The Adventures of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons Part 11

And before Olaf could prevent him Holmes had grabbed the horse's leg up between his own knees, whipped out his pocket-knife, and sc.r.a.ped away at the strange lump between the pastern and the hoof. He found it to be a lump of mud, which rolled out on the straw-littered floor of the stall, broke into pieces, and then disclosed to our wondering eyes one of the mysteriously stolen diamond cuff-b.u.t.tons!

"Great Caesar's ghost!" yelled Holmes at the top of his voice; "here's one of them, anyhow!"

And he grabbed up the glittering jewel from the floor, and confronted the astounded and frightened Yensen.

"So the horse was born with a diamond on his hoof, eh? That beats a baby's being born with a golden spoon in its mouth, as they say some of them are. But hold on a minute, O faithful confidant of the Australian crook. My name isn't really d.i.c.k Henderson. It's," and Holmes suddenly jerked off the false lump on his nose and resumed his natural tone of voice, "Hemlock Holmes, at your service! Now you, march!"

As he uttered these words, Holmes pulled out his revolver, covered the shrinking coachman, and motioned him toward the castle.

I now came out of my hiding-place in the next stall, and accompanied the strange procession into the castle: Yensen, holding his hands up, his face almost green with fright, in front; Holmes, with his drawn revolver pointed at him, immediately behind, and yours truly bringing up the rear, while the bulldog barked loudly at us from his kennel next to the stalls. As we marched along the garden-paths, Holmes demanded of his victim:

"Say, wasn't Thorneycroft out here at the stable to see you along with Billie Budd, Olaf?"

"Yes, he was, Mr. Holmes," answered the cowering Olaf.

"And they both made it up with you to hide the cuff-b.u.t.ton, eh? Now tell me how you came to put it in such an outlandish place! Talk quick, now!" said Holmes.

"Ay had it hidden up in the hay-loft first, und Ay yust vas taking it out to admire it vile Ay curried das horse, ven Ay heard you coming along, und Ay got scared, und put some mud over it und shoved it under das horse's pastern as das nearest place Ay could tink of! Please don't hurt me now, Mr. Holmes. Ay never sviped anyt'ing before!"

pleaded Olaf, as he cringed along toward the castle, every other moment looking around nervously behind him at Holmes's revolver.

"Except that you tried to steal Linescu's boots, according to his testimony," returned Holmes dryly just as we entered the rear door of the castle, and proceeded along the corridor toward the library. "But don't be afraid. We'll talk about the proper retribution for your crime after all the rest of the cuff-b.u.t.tons are found. Do you know anything about them?"

"Not a thing, Mr. Holmes,--not a t'ing. The only one Ay saw is das one you captured now," replied Olaf.

Holmes marched his captive into the library, where the Earl and Thorneycroft, who had been sitting down at the table going over some bills and other papers, jumped up in surprise at the sight of us; while Holmes informed them of his ident.i.ty beneath the race-track disguise. Thorneycroft turned pale when he saw his recent accomplice, Olaf Yensen, in the hands of the avenging detective, and he had to grab the edge of the table to steady himself.

"Your Lordship, here is the first one of the diamond cuff-b.u.t.tons recovered for you, with my compliments," said Holmes triumphantly, laying the gem on the table before the astonished Earl. "Your coachman is not really the thief,--only a receiver of stolen goods.

Thorneycroft," he added, as he turned to the latter, "the game is up!

I'm onto you! You stole the cuff-b.u.t.ton and gave it to Olaf to hide for you, and William X. Budd knows where the rest are, and you probably do, too. Now make a clean breast of it, and avoid further trouble."

My partner seated himself in one of the leather easy-chairs, lit a cigarette, crossed his legs comfortably, and listened while the confused and guilty secretary tried to find his voice. The Earl sat down hard in another chair and listened with all his ears.

CHAPTER XI

"Er, er,--oh, this is terrible! Billie Budd stole 'em, not me. He came into my room early Monday morning, while I was dressing, and showed me the pair of cuff-b.u.t.tons he said he had stolen during Sunday night, and gave me one to keep for him until he had a good chance to dispose of it. Then, right after I returned from calling on you to inform you of their loss, which was about half-past ten, he and I went out to the stables and he gave the other one to Olaf here to hide for him. Here's the one I have been keeping, Mr. Holmes," stammered Thorneycroft, as he took the second sparkling cuff-b.u.t.ton out of his vest-pocket and laid it on the table beside the one recovered from Olaf. "When the village constables came up here to search us, I simply slipped the thing into the upper edge of my shoe until they had gone, and I've been carrying it here in my vest-pocket ever since."

And Eustace paused as he drew out his handkerchief and mopped his perspiring face.

"Then you had it right with you when you burst into my office in Baker Street to tell me of the loss, and your nervous excitement at the time was a fake,--you big stiff?" Holmes asked, blowing out a cloud of cigarette-smoke.

"Yes. I acknowledge with shame that I did. But it was that scoundrel Budd that burglarized His Lordship's room and stole the jewels originally, and the coachman and myself are both simply receivers of stolen goods, not robbers. O Your Lordship, this is awful," Eustace added, turning to the Earl. "I am a graduate and an honor man of Oxford University, as you know, and I surely must have been intoxicated when I let Budd entice me into his d.a.m.nable scheme! The reason he took the jewels was because he had been losing heavily at cards in London recently, as he told me, and wanted to sell them to recoup his losses. I'll swear I didn't have a thing to do with the disappearance of the other nine cuff-b.u.t.tons, because if I did, I'd tell you. That's all."

The Earl looked at Holmes sitting there puffing out smoke in a very _degage_ att.i.tude, with the smile of triumph still on his eagle-like face, in spite of his absurd disguise, then he looked at the confused and embarra.s.sed Thorneycroft standing at one side of the table, anxiously rubbing his hands, then he looked at the red-faced Olaf standing near him, and finally he looked at me sitting in another chair, furnishing the calm and sober background for all this sensationalism,--as usual.

"Well, by Jove, I hardly know _what_ to say, and that's the truth, Holmes," he remarked at length; "but the fact that my recreant secretary has just now voluntarily coughed up the second cuff-b.u.t.ton without trying to hide it again in his shoe, as he might have done, inclines me to let him live this time. So I'll forgive you, Eustace, but don't you ever let it happen again, or I might forget myself so far as to have you blackballed from all of the London clubs you belong to," added the Earl, shaking his finger at Eustace.

"Thank you, Your Lordship, thank you!" cried the latter profusely, "I shall endeavor to deserve your consideration by doing my best to help you find the other cuff-b.u.t.tons still missing."

"Keep the change, Eustace," said the Earl dryly. "Now, Holmes, what'll we do with this little stiff over here?"

And he pointed to the still trembling coachman, who stood fumbling his cap in his hands.

"Why, he looks harmless enough," commented Holmes; "I knew he didn't have brains sufficient to plan the robbery, but was merely Billie Budd's tool. So I think you might as well forgive him, too, Your Lordship, and thus get all the states' evidence they can turn for us.

Thorneycroft," he added, turning to the secretary, "you accused Luigi Vermicelli, the Earl's valet, of having stolen the cuff-b.u.t.tons, and you there, Olaf, accused your stable-partner, Carol Linescu, of the theft. I shall give your statements due consideration, and lay for the accused parties accordingly. Now, Watson, we'll get busy and see if we can't recover some more of the cuff-b.u.t.tons before luncheon. It's only a little after nine now," looking at his watch, "and we have nearly three hours left. And, by the way, I believe I made a bet of five pounds with Billie Budd yesterday morning that I would find some of the cuff-b.u.t.tons that same day. He won the bet, since I didn't find the heirlooms until to-day, but inasmuch as the aforesaid Budd is a fugitive from justice, I'll just confiscate the stakes and call myself the winner! Doc, hand over those ten pounds you've been keeping there."

I did so at once, glad to be relieved of the responsibility, and old Hemlock Holmes was about twenty-five dollars ahead by Budd's disappearance, although still nine diamond cuff-b.u.t.tons behind!

"You may go back to the stables now, Olaf," said the Earl to the coachman; who beat it immediately, glad to get out of any further arraignment. "And you, Eustace, can get busy again with these darned bills we were auditing when Holmes came in with his news."

He took up the two glittering baubles, put them in his pocket, and drew up his chair again to the table, while Eustace resumed his former seat.

"Oh, say! I nearly forgot. We must celebrate a little on this!" the Earl suddenly cried, as he pounded his fist on the table.

"Harrigan," he called out, "bring up a bottle of my very best Burgundy, and set 'em up to Mr. Holmes and Doctor Watson, in honor of the glad return of my ancestor's historic cuff-b.u.t.tons!"

The jovial butler seemed always to be within earshot whenever the Earl wanted him, and in a moment entered the library and ventured:

"The best Burgundy you have is the 1874 Beaune, Your Lordship. Shall I bring that?"

"Sure! P. D. Q.! I'm feeling a little dry again, anyhow," said the Earl, as he winked at us, while the still somewhat embarra.s.sed Thorneycroft looked out of the window at the birds singing their spring songs among the trees.

Harrigan left the room, and in a few minutes returned from the cellar with a long dark bottle that seemed to hold the ruby-red sparkles of the sunset on the hills of eastern France imprisoned in its depths. He uncorked it, and deftly poured out three gla.s.ses of the ancient wine, one of which the Earl took up in his hand while Holmes and I each took one of the remaining two.

"Eustace, I'll have to cut you out of this, I'm sorry to say. Holmes, I drink to your swift and happy recovery of the other nine cuff-b.u.t.tons. Prosit!"

At the welcome word of cheer we each put ourselves outside of the finest fermented grape-juice that had ever tickled my throat.

"Thanks. Now we'll get down to business again," said Holmes, full of renewed "pep," as he set down his gla.s.s on the table and turned to me.

"Doc, let's go up to our room while I get this horrible suit of clothes off of me, and wash the red grease-paint off my face. Ta, ta, Your Lordship; see you later, with some more cuff-b.u.t.tons, I expect."

And we both left the library and went upstairs, where Holmes rapidly changed his clothes and washed off the make-up in the lavatory nearby.

When he stood before me again in civilized habiliments, he began:

"Doc, I'm going to jump onto this man Vermicelli, the valet. My deductions lead me to believe that he has another one of the jewels stowed away somewhere, and it's up to me to find it."

So we left our room and went down the stairway, hot on the trail of the slippery valet from Venice. As we rounded the foot of the stairway at the second floor, halfway down to the main scene of operations, Holmes's quick ear detected the sound of voices in a room nearby, though my slower ears couldn't hear a thing.

He put his finger to his lips, took me by the arm, and quietly stole along the corridor with me to the half-open door whence the subdued voices proceeded. Arriving there, we halted, while Holmes cautiously listened a moment, then put his head in at the door and coughed. He pushed the door open immediately and walked in, with me at his heels, determined not to miss any of it, whatever it was.

Seated in a rocking-chair by the window was the elderly figure of the Countess's bachelor uncle, J. Edmund Tooter, the retired tea and spice merchant from Hyderabad, India, holding his niece's Spanish maid, Teresa Olivano, on his lap. As we entered so unceremoniously the two of them ceased their billing and cooing, hastily relaxed the half-Nelson grip they had on each other, and faced us with considerable resentment showing in their faces, though Teresa didn't get off Tooter's lap, as I thought she would.

"Well, what do you mean by this impudent intrusion, Holmes?" demanded Tooter angrily. "I guess a man can hold his affianced wife in his lap if he feels like it, without having a cheeky detective walk in on him."

"Your what?" asked Holmes, with surprise.