Cleek of Scotland Yard Part 30

"Woorali! Woorali! That is the basis of the drug curarin, produced by Roulin and Boussingault in 1828 from a combination of the allied poisons known to the savages of South America and of the tropics by the names of corroval and vao, is it not?"

"Yes. And a fiend's thing it is, too. A mere scratch from anything steeped in it is enough to kill an ox almost immediately. The favourite 'native' manner of using the h.e.l.lish thing is by means of a thorn and a blowpipe. But no such method has been employed in this case. No thorn nor, indeed, any other projectile has entered the flesh, nor is there one lying anywhere about the floor. Be sure I looked, Doctor, the instant I suspected that woorali had been used. Pardon me, but that must be all for the present. I have other fish to fry."

CHAPTER XXIX

The "frying" of them took the shape of first going outside and walking round the Stone Drum, and then of stepping back to the door and beckoning Narkom and Lord Fallowfield and young James Drake out to him.

"Anybody in the habit of sitting out here to read or paint or anything of that sort?" he asked abruptly.

"Good gracious, no!" replied Lord Fallowfield. "Whatever makes you ask such a thing as that, Mr. Cleek?"

"Nothing, only that I have found four little marks disposed of at such regular distances that they seem to have been made by the four legs of a chair resting, with a rather heavy weight upon it, on the leads of the roof and immediately under one of the bowman's slits in the Stone Drum. A chair with casters, I should imagine, from the character of the marks. We are on a level with the sleeping quarters of the servants in the house proper, I believe, and chairs with casters are not usual in servants' bedrooms in most houses. Are they so here?"

"Certainly not," put in young Drake. "Why, I don't believe there is a chair with casters on the whole blessed floor. Is there, Lord Fallowfield? You ought to know."

"Yes, there is, Jim. There are three in fact; they all are in the old armoury. Been there a dog's age; and they so matched the old place your poor father never had them taken out."

"The 'old armoury'? What's that, your lordship, may I ask?"

"Oh, a relic of the old feudal times, Mr. Cleek. You see, on account of the position of the Stone Drum, the weapon room, or arming-room, had to be up here on a level with the wing roof, instead of below stairs, as in the case of other 'towers.' That's the place over there--the window just to the left of the door leading into the building proper. It is full of the old battle flags, knights'

pennants, shields, cross-bows, and the Lord knows what of those old days of primitive warfare. We Fallowfields always preserved it, just as it was in the days of its usefulness, for its historical interest and its old a.s.sociation with the name. Like to have a look at it?"

"Very much indeed," replied Cleek, and two minutes later he was standing in the place and revelling in its air of antiquity.

As Lord Fallowfield had declared, the three old chairs which supplied seating accommodation were equipped with casters, but although these were the prime reason for Cleek's visit to the place, he gave them little more than a pa.s.sing glance, bestowing all his attention upon the ancient shields and the quaint old cross-bows with which the walls were heavily hung in tier after tier almost to the groined ceiling.

"Primitive times, Mr. Narkom, when men used to go out with these jimcrack things and bang away at each other with skewers!" he said, taking one of them down and examining it in a somewhat casual manner, turning it over, testing its weight, looking at its catch, and running his fingers up and down the propelling string.

"Fancy a chap with one of these things running up against a modern battery or sailing out into a storm of shrapnel! Back to your hook, grandfather"--hanging it up again--"times change and we with time.

By the way, your lordship, I hope you will be better able to give an account of _your_ whereabouts last night than I hear that Mr.

Drake here is able to do regarding his."

"I? Good heavens, man, what do you mean?" flung out his lordship, so taken aback by the abruptness of the remark that the very breath seemed to be knocked out of him. "Upon my soul, Mr. Cleek----"

"Gently, gently, your lordship. You must certainly realize that in the circ.u.mstances the same necessity must exist for you to explain your movements as exists for Mr. Drake. I am told that in the event of the elder Mr. Drake's death this property was to come to you wholly unenc.u.mbered by any charge or any restrictions whatsoever."

"Good G.o.d! So it was. Upon my soul, I'd forgotten all about that!"

exclaimed his lordship with such an air that he was either speaking the absolute truth or was a very good actor indeed.

"Jim! My boy! Oh, good heavens! I never gave the thing a thought--never one! No, Mr. Cleek, I can give no account of my movements other than to say that I went to bed directly I left the Stone Drum. Or--yes. I can prove that much, by George! I can, indeed. Ojeebi was with me, or, at least, close at my heels at the time, and he saw me go into my room, and must have heard me lock the door."

"Ojeebi? Who is he?"

"My father's j.a.panese valet," put in young Drake. "Been with him for the past five years. If he tells you that he saw Lord Fallowfield go into his room and lock the door after him, you can rely upon that as an absolute and irrefutable truth. 'Whitest' little yellow man that ever walked on two feet; faithful as a dog, and as truthful as they make 'em."

"And they don't make 'em any too truthful, as a rule, in his country, by Jove!" said Cleek. "Still, of course, as he could not possibly have anything to gain----Call him up, will you, and let us hear what he has to say with regard to Lord Fallowfield's statement."

Young Drake rang for a servant, issued the necessary order, and some five or six minutes later a timid little yellow man with the kindest face and the most gentle step a man could possess came into the room, his soft eyes reddened with much weeping, and tear-stains marking his sallow cheeks.

"Oh, Mr. Jim! Oh, Mr. Jim! the dear, kind old 'boss'! He gone! he gone!" he broke out disconsolately as he caught sight of his late master's son, and made as if to prostrate himself before him.

"That's all right, Ojeebi--that's all right, old man!" interrupted young Drake, with a smothered "blub" in his voice and a twitching movement of his mouth. "Cut it out! I'm not iron. Say, this gentleman wants to ask you a few questions, Ojeebi; deliver the goods just as straight as you know how."

"Me, Mr. Jim? Gentleman want question me?" The small figure turned, the kindly face lifted, and the sorrowful eyes looked up into Cleek's unemotional ones.

"Yes," said he placidly; and forthwith told him what Lord Fallowfield claimed.

"That very true," declared Ojeebi. "The lord gentleman he right ahead of me. I see him go into his room and hear him lock door. That very true indeed."

"H'm! Any idea of the time?"

"Yes--much idea. Two minutes a-past twelve. I see clock as I go past Lady Marj'ie's room."

"What were you doing knocking about that part of the house at that hour of the night? Your room's up here in the servant's quarters, isn't it?"

"Yes, sir. But I go take ice-water to the boss's room. Boss never go to bed nights without ice-water handy, sir. 'Merican boss never do."

"Yes! Quite so, quite so! Where did you get the ice from--and how?

Chop it from a big cake?"

"No, sir. It always froze to fit bottle. I get him from the ice-make room downstairs."

"He means the refrigerating room, Mr. Cleek," explained young Drake. "You know, I take it, what a necessary commodity we Americans hold ice to be. Indeed, the dear old dad wouldn't think a dinner was a dinner without ice-water on the table, and ice-cream for the final course. And as there was no possibility of procuring a regular and adequate supply in an out-of-the-way spot like this, he had a complete artificial ice-making plant added to the place, and overcame the difficulty in that way. That is what Ojeebi means by the 'ice-make room.' What he means about its being frozen to fit the bottles is this: The ice which is to be used for drinking purposes is manufactured in forms or vessels which turn it out in cubes, so that whenever it is wanted all that a servant has to do is to go to the plant, and the man in charge supplies him with all the cubes required."

"Ah, I see," said Cleek, and stroked his chin. "Well, that's all, I reckon, for the time being. Ojeebi has certainly backed up your statement to the fullest, your lordship, so we can dispense with him entirely. And now, if I have your permission, gentlemen, I should like to feel myself privileged to go poking about the house and grounds for the next hour or so in quest of possible clues. At the end of that time I will rejoin you here, and shall hope to have something definite to report. So if you don't mind my going----Thanks very much. Come along, Mr. Narkom. I've a little something for you to do, and--an hour will do it, or I'm a dogberry."

With that he took his departure from the armoury and, with the superintendent following, went down through the house to the grounds and out into the screen of close crowding, view-defying trees.

Here he paused a minute to pull out his notebook and scribble something on a leaf, and then to tear out that leaf and put it into Mr. Narkom's hand.

"Rush Lennard off to the post-office with that, will you? and have it wired up to town as soon as possible," he said. "Prepay the reply, and get that reply back to me as soon as telegraph and motor can get it here."

Then he swung off out of the screen of the trees and round the angle of the building, and set about hunting for the refrigerating plant.

CHAPTER x.x.x

It was five and after when the superintendent, pale and shaking with excitement, came up the long drive from the Hall gates and found Cleek lounging in the doorway of the house, placidly smoking a cigarette and twirling a little ball of crumpled newspaper in his hand.

"Right was I, Mr. Narkom?" he queried smilingly.

"Good G.o.d, yes! Right as rain, old chap. Been carrying it for upward of a twelvemonth, and no doubt waiting for an opportunity to strike."