“It was the butler who saw him go. Twelve o’clock at nightand raining hard. So next night I was up at the house and, sureenough, master was off again. Stephens and I went after him,but it was jumpy work, for it would have been a bad job if he hadseen us. He’s a terrible man with his fists if he gets started, and norespecter of persons. So we were shy of getting too near, but wemarked him down all light. It was the haunted crypt that he wasmaking for, and there was a man waiting for him there.”
“What is this haunted cryp?”
“Well, sir, there is an old ruined chapel in the park. It is so oldthat nobody could fix its date. And under it there’s a crypt whichhas a bad name among us. It’s a dark, damp, lonely place by day,but there are few in that county that would have the nerve to gonear it at night. But master’s not afraid. He never feared anythingin his life. But what is he doing there in the night-time?”
“Wait a bit!” said Holmes. “You say there is another man there.
It must be one of your own stablemen, or someone from thehouse! Surely you have only to spot who it is and question him?”
“It’s no one I know.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because I have seen him, Mr. Holmes. It was on that secondnight. Sir Robert turned and passed us—me and Stephens, quakingin the bushes like two bunny-rabbits, for there was a bit of moonthat night. But we could hear the other moving about behind. Wewere not afraid of him. So we up when Sir Robert was gone andpretended we were just having a walk like in the moonlight, and sowe came right on him as casual and innocent as you please. ‘Hullo,mate! who may you be?’ says I. I guess he had not heard us coming,so he looked over his shoulder with a face as if he had seen thedevil coming out of hell. He let out a yell, and away he went ashard as he could lick it in the darkness. He could run! —I’ll givehim that. In a minute he was out of sight and hearing, and who hewas, or what he was, we never found.”
“But you saw him clearly in the moonlight?”
“Yes, I would swear to his yellow face—a mean dog, I should say.
What could he have in common with Sir Robert?”
Holmes sat for some time lost in thought.
“Who keeps Lady Beatrice Falder company?” he asked at last.
“There is her maid, Carrie Evans. She has been with her this fiveyears.”
“And is, no doubt, devoted?”
Mr. Mason shuffled uncomfortably.
“She’s devoted enough,” he answered at last. “But I won’t say towhom.”
“Ah!” said Holmes.
The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes 1391
“I can’t tell tales out of school.”
“I quite understand, Mr. Mason. Of course, the situation is clearenough. From Dr. Watson’s deion of Sir Robert I can realizethat no woman is safe from him. Don’t you think the quarrelbetween brother and sister may lie there?”
“Well, the scandal has been pretty clear for a long time.”
“But she may not have seen it before. Let us suppose that shehas suddenly found it out. She wants to get rid of the woman. Herbrother will not permit it. The invalid, with her weak heart andinability to get about, has no means of enforcing her will. Thehated maid is still tied to her. The lady refuses to speak, sulks,takes to drink. Sir Robert in his anger takes her pet spaniel awayfrom her. Does not all this hang together?”
“Well, it might do—so far as it goes.”
“Exactly! As far as it goes. How would all that bear upon thevisits by night to the old crypt? We can’t fit that into our plot.”
“No, sir, and there is something more that I can’t fit in. Whyshould Sir Robert want to dig up a dead body?”
Holmes sat up abruptly.
“We only found it out yesterday—after I had written to you.
Yesterday Sir Robert had gone to London, so Stephens and I wentdown to the crypt. It was all in order, sir, except that in one cornerwas a bit of a human body.”
“You informed the police, I suppose?”
Our visitor smiled grimly.
“Well, sir, I think it would hardly interest them. It was just thehead and a few bones of a mummy. It may have been a thousandyears old. But it wasn’t there before. That I’ll swear, and so willStephens. It had been stowed away in a corner and covered overwith a board, but that corner had always been empty before.”
“What did you do with it?”
“Well, we just left it there.”
“That was wise. You say Sir Robert was away yesterday. Has hereturned?”
“We expect him back to-day.”
“When did Sir Robert give away his sister‘s dog?”
“It was just a week ago to-day. The creature was howling outsidethe old wellhouse, and Sir Robert was in one of his tantrums thatmorning. He caught it up, and I thought he would have killed it.
Then he gave it to Sandy Bain, the jockey, and told him to take thedog to old Barnes at the Green Dragon, for he never wished to seeit again.”
Holmes sat for some time in silent thought. He had lit theoldest and foulest of his pipes.
1392 The Complete Sherlock Holmes
“I am not clear yet what you want me to do in this matter, Mr.
Mason,” he said at last. “Can’t you make it more definite?”
“Perhaps this will make it more definite, Mr. Holmes,” said ourvisitor.
He took a paper from his pocket, and, unwrapping it carefully,he exposed a charred fragment of bone.
Holmes examined it with interest.
“Where did you get it?”
“There is a central heating furnace in the cellar under LadyBeatrice’s room. It’s been off for some time, but Sir Robertcomplained of cold and had it on again.
Harvey runs it—he’s one of my lads. This very morning he cameto me with this which he found raking out the cinders. He didn’tlike the look of it.”
“Nor do I,” said Holmes. “What do you make of it, Watson?”
It was burned to a black cinder, but there could be no questionas to its anatomical significance.
“It’s the upper condyle of a human femur,” said I.
“Exactly!” Holmes had become very serious. “When does thislad tend to the furnace?”
“He makes it up every evening and then leaves it.”
“Then anyone could visit it during the night?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Can you enter it from outside?”
“There is one door from outside. There is another which leadsup by a stair to the passage in which Lady Beatrice’s room issituated.”
“These are deep waters, Mr. Mason; deep and rather dirty. Yousay that Sir Robert was not at home last night?”
