Ravensdene Court Part 14

"Aye!" said Mr. Cazalette. "And that was----"

"Money!" answered the detective. "Money! If these men left any relations--sisters, brothers, nephews, nieces--it's in the interest of these relations to come into the light, for there's money awaiting them. That's well known--I had it noised abroad in the papers, and let it be freely talked of in town. But, as I say, n.o.body's come along. I firmly believe, now, that these two hadn't a blood relation in the world--a queer thing, but it seems to be so."

"And--this money?" I asked. "Is it much?"

"That was one of the first things I went for," answered Scarterfield.

"Naturally, when a man comes to the end which Noah Quick met with, inquiries are made of his solicitors and his bankers. Noah had both in our parts. The solicitors knew nothing about him except that he had employed them now and then in trifling matters, and that of late he had made a will in which, in brief fashion, he left everything of which he died possessed to his brother Salter, whose address he gave as being the same as his own; about the same time they had made a will for Salter, in which he bequeathed everything he had to Noah. But as to the antecedents of Noah and Salter--nothing! Then I approached the bankers. There I got more information. When Noah Quick first went to Devonport he deposited a considerable sum of money with one of the leading banks at Plymouth, and at the time of his death he had several thousand pounds lying there to his credit: his bankers also had charge of valuable securities of his. On Salter Quick's coming to the Admiral Parker, Noah introduced him to this bank: Salter deposited there a sum of about two thousand pounds, and of that he had only withdrawn about a hundred. So he, too, at the time of his death, had a large balance; also, he left with the bankers, for safe keeping, some valuable scrip and securities, chiefly of Indian railways. Altogether, those bankers hold a lot of money that belongs to the two brothers, and there are certain indications that they made their money--previous to coming to Devonport--in the far East. But the bankers know no more of their antecedents than the solicitors do. In both instances--banking matters and legal matters--the two men seem to have confined their words to strict business, and no more; the only man I have come across who can give me the faintest idea of anything respecting their past is a regular frequenter of the Admiral Parker who says that he once gathered from Salter Quick that he and Noah were natives of Rotherhithe, or somewhere in that part, and that they were orphans and the last of their lot."

"Of course, you have been to Rotherhithe--making inquiries?" suggested Mr. Raven.

"I have, sir," replied Scarterfield. "And I searched various parish registers there, and found nothing that helped me. If the two brothers did live at Rotherhithe, they must have been taken there as children and born elsewhere--they weren't born in Rotherhithe parish. Nor could I come across anybody at all who knew anything of them in seafaring circles thereabouts. I came to the conclusion that whoever those two men were, and whatever they had been, most of their lives had been spent away from this country."

"Probably in the far East, as you previously suggested," muttered Mr.

Cazalette.

"Likely!" agreed Scarterfield. "Their money would seem to have been made there, judging by, at any rate, some of their securities. Well, there's more ways than one of finding things out, and after I'd knocked round a good deal of Thames' side, and been in some queer places, I turned my attention to Lloyds. Now, connected with Lloyds, are various publications having to do with shipping matters--the 'Weekly Shipping Index,' the 'Confidential Index,' for instance; moreover, with time and patience, you can find out a great deal at Lloyds not only about ships, but about men in them. And to cut a long story short, gentlemen, last week I did at last get a clue about Noah and Salter Quick which I now mean to follow up for all it's worth."

Here the detective, suddenly a.s.suming a more business-like air than he had previously shown, paused, to produce from his breast-pocket a small bundle of papers, which he laid before him on the table. I suppose we all gazed at them as if they suggested deep and dark mystery--but for the time being Scarterfield let them lie idle where he had placed them.

"I'll have to tell the story in a sort of sequence," he continued.

"This is what I have pieced together from the information I collected at Lloyds. In October, 1907, now nearly five years ago, a certain steam ship, the _Elizabeth Robinson_, left Hong-Kong, in Southern China, for Chemulpo, one of the princ.i.p.al ports in Korea. She was spoken in the Yellow Sea several days later. After that she was never heard of again, and according to the information available at Lloyds she probably went down in a typhoon in the Yellow Sea and was totally lost, with all hands on board. No great matter, perhaps!--from all that I could gather she was nothing but a tramp steamer that did, so to speak, odd jobs anywhere between India and China; she had gone to Hong-Kong from Singapore: her owners were small folk in Singapore, and I imagine that she had seen a good deal of active service. All the same, she's of considerable interest to me, for I have managed to secure a list of the names of the men who were on her when she left Hong-Kong for Chemulpo--and amongst those names are those of the two men we're concerned about: Noah and Salter Quick."

Scarterfield slipped off the india-rubber band which confined his papers, and selecting one, slowly unfolded it. Mr. Raven spoke.

"I understood that this ship, the _Elizabeth Robinson_, was lost with all hands?" he said.

"So she is set down at Lloyds," replied Scarterfield. "Never heard of again--after being spoken in the Yellow Sea about three days from Chemulpo."

"Yet--Noah and Salter Quick were on her--and were living five years later?" suggested Mr. Raven.

"Just so, sir!" agreed Scarterfield, dryly. "Therefore, if Noah and Salter Quick were on her, and as they were alive until recently, either the _Elizabeth Robinson_ did not go down in a typhoon, or from any other reason, or--the brothers Quick escaped. But here is a list of the men who were aboard when she sailed from Hong-Kong. She was, I have already told you, a low-down tramp steamer, evidently picking up a precarious living between one far Eastern port and another--a small vessel. Her list includes a master, or captain, and a crew of eighteen--I needn't trouble you with their names, except in two instances, which I'll refer to presently. But here are the names of Noah Quick, Salter Quick--set down as pa.s.sengers. Pa.s.sengers!--not members of the crew. Nothing in the list of the crew strikes me but the two names I spoke of, and that I'll now refer to. The first name will have an interest for Mr. Middlebrook. It's Netherfield."

"Netherfield!" I exclaimed. "The name----"

"That Salter Quick asked you particular questions about when he met you on the headlands, Mr. Middlebrook," answered Scarterfield, with a knowing look, "and that he was very anxious to get some news of William Netherfield, deck-hand, of Blyth, Northumberland--that's the name on the list of those who were aboard the _Elizabeth Robinson_ when she went out of Hong-Kong--and disappeared forever!"

"Of Blyth?" remarked Mr. Cazalette. "Um!--Blyth lies some miles to the southward."

"I'm aware of it, sir," said Scarterfield, "and I propose to visit the place when I have made certain inquiries about this region. But I hope you appreciate the extraordinary coincidence, gentlemen? In October, 1907, Salter Quick is on a tramp steamer in the Yellow Sea in company, more or less intimate, with a sailor-man from Blyth, in Northumberland, whose name is Netherfield: in March, 1912, he is on the sea-coast near Alnmouth, asking anxiously if anybody knows of a churchyard or churchyards in these parts where people of the name of Netherfield are buried? Why? What had the man Netherfield who was with Salter Quick in Chinese waters in 1907 got to do with Salter Quick's presence here five years later?"

n.o.body attempted to answer these questions, and presently I put one for myself.

"You spoke of two names on the list as striking you with some significance," I said. "Netherfield is one. What is the other?"

"That of a Chinaman," he replied promptly, referring to his doc.u.ments. "Set down as cook--I'm told most of those coasting steamers in that part of the world carry Chinamen as cooks. Chuh Fen--that's the name. And why it's significant to me, when all the rest aren't, is this--during the course of my inquiries at Lloyds, I learnt that about three years ago a certain Chinaman, calling himself Chuh Fen, dropped in at Lloyds and was very anxious to know if the steamer _Elizabeth Robinson_, which sailed from Hong-Kong for Chemulpo in October, 1907, ever arrived at its destination? He was given the same information that was afforded me, and on getting it went away, silent. Now then--was this man, this Chinaman, the Chuh Fen who turned up in London, the same Chuh Fen who was on the _Elizabeth Robinson_? If so, how did he escape a shipwreck which evidently happened? And why--if there was no shipwreck, and something else took place of which we have no knowledge--did he want to know, after two years' lapse of time, if the ship did really get to Chemulpo?"

There was a slight pause then, suddenly broken by Dr. Lorrimore, who then spoke for the first time.

"Do you know what all this is suggesting to me?" he exclaimed, nodding at Scarterfield. "Something happened on that ship! It may be that there was no shipwreck, as you said just now--something may have taken place of which we have no knowledge. But one fact comes out clearly--whether the _Elizabeth Robinson_ ever reached any port or not, it's very evident--nay, certain!--that Noah and Salter Quick did.

And--considering the inquiry he made at Lloyds--so did the Chinaman, Chuh Fen. Now--what could those three have told about the _Elizabeth Robinson_?"

No one made any remark on that, until Scarterfield remarked softly:

"I wish I had chanced to be at Lloyds when Chuh Fen called there!

But--that's three years ago, and Chuh Fen may be--where?"

Something impelled Miss Raven and myself to glance at Dr. Lorrimore.

He nodded--he knew what we were thinking of. And he turned to Scarterfield.

"I happen," he said, "to have a Chinaman in my employ at present--one Wing, a very clever man. He has been with me for some years--I brought him from India, when I came home recently. An astute chap, like----"

He paused suddenly; the detective had turned a suddenly interested glance on him.

"You live hereabouts, sir?" he asked. "I--I don't think I've caught your name?"

"Dr. Lorrimore--our neighbour," said Mr. Raven hurriedly. "Close by."

I think Lorrimore saw what had suddenly come into Scarterfield's mind.

He laughed, a little cynically.

"Don't get the idea, or suspicion, formed or half-fledged, that my man Wing had anything to do with the murder of Salter Quick!" he said. "I can vouch for him and his movements--I know where he was on the night of the murder. What I was thinking of was this--Wing is a man of infinite resource and of superior brains. He might be of use to you in tracing this Chuh Fen, if Chuh Fen is in England. When Wing and I were in London--we were there for some time after I returned from India, previous to my coming down here--Wing paid a good many visits to his fellow Chinamen in the East End, Limehouse way; he also had a holiday in Liverpool and another at Swansea and Cardiff, where, I am told, there are Chinese settlements. And I happen to know that he carries on an extensive correspondence with his compatriots. If you think he could give you any information, Mr. Scarterfield----"

"I'd like to have a talk with him, certainly," responded the detective, with some eagerness. "I know a bit about these chaps--some of them can see through a brick wall!"

Lorrimore turned to Mr. Raven.

"If your coachman could run across with the dog-cart, or anything handy," he said, "and would tell Wing that I want him, here, he'd be with me at once. And he may be able to suggest something--I know that before he came to me--I picked him up in Bombay--he had knocked about the ports of Southern China a great deal."

"Come with me and give my coachman instructions," said Mr. Raven.

"He'll run over to your place in ten minutes; and while we are discussing this affair we may as well have as much light as we can get on it."

He and Lorrimore left the room together; when they returned, the conversation reverted to a discussion of possible ways and means of finding out more about the antecedents of the Quicks. Half an hour pa.s.sed in this--fruitlessly; then the door was quietly opened and behind the somewhat pompous figure of the butler I saw the bland, obsequious smile of the Chinaman.

CHAPTER XI

THE FIVE CONCLUSIONS

We who sat round that table during the next hour or so must have made a strange group. Mr. Raven, always a little nervous and fl.u.s.tered in manner; his niece, fresh and eager, in her pretty dinner dress, a curious contrast to the antiquated garb and parchment face of old Cazalette, who sat by her, watchful and doubting; the officialdom-suggesting figure of the police-inspector, erect and rigid in his close-fitting uniform; the detective, rubicund and confident, though of what one scarcely knew; Lorrimore and myself, keen listeners and watchers, and last, but not by any means the least notable, the bland, suave Chinaman in his neat native dress, sitting modestly in the background, inscrutable as an image carved out of ivory. I do not know what the rest thought, but it lay in my own mind that if there was one man in that room who might be trusted to find his way out of the maze in which we were wandering, that man was Dr.

Lorrimore's servant.

It was Lorrimore who, at the detective's request, explained to Wing why we had sent for him. The Chinaman nodded a grave a.s.sent when reminded of the Salter Quick affair--evidently he knew all about it.

And--if one really could detect anything at all in so carefully-veiled a countenance--I thought I detected an increased watchfulness in his eyes when Scarterfield began to ask him questions arising out of what Lorrimore had said.

"There is evidence," began the detective, "that this man Salter Quick, and his brother Noah Quick, were mixed up in some affair that had connection with a trading steamer, the _Elizabeth Robinson_, believed to have been lost in the Yellow Sea, between Hong-Kong and Chemulpo, in October 1907. On board that steamer was a certain Chinaman, who, two years later, turned up in London. Now, Dr. Lorrimore tells me that when you and he were in London, some little time ago, you spent a good deal of time amongst your own people in the East End, and that you also visited some of them in Liverpool, Cardiff, and Swansea. So I want to ask you--did you ever hear, in any of these quarters, of a man named Chuh Fen? Here--in London--two years after the _Elizabeth Robinson_ affair--that's three years back from now."