury, which was composed of farm labourers, with the local butcher as foreman, had by now fully made up its silly mind that Mr. Morley Thrall had taken the opportunity of sneaking into the smoking-room, snatching up the revolver, and shooting 'Remount Forburg,' whom he hated because the Colonel was opposing his marriage with Miss Monica. It was all as clear as daylight to those dunderheads, and from that moment they simply would not listen to any more evidence. They had made up their minds; they were ready with their verdict and it was: Manslaughter against Morley Thrall. Not murder, you see! The dolts who had all of them suffered from 'Remount Forburg's' arrogance and violent temper would not admit that killing such vermin was a capital crime.
"What I am telling you would be unbelievable if it were not a positive fact. It is no use quoting British justice and dilating on the absolute fairness of trial by jury. A coroner's inquest fortunately is not a trial. The verdict of a coroner's jury, such as the one which sat on the Brudenell Court affair, though it may have very unpleasant consequences for an innocent person, cannot have fatal results. In this case it cast a stigma on a gentleman of high position and repute, and the following day Mr. Morley Thrall, himself J.P., was brought up before his brother magistrates on an ignominious charge.
"It is not often," the Old Man in the Corner resumed after a while, "that so serious a charge is preferred against a gentleman of Mr. Morley Thrall's social position, and I am afraid that the best of us are snobbish enough to be more interested in a gentleman criminal than in an ordinary Bill Sykes.
"I happened to be present at that magisterial enquiry when Mr. Morley Thrall, J.P., was brought in between two warders, looking quite calm and self-possessed. Every one of us there noticed that when he first came in, and in fact throughout that trying enquiry, his eyes sought to meet those of Miss Glenluce who sat at the solicitor's table; but whenever she chanced to look his way, she quickly averted her gaze again, and turned her head away with a contemptuous shrug. Gerald Glenluce, on the other hand, made pathetic efforts at showing sympathy with the accused, but he was of such unprepossessing appearance and was so shy and awkward that it was small wonder Morley Thrall took little if any notice of him.
"Very soon we got going. I must tell you, first of all, that the whole point of the evidence rested upon a question of time. If the accused took the revolver out of the desk in the smoking-room, when did he do it? The footman, Cambalt, reiterated the statement which he had made at the inquest. He was, of course, pressed to say definitely whether after the quarrel between Mr. Morley Thrall and the Colonel which he had witnessed, and before every one went in to dinner, Mr. Thrall might have gone back to the smoking-room and extracted the revolver from the drawer of the desk; but Cambalt said positively that he did not think this was possible. He himself, after he had tidied the smoking-room, had been in and out of the hall preparing to serve dinner. The door of the smoking-room gave on the hall, between the dining-room and the passage leading to the kitchens. If any one had gone in or out of the smoking-room at that time, Cambalt must have seen them.
"At this point Miss Glenluce was seen to lean forward and to say something in a whisper to the Clerk of the Justices, who in his turn whispered to the chairman on the Bench, and a moment or two later that gentleman asked the witness:
"'Are you absolutely prepared to swear that no one went in or out of the smoking-room while you were making ready to serve dinner?7
"Then, as the young man seemed to hesitate, the magistrate added more emphatically:
"Think now! You were busy with your usual avocations; there would have been nothing extraordinary in one of the gentlemen going in or out of the smoking-room at that hour. Do you really believe and are you prepared to swear that such a very ordinary incident would have impressed itself indelibly upon your mind?'
"Thus pressed and admonished, Cambalt retrenched himself behind a vague: 'No, sir! I shouldn't like to swear one way or the other.'
"Whereat Miss Monica threw a defiant look at the accused, who, however, did not as much as wink an eyelid in response.
"Presently when that lady herself was called, no one could fail to notice that she, like the coroner's jury the previous day, had absolutely made up her mind that Morley Thrall was guilty, otherwise her attitude of open hostility toward him would have been quite inexplicable. She dwelt at full length on the fact that Mr. Thrall had paid her marked attention for months, and that he had asked her to marry him. She had given him her consent, and between them they had decided to keep their engagement a secret until after she, Monica, had attained her twenty-first birthday, when she would be free to marry whom she chose.
"'Unfortunately,' the witness went on, suddenly assuming a dry, pursed-up manner, 'Colonel Forburg got wind of this. He was always very much set against my marrying at all, and between tea and dinner on Christmas Eve he and I had some very sharp words together on the subject, at the end of which my stepfather said very determinedly: "Christmas or no Christmas, the fellow shall leave my house by the first available train to-morrow, and to-night I am going to give him a piece of my mind."'
"Just for a moment after Miss Glenluce had finished speaking, the accused seemed to depart from his attitude of dignity and reserve, and an indignant 'Oh!' quickly repressed, escaped his lips. The public by this time was dead against him. They are just like sheep, as you know, and the verdict of the coroner's jury had prejudiced them from the start, and the police, aided by Miss Glenluce, had certainly built up a formidable case against the unfortunate man. Every one felt that the motive for the crime was fully established already. 'Remount Forburg' had had a violent quarrel with Morley Thrall, then had turned him out of the house, and the latter, furious at being separated from the girl he loved, had killed the man who stood in his way.
"I should be talking until to-morrow morning were I to give you in detail all the evidence that was adduced in support of the prosecution. The accused listened to it all with perfect calm. He stood with arms folded, his eyes fixed on nothing. The 'Oh!' of indignation did not again cross his lips, nor did he look once at Miss Monica Glenluce. I can assure you that at one moment that day things were looking very black against him.
"Fortunately for him, however, he had a very clever lawyer to defend him in the person of his distinguished cousin, Sir Evelyn Thrall. The latter, by amazingly clever cross-examination of the servants and guests at Brudenell Court, had succeeded in establishing the fact that at no time, from the moment that the burglary alarm was given until after the two revolver shots had been heard, was the accused completely out of sight of some one or other of the witnesses. He was the last to leave the dining-room. Mrs. Rawstone and her daughter testified to that. He had stayed behind one moment after the other three gentlemen had gone out in order to say a few words to Monica Glenluce. Miss Rawstone was standing inside the dining-room door and she was quite positive that Mr. Thrall went straight out into the garden.
"On the other hand Major Rawstone saw him in the forecourt coming away from the five-acre meadow only a very few moments after the shots were fired, and gave it absolutely as his opinion that it would have been impossible for the accused to have fired those shots. This is where the question of time came in.
"'When a man who bears a spotless reputation,' Major Rawstone argued, 'finds that he has killed a fellow creature, he would necessarily pause a moment, horror-struck with what he has done; whether the deed was premeditated or involuntary he would at least try and ascertain if life was really extinct. It is inconceivable that any man save an habitual and therefore callous criminal, would just throw down his weapon and with absolute calm, hands in pocket and without a tremor in his voice, make a casual remark to a friend. Now I saw Mr. Morley Thrall perhaps two minutes after the shots were fired; in that time he could not have walked from the centre of the field to the forecourt where I was standing; and he had not been running as his voice was absolutely clear and he came walking towards me with his hands in his pockets.'
"As was only to be expected, Sir Evelyn Thrall made the most of Major Rawstone's evidence, and I may say that it was chiefly on the strength of it that the charge of murder against the accused was withdrawn, even though the Clerk to the Magistrates, perpetually egged on by Miss Glenluce, did his best to upset Major Rawstone. When the lady found that this could not be done, she tried to switch back to the idea that accused had abstracted the revolver out of the smoking-room before dinner and immediately after his quarrel with Colonel Forburg. The footman Cambalt's evidence on this point had been somewhat discounted by his refusing to state positively that no one could have gone into the smoking-room at that time without his seeing them. But against this theory there was always the argument—of which Sir Evelyn Thrall made the most as you know—that before dinner the accused could not have known that there would be an alarm of burglary which would give him the opportunity of waylaying the Colonel in the open field. With equal skill, too, Sir Evelyn brought forward evidence to bear out the statement made by the accused on the matter of his quarrel with Colonel Forburg.
"'Just before dinner,' Mr. Thrall stated, 'Colonel Forburg told me he had something to say to me in private. I followed him into the smoking-room, and there he gave me certain information with regard to his past life, and also with regard to Miss Glenluce's parentage, which made it absolutely impossible for me, in spite of the deep regard which I have for that lady, to offer her marriage. Miss Glenluce is the innocent victim of tragic circumstances in the past, and Forburg was just an unmitigated blackguard, and I told him so, but I had my family to consider and very reluctantly I came to the conclusion that I could not introduce any relation of Colonel Forburg into its circle. Colonel Forburg did not stand in the way of my marrying his stepdaughter; it was I who most reluctantly withdrew.'
"Whilst the accused was cross-examined upon this statement, and he gave his answers in firm, dignified tones, Miss Monica never took her eyes off him, and surely if looks could kill, Mr. Morley Thrall would not at that moment have escaped with his life, so full of deadly hatred and contempt was her gaze. The accused had signed a much fuller statement than the one which he made in open court; it contained a detailed account of his interview with Colonel Forburg, and of the circumstances which finally induced him to give up all thoughts of asking Miss Glenluce to be his wife.
"These facts were not made public at the time for the sake of Miss Monica and of the unfortunate, Gerald, but it seems that the transactions which had earned for the Colonel the sobriquet of 'Remount Forburg' were so disreputable and so dishonest that not only was he cashiered from the army, but he served a term of imprisonment for treason, fraud, and embezzlement. He had no right to be styled Colonel any longer, and quite recently had been threatened with prosecution if he persisted in making further use of his army rank.
"But this was not all the trouble. It seems that in his career of improbity he had been associated with a man named Nosdel, a man of Dutch extraction whom he had known in South Africa. This man was subsequently hanged for a particularly brutal murder, and it was his widow who was 'Remount Forburg's' second wife, and the mother of Monica and of Gerald, who had been given the fancy name of Glenluce.
"Obviously a man in Mr. Morley Thrall's position could not marry into such a family, and it appears that whenever there was a question of a suitor for Monica, 'Remount Forburg' would tell the aspirant the whole story of his own shady past and, above all, that of Monica's father. Sir Evelyn Thrall had been clever enough to discover one or two gentlemen who had had the same experience as his cousin Morley; they, too, just before their courtship came to a head had had a momentous interview with 'Remount Forburg,' who found this means of choking off any further desire for matrimony on the part of a man who had family connections to consider. But it was very obvious that Mr. Morley Thrall had no motive for killing 'Remount Forburg'; he would have left Brudenell Court that very evening, he said, only that young Glenluce had begged him, for Monica's sake, not to make a scene; anyway, he was leaving the house the next day and had no intention of ever darkening its doors again.
"Poor Monica Glenluce or Nosdel, ignorant of the hideous cloud that hung over her entire life, ignorant, too, of what had passed between her stepfather and Mr. Morley Thrall, felt nothing but hatred and contempt for the man whose love, she believed, had proved as unstable as that of any of her other admirers. For charity's sake one must suppose that she really thought him guilty at first, and hoped that when the clouds had rolled by he would return to her more ardent than before. Presumably he found means to make her understand that all was irrevocably at an end between them as far as he was concerned, whereupon her regard for him turned to bitterness and desire for revenge.
"And, indeed, but for the cleverness of a distinguished lawyer, poor Morley Thrall might have found himself the victim of a judicial error brought about by the deliberate enmity of a woman. Had he been committed for trial, she would have had more time at her disposal to manufacture evidence against him, which I am convinced she had a mind to do."
"As it is," I now put in tentatively, for the Old Man in the Corner had been silent for some little while, "the withdrawal of the charge of murder against Morley Thrall did not help to clear up the mystery of 'Remount Forburg's' tragic death."
"Not so far as the public is concerned," he retorted dryly.
"You have a theory?" I asked.
"Not a theory," he replied. "I know who killed 'Remount Forburg.'"
"How do you know?" I riposted.
"By logic and inference," he said. "As it was proved that Morley Thrall did not kill him, and that Miss Monica could not have done it, as the ladies did not join in the chase after the burglar, I looked about me for the only other person in whose interest it was to put that blackguard out of the way."
"You mean——?"
"I mean the boy Gerald, of course. Openly and before the other witness, Cambalt, he stood up for his stepfather against Thrall who was not measuring his words, but just think how the knowledge which he had gained about his own parentage and that of his sister must have rankled in his mind. He must have come to the conclusion that while this man—his stepfather—lived, there would be no chance for him to make friends, no chance for the sister whom he loved ever to have a home, a life of her own. Whether that interview on Christmas Eve was the first inkling which he had of the real past history of his own and Forburg's family, it is impossible to say. Probably he had suspicions of it before, when, one by one, Monica's suitors fell away after certain private interviews with the Colonel. Morley Thrall must have been a last hope, and that, too, was dashed to the ground by the same infamous means.
"I am not prepared to say that the boy got hold of the revolver that night with the deliberate intention of killing his stepfather at the earliest opportunity; he may have run into the smoking-room to snatch up the weapon, only with a view to using it against the burglar; certain it is that he overtook 'Remount Forburg' in the five-acre field and that he shot him then and there. Remember that the night was very dark, and that there was a great deal of running about and of confusion. The boy was young enough and nimble enough after he had thrown down the revolver to run across the field and then to go back to the house by a roundabout way. It is easy enough in a case like that to cover one's tracks, and, of course, no one suspected anything at the time. Even the sound of firing created but little astonishment; it was so very much on the cards that the Colonel would use a revolver without the slightest hesitation against a man who had been trying to break into his house. It was just the sort of revenge that a man of Gerald's temperament—disfigured, shy, silent and self-absorbed—would seek against one whom he considered the fount of all his wrongs."
"But," I objected, "how could young Glenluce run into the smoking-room, pick up the revolver out of a drawer, and run back through the hall with servants and guests standing about? Some one would be sure to see him."
"No one saw him," the funny creature retorted, "for he did it at the moment of the greatest confusion. The butler had run in with the news of the burglary, the Colonel jumped up and ran out through the hall, the guests had not yet made up their minds what to do. In moments like this there are always just a few seconds of pandemonium, quite sufficient for a boy like Gerald to make a dash for the smoking-room."
"But after that——"
"He took the revolver out of the drawer and ran out through the French window."
"But the shutters were found to be bolted on the inside," I argued, "when they were examined by the police inspector."
"So they were," he admitted. "Miss Monica had already been in there with young Gerald. They had seen to the shutters."
"Then you think that Monica knew?"
"Of course she did."
"Then her desire to prove Morley Thrall guilty——"
"Was partly hatred of him, and partly the desire to shield her brother," the funny creature concluded as he collected traps, his bit of string and his huge umbrella. "Think it over; you will see that I am right. I am sorry for those two, aren't you? But they are selling Brudenell Court, I understand, and their mother's fortune has become theirs absolutely. They will go abroad together, make a home for themselves, and one day, perhaps, everything will be forgotten, and a new era of happiness will arise for the innocent, now that the guilty has been so signally punished. But it was an interesting case. Don't you agree with me?”